Search results

There is nothing good about 4-5 carriage intercity trains. It's a ridiculous idea which has caused problems wherever it's been implemented. I don't know where the obsession has come from but it needs to stop immediately. The Voyagers were a fiasco from the start. Even now, when they have...

I know this has been discussed previously, but do we have any more detailed idea what is going to happen to the Class 185s post-TRU? Assuming Transpennine will completely replace them on the north Transpennine route and retain 16-20 units to run the south Transpennine route, that will free up at...

Interesting detail from Northern's FAQ page on their new rolling stock programme: This suggests that some of the Airedale services will be integrated with the local Transpennine services. Either that or trains will run out of service from Shipley depot to Leeds, which sounds wasteful.

Cost per km is a terrible metric to use on HS2 as it doesn't consider the capacity provided. Cost per seat.km (with the net increase used for upgrades) would appear to me to be a much better measure of a project's worth. Comparing HS2 with the transpennine route upgrade this way gives us the...

It's fair to say it's been a while since I used it, but looking at the current timetable Alnmouth seems to have amassed a huge number of services. Where has that come from? Yes, Alnwick is nearby but it's not THAT big.

The latest in unsolicited advice from everyone's favourite Railtrack CEO... https://www.railnews.co.uk/news/2026/02/27-former-railtrack-chief-predicts-eventual.html Unfortunately he fundamentally misunderstands railway economics. There is likely no profitable core to UK railways (or if there...

So the new Leeds-Sheffield fast(ish) service arrives at Sheffield just before a St Pancras train leaves, and leaves just after a St Pancras train arrives. It seems like a no-brainer to combine the two together, and have a direct service from Leeds to St Pancras. Not that the end-to-end journey...

In recent decades there have been a significant number of stations which have seen their capacity expanded. However, unlike new stations, there doesn't appear to be any publicly available list, comprehensive or otherwise, of existing stations which have been expanded. So I thought I would make a...

Following on from the thread in the EU high speed rail report, I am creating this thread as a space for speculative discussion. My view is that, somewhat ironically, the European network should be more like Britain's, with main lines bypassing conurbations so that long distance services have a...

The EU commission have launched "a plan to accelerate high speed rail across Europe": https://transport.ec.europa.eu/news-events/news/commission-launches-plan-accelerate-high-speed-rail-across-europe-2025-11-05_en However, looking at the details the plan is not very ambitious at all: Brussels...

Why doesn't the DLR just go the whole hog and extend itself to Tilbury?

For what it's worth, here is an extract from a TfN report from August 2024 proposing a "Leeds Area Task Force": mods note - split from this thread In other words, there are a whole heap of programmes and schemes to fulfil those programmes, and it could become a massively convoluted mess...

Useful update at a recent TfN meeting: https://democracy.transportforthenorth.com/documents/s10675/Transpennine Route Upgrade TFN Summer 25.pdf It includes this slide showing the proposed service:

Moderator note: Split from: https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/leeds-station-improvement.170747/page-46#post-7340344 It would be better for the new fast Leeds-Sheffield service to take over Nottingham duties. In fact, wasn't this the Northern Connect plan?

Milton Keynes will offer significant interchange opportunities when EWR opens later this year, with the potential to significantly improve journey times from the North to the Thames valley and relieve crowding elsewhere e.g. Birmingham New Street. Additional long distance through services may be...

I've tended to dismiss the potential of reopening Skipton-Colne, lumping it within other "hardy perennial" basket cases like Bradford crossrail, Woodhead, Okehampton-Tavistock and so on. My skepticism may have been increased by the overblown claims made about the reopening by its proponents -...

There are lots of campaigns focussed on reopening closed railway lines. But what short-ish lengths of new line (up to about 15 miles long, as per the Selby diversion) could be built to give major improvements to the rail network? A couple of suggestions to kick off: 1. Morpeth bypass - not a...

https://www.railnews.co.uk/news/2024/10/03-new-great-british-railways-chair.html I hadn't heard of her previously, but I think it's a good call for the GBR chair to have an operational background rather than infrastructure, and good that it's someone with experience of non-London urban...

3-car Class 331s are now running on the Leeds North-West routes. My understanding was that this was going to happen when the platform extensions currently underway were completed, allowing 2x3-car services to run. Unfortunately it seems the units are being run already, before the platform works...

Moderator note: Split from https://www.railforums.co.uk/threads/transpennine-route-upgrade-and-electrification-updates-cp6.88054/ The topography from Google maps seems to match the sketch. No way you're getting four tracks through there without widening the cutting. All doable of course, and...