South Wales 'Metro' updates

[edwin_m]

Ah yeah that would make sense. Looks like they've changed the track so potentially they needed to update the existing bit temporarily to keep compliant.

Nice to see the rotten old wooden buffer stop replaced.

The way ORR has been about tactiles recently, I'm surprised they were able to do anything without adding them. I guess they are no longer main line railway so avoid various regulations, but it's an obvious measure that needs to be considered.

 

[Last Hurrah]

A challenge for TfW . . .

Will works have sufficiently progressed to enable trains to run to Treherbert by Saturday 3rd February ‘24, the date of Wales Six Nations fixture against Scotland

No pressure then . . .

 

[positron]

The way ORR has been about tactiles recently, I'm surprised they were able to do anything without adding them. I guess they are no longer main line railway so avoid various regulations, but it's an obvious measure that needs to be considered.

I guess it didn't have tactiles before so at least they've not removed any.

 

[Tomos y Tanc]

A challenge for TfW . . .

Will works have sufficiently progressed to enable trains to run to Treherbert by Saturday 3rd February ‘24, the date of Wales Six Nations fixture against Scotland

No pressure then . . .

It shouldn't be too hard to have the branch able to handle DMU services by then. They don't need to have finished everything.

 

[positron]

It shouldn't be too hard to have the branch able to handle DMU services by then. They don't need to have finished everything.

I guess it depends on if they finish the signalling. Everything else can wait but that's obviously needed.

 

[edwin_m]

I guess it didn't have tactiles before so at least they've not removed any.

Indeed, but I've been involved in other projects that were doing much less than this to a platform, and tactiles were insisted on.

 

[positron]

Indeed, but I've been involved in other projects that were doing much less than this to a platform, and tactiles were insisted on.

Maybe they're just hoping by the time the ORR find out it'll be finished.

 

[Peter Sarf]

Maybe they're just hoping by the time the ORR find out it'll be finished.

Wouldn't be the first time TfW have gone about procedure in the order that suited them !.

 

[Dai Corner]

Wouldn't be the first time TfW have gone about procedure in the order that suited them !.

and ended up having to go through the full planning procedure with the relevant Council and having to put on replacement buses for an indefinite period.

 

[5021]

I guess it depends on if they finish the signalling. Everything else can wait but that's obviously needed.

The signalling is due to be commissioned in just 3 weeks time, on 13th December, controlled from an additional workstation at Taffs Well - TAM B - according to CVL engineering notice so some sort of hope then!

and ended up having to go through the full planning procedure with the relevant Council and having to put on replacement buses for an indefinite period.

Would this be at somewhere with the initials Q Y by any chance?

 

[Dai Corner]

Would this be at somewhere with the initials Q Y by any chance?

Yup!

 

[positron]

and ended up having to go through the full planning procedure with the relevant Council and having to put on replacement buses for an indefinite period.

Tbf I consider that technicality to be a show of just how much of a disaster our planning system is. It's utterly ludicrous that a public entity doing works well within their legal allowance gets so utterly screwed just because of the order in which they did things.

 

[Markdvdman]

Well regarding Quakers Yard - in Journey check they say 28th November for restart, but in planned improvement works December 8th! Cannot even get it correct on their own site! I believe December 8th before November 28th mind you!

 

[Tomos y Tanc]

Tbf I consider that technicality to be a show of just how much of a disaster our planning system is. It's utterly ludicrous that a public entity doing works well within their legal allowance gets so utterly screwed just because of the order in which they did things.

Agreed - but TfW should have known how the system works.

 

[StKeverne1497]

Crickey. Dumballs Road - the Police Station for Cardiff is at the South End of it !. Now I remember shepherding the 8 years old GD past some dodgey people at the opposite end !. An area to avoid.

On the subject of walking to Cardiff Bay from Cardiff town centre. If it is so easy to walk then why bother with a train (tram) service ?. I really hope it gets extended deeper into the bay area soon as there are then more tempting destinations. My dream is across the barrage and up the (steep) hill into Penarth.

Of course, not all that long ago, what we know today as Dumballs Road was actually a railway.

See if you can spot it in this image from the National Museum of Wales archive.

And here's the lower end of Bute Street with what is now Cardiff Bay station quite recognisable (link)


There are loads more where that came from, though searching can be a bit haphazard and the index pages are a bit skewiff for me at the moment - they didn't used to be like that.

(Edit: because I accidentally attached the same image twice)

 

[Peter Sarf]

Of course, not all that long ago, what we know today as Dumballs Road was actually a railway.
View attachment 147185
See if you can spot it in this image from the National Museum of Wales archive.

And here's the lower end of Bute Street with what is now Cardiff Bay station quite recognisable (link)
View attachment 147186

There are loads more where that came from, though searching can be a bit haphazard and the index pages are a bit skewiff for me at the moment - they didn't used to be like that.

(Edit: because I accidentally attached the same image twice)

Wonderful, that builds on a lot of half knowledge and deas I have about the area.

So there was a railway ramp up through what is now the car park at Cardiff Central station to join the main line over the Taff. Just right for the future trams !. I recognise those angled gable ends on those factory/warehouses btw - still there.

And a canal to the left. I think I have found the route of that before, its still a kind of open space / strip.

My Grandaughters house is on the wasteland just beyond the bridge at the top of the picture, on the right bank of the Taff.

Second picture shows another canal (wider) alongside Bute Street station and its yards. That canal would now be the A470 "Lloyd George Avenue.

Mods - time for a new thread "Cardiff History and connection with the future tram/trains" ?.

 

[56xx]

Well regarding Quakers Yard - in Journey check they say 28th November for restart, but in planned improvement works December 8th! Cannot even get it correct on their own site! I believe December 8th before November 28th mind you!

December 13th is the next MTCBC Planning Committee meeting the November 15th meeting was cancelled.

 

[Tomos y Tanc]

Wonderful, that builds on a lot of half knowledge and deas I have about the area.

So there was a railway ramp up through what is now the car park at Cardiff Central station to join the main line over the Taff. Just right for the future trams !. I recognise those angled gable ends on those factory/warehouses btw - still there.

And a canal to the left. I think I have found the route of that before, its still a kind of open space / strip.

My Grandaughters house is on the wasteland just beyond the bridge at the top of the picture, on the right bank of the Taff.

Second picture shows another canal (wider) alongside Bute Street station and its yards. That canal would now be the A470 "Lloyd George Avenue.

Mods - time for a new thread "Cardiff History and connection with the future tram/trains" ?.

Mainly correct!

The ramp behind Central actually led to the small Cardiff Riverside station located next to what is now Platform 8 of Central.

The passenger services on the Riverside branch generally ran Cogan > Riverside > Clarence Road or via the Barry Railway from Pontypridd to join the SWML as Saint Fagans before accessing the branch at Central. The latter service was know, slightly sarcastically, as the "Saint Fagans Pulman" due to the generally decrepid rolling stock!

What you describe as a "wider canal" running alongside Bute Street is actually the Bute West Dock opened in 1839, the first modern dock in Cardiff. It was accessed via the Oval Basin, now the plaza in front of the Millenium Centre.

 

[StKeverne1497]

And a canal to the left. I think I have found the route of that before, its still a kind of open space / strip.

Second picture shows another canal (wider) alongside Bute Street station and its yards. That canal would now be the A470 "Lloyd George Avenue.

The warehouses alongside that canal were on East Canal Wharf - the street where Jacobs Antiques is (I assume it's still there?). I used to work in one of the warehouses, converted in the 1980s into a radio station and then flattened for the road improvements. No canal even in the 1980s but the name of the road stuck.

As for the second picture, I think that Lloyd George Avenue is somewhat closer to the railway than the canal. I think all that new housing is built over the canal. Notice there's a corner of the Oval Basin right at the bottom of the photograph. As I said, there are dozens and dozens more of these pictures.

 

[56xx]

Caerphilly CBC have recently submitted a planning application to completely demolish Caerphilly Railway and Bus Station and rebuild in a modern style with huge glass windows and canopies.

 

[Peter Sarf]

Mainly correct! What you describe as a "wider canal" is actually the Bute West Dock opened in 1839, the first modern dock in Cardiff. It was accessed via the Oval Basin, now the plaza in front of the Millenium Centre.

Ah yes. With the Senedd nearly on that oval basin it but the Wales Millenium Centre on it. Many happy hot days coaxing the grandaughter into walking there.

Does occur to me the extension beyond Bute Street could instead swing West then up Dumballs Road then over the Taff. With a stop just before the Taff.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 24 Nov 2023 ==

The warehouses alongside that canal were on East Canal Wharf - the street where Jacobs Antiques is (I assume it's still there?). I used to work in one of the warehouses, converted in the 1980s into a radio station and then flattened for the road improvements. No canal even in the 1980s but the name of the road stuck.

As for the second picture, I think that Lloyd George Avenue is somewhat closer to the railway than the canal. I think all that new housing is built over the canal. Notice there's a corner of the Oval Basin right at the bottom of the photograph. As I said, there are dozens and dozens more of these pictures.

I assumed that could be a gate leading from the Oval Basin to the non-tidal dock that I erroneously thought was a canal.

There is the even bigger Atlantic Wharf still existing out of shot to the right/East.

 

[Tomos y Tanc]

I think we're in danger of wandering off-topic here!

To get us back on track, does anyone know how widely the Metro branding is going to be used? I haven't been up the Ebbw Vale line recently so do the works there use the Metro brand or is it confined to the core valley lines?

 

[Bob Price]

I think we're in danger of wandering off-topic here!

To get us back on track, does anyone know how widely the Metro branding is going to be used? I haven't been up the Ebbw Vale line recently so do the works there use the Metro brand or is it confined to the core valley lines?

It's already being applied to stations in the Rhymney Valley. It will be across the whole of the Pontypridd valleys as well

And staying off topic, there were two lines down the canal. The GWR Clarence road branch and, alongside the canal, the Glamorganshire Canal Railway. Lloyd George avenue is built on the old Bute West Dock which was filled in.

Not that I make videos about this stuff or anything

 

[CardiffKid]

To get us back on track, does anyone know how widely the Metro branding is going to be used?

I believe it's just the Core Valleys, City/Coryton Line and Bay.

The 231s which will eventually end up on the Maesteg and Ebbw Vale line for explain don't have the word Metro on them, but the 756s (Rhymney, Penarth and Coryton) do.

If you look closely in Central you'll see mainline platform signs have a red edge and 6/7/8 have the red/orange of the Metro.

 

[bradleyd]

From this photo above the split from the treherbert and Merthyr lines at Pontypridd, am I right, from looking at it, that the green block to the right of the Merthyr line, on the tram road, is an electric substation, and then the white pipes leading up to the gantry are electric lines? If so, which of the two lines does it power, or is it both?

 

[59CosG95]

From this photo above the split from the treherbert and Merthyr lines at Pontypridd, am I right, from looking at it, that the green block to the right of the Merthyr line, on the tram road, is an electric substation, and then the white pipes leading up to the gantry are electric lines? If so, which of the two lines does it power, or is it both?

It's Pontypridd Track Sectioning Site (TSS), and it is indeed connected to both lines. The white 'pipes' are trough routes carrying cables.

 

[bradleyd]

What does track sectioning site mean

 

[59CosG95]

What does track sectioning site mean

That's basically the railway term for one of those substations. It isn't fed from a grid substation (that would be a Feeder Station), but it allows for remote isolations on large sections of line, controlled from the Electrical Control Room (in this case, Taff's Well).

 

[Tomos y Tanc]

I believe it's just the Core Valleys, City/Coryton Line and Bay.

The 231s which will eventually end up on the Maesteg and Ebbw Vale line for explain don't have the word Metro on them, but the 756s (Rhymney, Penarth and Coryton) do.

If you look closely in Central you'll see mainline platform signs have a red edge and 6/7/8 have the red/orange of the Metro.

I'll take your word for it!

Personally, I think it's a pity if the Metro brand isn't used as widely as possible - if only to show that it really is a South Wales Metro, not a Cardiff one. It also pressures TfW to include lines like the Vale, Llynfi and Ebbw in the list of lines where 4tph is at least an aspiration.

 

[bradleyd]

That's basically the railway term for one of those substations. It isn't fed from a grid substation (that would be a Feeder Station), but it allows for remote isolations on large sections of line, controlled from the Electrical Control Room (in this case, Taff's Well).

Thank you, that makes a lot of sense now