Ficticious UK circle line

[flitwickbeds]

Interested in a fantasy building a circle line which uses the Crossrail route Paddington to Liverpool Street then calls at as many large towns/cities as possible before looping back round to Paddington. The rules are that there must be no reversals, it must be circular in both directions (although can be any shape including figures of eights), and can duplicate track/stations if necessary. It must also all be on existing track, junctions and infrastructure.

My proposal - can you get any more large towns or cities in?

PADDINGTON > Liverpool Street > Chelmsford > Colchester > Ipswich > Bury St Edmunds > Ely > Peterborough > Nottingham > Sheffield > Doncaster > Leeds > York > Darlington > Newcastle > Edinburgh > Glasgow > Motherwell > Carlisle > Lancaster > Preston > Bolton > Salford > Manchester Picc > Crewe > Shrewsbury > Bridgend > Cardiff > Newport > Bristol > Exeter > Salisbury > Southampton > Basingstoke > Reading > PADDINGTON

 

[Cowley]

Interested in a fantasy building a circle line which uses the Crossrail route Paddington to Liverpool Street then calls at as many large towns/cities as possible before looping back round to Paddington. The rules are that there must be no reversals, it must be circular in both directions (although can be any shape including figures of eights), and can duplicate track/stations if necessary. It must also all be on existing track, junctions and infrastructure.

My proposal - can you get any more large towns or cities in?

PADDINGTON > Liverpool Street > Chelmsford > Colchester > Ipswich > Bury St Edmunds > Ely > Peterborough > Nottingham > Sheffield > Doncaster > Leeds > York > Darlington > Newcastle > Edinburgh > Glasgow > Motherwell > Carlisle > Lancaster > Preston > Bolton > Salford > Manchester Picc > Crewe > Shrewsbury > Bridgend > Cardiff > Newport > Bristol > Exeter > Salisbury > Southampton > Basingstoke > Reading > PADDINGTON

We had a couple of threads a while ago that might be useful for you:

Trivia: What's the longest possible journey a train could make between two UK stations without reversing?

Here's an interesting little question: Supposing you had complete open access and unlimited paths, what's the longest possible journey a diesel train could make in the UK without reversing or repeating track? There has to be a clear A and B - you can't go on in an infinite loop - and once your...

www.railforums.co.uk

Trivia: Longest possible journey entirely on 25kV without reversing?

Talk on another thread about getting from Manchester to King's Cross got me thinking about this. I think you'd be hard pushed to beat this one: Euston-Northampton-Birmingham-Stoke-Manchester-Preston-Motherwell-Coatbridge-Gartcosh-Cowlairs-Carmuirs-Edinburgh-King's Cross.

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Mine would be less ambitious but definitely include East West Rail from Oxford all the way to Cambridge.

 

[JohnMcL7]

I'm perhaps misunderstanding the rules here but could you not go further north in Scotland to go through Stirling, Perth, Dundee, Aberdeen, Inverness and back down to Perth?

 

[zwk500]

I'm perhaps misunderstanding the rules here but could you not go further north in Scotland to go through Stirling, Perth, Dundee, Aberdeen, Inverness and back down to Perth?

You would need to reverse in Inverness

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 29 Aug 2023 ==

Interested in a fantasy building a circle line which uses the Crossrail route Paddington to Liverpool Street then calls at as many large towns/cities as possible before looping back round to Paddington. The rules are that there must be no reversals, it must be circular in both directions (although can be any shape including figures of eights), and can duplicate track/stations if necessary. It must also all be on existing track, junctions and infrastructure.

My proposal - can you get any more large towns or cities in?

PADDINGTON > Liverpool Street > Chelmsford > Colchester > Ipswich > Bury St Edmunds > Ely > Peterborough > Nottingham > Sheffield > Doncaster > Leeds > York > Darlington > Newcastle > Edinburgh > Glasgow > Motherwell > Carlisle > Lancaster > Preston > Bolton > Salford > Manchester Picc > Crewe > Shrewsbury > Bridgend > Cardiff > Newport > Bristol > Exeter > Salisbury > Southampton > Basingstoke > Reading > PADDINGTON

You can swing by Lincoln between Peterborough and Nottingham, and via Derby between Nottingham and Sheffield.
You'd have to call at the low level platforms at one of the Glasgow stations (Looping via Anniesland, Maryhill and Cowlairs).
You can also visit Barrow-in-Furness between Carlisle and Lancaster if that counts as a 'large' town.
It's possible to call Wolves and Birmingham without sacrificing South Wales but you do force the Abbey Foregate Curve at Shrewsbury, not the station.

 

[JohnMcL7]

You would need to reverse in Inverness

Of course, I was mixing up the lines thinking of coming in from Rose street but that wouldn't work with Aberdeen onto the south,

 

[MattRat]

Couldn't you also use Thameslink to get through London? Which could also get you down to Brighton and the south coast.

 

[zwk500]

Couldn't you also use Thameslink to get through London? Which could also get you down to Brighton and the south coast.

You can't get Brighton itself because of the reversal, and using Thameslink forces you onto the MML or ECML so it'd be hard to work in. However you can do an awkward knot by running Southampton > Hove > Croydon > Herne Hill > Clapham Jun (windsor) > Kew Jns > Dudding Hill > Chiltern > Bicester > Oxford > Didcot > Reading > Paddington.