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Looking at that timetable one begins to wonder about what exactly BR (and presumably the [real] LNER and NER) were exactly trying to do. I suspect that this sort of thing was rather more common than people would like to think, even then.
The Leeds Northern Railway became one of so many embarassing leftovers from the Railway Mania. Once the early railways had been consolodated it was of little use beyond providing local services in an area of low population density. Road haulage soon made freight traffic unprofitable leaving just the passenger traffic. Yes running via Ripon could potentially be a little quicker but if revenue matters who in their right mind would want to avoid York?!
I think you're missing the point. For example I had two work colleagues in Leeds who commuted from Ripon. They used their cars every day. The bus journey times (up to 2 hours in the peak) are simply uncompetitive. A few times a year, after a boozy session, they would use the train from Leeds to Harrogate then bus (or be picked up) to Ripon. The greatest number of likely users of a train from Ripon to Leeds (and Harrogate) aren't likely to be currently found on the 36 bus.
Looking at that timetable one begins to wonder about what exactly BR (and presumably the [real] LNER and NER) were exactly trying to do. I suspect that this sort of thing was rather more common than people would like to think, even then.
4 stoppers per day, convenient for daily travel to Ripon/Harrogate and Northallerton/Thirsk and the lunchtime one for other business, plus a couple of semi-fasts and the twice-daily Transpennine.
The stopping service pattern is certainly not untypical for the (L)NER and probably hadn't changed in 50 years. Ripon/Harrogate long-distance passengers probably didn't need to use them - the Settle and Carlisle wasn't dissimilar on the LMS.
Essentially they were catering for such limited flows as there were, in the face of bus competition for shorter journeys.
I think you're missing the point. For example I had two work colleagues in Leeds who commuted from Ripon. They used their cars every day. The bus journey times (up to 2 hours in the peak) are simply uncompetitive. A few times a year, after a boozy session, they would use the train from Leeds to Harrogate then bus (or be picked up) to Ripon. The greatest number of likely users of a train from Ripon to Leeds (and Harrogate) aren't likely to be currently found on the 36 bus.
Would an express coach service that did it in an hour be more attractive? That would be a good indicator of demand, and could be implemented in a matter of weeks. It would also have the significant advantage of not costing over half a billion quid.
Would an express coach service that did it in an hour be more attractive? That would be a good indicator of demand, and could be implemented in a matter of weeks. It would also have the significant advantage of not costing over half a billion quid.
The current scheduled stage carriage bus, Route 36 is scheduled for around 38 minutes Harrogate <-> Ripon. Ripon Bus Station, such as it is, is far more centrally placed that the prospective future railway station that appears to be on the far side of the bypass.
The 36 journey time between Ripon and Harrogate is only about 5 minutes slower than the car. Stops are not the problem. However, a 38-minute / peak 45(?)-minute journey time is quite long. Could a busway using most of the former railway alignment work? This could conceivably achieve a substantially shorter journey time, but would miss out all the residential areas between Central Ripon and Quarry Moor, Ripley and Killinghall. You would end up with very few people whose door-to-door journey time actually gets improved.
The current scheduled stage carriage bus, Route 36 is scheduled for around 38 minutes Harrogate <-> Ripon. Ripon Bus Station, such as it is, is far more centrally placed that the prospective future railway station that appears to be on the far side of the bypass.
Sorry, yes, I meant an hour Ripon to Leeds. Down the A1 / M1.
I’m assuming that the proposers wishing to see this new line being built are thinking a little more ambitiously than simply connecting Ripon with Harrogate, and that Ripon to Leeds is the journey that would see most potential.
Would an express coach service that did it in an hour be more attractive? That would be a good indicator of demand, and could be implemented in a matter of weeks. It would also have the significant advantage of not costing over half a billion quid.
...and one would ask why there hasn't been one tried. If one wants to commute to Leeds then live nearer!
However, one might ask what would the likely rail custom be if Ripon Station were still open. Comparing three similarly sized towns' entries and exits, Westbury has c540k, Northallerton c800k and Knaresborough c600k. However, these are on existing routes. Adding c30 (partly new) route miles to serve one small (>20k) town when adding 6 (existing) for Tavistock is marginal looks a non starter. Railways are meant primarily for capacity, only secondarily for socio-economic need.
Please read my latest post. There are no buildings on the Ripon-Harrogate trackbed. of consequence. Only garden sheds at Wormald Green where gardens have been extended onto the trackbed. Arup suggested a slight diversion to the west at South Stainley with a combined road/rail bypass for Wormald Green to eliminate the short, sharpe hill that always causes closure of the A61 in sub zero temperatures. This would save building another bridge over the A61 at South Stainley and double bend here being replaced by embankment. Access would be via the underbridge opposite the Red Lion pub now called the Inn. It would also solve the problem of the former level crossing at the end of Wormald Green station platforms as a new cutting through rising ground part way along the Markington road would be bridged together with the new bypass. Unfortunately a house has recently been built on this line and may have to be sacrificed.
For someone how claims to have been involved in its reopening for 40 years you are missing the row of dwellings at Littlethorpe on the track bed. In those 40 years the unavailability of any micky mouse story for a main headline in the local weekly rag has invariably been filled by one on the reopening of the railway. The solution that was given to resolve Littlethorpe and the Ripon bypass was to site a station at Ripon Racecourse showing what a complete non starter it is.
The sensible alternative is to improve the bus services for example that to Thirsk and Northallerton running as X70s via the A61 and a separate service running through the missed villages as far as Thirsk.
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Reasonable comparisons in settlement size, but not service provision. Knaresborough has 2 trains an hour to each of Leeds and York, which are both large destinations in their own right, and in that 20-45 minute typical commuting window. Northallerton similarly, two trains an hour to York (three in some hours), one to Newcastle, and one to, err, Teeside. But also 24 trains a day to London, in around 2hr20. In a fantasy world where this line was built, Ripon wouldn’t get a service anything like that in terms of destinations, and almost certainly not in frequency, unless it was a shuttle to Harrogate.
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And at Wormald Green. Not to mention a whole stack of resdiential property in NE Harrogate who would no doubt be delighted to find a railway over their back fence rather than the Greenway they have now. You could expect every single one of them to object, and seek compensation for loss of amenity.
But we do actually have a couple of new railways and stations to show for it - which is more than was achieved in England for the previous two decades.
2 may have opened since the restoring your railway Johnson PR stunt was introduced but weren't they already very well advanced projects before it came along?
2 may have opened since the restoring your railway Johnson PR stunt was introduced but weren't they already very well advanced projects before it came along?
And millions of us buy cars with performance levels you'd find hard to fully use on German autobahns let alone our congested motorways, city streets and country roads. And they're kitted out with all sorts of electronic gadgets to cocoon us from our neighbours. My old Beeching era Morris Minor wouldn't be up to modern expectations but I have to confess that I could manage with a smaller and lower specification vehicle than I have now (it is12 years old though). I've been happy to pay for that.
The Leeds Northern Railway became one of so many embarassing leftovers from the Railway Mania. Once the early railways had been consolodated it was of little use beyond providing local services in an area of low population density. Road haulage soon made freight traffic unprofitable leaving just the passenger traffic. Yes running via Ripon could potentially be a little quicker but if revenue matters who in their right mind would want to avoid York?!
Are any of you reading my posts? The Ripon line was making £13,000 annual profit in 1962 when Beeching looked at the line and should not have been closed. The Queen of Scots Pullman was routed through Ripon non stop to Harrogate and Leeds Central station where it reversed before continuing to KX. If it was routed via York it could not have called at Leeds as there was no connection between City station and the London line via Copley Hill at that time. Two other long distance passenger trains from Leeds to the northeast passed Ripon non stop. They were routed this way as York was at capacity so it was for operational convenience. These trains were of no use to Ripon rail users but operating costs were added to the line in the case for closing it yet it still made an overall profit. The same happened with two freight trains routed this way. Had they been routed via York then the Ripon line would have made even profit.
York is not the centre of the universe. Not everybody wants or needs to go there but have to whether they want to or not as there is no other way between York and Northallerton for London to the northeast and east Scotland trains. At least 8tph call there.
The current scheduled stage carriage bus, Route 36 is scheduled for around 38 minutes Harrogate <-> Ripon. Ripon Bus Station, such as it is, is far more centrally placed that the prospective future railway station that appears to be on the far side of the bypass.
Reasonable comparisons in settlement size, but not service provision. Knaresborough has 2 trains an hour to each of Leeds and York, which are both large destinations in their own right, and in that 20-45 minute typical commuting window. Northallerton similarly, two trains an hour to York (three in some hours), one to Newcastle, and one to, err, Teeside. But also 24 trains a day to London, in around 2hr20. In a fantasy world where this line was built, Ripon wouldn’t get a service anything like that in terms of destinations, and almost certainly not in frequency, unless it was a shuttle to Harrogate.
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And at Wormald Green. Not to mention a whole stack of resdiential property in NE Harrogate who would no doubt be delighted to find a railway over their back fence rather than the Greenway they have now. You could expect every single one of them to object, and seek compensation for loss of amenity.
You are both over egging the anti pudding by nit picking about everything you can think of.
For starters, the proposed station site is only 8 minutes walk from the market square. Then there is a City bus service which could easily divert to the station. 40% of Ripon residents live within 20 minutes walk of the station site.
You do not know how clogged the road network becomes around here. It sounds easy to route an express bus from Ripon to Leeds but at morning peak time the A1 motorway is at a standstill southbound between the A59 and A64 junctions as Knareborough/Harrogate-Leeds car commutes also use this route. This section of motorway is heavily congested all day. Then Leeds is at a standstill from the ring road into a gridlocked city centre. It is even worse via Harrogate as congested/gridlocked Harrogate has to be negotiated then there is the same problem from the Leeds ring road in. I know as I commuted from Ripon to Leeds St James hospital for 12 years.
65% of out of Ripon commuters travel the very inadequate, speed restricted A61 each day. There were 29 fatalitis on this road between 2003 and 2020.
Define whole stack of houses. How do you know they would be stressed by a railway close by. Have you surveyed them as we have?
There is no kink on the ground. The houses have not been built of the former trackbed. I agree they are very close. It is not the end of the world if they have to be demolished. The Mottram bypass recently demolished more than 12 houses. Just because it is a road.
The 'reversing Beeching' reopenings were no different in terms of policy outcome to the steady progress made over previous decades. And they were the lowest of low hanging fruit.
Not sure of the full history, but I'm pretty sure it was operated by Thames Trains/ FGWL before Chiltern took it over for the Oxford to Marylebone project.
The thing which is notable about all the English reopenings that have been mentioned is that they're returning an already existing freight (or heritage in the case of Okehampton) line to passenger use. Even Portishead would never be happening if the line wasn't still there to Pill.
Scotland have done more rebuilding though with the Borders and Leven (was that one actually formally closed or just unusable?). Whereas in England we're building HS2 and EWR.
Indeed - but Evergreen 3 transformed it by connecting it to the Chiltern line. This is a prime example of why the platonic ideal of 'reopening a closed railway' exists more in the imagination than reality. While the length of track reopened to passenger traffic by Evergreen 3 was minimal, it joined bits of network together to produce an important new connection. There are other cases which could be the subject of debate over definition - did the introduction of the service from Stratford up the Lea Valley lines constitute a reopening, for example?
We could also add East West Rail which was funded and its design well advanced before the Reversing Beeching scheme, although construction work didn't begin until 2020 thanks to numerous false starts. Camp Hill Line could be another depending on how we define a reopening.
There's an interesting debate to be had over what constitutes a reopening. Notwithstanding that, Reversing Beeching didn't achieve anything more that had been achieved in previous decades. The two schemes that did open would probably have opened anyway, and more would have been achieved with a better focussed reopening programme rather than the unorganised free-for-all we got.
Bicester to Oxford was closed in 1968.
It was reopened in 1987 under Network SouthEast.
Services were suspended for ~18 months in 2014/15 to allow the line to upgraded as part of Project Evergreen, which is a very different scenario to the line being formally closed.
The 'reversing Beeching' reopenings were no different in terms of policy outcome to the steady progress made over previous decades. And they were the lowest of low hanging fruit.
The line closed because it was deemed to be "unremunerative", whatever that means. Since there are no toll booths on the A61 to pay for its maintenance and policing that must also be unremunerative. Closure was enacted by Labour transport minister Barbara Castle who during her tenure ruthlessly wiped-out 2,050 miles of railways, many of which would today be seen as essential.
If we are putting together a case to open up to Ripon can we get the line back open between bishop and Durham again? most of the line hasn't been built on apart from the pesky road across the viaduct but we have a bigger population than Ripon and we are on track to get 1 million visitors there next year due to Kynren expanding, so by the previous arguments for opening a railway are we not in a better position for the investment than Ripon
The line closed because it was deemed to be "unremunerative", whatever that means. Since there are no toll booths on the A61 to pay for its maintenance and policing that must also be unremunerative
Well unless you want to suggest that people who drive on the A61 would instead buy fully taxed fuel and then set it on fire instead if the road was not available... I'm not sure this is a sensible comparison.
Would the money for reopening Ripon not be better spent on redoubling the single sections between Knaresborough and York, modernising the signalling and potentially wiring?
Are any of you reading my posts? The Ripon line was making £13,000 annual profit in 1962 when Beeching looked at the line and should not have been closed. The Queen of Scots Pullman was routed through Ripon non stop to Harrogate and Leeds Central station where it reversed before continuing to KX. If it was routed via York it could not have called at Leeds as there was no connection between City station and the London line via Copley Hill at that time. Two other long distance passenger trains from Leeds to the northeast passed Ripon non stop. They were routed this way as York was at capacity so it was for operational convenience. These trains were of no use to Ripon rail users but operating costs were added to the line in the case for closing it yet it still made an overall profit. The same happened with two freight trains routed this way. Had they been routed via York then the Ripon line would have made even profit.
Could you explain what additional operating costs would be incurred by 3 all-year-round services on top of the early 60s 8-9tpd. Were any signalboxes graded higher as a result? Was the maintenance regime any different?
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