Recent content by HSTEd

Well a lot of this is the result of local authorities and campaigners trying to 'Canute' the car. If bus and other public transport networks shifted to support the places people want to go, rather than the legacy town centre, we'd be in a much better spot. New developments should include...

I agree that some routes could have been saved by resort to early rationalisation. As an example, probably big chunks of the GCML could have been saved by two car Derby lightweights and paytrain. Even leaving aside whether the unions will wear such rationalisation before the trauma of Beeching...

The trains should operate to the timetable, if people don't arrive at the scheduled time that is their problem. But timetables should not be misleading as to the reality on the ground - especially as the railway loves to use journey times based on said timetable for marketing purposes. Journey...

I don't see why the extension of electrification all the way to beyond Sheffield would alter the chances of "survival" of the line? The line is extremely unlikely to close barring some catastrophic natural disaster or similar event. At this time, electrification through to the Leeds-Doncaster...

I'm not sure what the advantage of something like this is, especially at railway termini. The railway has total control of the public timetable, they can set the departure time to whatever they want. Is this just a method of cheating on journey times by setting the train departure time later...

The problem, as I see it, is that reopening to Ripon on the existing alignment needs 14km of route/track to serve ~14,000 people. It's likely to be very expensive, and any extension to Northallerton is certainly unworkable economically. If we weren't married to the old route, maybe you could...

In the Eurostar context, the market has already grown to the degree the infrastructure can support it at reasonable cost. There is no "rising tide" here - St Pancras can't be made to fit many more trains (if any). And growing the market does not necessarily mean their profits will increase...

Well it won't if the train in question is a Class 185.......

Back in the GNER and National Express era I recall quite regularly geting jolts of the suspension hitting the end of travel and endless creaking noises near Hatfield. I will say one of the smoothest experiences I ever had on the line was the Hull Trains Class 86 and Mark 3 set that was used to...

If delay repay was abolished, would that money be used to "invest for reliability", or would it just be used to reduce railway subsidies by the commensurate amount? Indeed I would argue it would probably lead to less spending on reliability because it would weaken the business case of...

As someone who has travelled fairly regularly on the ECML since the late 1990s, I can't say the ride is any worse than the Mark 4s the IEPs replaced.

My understanding was that the Class 810 units were not ordered until shortly before coronavirus. By then the Class 800 series units were probably the de-facto standard new intercity rolling stock platform because they represented the vast majority of orders for such stock in the previous decade...

Not that many cyclists, with not that much money in additional fares.

Well yes, but I don't think many of them run 100km round trips (Burton and back) under battery power, at least at the moment!

Is a heavy rail chord cheaper or more expensive than a ~2300m tramway from adjacent to Leicester station? Such a tramway also wouldn't consume valuable paths in and out of Leicester. Even if you don't want 750V electrification on the railway section diesel tram trains are quite common in Germany.