£48m boost for Penistone line service doubling and capacity increases

[james2trains]

Apologies if this has been covered elswhere - this has been announced today that the Penistone line will recieve £48m in upgrades to improve journey times and double the current service from hourly to half houry. As a frequent user of the line, I'd be interested see how the service increase would be feasible and where additional track would need to be and what other upgrades may happen.

For those not familiar with the line, it runs from Huddersfield to Sheffield, with the majority of single track from Huddersfield to Barnsley (with two passing loops at Shepley/Stocksmoor and Penistone) and then double track all the way from Barnsley to Sheffield as this section is shared with the semi fast trains to/from Leeds.

Sheffield-Huddersfield rail route gets £48m boost

The Penistone line will be improved in a bid to boost journey times, the government says.

www.bbc.co.uk

Track and stations would be improved on the Penistone line in a bid to boost journey times and service reliability on the route, officials confirmed.

It was hoped that in the future, the frequency of rail services on the Penistone route could be doubled to two trains per hour running between Huddersfield and Sheffield via Barnsley.

£48million funding boost to get Penistone rail line on the right track - Kirklees Together

The government have just announced that we’ve been successful in a bid to their Levelling Up Fund for £48million, to support major improvements to the Penistone rail line.

kirkleestogether.co.uk

It will include station improvements creating better access and waiting facilities, increasing the speed of travel along the line and upgrading the rail infrastructure – including doubling sections of track, which will allow for two trains to travel on the northern section of the line every hour, in both directions.

 

[JD2168]

This is good news to hear about the Penistone Line. There probably will have to be some track layout changes to enable more passing places than are currently available. Between Barnsley & Sheffield it will be interesting to see how the extra journey is put into the schedule as currently it is timed at 4 per hour, 2 limited stop & 2 all stops.

 

[midland1]

With talk of running a line through Sheffield Vic. part way up the Woodhead route for passengers, would it not be a good idea to run the line down from Penistone to link up.

 

[GoneSouth]

I used this line recently for the first time in many years. Nothing much has changed in that time, it’s still painfully slow but still some nice views along the way if you have the time.

More trains would probably need a footbridge at Penistone as I think it’s only got a track level crossing at the moment. Also if more track is to be reinstated, would any more stations require a second platform adding? I really don’t remember the layout.

Where would you put an extra train to turn around in Huddersfield or would they just turn around more quickly?

Eventually after about another 30 years of work, you’ll be able to send the much publicised and then much less publicised dropping of a Bradford to Nottingham Northern Connect service.

Actually, to be fair it would probably be quicker on a donkey than going this route (and yes I know the original plan was to go via Wakefield and not this route) but it would have been quite amusing to take half a day to travel between two largish Northern England cities.

Joking aside it’s great that money is going into the Penistone line, I’m sure there have been times in the past when it could quite easily have vanished altogether.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

As a formerly daily user of the line with family still in the area, I cautiously welcome this news. Though Ms. Cates MP may be a little optimistic if she's expecting significant reductions in journey times.

For an all-day 2tph service, with even spacings, another loop is essential. The current hourly service has trains scheduled to cross on the long-ish loop which runs from just north of Stocksmoor to Clayton West Junction just south of Shepley. The only scheduled use of the loop at Penistone is for the out-of-pattern evening extra which runs from Huddersfield to Sheffield, though in the event of a delay to one or both services scheduled to cross at Shepley, the Penistone loop is used instead.
Whilst it may be possible to run a second service as far as Barnsley with no infrastructure changes, that service would not be evenly spaced and would leave no room for recovery if something goes wrong. Honley or Lockwood will probably be the candidates for an additional loop, most likely Lockwood for timing purposes. Both still have their disused platform in place and ready to be refurbished. Berry Brow (between the two) would work, but as the sole platform partly occupies the trackbed of the removed track, redoubling there would be complicated and more expensive.

As a 2tph railway but still with mostly single track, it could bump the line slightly up the pecking order for electrification too. Added bonus, should be plenty of clearance in the tunnels which are single-track but in double-track bores.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 Nov 2023 ==

Where would you put an extra train to turn around in Huddersfield or would they just turn around more quickly?

I'd expect nothing would change much at Huddersfield- under the current timetable the turnaround is 15-20mins depending on time of day and any delays on the way in. There would still only be one platform needed for Sheffield services as only one unit would ever be north of the new loop. At present platform 2 (future P1) is unoccupied for 35-40 mins in each hour.

More trains would probably need a footbridge at Penistone as I think it’s only got a track level crossing at the moment. Also if more track is to be reinstated, would any more stations require a second platform adding? I really don’t remember the layout.

Yeah, I'd expect the doubling of frequency might need a footbridge putting in at PNS. As mentioned above, for an even interval half hourly service another loop would be needed at the Huddersfield end. If at a station this would probably be at Lockwood or maybe Honley, both of which have a second platform in place but out of use. Another option would be to put the loop between stations, which might work better for the timetable (I'd have to study it more closely) and would negate the need to rehabilitate an old (disused since around 1986-88) platform to modern standards.

 

[Snow1964]

It is one of the Levelling Up funding round 3 awards

£1 billion boost for levelling up: government backs 55 transformational local projects across the UK

55 local projects awarded share of nearly £1 billion from Round 3 of government’s flagship Levelling Up Fund, to spread opportunity, create jobs and revitalise local communities

www.gov.uk

Levelling Up Fund Round 3: explanatory and methodology note on the decision-making process

This sets out the decision-making process for selecting successful bids to Round 3 of the Levelling Up Fund.

www.gov.uk

There are other transport related projects in the list

 

[Killingworth]

Exactly what is £48m to achieve, where and by when? It seems rather vague.

 

[YorkshireBear]

Exactly what is £48m to achieve, where and by when? It seems rather vague.

I was just coming to say the same thing, it is very light on any detail and I doubt this money is for 10 years!

 

[Iskra]

I agree this sounds all very woolly.

Should we get to a point where a 30 minute frequency is possible, can anyone speculate how this would impact:

- the Hallam line service between Barnsley and Sheffield. Would this run as an additional service? Would this replace one of the existing services on the line?
- How an extra service would be accommodated on the busy Meadowhall-Sheffield line and at Sheffield station?

 

[Railwaysceptic]

I used this line recently for the first time in many years. Nothing much has changed in that time, it’s still painfully slow but still some nice views along the way if you have the time. . . . .

For the benefit of those who have never used this line, why is it painfully slow? Route alignment? State of the track?

 

[YorkshireBear]

For the benefit of those who have never used this line, why is it painfully slow? Route alignment? State of the track?

Its a very rural line, not in a straight line and generally because of this low line speeds, combined with regular station stops.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

Its a very rural line, not in a straight line and generally because of this low line speeds, combined with regular station stops.

There are sections of low speeds, but in general it isn't a "slow" route speed wise, especially since most of the old jointed track was replaced. Linespeeds in the 60-75mph area for the most part. The frequent stops and meandering route are a much bigger factor.
For this reason I'm rather sceptical of Penistone MP Miriam Cates's aspirations of improved journey times. Realistically the only way to speed up journey times is to skip some stops, then the question becomes which ones do you drop?
Lockwood? Quite close to Huddersfield town centre, decent competition from buses. Handy for bits of the university. Numbers may be boosted by short faring.
Berry Brow? Decent competition from buses, possibly the best candidate for reduced service though that isn't saying much.
Honley? Heavy use by schools traffic, probably not a great idea to skip.
Brockholes? No inbound school traffic, but is an unofficial railhead for Holmfirth.
Stocksmoor? Not a particularly large village, and possibly the most "rural" station on the line in terms of immediate surroundings. Start of one of the existing loops, so not much to be gained by skipping.
Shepley? Fairly sprawling collection of villages, a large source of the schools traffic to/from Honley.
Denby Dale? Another sizeable village with neighbouring villages using the station as a railhead, including visitors to/from Holmfirth via the X1 bus. Is the boundary station between WY and SY ticket zones, and treated as being in both.

No stand-out candidates for a reduced service there, at a stretch you could perhaps make a case for Brockholes or Berry Brow to stay hourly. Skipping two stops is not going to turn the line into a regional express to rival the Northern services via Wakefield. The dogleg into Barnsley is the biggest issue, and unless something ridiculous happens with Stocksbridge and Sheffield Victoria, that isn't going to change.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Nov 2023 ==

I agree this sounds all very woolly.

Should we get to a point where a 30 minute frequency is possible, can anyone speculate how this would impact:

- the Hallam line service between Barnsley and Sheffield. Would this run as an additional service? Would this replace one of the existing services on the line?
- How an extra service would be accommodated on the busy Meadowhall-Sheffield line and at Sheffield station?

The situation at the Sheffield end is a much tougher nut to crack. Seeing as we've been shunted into the speculative yard, perhaps the second Huddersfield service could split/join from the Hallam stopper at Barnsley.

 

[YorkshireBear]

There are sections of low speeds, but in general it isn't a "slow" route speed wise, especially since most of the old jointed track was replaced. Linespeeds in the 60-75mph area for the most part. The frequent stops and meandering route are a much bigger factor.
For this reason I'm rather sceptical of Penistone MP Miriam Cates's aspirations of improved journey times. Realistically the only way to speed up journey times is to skip some stops, then the question becomes which ones do you drop?
Lockwood? Quite close to Huddersfield town centre, decent competition from buses. Handy for bits of the university. Numbers may be boosted by short faring.
Berry Brow? Decent competition from buses, possibly the best candidate for reduced service though that isn't saying much.
Honley? Heavy use by schools traffic, probably not a great idea to skip.
Brockholes? No inbound school traffic, but is an unofficial railhead for Holmfirth.
Stocksmoor? Not a particularly large village, and possibly the most "rural" station on the line in terms of immediate surroundings. Start of one of the existing loops, so not much to be gained by skipping.
Shepley? Fairly sprawling collection of villages, a large source of the schools traffic to/from Honley.
Denby Dale? Another sizeable village with neighbouring villages using the station as a railhead, including visitors to/from Holmfirth via the X1 bus. Is the boundary station between WY and SY ticket zones, and treated as being in both.

No stand-out candidates for a reduced service there, at a stretch you could perhaps make a case for Brockholes or Berry Brow to stay hourly. Skipping two stops is not going to turn the line into a regional express to rival the Northern services via Wakefield. The dogleg into Barnsley is the biggest issue, and unless something ridiculous happens with Stocksbridge and Sheffield Victoria, that isn't going to change.

Fair point. Having just checked my own facts I agree.
I don't think you could having used the line, lots of inter village travel as well as to main urban centres, and as you say, who gets cut?

If momentarily I went full speculative, I would think that filling Penistone Deepcar would be one of the only ways to seriously improve the Penistone Huddersfield section, with faster trains to Sheffield an option. I would keep the other route too for links to Barnsley/Meadowhall and the Barnsley/Sheffield stopper. Maybe its closer than it ever has been with announcements for Sheffield Victoria to reopen with the cancelled HS2 money. Although I will believe that when I see it!

 

[Djgr]

I was just coming to say the same thing, it is very light on any detail and I doubt this money is for 10 years!

As soon as I saw the words "the government" I filed this under pure speculation. Wasn't Boris going to reverse all the Beeching cuts?

 

[eastwestdivide]

At the moment, spare paths into Sheffield most hours with the missing second train an hour on the Doncaster route, fewer XCs running than pre-pandemic, and the two trains/hour on the Worksop axis never really materialised either.

 

[YorksLad12]

At the moment, spare paths into Sheffield most hours with the missing second train an hour on the Doncaster route, fewer XCs running than pre-pandemic, and the two trains/hour on the Worksop axis never really materialised either.

Does that account for the apparent Leeds-Westgate-Sheffield fast that isn't funded? I wish they'd get on with that, it's already six years late!

I'd guess that the additional services would run Huddersfield-Barnsley, with "an aspiration" to run through to Sheffield. Fast via the former route to the former Victoria station isn't funded, and somewhat misses the point of having more services to/from Barnsley (they co-developed the plan). Not to mention being dumped out in the sticks at Sheffield

 

[Iskra]

There are sections of low speeds, but in general it isn't a "slow" route speed wise, especially since most of the old jointed track was replaced. Linespeeds in the 60-75mph area for the most part. The frequent stops and meandering route are a much bigger factor.
For this reason I'm rather sceptical of Penistone MP Miriam Cates's aspirations of improved journey times. Realistically the only way to speed up journey times is to skip some stops, then the question becomes which ones do you drop?
Lockwood? Quite close to Huddersfield town centre, decent competition from buses. Handy for bits of the university. Numbers may be boosted by short faring.
Berry Brow? Decent competition from buses, possibly the best candidate for reduced service though that isn't saying much.
Honley? Heavy use by schools traffic, probably not a great idea to skip.
Brockholes? No inbound school traffic, but is an unofficial railhead for Holmfirth.
Stocksmoor? Not a particularly large village, and possibly the most "rural" station on the line in terms of immediate surroundings. Start of one of the existing loops, so not much to be gained by skipping.
Shepley? Fairly sprawling collection of villages, a large source of the schools traffic to/from Honley.
Denby Dale? Another sizeable village with neighbouring villages using the station as a railhead, including visitors to/from Holmfirth via the X1 bus. Is the boundary station between WY and SY ticket zones, and treated as being in both.

No stand-out candidates for a reduced service there, at a stretch you could perhaps make a case for Brockholes or Berry Brow to stay hourly. Skipping two stops is not going to turn the line into a regional express to rival the Northern services via Wakefield. The dogleg into Barnsley is the biggest issue, and unless something ridiculous happens with Stocksbridge and Sheffield Victoria, that isn't going to change.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Nov 2023 ==


The situation at the Sheffield end is a much tougher nut to crack. Seeing as we've been shunted into the speculative yard, perhaps the second Huddersfield service could split/join from the Hallam stopper at Barnsley.

That's an interesting idea, but that service is already very complicated as it is, with its intricate sharing of platforms at Leeds and its diversion/reversal at Castleford- any issue between Nottingham, Leeds, Castleford and even on the Knottingley via both Wakefields route as that also shares P17, could cause delays. And that's before you add the extra risk of planning it to meet a service coming off a line with single track, passing places and a brief part of the Transpennine core!

As soon as I saw the words "the government" I filed this under pure speculation. Wasn't Boris going to reverse all the Beeching cuts?

I do agree with this, it's a desperate ploy from a Tory MP who may well be out of a job soon. It's easy to promise stuff that you won't be accountable for future delivery. It's also a convenient stick to beat Labour with if they cancel it later on.

At the moment, spare paths into Sheffield most hours with the missing second train an hour on the Doncaster route, fewer XCs running than pre-pandemic, and the two trains/hour on the Worksop axis never really materialised either.

Presumably those paths still belong to XC though, so they aren't realistically going to be relinquished.

 

[Killingworth]

Paths to the north out of Sheffield are being suggested for extra hourly services to Leeds, Hull and Chesterfield via Barrow Hill plus restoring XC via Doncaster.

It will be interesting to see how a quart is squeezed into that pint pot.

 

[fishwomp]

There are sections of low speeds, but in general it isn't a "slow" route speed wise, especially since most of the old jointed track was replaced. Linespeeds in the 60-75mph area for the most part. The frequent stops and meandering route are a much bigger factor.

Sectional appendix says 50mph max (which I am fairly sure is the case, but happy to be corrected) - anywhere between Barnsley and Huddersfield. Handful of lower restrictions (nr Dodworth, Penistone, Lockwood).

For this reason I'm rather sceptical of Penistone MP Miriam Cates's aspirations of improved journey times. Realistically the only way to speed up journey times is to skip some stops, then the question becomes which ones do you drop?
[..]

In terms of speed - very little scope. Maybe 30 seconds for fixing the bridge south of Dodworth 25mph, maybe 1 minute for removing 35mph at Penistone viaduct and 15mph within the station (Huddersfield end) - unless skipping stops.

However, there are a few spare minutes built into journey times due to it being single track - half the time the Sheffield's are waiting at Clayton West Jct, so there's a couple of minutes padding not required if the passing were able to move back into a longer dynamic loop. The stops to drop - Wombwell and Elsecar - as used to be the case.

The PR says there'll be some doubling of track - not where though. To do 2 per hour, both the Penistone - Barnsley and Stocksmoor - Huddersfield need to shrink, as they are both > 15 mins (just). Penistone to Clayton West Jct is about 11 mins. You'd also get the extra reliability if only 1 per hour from any work.

1. Penistone-Barnsley could get a good 1 minute shorter by doubling Penistone to the old Barnsley Jct (where it swings to Barnsley) - is 0.9 of a mile from the station and the formation is good for it, or as far as Silkstone Common (6 mins)
2. Barnsley Summer Lane to almost Dodworth - the whole formation, bar the platform at Dodworth looks good for it - albeit single since 1984-ish, the bridges are all dual track sized. That gets up to 6 minutes less single track.
3. Stocksmoor to Honley - reopen the old platforms, about 8 minutes extra double track.
4. Go whole hog - demolish Berry Brow and rebuild as two platforms, and then double track to Longroyd Bridge viaduct, or Springwood cutting.

So, (1 or 2) and (3 or 4) would be the options.

 

[johntea]

I was going to say they could do with getting Hallam back to some sort of reliable running first before worrying about extra services on the Penistone!

It doesn’t help on top of the daily cancellations (on the Hallam) they then have unit shortages on top so you get packed out 2 unit services as a result

One thing I was wondering the other day is when a Hallam service gets heavily delayed Northern have a habit of axing the Castleford stop and running it fast from Normanton to Woodlesford / Leeds to make up some time on the delay, with the new platform at Castleford opening next month do they have an option to route services through that so they don't have to faff about with the reverse?

 

[moonarrow458]

Its a little bit ironic this is being proposed just as the evening peak extra from Huddersfield is being axed from the December timetable change

 

[61653 HTAFC]

Its a little bit ironic this is being proposed just as the evening peak extra from Huddersfield is being axed from the December timetable change

Hadn't realised that was happening! Have Northern given a reason?

Has getting the extra unit over from Holbeck become unreliable? That's something that will only get more troublesome as the big TransPennine route upgrade plods along.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 21 Nov 2023 ==

Sectional appendix says 50mph max (which I am fairly sure is the case, but happy to be corrected) - anywhere between Barnsley and Huddersfield. Handful of lower restrictions (nr Dodworth, Penistone, Lockwood).

In terms of speed - very little scope. Maybe 30 seconds for fixing the bridge south of Dodworth 25mph, maybe 1 minute for removing 35mph at Penistone viaduct and 15mph within the station (Huddersfield end) - unless skipping stops.

However, there are a few spare minutes built into journey times due to it being single track - half the time the Sheffield's are waiting at Clayton West Jct, so there's a couple of minutes padding not required if the passing were able to move back into a longer dynamic loop. The stops to drop - Wombwell and Elsecar - as used to be the case.

The PR says there'll be some doubling of track - not where though. To do 2 per hour, both the Penistone - Barnsley and Stocksmoor - Huddersfield need to shrink, as they are both > 15 mins (just). Penistone to Clayton West Jct is about 11 mins. You'd also get the extra reliability if only 1 per hour from any work.

1. Penistone-Barnsley could get a good 1 minute shorter by doubling Penistone to the old Barnsley Jct (where it swings to Barnsley) - is 0.9 of a mile from the station and the formation is good for it, or as far as Silkstone Common (6 mins)
2. Barnsley Summer Lane to almost Dodworth - the whole formation, bar the platform at Dodworth looks good for it - albeit single since 1984-ish, the bridges are all dual track sized. That gets up to 6 minutes less single track.
3. Stocksmoor to Honley - reopen the old platforms, about 8 minutes extra double track.
4. Go whole hog - demolish Berry Brow and rebuild as two platforms, and then double track to Longroyd Bridge viaduct, or Springwood cutting.

So, (1 or 2) and (3 or 4) would be the options.

Thanks for the correction on the speeds- it always felt faster on a 144!

Units with better acceleration than the 150s could possibly help minimise the amount of double track needed, though you wouldn't want to cut things too fine.

 

[Sapphire Blue]

Why not an extra semi-fast, calling Huddersfield-Penistone-Barnsley-Meadohall-Sheffield only.
This wouldn't reduce or increase service to the shacks, but one train per hour at Lockwood, Berry Brow et al, is enough. I'd go as far as to say more than enough.
A sub hour, end to end, journey should be targeted.

 

[Iskra]

Why not an extra semi-fast, calling Huddersfield-Penistone-Barnsley-Meadohall-Sheffield only.
This wouldn't reduce or increase service to the shacks, but one train per hour at Lockwood, Berry Brow et al, is enough. I'd go as far as to say more than enough.
A sub hour, end to end, journey should be targeted.

If you’re doing that why not just run a fast service: Sheffield-Meadowhall-Barnsley-Wakefield Kirkgate (R) -Mirfield(?)-Huddersfield.

It saves £48m, gives a faster journey as the Penistone Line is never going to be a fast route and also restores Huddersfield-Wakefield. I’m not convinced knocking something like 8 minutes off the current train service for Penistone is going to be all that revolutionary, and it’s more about politics than passengers.

 

[Killingworth]

Not so long ago TOCs were promising lots more trains to Manchester, particularly to the Airport. When some of them were introduced it quickly became clear that there wasn't enough capacity for them all, paticularly on a critical 2 track corridor. Chaos and a complete remapping ensued resulting in services being lost to make some sense of it all.

There is a similar 2 track choke point to the north of Sheffield. Adding a second hourly service via Penistone needs to be balanced with aspirations to add extra services to other destinations. As it is XC and TPE long distance services can get held up between Meadowhall and Sheffield by slower Nothern and freight trains.

Aspirations for this route may be thwarted by the pressure around Nunnery. A very substantial investment to add capacity along the Hope Valley for one nore train an hour is not going to see that happen due to lack of capacity in both Sheffield and Manchester. Advocates of extra Huddersfield services need to confirm how they shoe horn them through against competition from other proposed extra services to Leeds, Doncaster and beyond.

 

[Manclad83]

How about Huddersfield-Barnsley for the second hourly service on the line. Time it for semi-fast connections at Barnsley.

 

[nr758123]

The line passes through three Tory marginals, though I'm sure that will not have been a consideration behind this announcement

 

[eastwestdivide]

It’s possible we’re focusing too much on the extra services: re-reading some of the news stories, is the emphasis perhaps more on station and reliability/speed improvements, with the possibility of extra trains?.
Really need more detail on what the actual plans are.

 

[Killingworth]

It’s possible we’re focusing too much on the extra services: re-reading some of the news stories, is the emphasis perhaps more on station and reliability/speed improvements, with the possibility of extra trains?.
Really need more detail on what the actual plans are.

It very much begs the question, what exactly will £48m be buying?

These glib announcements are one thing, actually getting the job done is quite another.

 

[cle]

So what is the problem to solve?

Frequency needed for local journeys (one of those rural lines used like a bus?) ?
Inbound commuting to Huddersfield (for Manc and Leeds also) ?
More service into Barnsley and Sheffield?
Leisure flows to Meadowhall?
Huddersfield to Barnsley/Sheffield 'intercity' demand?

As maybe some periods of 2tph during the peaks, or on Saturdays might be a smart way to start?

Is a second stopper desirable?
Or move to a skip stop pattern to speed things up for smaller stations a little, and give the busier stations 2tph?
Or have an express service?