Future services for Liverpool Lime Street?

[adam9413]

Possibly some extensions to the Crewe - Euston TV stopper

 

[AlterEgo]

Yes probably, but lots of people in the NorthWest would catch a morning flight out of Gatwick if it were convenient to reach in that way.
Maybe stop at Crewe, Birmingham, London (Kensington?) along the way.

I can’t think of any worse way to arrive at Gatwick than on an overnight train in a Standard Class seat. I think that’s definitely a niche market - from Liverpool at least.

 

[Bevan Price]

Of course, I'm not saying they don't. But we can never have direct services from everywhere people are to everywhere they want to go. The very nature of public transport is that it's never going to work like that, and nor should it.
Liverpool does pretty well for direct services to most parts of the country, and if passengers are having problems making a single connection in their journey then I'd suggest that's a problem with the passenger, not the service, and a circumstance where 'Passenger Assist' might come into play.

I partly agree with the first part - but Liverpool did once have through services to some important destinations such as Oxford, Reading & Bristol; these were sacrificed because DfT /predecessors wanted (more or less) identikit timetables every hour, rather than allow some "less-frequent" through services from places not in the "standard plan" - in other words for "their" convenience rather than the convenience of passengers. .

To me, the second paragraph situation fails due to the inadequate (too small) trains on the XC part of the trip, the poor coordination regarding connections, and for many, having to navigate the New Street Maze at Birmingham.

Once upon a time, there used to be relatively simple cross platform interchanges at New Street, e.g. at Platforms 8 & 9. or 10 & 11, with trains present simultanously on each platform (e.g. Liverpool (or Manchester) - Bristol/beyond service & Newcastle-Poole services, facilitating croo-connections between both trains.) Sadly, such easy connections have long gone.

 

[maire23]

Would definitely agree with the Liverpool-Leicester one. I did said journey yesterday and it was hellish. I went LM to BHM then XC to LEI. The LM train was uncomfortable and not the best journey experience. I’m disabled and so changing trains is always a grind- it’s just unfortunate that Leicester is so, as a previous poster pointed out, badly served for direct trains!

 

[Ianno87]

I partly agree with the first part - but Liverpool did once have through services to some important destinations such as Oxford, Reading & Bristol; these were sacrificed because DfT /predecessors wanted (more or less) identikit timetables every hour, rather than allow some "less-frequent" through services from places not in the "standard plan" - in other words for "their" convenience rather than the convenience of passengers. .

To me, the second paragraph situation fails due to the inadequate (too small) trains on the XC part of the trip, the poor coordination regarding connections, and for many, having to navigate the New Street Maze at Birmingham.

Once upon a time, there used to be relatively simple cross platform interchanges at New Street, e.g. at Platforms 8 & 9. or 10 & 11, with trains present simultanously on each platform (e.g. Liverpool (or Manchester) - Bristol/beyond service & Newcastle-Poole services, facilitating croo-connections between both trains.) Sadly, such easy connections have long gone.

Such standard pattern timetabling is precisely how one makes the best use of capacity through a location like Birmingham New Street.

What wastes capacity is having trains do different things on different hours, requiring trains to sit around in platforms waiting for specific paths on the next leg of their journeys. With the number of trains operating through New St nowadays, this is simply not practical. Neither are neat cross-platform interchanges. But Liverpool can connect to either Bournemouth or Bristol with a (generally) same platform change at either Stafford or Wolverhampton. Not helped by journey planners not being great at finding the 'easiest' change where this is appropriate.

Liverpool did get served every 2 hours by Virgin XC under Operation Princess. Unfortunately, trying to be standard pattern with a stretched fleet of Voyagers meant that turnround times at Liverpool were rather short - less than 10 minutes, which wasn't really sustainable. Hence focusing on Manchester, also a traincrew base.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Leicester-Liverpool (and Manchester) is an example of where the network falls down,
There's an hourly service Liverpool-Manchester-Peterborough-Norwich, but nothing to Leicester (maybe the odd train avoiding Grantham).
What used to be a reasonable interchange at Nuneaton into Birmingham-Leicester-Stansted has gone because of the present WCML timetabling.
Liverpool-Euston missing Nuneaton is good for through passengers but not for the connections missed.
Once upon a time the Birmingham-Stansted originated at Liverpool on a 170, but you can understand why they changed to an electric shuttle to Birmingham.
Connections via Crewe have also suffered with the run-down of the Crewe-Derby service, which used to extend to useful places like Nottingham and Lincoln.
Most of that was because of congestion at Derby.
Maybe we will get something better on that route once Derby has been remodelled with new platforms.
Bi-modes would also change the mind-set of where services start/end.

 

[atillathehunn]

Possibly some extensions to the Crewe - Euston TV stopper

This is the sensible one.

A number of years ago there was a proposal from either LM or DfT that they would shake up services so that the current:

2/hour Liverpool - Brum services and 1/hour Crewe - Euston stopper would become

1/hour Liverpool - Brum; 1/hour Preston - Brum (finally giving Hartford, Winsford, Acton Bridge a northbound service); 1/hour Livepool - Euston via Trent Valley stopping path

 

[atillathehunn]

I can’t think of any worse way to arrive at Gatwick than on an overnight train in a Standard Class seat. I think that’s definitely a niche market - from Liverpool at least.

That, combined with a potentially long haul flight, sounds like it contravenes the Geneva Convention.

 

[Merseysider]

That, combined with a potentially long haul flight, sounds like it contravenes the Geneva Convention.

Brilliant

 

[driver_m]

Such standard pattern timetabling is precisely how one makes the best use of capacity through a location like Birmingham New Street.

What wastes capacity is having trains do different things on different hours, requiring trains to sit around in platforms waiting for specific paths on the next leg of their journeys. With the number of trains operating through New St nowadays, this is simply not practical. Neither are neat cross-platform interchanges. But Liverpool can connect to either Bournemouth or Bristol with a (generally) same platform change at either Stafford or Wolverhampton. Not helped by journey planners not being great at finding the 'easiest' change where this is appropriate.

Liverpool did get served every 2 hours by Virgin XC under Operation Princess. Unfortunately, trying to be standard pattern with a stretched fleet of Voyagers meant that turnround times at Liverpool were rather short - less than 10 minutes, which wasn't really sustainable. Hence focusing on Manchester, also a traincrew base.

No it didn't. Everything pulled out of Liverpool under operation princess. The Manchester crews did the Liverpool work anyway and it wasn't every two hours as you say. It was an irregular service.

 

[Bletchleyite]

No it didn't. Everything pulled out of Liverpool under operation princess.

No, it didn’t, the OP is correct. Liverpool services were lost later as it was found the capacity of the Voyagers to be woefully inadequate.

 

[driver_m]

No, it didn’t, the OP is correct. Liverpool services were lost later as it was found the capacity of the Voyagers to be woefully inadequate.

Ah my bad. Sorry ianno87 I forgot about that short bit entirely. I was referring to the previous long established timetable which still did use the voyager sets in the changeover period from 86/47s and 158s.

 

[cuccir]

Liverpool does pretty well for direct services to most parts of the country.

I'm not sure it does, really. There's nothing to anywhere south of Birmingham, other than London and stations to Norwich. Nothing to anywhere north of the Central Belt in Scotland, and even those haven't actually started yet. Just 1 of the 3 large East Midlands cities. On a local scale, there's a lack of services to destinations such as Stoke, Wigan and North Wales.

Contrast that with Newcastle, my local largest city, and there are services to places such as Southampton, Plymouth and beyond, Aberdeen, Inverness and all stations in-between, with no major local gaps.

I'm not saying that the full list of services given on this thread need or deserve introduction, and I agree that the preference of both enthusiasts and the public at large for direct services may not be completely rational. But the new Scottish services are really only bringing Liverpool up to an acceptable level of connections; it's certainly not what I'd describe as 'good'.

 

[driver_m]

That point that was made about Leicester. It's badly linked to all the North West. A direct service should be considered to Manchester at the least and carry it on from there to either Liverpool or elsewhere in the NW so it's not clogging up Piccadilly even more.

 

[irish_rail]

I think the new birmingham new st station is a big part of the problem where once fairly easy changes could be made ,now at least 20 minutes is required if you have luggage / prams etc.
What has occurred at our biggest station outside of London is a disgrace, and all in the name of retail opportunity.
I do think Liverpool to Plymouth would be a very useful service as for some reason almost all xc trains from Plymouth only go to the north east and Yorkshire, virtually nothing to the north west.

 

[frodshamfella]

A Leicester connections seems a very good idea, plus as mentioned Stoke and Derby are not available. I really hope the thru Norwich service stays, that is useful.How about a Liverpool to Hull service, east coast port to west coast port.

 

[frodshamfella]

I'm not sure it does, really. There's nothing to anywhere south of Birmingham, other than London and stations to Norwich. Nothing to anywhere north of the Central Belt in Scotland, and even those haven't actually started yet. Just 1 of the 3 large East Midlands cities. On a local scale, there's a lack of services to destinations such as Stoke, Wigan and North Wales.

Contrast that with Newcastle, my local largest city, and there are services to places such as Southampton, Plymouth and beyond, Aberdeen, Inverness and all stations in-between, with no major local gaps.

I'm not saying that the full list of services given on this thread need or deserve introduction, and I agree that the preference of both enthusiasts and the public at large for direct services may not be completely rational. But the new Scottish services are really only bringing Liverpool up to an acceptable level of connections; it's certainly not what I'd describe as 'good'.

Ok thought Wigan was fairly frequent ? This maybe improved furher with the alternative route via Kirby and the new Skelmerdale link. North Wales too Will improve because of the Halton Curve at some stage.

 

[swt_passenger]

No, it didn’t, the OP is correct. Liverpool services were lost later as it was found the capacity of the Voyagers to be woefully inadequate.

Yes, as I pointed out in a XC thread a few weeks ago, "Operation Princess" was the name for the attempted timetable with all the destinations included. The withdrawals were made in the post-Princess recovery period, after it had been seen to fail.

What seems to happen is that people equate the term "Operation Princess" with the follow up actions, not the original plan.

 

[IanXC]

Threads like this remind me of the 'accidents of railway history' that gave us the network we have. Whether that be what was built or not built originally, what has been closed over the years or what more recent service choices have done.

When you really look there are some hard done by locations, Liverpool and Leicester as above, but also places like Bradford (no long distance links other than London or Manchester), or Hull (nothing north of York/Scarborough).

 

[Confused147]

Liverpool has lost its direct services to Plymouth and Southampton & Bournemouth. XC do a "one service a day" deal for Southern destinations like Guildford, Bath Spa, Eastleigh - so why not do the same for some Northern destinations and provide a one service a day to and from Liverpool, Chester or Bradford??

 

[urbophile]

It would provide a link between the north west and the eastern part of the West Midlands, Liverpool seems to be good for nights out etc., Ashford is a great way to connect to the Eurostar, whilst avoiding the dazzles of central London, and Margate is an area that the government is keem to re-generate.

Who the **** is going to travel from Margate to Liverpool for a night out? Even a stag/hen weekend would be easier to go via London. And as long as there are direct flights from Liverpool to Paris, only a masochist would insist on taking a slow trundling train across the widest part of the country to connect with a rare Eurostar service from Ashford. I doubt if it would be any cheaper, and a lot less convenient, than a train to Euston, a five minute walk along the Euston Road, and Eurostar from St Pancras.

 

[AlterEgo]

Liverpool has lost its direct services to Plymouth and Southampton & Bournemouth. XC do a "one service a day" deal for Southern destinations like Guildford, Bath Spa, Eastleigh - so why not do the same for some Northern destinations and provide a one service a day to and from Liverpool, Chester or Bradford??

Because they're franchise requirements. Nothing to do with how much they "care" about those destinations.

Incidentally the future timetable consultation proposes cutting off some of those extension services, because XC has a business need to concentrate on its core purpose of shifting people between key hubs.

In XC's own words, "To enable these capacity improvements on busy trains, some decrements to current service patterns will be necessary, where demand is comparatively light and alternative journey solutions or services are available..."

...and then goes on to list some extension services.

https://www.crosscountrytrains.co.u...ry-future-timetable-consultation-document.pdf

 

[YorkshireBear]

Leicester seems to suffer for XC type services due to its good main line services. Indeed it has poor links to the North East and the North West. At least Derby has a major XC presence, and Nottingham has services to Leeds and Manchester too. Leicester- Manchester for me would be a good route, including Derby to Manchester in that flow helps the case. However, taking it to Liverpool probably is a step too far. Just makes it way more difficult to path and crew etc. Whether it turns round at Sheffield or takes the curve is a question, probably Sheffield to provide a 3rd fast train. However paths into the South at Sheffield are now going to be in short supply seen as HS2 is going to come on the classic lines.

 

[MG11]

Leicester seems to suffer for XC type services due to its good main line services. Indeed it has poor links to the North East and the North West. At least Derby has a major XC presence, and Nottingham has services to Leeds and Manchester too. Leicester- Manchester for me would be a good route, including Derby to Manchester in that flow helps the case. However, taking it to Liverpool probably is a step too far. Just makes it way more difficult to path and crew etc. Whether it turns round at Sheffield or takes the curve is a question, probably Sheffield to provide a 3rd fast train. However paths into the South at Sheffield are now going to be in short supply seen as HS2 is going to come on the classic lines.

I think Leicester does quite well, it does have direct services to a Cambridge, Stansted, FOUR TPH to London and Manchester is just one change away from either Nottingham, Chesterfield or Sheffield.

 

[Mathew S]

Ok thought Wigan was fairly frequent ? This maybe improved furher with the alternative route via Kirby and the new Skelmerdale link. North Wales too Will improve because of the Halton Curve at some stage.

There are 3tph from Lime Street to Wigan plus the 1tph on the Kirkby line. Outside peak times, they are far, far from busy leaving or arriving Wigan. The three services from Lime Street are (very nearly) all 319s and so not exactly short of capacity.
The Sunday service is also being increased in the new timetable.
There is no need whatsoever for a better service between Wigan and Liverpool.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

A

There are 3tph from Lime Street to Wigan plus the 1tph on the Kirkby line. Outside peak times, they are far, far from busy leaving or arriving Wigan. The three services from Lime Street are (very nearly) all 319s and so not exactly short of capacity.
The Sunday service is also being increased in the new timetable.
There is no need whatsoever for a better service between Wigan and Liverpool.

And Wigan (and St Helens) will get some more fast services when the TPE Glasgow service starts.
Liverpool, like many WCML places, loses out because of the need to keep tilting stock to core routes.
That's what took away the routes beyond Glasgow/Edinburgh and south of Birmingham.

 

[notlob.divad]

I can't see there being much demand. Manchester Airport lost their link to Gatwick some years ago, presumably because it didn't offer much connection wise for NW air passengers. With Liverpool and Manchester both having airports with numerous destinations, I think most passengers would choose to fly more locally.

The loss of the Manchester <-> Gatwick shuttle was a pain in the proverbial. We used to use it all the time for work to get down to the South Coast early Monday morning and return back Friday evening pick up a Hire Car at Gatwick and we could be at our suppliers by 10:30 /11 am. Instead we ended up getting either a flight to Southampton and the trudge along the A27. Or even just drive all the way from the North West. Massive loss in productivity.

 

[swt_passenger]

Because they're franchise requirements. Nothing to do with how much they "care" about those destinations.

And as you say, the few that exist hardly create a precedent, as they are being removed under current plans.
Eastleigh was a poor example anyway, it only got its one call a day for a couple of timetable periods, and the service in question was re-timed to later in the evening to allow it to run through to its proper destination of Southampton Central.

 

[driver_m]

Gatwick was pretty good from the north if you swapped at MK or Watford. Till someone decided it was a good idea to cut back the southern service to East Croydon and take away most of the VT Watford & MK stops. Another change that benefitted southern commuters but screwed up connections for the rest of us.

 

[Bletchleyite]

If you want Gatwick from the North West it's as quick to go via London. But really why fly from Gatwick from the North West? If you want legacy airline long haul you can connect at Heathrow, and if you want easyJet there are other options more locally - even Luton (by car) is much easier.