Fife Rail Electrification/Decarbonisation

[och aye]

A short video running through the area which has masts up, heading towards Cameron Bridge from the Thornton direction.

Thanks for the video. It looks like it was a lovely day when you recorded that footage.

 

[GRALISTAIR]

Not cancelling projects halfway through seems to be a pretty good place to start...

Agree. Nor changing the spec several times (Euston).

Also agree!

 

[mcmad]

Barrhead/Kilmarnock and Kilmarnock/Barassie.

For the record, and to be absolutely clear, I am totally in favour of electrification, on every route where it can be justified, and that does include Fife and beyond. But the wiring of Haymarket/Dalmeny will, for several years, be used by only a handful of trains, and the Leven branch will not be used by any.

Completely disagree as the same argument you use also apply to Kilmarnock. Without additional stock there is nothing that would use the wires, at least LNER can make limited use of the current wiring. Need to start wiring up the East at some point as its been sadly ignored for too long.

 

[QueensCurve]

Mind you it’s only a temporary solution to bring electric and nearly carbon free trains onto the line. Full electrification is planned for 2040. Better some done now than nothing.

I hope I live long enough to see it.

 

[Falcon1200]

Of course, what we don't (I think) know is how much the Happy Train exercise cost, and who paid for it.

Yes, that is a fair point. However...

Completely disagree as the same argument you use also apply to Kilmarnock. Without additional stock there is nothing that would use the wires

Not the same argument at all! There are EMUs available, now, which could run to East Kilbride and, later, Kilmarnock; Off-lease Class 321s, a type which Scotrail previously obtained and reduced to 3-cars as Class 320s, and which are already in daily use in Scotland. Whereas BEMUs have not even been ordered yet, let alone constructed, delivered, staff training completed and maintenance and charging facilities provided.

 

[John R]

Not the same argument at all! There are EMUs available, now, which could run to East Kilbride and, later, Kilmarnock; Off-lease Class 321s,

You probably need to change the tense of that statement to something a bit more historic.

 

[Southsider]

You probably need to change the tense of that statement to something a bit more historic.

Most have gone for scrap but, reading the 321 disposal thread, there are a few left. Academic if Scotrail aren’t interested in them.

 

[QueensCurve]

Barrhead/Kilmarnock and Kilmarnock/Barassie.

Would Kilmarnock to Barassie be a serious candidate for early electrification? Surely it would be an infill if and when the G&SW main line to Carlisle had been electrified. Surely the two routes to Dundee would be a higher priority?

 

[Carntyne]

Please demonstrate where I have 'railed against electrification of East Kilbride' - I most certainly have not, and your statement is utter nonsense. What I have expressed is surprise, and disappointment, no doubt shared by those who use the route, that after months of disruption, including a lengthy complete line closure... The line is still worked by DMUs! And even when electric trains do, finally, start running to East Kilbride.... Some diagrams will still be DMUs! That is a failure by Scotrail to obtain the necessary stock, and I do not accept any excuses about how hard it might be - Scotrail did a remarkable job getting Class 365s for the E&G service when the 385s were delayed but that enterprising spirit seems to have disappeared.

It'd be difficult to run electric trains on the route until the electrification work is complete - that will happen in December.

 

[mcmad]

I've heard the wires go live shortly then driver training until passenger service starts with the December timetable.

 

[Falcon1200]

It'd be difficult to run electric trains on the route until the electrification work is complete - that will happen in December.

I've heard the wires go live shortly then driver training until passenger service starts with the December timetable.

Which is not particularly impressive, given that the whole line was closed for a period yet the wires are not even live yet - And even less impressive that when they are, some diagrams will still, apparently, be worked by DMUs!

Would Kilmarnock to Barassie be a serious candidate for early electrification?

Very much so, because it would link two electrified lines, would allow the sets for the start and end of the Kilmarnock service to stable at Ayr Townhead, as indeed they do now, would allow the (admittedly few but there should be more) Glasgow//Kilmarnock/ Ayr trains to be EMUs, and lastly is a simple job, a short, plain single line with no complications.

 

[Davester50]

Completely disagree as the same argument you use also apply to Kilmarnock. Without additional stock there is nothing that would use the wires, at least LNER can make limited use of the current wiring. Need to start wiring up the East at some point as its been sadly ignored for too long.

For 6/8 trains a day when there's currently stored EMUs or left it too late to get more 320/4s says @Falcon1200 isn't wrong.
It's the wrong electrification being done, and the while putting up the posts is great, it's useless without the stock.

 

[Trainbike46]

What Scotland's railway is doing is trying to get to a desired end-state for the lowest possible cost, not necessarily trying to get improvements implemented as quickly as possible. Leasing old 321s would be an example of the latter approach, and I'm not convinced that would be the right call.

Ideally the new (B)EMUs would have been ordered sooner. However, that isn't an infrastructure issue, and keeping the electrification teams working steadily helps reduce infrastructure costs, so continuing with Dalmeny and now Fife is a good idea, and it will help having all the infrastructure ready when the BEMUs arrive around 2030.

 

[Davester50]

Ideally the new (B)EMUs would have been ordered sooner. However, that isn't an infrastructure issue, and keeping the electrification teams working steadily helps reduce infrastructure costs, so continuing with Dalmeny and now Fife is a good idea, and it will help having all the infrastructure ready when the BEMUs arrive around 2030.

Yet they haven't. And 2030 is looming ever closer for an untested design of rolling stock, and quick win in-fills keeping teams busy would keep those costs down.

 

[Trainbike46]

Yet they haven't. And 2030 is looming ever closer for an untested design of rolling stock, and quick win in-fills keeping teams busy would keep those costs down.

That would require the design to be ready for those "quick in-fill" sections. Are they?

 

[Davester50]

That would require the design to be ready for those "quick in-fill" sections. Are they?

I guess there's no design for the ones they've done then

 

[Trainbike46]

I guess there's no design for the ones they've done then

What do you mean?

Clearly the design work for the area near Cameron Bridge has been done, as they are building it?

 

[Davester50]

What do you mean?

Clearly the design work for the area near Cameron Bridge has been done, as they are building it?

There's clearly design work. It was probably ready for the branch line re-opening.
Just as there could easily be design work for the infills which will get done.

It's a matter of priority. They've chosen the worst option, doing design for the Dalmeny part and having virtually no stock to use it for years, when the reason you're giving of keeping teams busy could have been easily deployed elsewhere and the equipment could be in use much, much sooner.

The lack of co-ordination between stock ordering and masts being planted *and then used* is concerning.

 

[aaronspence]

There's clearly design work. It was probably ready for the branch line re-opening.

Werent the foundation pilings put in during the branch build? So they have just bolted some masts to them (not downplaying that work but its the easier part).

 

[Davester50]

Werent the foundation pilings put in during the branch build? So they have just bolted some masts to them (not downplaying that work but its the easier part).

Google Street view of Cameron Bridge mast foundations

Shows the founds back in 2024.

 

[Falcon1200]

The lack of co-ordination between stock ordering and masts being planted *and then used* is concerning.

That is my view, and IMHO the reason why, while electrifying Fife and beyond absolutely should be done, the resources being deployed now to almost zero benefit would have been better used elsewhere.

 

[Davester50]

That is my view, and IMHO the reason why, while electrifying Fife and beyond absolutely should be done, the resources being deployed now to almost zero benefit would have been better used elsewhere.

I'm glad I'm not alone.
If the reason to put the masts, unused in the main for the next 5 years is to keep the teams busy, why not add to isolated sections in already wired areas where the masts will be used sooner, or extend north from Dunblane, where it too would be used by LNER, and possibly get to the Blackford water works.
Yes, there's more than plonking masts in the ground, and plugging it in, but it seems so wasteful to start on a scheme without anything to use it for many years to come.

 

[Southsider]

That is my view, and IMHO the reason why, while electrifying Fife and beyond absolutely should be done, the resources being deployed now to almost zero benefit would have been better used elsewhere.

I agree entirely. When an organisation makes a major capital investment it should be aiming to make the maximum return as quickly as possible. The fact that it’s tax payers money, which we are told is in short supply, makes this even more important.

 

[John R]

I'm glad I'm not alone.
If the reason to put the masts, unused in the main for the next 5 years is to keep the teams busy, why not add to isolated sections in already wired areas where the masts will be used sooner, or extend north from Dunblane, where it too would be used by LNER, and possibly get to the Blackford water works.
Yes, there's more than plonking masts in the ground, and plugging it in, but it seems so wasteful to start on a scheme without anything to use it for many years to come.

Don't forget that of the overall Fife electrification scheme, three of the five legs will enable LNER to run under the wires, being the two main line sections either side of Thornton and the Haymarket to Dalmeny stretch. That's 4 services, rather more than the one to Inverness. I suspect that the reason the Leven line is being done first is because all the preparatory work was done during reopening - no bridges to raise or piles to instal - it's literally ready for the metalwork to go in. So the team can get in with that whilst prep work takes place elsewhere.

 

[takno]

I'm glad I'm not alone.
If the reason to put the masts, unused in the main for the next 5 years is to keep the teams busy, why not add to isolated sections in already wired areas where the masts will be used sooner, or extend north from Dunblane, where it too would be used by LNER, and possibly get to the Blackford water works.
Yes, there's more than plonking masts in the ground, and plugging it in, but it seems so wasteful to start on a scheme without anything to use it for many years to come.

This is the problem with planning from the peanut gallery though.

There's a degree of planning and prep required which itself takes well over a year, and more like 5-7 years if the power supply isn't in place to run the trains. If the planning hasn't been done for an area then you can just head up there with a crew and start planting posts, and the if the power supply hasn't been upgraded then you won't be able to power trains off the wires even if they are up. Furthermore, even when you've finished and are ready to switch on it could be several months before you get sign-off on the wires from ORR.

You can argue that we worry too much about safety in bridges and signal siting, or that we should go back to the days when there were fewer trains and it was easier to take a possession, or even that people should go back to hanging off ladders doing the work on the live railway. The trouble is that the Scottish government doesn't have the power to make any of these happen, so it's just a fantasy.

The way you optimise the public spend and minimise waste is just by a steady boring process of planning, design and wiring the lines in the order you already determined. No surprises, no "clever" last minute optimisation. That way you get the whole thing done, and you get it done for half the cost. The equipment will be there for 50 years or more, so worrying about whether it gets used optimally for the first 2 is a fool's errand.

 

[TrainViation]

Don't forget that of the overall Fife electrification scheme, three of the five legs will enable LNER to run under the wires, being the two main line sections either side of Thornton and the Haymarket to Dalmeny stretch. That's 4 services, rather more than the one to Inverness. I suspect that the reason the Leven line is being done first is because all the preparatory work was done during reopening - no bridges to raise or piles to instal - it's literally ready for the metalwork to go in. So the team can get in with that whilst prep work takes place elsewhere.

Don’t forget about the return journeys for LNERs too, which makes it 8 services, versus 2 which is even better.

 

[Carntyne]

Which is not particularly impressive, given that the whole line was closed for a period yet the wires are not even live yet - And even less impressive that when they are, some diagrams will still, apparently, be worked by DMUs!

In danger of going further off topic, but it's no different to how the other electrification schemes in Scotland have gone. EGIP had significant Winchburgh and Queen Street closures, as did A2B and Shotts, electrics weren't running on the Monday morning afterwards.

The fleet issue is a big one, falls back to TS and Scottish Government not ordering the trains the railway needs.

 

[waverley47]

Please demonstrate where I have 'railed against electrification of East Kilbride' - I most certainly have not, and your statement is utter nonsense. What I have expressed is surprise, and disappointment, no doubt shared by those who use the route, that after months of disruption, including a lengthy complete line closure... The line is still worked by DMUs! And even when electric trains do, finally, start running to East Kilbride.... Some diagrams will still be DMUs! That is a failure by Scotrail to obtain the necessary stock, and I do not accept any excuses about how hard it might be - Scotrail did a remarkable job getting Class 365s for the E&G service when the 385s were delayed but that enterprising spirit seems to have disappeared.

I do take your point, and I apologise, that's my mistake. I had you mixed up with another forum member who has been very vocal on the subject of East Kilbride, however their point being that the line shouldn't have been wired unless there are extant trains to be able to run an electric service, and that the money should have been spent elsewhere. I am sorry for 'calling you out' and I didn't mean to accuse you of being anti-electrification, when you have clearly been supportive.

Barrhead/Kilmarnock and Kilmarnock/Barassie.

I'll come back to this.

Of course, what we don't (I think) know is how much the Happy Train exercise cost, and who paid for it. I suspect Hitachi was on the hook for some fairly sizeable compensation

The estimated cost for the Happy Trains exercise is buried deep in the TS accounts for the years in question, and although I cannot find the exact number, it's several tens of millions of pounds, for an immediate lease, staff training and route clearance, and the cost of compensation paid out when other services were cancelled as stock was shuffled around.

What Scotland's railway is doing is trying to get to a desired end-state for the lowest possible cost,

Not exactly, but not far off. They want to get the money for electrification as quickly as possible from a separate budget, into the enhancements budget. Currently, the money for electrification is spent as a one off, capital expenditure, however once costs come down enough and there's enough of a pipeline, then suddenly it counts as operational expenditure.

If costs come down far enough, then the cost of wiring is offset by the savings from running electric Vs diesel trains, and suddenly it counts as an investment that can be written off, and the whole thing becomes an academic exercise; you can just increase the enhancements budget by X amount, and let SPL just get on with it.

I'm glad I'm not alone.
If the reason to put the masts, unused in the main for the next 5 years is to keep the teams busy, why not add to isolated sections in already wired areas where the masts will be used sooner, or extend north from Dunblane, where it too would be used by LNER, and possibly get to the Blackford water works.
Yes, there's more than plonking masts in the ground, and plugging it in, but it seems so wasteful to start on a scheme without anything to use it for many years to come.

I'll get back to this as well

I agree entirely. When an organisation makes a major capital investment it should be aiming to make the maximum return as quickly as possible. The fact that it’s tax payers money, which we are told is in short supply, makes this even more important.

And this.

In danger of going further off topic, but it's no different to how the other electrification schemes in Scotland have gone. EGIP had significant Winchburgh and Queen Street closures, as did A2B and Shotts, electrics weren't running on the Monday morning afterwards.

This is true, but not necessarily helpful. Most electrification schemes do include some new electric stock, either from a factory or from one of the Home Counties TOCs that's just ordered a batch of new trains.

The difficulty in Scotland is that the electrification money was already spent before COVID, but no money was spent on new trains. The conversation about the design teams, and the feeder stations, is particularly relevant here.

Detailed design for electrification takes years, from modelling demand and supply, to creating a detailed model of the route to see if any new masts block line of sight of signals, to seeing which bridges need a rebuild, to talking to councils and utilities providers and asking where their pipes and wires are, and where they can pile and which bridges are going to be complicated and expensive. The lead time on the feeder stations before COVID was about 6 years, and the lead time on grid connections, depending where in the country they're going, can be up to a decade.

Some of these issues are things you just have to deal with; insulating the signalling is just something you do whenever there's a renewal job, or you send a team out for six months insulating the whole thing. Others are symptomatic of wider economic issues; the issues with National Grid and getting grid connections is widely documented, and is just a side effect of a private company running a national asset, and the massive, rapid shift towards electric everything.

The design teams were set up way way back before EGIP got underway, in 2008!!! They've been working through the list of priorities set out way back then, first Cumbernauld, then E&G, then the Stirling Triangle, the Shotts line, and so on. The reason East Kilbride and Barrhead were shovel ready was because someone close to fifteen years ago decided that it made sense to wire those two up next in line after Stirling and Shotts.

After that, they worked and designed the Borders line wiring, which is done, and there is a feeder station sitting in Cadder Yard waiting to be shipped to Tweedbank, and the teams will begin putting masts up at some point in the next year or so.

Then they did the design of the line up to Perth, when they stopped, and moved to the whole ECML, up as far as Aberdeen. The whole design for the whole line to Aberdeen is done, which is why there are sporadic bridge closures or rebuilding a between Dundee and Aberdeen, as the bridge rebuilding team moves from one bridge to the next around the country.

The reason they stopped at Perth, is that this was before COVID, and there was an expectation that Perth station would be remodeled at some point in CP7. Design work couldn't start, and indeed electrification cannot begin, until Perth is razed and rebuilt. The signalling, the layout, and the station are woefully inadequate, and the design team just moved on to somewhere else. Obviously COVID happened, and now there's less money and things are more expensive, so they haven't rebuilt Perth, so the design team haven't come back to finish the job.

Nobody ever told them to go and model the wiring down to Kilmarnock, because nobody saw it as a priority.* It's a not particularly busy line, either in terms of number of passengers or number of trains, and therefore you don't really unlock much capacity. Wiring Fife cascades a lot of more modern diesel units, so you don't need to buy new diesel trains to serve it when the 156s go to the scrapheap. I'm sure the design team has probably begun on the Kilmarnock design already, but that's a multi-year job, and, here is the important bit, it makes sense to wire the bits that are already designed, than stop wiring and wait until something else is designed.

The fleet issue is a big one, falls back to TS and Scottish Government not ordering the trains the railway needs.

So here we come to the crux of the issue. These designs, the order of priorities, and the decision to wire, was made years ago, before COVID, and years before that. The grid feeders sat in the SPL compound were ordered in 2017!

It made a lot of sense to order them, because back then everyone had hot and cold running money; you could pay for pretty much anything in an era of zero interest rates and minimal inflation. Nobody could have predicted (yes they absolutely could have) that there would be a shock to the global economy, and the new trains to run the new electric services would become unaffordable. Basically, the wires were ordered a decade ago, the trains should have been ordered five years ago, but weren't.

They've paid for all the design and kit already, they just haven't put the bits in the ground yet. It makes sense therefore, unless I'm being particularly stupid, to just keep building the wiring that you've in effect already bought, and take the hit on an unused asset for a couple of years until the trains arrive late?



*Priority in this case is a bit of a nebulous term. The order of the list was determined by demand modelling, cost efficiency, practicality, and no small bit of politicking. Who gets new trains in what order is important to some people, and a great number of those people will be in charge of telling NRScot how soon certain areas get electric trains, and in which order they do so.

It's not particularly surprising that Dumfries and Galloway, being a vast rural area, not particularly supportive of the current Scottish Government, and low demand for the trains in general, is currently sat quite far down the list. It's also not surprising that Fife, a much more populous area, with far more services and no small number of marginal constituencies, is near the top.

 

[47701]

This thread will be dedicated to the later phases of the ongoing Fife Circle Electrification project, and certain aspects around it.

I’d like to ask an initial question. The B9130 road which goes over a cobble bridge at Markinch station is FAR too low to support any means of electric wires or even a raised pantograph. Looking at www.roadworksscotland.org it is listed in several location that bridges too low will be raised or rebuilt to accommodate wires. However, this one is not listed. What is the most likely outcome that this bridge will face in the future to adhere to the electric future?

Markinch-Dundee might be a while yet. I was on Meadowplace Rd Corstorphine,for a few weeks I've seen the overhead stanchions ready & waiting. The bridge carrying Ladywell Ave over the railway is going to be closed until next summer. How it takes them that long to replace a bridge beats me,but that's the situation there. I can't imagine Markinch being worked on at the same time as Haymarket-Cardenden.

 

[John R]

How it takes them that long to replace a bridge beats me,but that's the situation there. I can't imagine Markinch being worked on at the same time as Haymarket-Cardenden.

It is of course perfectly possible to work on a section of line whilst some bridges remain to be rebuilt. All the metalwork can be put in place, just waiting for the wires to be strung.