MK Tom
Established Member
Well I obviously missed that bit! I wonder why they went to the trouble of making this image then... http://www.alliancerail.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/gnwr-pendo.jpg
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Alliance Rail GNWR Services Approved
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asylumxl
Established Member
That's awful. Hope they didn't pay someone for that Photoshop abomination.
I'm reasonably concerned about their choice of turnback siding. Will they have enough time at Queen's Park to tip out an entire train (even if it's only 6 cars) and move it into a reversing siding and do the reverse (while fouling the up slow), before it gets in the way of some LM service on the slows?
swt_passenger
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Network Rail say it will work. I expect if you know better your detailed analysis has shown a different conclusion, so can we see it?
Loving the VT logo still on the passenger door window
Queens Park for long distance travel? Many suitcases travelling on the Bakerloo line at peak for connections to central London ? As Bob Crow once said, "It's a recipe for disaster"
They only have off-peak paths.
Bletchleyite
Veteran Member
Loving the VT logo still on the passenger door window
Queens Park for long distance travel? Many suitcases travelling on the Bakerloo line at peak for connections to central London ? As Bob Crow once said, "It's a recipe for disaster"
Or a useful experiment as to the termination of HS2 at Old Oak?
No, you just need a few more hologram ladies at the escalators. She'll have to speak in Lanky of course.
causton
Established Member
By the time they actually get to run any trains I'm sure something could be done! They could turn the ticket office at QPW into a nice waiting room for the GC passengers
tsr
Established Member
"Get up tha stairs tha lazy puddin'. Wha ya on' escalator eh?"
Although to be fair that could read as Yorkshire speak too...
Still lugging luggage around the Bakerloo isn't ideal, is Queens Park step free access?
Chris M
Member
It isn't at present, but I believe that work to make it so is planned and funded.
Agreed!
61653 HTAFC
Veteran Member
I can hear the announcement now: "Ladies and gentlemen, we will shortly be arriving at London Queen's Park where this service will terminate. Please collect all your luggage and personal belongings, and wait by the doors to alight as soon as the train arrives."
I believe they are planning to have 5 minutes or so dwell time. That's actually not too bad as long as the majority of passengers don't have masses of luggage. Also, their intention is to terminate a Euston as long as they can show that the capacity will exist during the rebuild.
causton
Established Member
Perhaps it should set down at Wembley Central for LM to Euston and SN to Clapham etc :P
Chris M
Member
It isn't at present, but I believe that work to make it so is planned and funded.
tsr
Established Member
There are plenty of Southern services which have to be cleared of up to 12 coaches' worth of passengers at locations with tight turnarounds, including sometimes a very high proportion of drunk people, and you can do that in less than 5 minutes if you're on the ball. The key is to have porter switches to close off carriages, and to have sufficient platform staff to help out. I can't see too many issues with using modern stock and having to do this on the WCML if the timetable allows it in the first place. Presuming these services have guards, and I should hope so, there will probably be enough time for them to assist passengers on the approach to the station if there are no stops for the previous 15 minutes or so, in order to inform them of the next stop, wake up any who are asleep, and get people to move luggage. It's easier said than done, certainly, but I have put all the above into practice in one way or another elsewhere, and it's been done.
4 minutes dwell time for terminating services, 2 minutes for northbound services.
61653 HTAFC
Veteran Member
I can only assume that you haven't visited Wembley Central in the last 30 years if that's a serious suggestion. That place is seriously grim, even if just remaining on platforms for a following service!
G_A_C_C_C
Member
Southern don't allow passengers to wait on the platform, everyone would have to go upstairs and wait in the corridor and then back down again when the required passenger train arrives. I don't think they like the narrow platforms and regular freight trains combination.
Class 170101
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It is of little surprise to me that Alliance have finally succeeded in accessing the WCML.
From my limited experience of using the WCML Virgin have, after their initial flourish and fanfare, got stuck in a rut. Three trains to both Birmingham and Manchester per hour may well be needed in the peaks but outside the peaks I don't believe this is needed.
Twice an hour to both destinations should be sufficient even if 11 car Pendolinos are needed to be used instead of the nine car fleet. This would have then left paths to serve new destinations such as Blackpool and Shrewsbury and a better service to existing destinations like Glasgow (or Edinburgh) and Liverpool. (Indeed it has been argued that all Pendolinos should be of 11 carriage formations).
The VHF timetable also impinged on local services with either reductions or inefficiencies created, or both. Therefore I can see why other operators like Alliance has sought to exploit these gaps.
From my limited experience of using the WCML Virgin have, after their initial flourish and fanfare, got stuck in a rut. Three trains to both Birmingham and Manchester per hour may well be needed in the peaks but outside the peaks I don't believe this is needed.
Twice an hour to both destinations should be sufficient even if 11 car Pendolinos are needed to be used instead of the nine car fleet. This would have then left paths to serve new destinations such as Blackpool and Shrewsbury and a better service to existing destinations like Glasgow (or Edinburgh) and Liverpool. (Indeed it has been argued that all Pendolinos should be of 11 carriage formations).
The VHF timetable also impinged on local services with either reductions or inefficiencies created, or both. Therefore I can see why other operators like Alliance has sought to exploit these gaps.
The Planner
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Not sure how Virgin are stuck in a rut, they have to provide what is specified in the franchise? anything else they will have to pay for, and they won't do that (as no other TOC would, and Chiltern isn't an exception to the rule as unless Oxford Marylebone takes off they will be burnt) unless it makes them a stack load of cash.
LNW-GW Joint
Veteran Member
The "rut" was created by the DfT/NR VHF timetable in 2008.
The Pendolino lengthening project was a DfT project (Virgin were excluded from the process until it came to delivery).
Virgin's (and First's) plans for the franchise were dumped by the DfT in 2012, leaving Virgin to soldier on with what they had.
We are still in the limbo that created (apart from the odd token "refresh" of stock).
It will be next year before the next ICWC franchise is specified/bid for.
Alliance have been quite clever in exploiting the limbo to get their application in and accepted (in reduced form).
After the Alliance trains start, they will have 4 trains operating on the WCML, ICWC will have 76.
Personally I think the VHF timetable works pretty well.
Nobody outside VT/DfT knows how well the trains are loaded, but VT's margin/premiums are increasing so it seems to be successful.
The 2012 DfT spec was for a very similar service to the VHF one, with a little more flexibility over stopping patterns and weekly destinations.
After the extension project Liverpool/Glasgow got 11-car trains, the Birmingham-Scotlands got significant new capacity, and new services are now running to Blackpool/Shrewsbury.
That's not so bad for a "rut".
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You appear to be suggesting that, off-peak, demand for trains to Manchester (inevitably also including the Potteries and East Cheshire) is substantially the same as that for Runcorn/Liverpool (Chester being separately served). On what do you base this? Clearly all those responsible for service planning have come to a different conclusion.
Then why do you need to cut the Birmingham service to provide a path to Shrewsbury? Do you feel that the optimal London-Shrewsbury route is via Stafford and the northern outskirts of Wolverhampton and that this would load better than the displaced train serving Coventry and New Street?
As someone who is frequently going to the cities of the north by train, and always able to get cheap advance tickets at suitable times to Manchester and not able to get them to Liverpool I would disagree that Manchester's three trains every hour have the same demand (per train of course)... Just not the way around you might prefer, assuming you're in Manchester.
There's a lot of sense in what he says and having a half hourly train to and from Liverpool (rather than me having a whole hour to wait to get back when I miss one with my very expensive walk up ticket) was one thing I had specifically in mind!
Given Birmingham's west coast services apparently have fewer passengers than even Manchester stands to reason those paths could be better utilised too.
There's a lot of sense in what he says and having a half hourly train to and from Liverpool (rather than me having a whole hour to wait to get back when I miss one with my very expensive walk up ticket) was one thing I had specifically in mind!
Given Birmingham's west coast services apparently have fewer passengers than even Manchester stands to reason those paths could be better utilised too.
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Class 170101
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If you want to run to Shrewsbury you need Rolling Stock. Reducing Birmingham from three to two per hour could give you this. (I accept as Wolverhampton to Shrewsbury isn't wired its not as simple as that).
The Planner
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So what trade offs do you make?
Currently the EBW services serve Rugby at xx.03, Watford at xx.23 and Milton Keynes at xx.43 out of Euston. The xx.43 is an Anglo-Scot so one would assume you keep that, so who loses out, Watford or Rugby? or do you add those stops to the other trains thus increasing journey time and decreasing the value of the franchise? How do you solve Rugby, Coventry and Birmingham International losing a fast service an hour to Birmingham? The only benefit it unlocks is the second XC going via Cov, which would have to pick up the slack in a Voyager.
Currently the EBW services serve Rugby at xx.03, Watford at xx.23 and Milton Keynes at xx.43 out of Euston. The xx.43 is an Anglo-Scot so one would assume you keep that, so who loses out, Watford or Rugby? or do you add those stops to the other trains thus increasing journey time and decreasing the value of the franchise? How do you solve Rugby, Coventry and Birmingham International losing a fast service an hour to Birmingham? The only benefit it unlocks is the second XC going via Cov, which would have to pick up the slack in a Voyager.
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