We should be building through platforms, rather than creating dead end platforms in the middle of a city in the middle of the country

[Stossgebet]

Moderator note: Split from

Midlands Rail Hub 20m extra seats

Just published (dated Monday 12th) 2 chords, 10 other interventions, 300 per day extra trains to Birmingham The Midlands Rail Hub project would deliver 20 million extra seats a year for businesses, residents and commuters. The Midlands Rail Hub proposes building two ‘chords’ and over 10...

www.railforums.co.uk

I find it devastating, that as European countries expensively move away from dead end stations (Antwerp central, Stuttgart, Zurich etc), we are building and expanding dead end stations in the centre of our country!

 

[The Planner]

I find it devastating, that as european countries expensively move away from dead end stations (Antwerp central, Stuttgart, Zurich ect), we are building and expanding dead end stations in the centre of our country!

Where would you expect the trains to go onwards from Moor St? If the evidence shows that Birmingham is the primary destination/origin, why would you build something else?

 

[SCDR_WMR]

I find it devastating, that as european countries expensively move away from dead end stations (Antwerp central, Stuttgart, Zurich ect), we are building and expanding dead end stations in the centre of our country!

Eh? Moor St isn't a dead end station. Is has 2 bay platforms and 2 through platforms. Even a major hub station such as Crewe has both bay and through platforms.

The difference being Moor St is the destination for the vast majority of passengers on the current lines that operate. Very few travel from end to end. It's location on the west of the city centre is very useful for the bullring area and Digbeth which are 2 of the busiest areas of the city centre.

 

[The exile]

I find it devastating, that as european countries expensively move away from dead end stations (Antwerp central, Stuttgart, Zurich ect), we are building and expanding dead end stations in the centre of our country!

One of the differences in all of those three cases is that some /many trains were having to box the compass to reach the city’s sole terminus, so a massive time saving is to be achieved. This doesn’t apply in the case of the services intended for Moor Street, which is, in any case, already a through station.

 

[AndrewE]

Where would you expect the trains to go onwards from Moor St? If the evidence shows that Birmingham is the primary destination/origin, why would you build something else?

Actually Curzon St leapt into my mind. I think Antwerp is fabulous, and it's a shame we couldn't do something similar for St Pancras or even Manchester Picc. A New St deep level on HS2 would have been good, but I doubt you could get a beautiful light well down to the deep levels.

The present proposals for Moor St look OK to me, out-and-back into bay platforms works well enough fo rthe Merseyrail underground, although that works the other way round!

 

[172007]

Don't forget the full scope of the project involves Snow Hill. In fact Snow Hill needs changes first so Chiltern services can be accommodated whilst the current Moor Street Bay platforms have the throat layout completely changed.

Chiltern staff accommodation at Moor Street is likely to be temporarily moved to Snow Hill too allegedly. Get ready for rumours of Chiltern and Snow Hill lines staff Birmingham depots merging under GBR!

Snow Hill is to have platform 4 re-instated as a through platform. A new set of facing switches are to be installed the Jewellery Quarter end giving access from the Jewellery Quarter to all platforms.

 

[Stossgebet]

Moor St can't be regarded as a through station for this, on the basis that not a single service proposed for the expanded moor st is a through service towards stourbridge.

Claiming that birmingham is the main destination, and so casting in stone the permanent hobbling of through journies and services is so short sighted. Especially if your aim is to make train travel more attractive. I am very sure a lot of journies end in Zurich and Stuttgart. Yet they will benefit from through stations. A benefit we are dismissing and writing off. I thought this was about the whole of the midlands. Not just Birmingham.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 31 Aug 2025 ==

One of the differences in all of those three cases is that some /many trains were having to box the compass to reach the city’s sole terminus, so a massive time saving is to be achieved. This doesn’t apply in the case of the services intended for Moor Street, which is, in any case, already a through station.

But we are baking in, at great cost, eternally slow approaches into birmingham for the next 2 or 3 generations!

 

[The exile]

Moor St can't be regarded as a through station for this, on the basis that not a single service proposed for the expanded moor st is a through service towards stourbridge.

Claiming that birmingham is the main destination, and so casting in stone the permanent hobbling of through journies and services is so short sighted. Especially if your aim is to make train travel more attractive. I am very sure a lot of journies end in Zurich and Stuttgart. Yet they will benefit from through stations. A benefit we are dismissing and writing off. I thought this was about the whole of the midlands. Not just Birmingham.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 31 Aug 2025 ==


But we are baking in, at great cost, eternally slow approaches into birmingham for the next 2 or 3 generations!

Whether it be Stuttgart, Leipzig, Munich, Zuerich or Birmingham most people’s journeys will either be to the city itself or will still involve changing as the service from their local station goes through to somewhere that isn’t where they happen to want to go. Most replacements of termini by underground through services have been more to do with simplification of operations (and as I said earlier, avoiding trains having to pretend to be in orbit for several miles ( than with offering passengers through services.

 

[The Planner]

Moor St can't be regarded as a through station for this, on the basis that not a single service proposed for the expanded moor st is a through service towards stourbridge.

Claiming that birmingham is the main destination, and so casting in stone the permanent hobbling of through journies and services is so short sighted. Especially if your aim is to make train travel more attractive. I am very sure a lot of journies end in Zurich and Stuttgart. Yet they will benefit from through stations. A benefit we are dismissing and writing off. I thought this was about the whole of the midlands. Not just Birmingham.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 31 Aug 2025 ==


But we are baking in, at great cost, eternally slow approaches into birmingham for the next 2 or 3 generations!

What through journeys? Are you suggesting everything needs to go to Stourbridge, if so, why? Stourbridge has 4tph to Birmingham Snow Hill and Moor St, how many more does it need and how are you dealing with them with just the two platforms?

What sort of speed approaches are you expecting for the stations we have?

 

[Stossgebet]

Whether it be Stuttgart, Leipzig, Munich, Zuerich or Birmingham most people’s journeys will either be to the city itself or will still involve changing as the service from their local station goes through to somewhere that isn’t where they happen to want to go. Most replacements of termini by underground through services have been more to do with simplification of operations (and as I said earlier, avoiding trains having to pretend to be in orbit for several miles ( than with offering passengers through services.

So if through stations are to simplify operations, is it not the case that building dead end stations in the middle of the country, is adding needless future complications?

And no. I am quite obviously NOT suggesting through services to Stourbridge. That is why i said Moor St can't be regarded as a through station, when none of the proposed new services are planned to go through it. But in future, may end up reversing at Moor St to go from one side of the midlands to the other. Something like Bristol to Nottingham or the like.

 

[The Planner]

So if through stations are to simplify operations, is it not the case that building dead end stations in the middle of the country, is adding needless future complications?

And no. I am quite obviously NOT suggesting through services to Stourbridge. That is why i said Moor St can't be regarded as a through station, when none of the proposed new services are planned to go through it. But in future, may end up reversing at Moor St to go from one side of the midlands to the other. Something like Bristol to Nottingham or the like.

That makes no sense. Its a through station, exactly as New St is where plenty of services terminate.

 

[Stossgebet]

That makes no sense. Its a through station, exactly as New St is where plenty of services terminate.

If my thoughts make no sense to you. That is ok. It is ok for me. And it is ok for you.

As for your comment about new street being a through station. No one would ever advocate for some of its through platforms to be turned into bays, on the basis that some trains terminate there. And it wouldn't be ideal to build additional bay platforms there if we could.

My original point, is that i don't like the idea of the next generations of transport users having their journies compromised by creating dead end platforms in the middle of a city in the middle of the country.

 

[SynthD]

The alternative is that their journeys are compromised by New St congestion or delays. This project is about making space for recovery.

 

[trundlewagon]

If my thoughts make no sense to you. That is ok. It is ok for me. And it is ok for you.

As for your comment about new street being a through station. No one would ever advocate for some of its through platforms to be turned into bays, on the basis that some trains terminate there. And it wouldn't be ideal to build additional bay platforms there if we could.

My original point, is that i don't like the idea of the next generations of transport users having their journies compromised by creating dead end platforms in the middle of a city in the middle of the country.

What's the alternative? Wait another lifetime for an amount of money that will probably never be forthcoming in order to build a load of new tunnels?

 

[BerkshireRails]

What through journeys? Are you suggesting everything needs to go to Stourbridge, if so, why? Stourbridge has 4tph to Birmingham Snow Hill and Moor St, how many more does it need and how are you dealing with them with just the two platforms?

I much prefer pulling out Chiltern and Cross Country services from past Moor Street and enhance West Midlands Railway Local services into something like this.

I prefer local through running and long distance terminating if there is a lack of capacity for both to through run.

 

[The Planner]

I much prefer pulling out Chiltern and Cross Country services from past Moor Street and enhance West Midlands Railway Local services into something like this.
View attachment 187552
I prefer local through running and long distance terminating if there is a lack of capacity for both to through run.

That is absolute overkill in terms of service. Stourbridge doesn't require 10tph, nor could you do it. Same goes for the North Warwicks line, 4tph is overkill south of Whitlocks End.

 

[Topological]

I can see the sense for through trains, but in the case of Birmingham, New Street provides the through services.

First best would be to add more platforms to New Street and grade separate the approaches to allow services to sort themselves out. However, there is neither the land, nor value for money for such a scheme.

Taking the Cross City services down to a lower-level station would achieve much of the same, though is again very expensive.

The solution of bringing trains into Moor Street is a practical one. Terminating services can go to Moor Street leaving the option for more through services at New Street.

Manchester Piccadilly High Speed Rail is a different case. That would benefit from being a through station. However, we have to be realistic on what is achievable. I would actually have built the station in East Manchester and then put more money into an underground cross-Manchester commuter service in much the way the Chinese put their High Speed stations on the edges of cities.

 

[BerkshireRails]

That is absolute overkill in terms of service. Stourbridge doesn't require 10tph, nor could you do it. Same goes for the North Warwicks line, 4tph is overkill south of Whitlocks End.

It was just an example of what you could do. I know it wouldn't without restoration of quad tracking between Lapworth and Birmingham Moor Street.

 

[Stossgebet]

I can see the sense for through trains, but in the case of Birmingham, New Street provides the through services.

First best would be to add more platforms to New Street and grade separate the approaches to allow services to sort themselves out. However, there is neither the land, nor value for money for such a scheme.

Taking the Cross City services down to a lower-level station would achieve much of the same, though is again very expensive.

The solution of bringing trains into Moor Street is a practical one. Terminating services can go to Moor Street leaving the option for more through services at New Street.

Manchester Piccadilly High Speed Rail is a different case. That would benefit from being a through station. However, we have to be realistic on what is achievable. I would actually have built the station in East Manchester and then put more money into an underground cross-Manchester commuter service in much the way the Chinese put their High Speed stations on the edges of cities.

MIdland rail hub at Moor St doesn't create space at New St for extra through services there. The moor st prososal doesn't reduce the number of trains through new st (except to transfer the upcoming camp hill local to Kings norton, which hasn't started yet). Indeed, in taking up capacity between Bromsgrove and Kings norton, and between Bordesely and Water Orton, the rail hub plan fills up the infrastructure without improving any through services across the city AND across the region, with the exception of returning the cross city south to its pre covid frequency.

So, with a heavy dose of sarcasm, i conclude that to return the cross city south to its previously operated 6 trains per hour, we have to spend £1.75 Billion to enable the new camp hill line stations to actually be served. And as a bonus, get an extra train per hour to Hereford, Cardiff and Bristol. New trains not included

 

[eldomtom2]

Whether it be Stuttgart, Leipzig, Munich, Zuerich or Birmingham most people’s journeys will either be to the city itself or will still involve changing as the service from their local station goes through to somewhere that isn’t where they happen to want to go. Most replacements of termini by underground through services have been more to do with simplification of operations (and as I said earlier, avoiding trains having to pretend to be in orbit for several miles ( than with offering passengers through services.

I'm not sure this is accurate - it would be hard to argue that, for instance, Japan's metro lines, which almost universally link to existing rail lines on each end and run through services onto them, didn't have the offering of through services as part of the motive of building them. There are also concerns of capacity, though perhaps this applies more to cases where entire new lines are constructed (though through-running on its own can be beneficial in terms of capacity because it means more trains can serve the city centre station, since dwell times can be cut if they don't need to turn around) - the Elizabeth Line of course is a good example of a case where providing additional capacity was a core motivation.

 

[daodao]

Manchester Piccadilly High Speed Rail is a different case. That would benefit from being a through station. However, we have to be realistic on what is achievable. I would actually have built the station in East Manchester and then put more money into an underground cross-Manchester commuter service in much the way the Chinese put their High Speed stations on the edges of cities.

Manchester Piccadilly High Speed Rail would be an expensive white elephant. Platform capacity at Piccadilly could be improved by converting the local suburban line through Reddish North to Metrolink, and by removing long distance trains from outwith Lancashire (other than Liverpool to Sheffield and beyond) from the Castlefield corridor and running them to/via Victoria.

Intercity trains need to serve city centre stations, even if they also have a suburban pickup call.

 

[Topological]

MIdland rail hub at Moor St doesn't create space at New St for extra through services there. The moor st prososal doesn't reduce the number of trains through new st (except to transfer the upcoming camp hill local to Kings norton, which hasn't started yet). Indeed, in taking up capacity between Bromsgrove and Kings norton, and between Bordesely and Water Orton, the rail hub plan fills up the infrastructure without improving any through services across the city AND across the region, with the exception of returning the cross city south to its pre covid frequency.

So, with a heavy dose of sarcasm, i conclude that to return the cross city south to its previously operated 6 trains per hour, we have to spend £1.75 Billion to enable the new camp hill line stations to actually be served. And as a bonus, get an extra train per hour to Hereford, Cardiff and Bristol. New trains not included

My understanding is that it is difficult to get those extra trains into New Street. So IF all current New Street trains continue to go to New Street then nothing is gained as you say. Well, nothing apart from service doubling between Birmingham and many other important cities. I would say that was a good thing? Not first best (because that is expanding New Street), but still a lot better than it could be.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 1 Sep 2025 ==

Manchester Piccadilly High Speed Rail would be an expensive white elephant. Platform capacity at Piccadilly could be improved by converting the local suburban line through Reddish North to Metrolink, and by removing long distance trains from outwith Lancashire (other than Liverpool to Sheffield and beyond) from the Castlefield corridor and running them to/via Victoria.

Intercity trains need to serve city centre stations, even if they also have a suburban pickup call.

The HS2 question is really one where we will never agree. There are those who believe that HS is not needed and those who do. I am firmly in the latter camp.

It is funny that we all accept that London is a 15 minute underground journey after we arrive in our terminal, but then get confused when the same is suggested for other cities. Well, it amuses me when that last 15 minutes costs so much that it can make or break the development of a new line.

 

[A S Leib]

But we are baking in, at great cost, eternally slow approaches into birmingham for the next 2 or 3 generations!

That frequently seems to be the case at New Street with a through station.

 

[NCT]

Devastating? That's a bit dramatic isn't it?

Through platforms are a solution. What problem is that solution trying to solve? What train services are you proposing to run and to satisfy what kind of travel demand? Compared to what's being proposed, what marginal benefits does your proposal deliver and at what marginal cost (some qualitative statements would do in a forum setting)?

Through stations are useful when settlement patterns are symmetrical on all sides of a major node. Are settlement patterns symmetrical either side of Birmingham? Does everything coming in from the east naturally have somewhere west to usefully go to? Bear in mind New Street already provides through facility.

 

[BerkshireRails]

That frequently seems to be the case at New Street with a through station.

New street is painful with its 10mph limits.

 

[The Planner]

New street is painful with its 10mph limits.

That is not going to change. Its 10mph in the throat and platforms. Even if it was increased marginally its highly doubtful you would alter the timetable.

 

[BerkshireRails]

That is not going to change. Its 10mph in the throat and platforms. Even if it was increased marginally its highly doubtful you would alter the timetable.

The only real way I see in sorting it out is to build a new deep level pair of tracks, with a line speed of 60-90mph and that could save up to 15 minutes per service.

 

[The Planner]

The only real way I see in sorting it out is to build a new deep level pair of tracks, with a line speed of 60-90mph and that could save up to 15 minutes per service.

15 is doing some really heavy lifting there, I fail to see how you could get anywhere near that. New St to Wolves is 75mph max and you aren't slowing down on the Coventry side until Adderley Park/Grand Jn.

 

[The Mercian]

It seems to me that the infra needed is:

- both chords into Moor St
- deep level Cross City from Duddeston to Five Ways ( one or two stations under New St/Curzon/Moor)
- 4 track Wolvo-Cov (eye wateringly expensive)
- a chord over in Soho to get Walsall services into SnowHill (expensive but used to exist)

Do that and you can have a decent mix of local, regional and IC services split between the stations and also give good usage of either through or bay platforms, it’s not either/or.

Of course it would help if the West Midlands could make up its mind between being a county and a region. West Midlands trains at the moment is predominantly a TfWM service with strands out into the hinterland counties. Maybe one for another thread but imv it would be better focused on TfWM stuff and a new regional operation to serve hinterland counties. The current operation doesn’t help in setting infra priorities.

 

[Palmerston]

The Walsall chord would be good as currently two lines come in from the South, but both continue to Stourbridge as there are no other lines. I've no idea how feasible this would be though.