How would you electrify Dawlish?

[HSTEd]

You appear to have forgotten Exeter to Bristol and Taunton to Newbury. The latter has not much higher a frequency of use than a branch line, so I would think the former would have priority and tie in with a Bristol to Brum wiring.

Yes, but I don't think anyone would suggest that there woudl be no wholly electric route from London to Dawlish at the time of it's electrification.

If the line to Plymouth was electrified by Bristol the simple answer would be that the trains would divert via BRistol and stop using the B&H.
The time advantage is already small and if this fabled 140mph running happens (it probably won't but still) then it will shrink further.

 

[HowardGWR]

Yes, but I don't think anyone would suggest that there woudl be no wholly electric route from London to Dawlish at the time of it's electrification.

If the line to Plymouth was electrified by Bristol the simple answer would be that the trains would divert via BRistol and stop using the B&H.
The time advantage is already small and if this fabled 140mph running happens (it probably won't but still) then it will shrink further.

Agreed. See the new early service to Torbay (0730 ex Pad) and other trains during the day. The Westbury cut-off was always a dubious investment and was more to do with meeting ocean liners and a few weeks in the summer holiday peak traffic. I'm not saying Castle Cary to Taunton should be closed mind!!! Indeed the reopening of stations between the two at Langport and Somerton and a service from Yeovil to Taunton would be justified, I am sure.

 

[Townsend Hook]

The recent stranding of a Voyager at Dawlish, having been hit by a wave, had me wondering. If (and yes, I accept it's a big if) how do you electrify along the sea wall? Water and electricity don't seem to be happy bedfellows.

Personally I would just move the line a mile or two inland..

 

[Xavi]

Agreed. See the new early service to Torbay (0730 ex Pad) and other trains during the day. The Westbury cut-off was always a dubious investment and was more to do with meeting ocean liners and a few weeks in the summer holiday peak traffic. I'm not saying Castle Cary to Taunton should be closed mind!!! Indeed the reopening of stations between the two at Langport and Somerton and a service from Yeovil to Taunton would be justified, I am sure.

Not sure how many times this has been said, but there's no chance whatsoever of the Long Way Round becoming the normal route for London to Devon & Cornwall with or without electrification. Reading to Taunton is easily done in under 1 hr 15 mins (like 1C87 that I was on today) which will never be regularly achieved via Bristol, particularly fitting in amongst the Bristol to Weston stoppers.

Journey time is important on this booming route with further capacity and all services running non-stop Reading to Taunton coming soon.

 

[HSTEd]

Not sure how many times this has been said, but there's no chance whatsoever of the Long Way Round becoming the normal route for London to Devon & Cornwall with or without electrification. Reading to Taunton is easily done in under 1 hr 15 mins (like 1C87 that I was on today) which will never be regularly achieved via Bristol, particularly fitting in amongst the Bristol to Weston stoppers.

Journey time is important on this booming route with further capacity and all services running non-stop Reading to Taunton coming soon.

Have you ever been on a train to Cornwall?
The train becomes so slow before it reaches the destinations where large numbers of people disembark that noone will notice a tiny handful of minutes (nationalrail.co.uk is not working for me at the moment so I can't demonstrate how few) between London and Taunton.

Especially considering you could easily double service frequency to the Cornish destinations by just extending the Plymouth terminators along this newly electrified line to Penzance.
140mph running and the resignalling project on the GWML will erase a large part of the remaining time advantage - especially given the acceleration capabilities of the IEPs and other to-be-procured EMUs that will reduce the capacity penalty from the stopping trains. (As this would imply the line between Bristol and Weston has been electrified and the stoppers would be electric).

 

[DarloRich]

No different to Sydney Gardens in Bath, the Royal Border bridge at Berwick upon Tweed, Edinburgh Waverley station or countless other projects. Edinburgh Waverley and Sydney Gardens are in UNESCO World Heritage sites, and the Forth Bridge, which is in line for electrification, is similarly a UNESCO World Heritage site.

The absolute most you can hope for is some architecturally sympathetic masts onto which the prevalent OLE system of the day will be mounted upon, though for most of the route, I would probably suggest twin track cantilevers mounted on the cliff side of the route would be both sensible engineering solutions and will have the least impact on the landscape.

I do seem to find myself repeatedly reminding people that a far more historically important and significant railway, the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, has successfully been electrified, with stations including Rainhill being sympathetically treated.

Those hoping to play the landscape or architecture card to stop electrification really need not bother - focus your energies on ensuring the work is done as sympathetically as possible, suggest practical and affordable options when the Network Rail and contractor teams conduct public meetings, explain to them patiently where you wouldn't want a mast or portal and suggest alternatives.

It's worth bearing in mind that the designers, consultants and engineers who draw up the plans won't know your town or village intimately so if they're missing something, kindly point it out to them instead of assuming they already know and don't care.

Sir,

I must insist that you cease attending this board merely for the purposes of posting sensible, logical, well reasoned, well thought out and accurate posts. I demand that you cease this unacceptable behavior and desist in any future postings in this style.

Are you unaware that there is a vast conspiracy directed by evil minds to destroy our precious heritage and whilst all want longer and faster trains their introduction must have no impact upon the exiting view or more correctly potentially impact upon the resale value of an already vastly overpriced house?

Such continued behavior can not be tolerated!

Good day to you!

 

[Xavi]

Have you ever been on a train to Cornwall?
The train becomes so slow before it reaches the destinations where large numbers of people disembark that noone will notice a tiny handful of minutes (nationalrail.co.uk is not working for me at the moment so I can't demonstrate how few) between London and Taunton.

Especially considering you could easily double service frequency to the Cornish destinations by just extending the Plymouth terminators along this newly electrified line to Penzance.
140mph running and the resignalling project on the GWML will erase a large part of the remaining time advantage - especially given the acceleration capabilities of the IEPs and other to-be-procured EMUs that will reduce the capacity penalty from the stopping trains. (As this would imply the line between Bristol and Weston has been electrified and the stoppers would be electric).

You're missing the point. It's London / Reading - Taunton / Exeter / Newton Abbot where journey time is important and continues to draw more and more 'visit London once or twice a week and enjoy a better lifestyle' type of business. Going via Bristol would be slower than now and totally unacceptable for the business community.

 

[HowardGWR]

I was misunderstood again (my apologies). I did not advocate closing Taunton to Castle Cary, on the contrary. I merely pointed out that HSTEd had apparently overlooked the electrification north east beyond Exeter and suggested that Exeter to Bristol would have higher priority than Taunton to Newbury - IMO.

 

[Rapidash]

If it does ever happen, and assuming an apocalyptic event doesn't occur.... Then one would suspect battery technology will reach the point where the view won't be changed by overhead gubbins.

 

[HowardGWR]

If it does ever happen, and assuming an apocalyptic event doesn't occur.... Then one would suspect battery technology will reach the point where the view won't be changed by overhead gubbins.

Oh, the view! I had not realised this was an issue. I have travelled on the Cote 'd'Azur, recently the Soller Railway and other scenic lines with OLE and didn't even notice it was there.

 

[fairysdad]

Oh, the view! I had not realised this was an issue. I have travelled on the Cote 'd'Azur, recently the Soller Railway and other scenic lines with OLE and didn't even notice it was there.

Never underestimate the volume of voice of Dawlish's resident NIMBYs!!!

(For 'Dawlish', enter anywhere in the UK...)

 

[HSTEd]

You're missing the point. It's London / Reading - Taunton / Exeter / Newton Abbot where journey time is important and continues to draw more and more 'visit London once or twice a week and enjoy a better lifestyle' type of business. Going via Bristol would be slower than now and totally unacceptable for the business community.

Currently the route via the B&H takes either 1hr14 or 1hr31 depending on the stopping patterns used (rather strangely the Plymouth terminators are the former, I would have thought it would be the other way around but there we go).
Currently changing at Bristol Parkway takes 2hr03 with 16 minutes of connection time. Which means it takes approximately 1hr47.

IEP related acceleration and dwell time improvements are expected to cut something like 15 minutes off current Bristol journey times.
Which takes us down to 1hr32 (and yes there will be journey time savings on the B&H, but they will be smaller due to the lesser number of stops and lower speeds which reduce the acceleration and dwell advantage of the EMUs.)

So even with 125mph running we have matched the current best journey time for Penzance if we exclude the Cornishman which would be infeasible to run all the time.

Then there is 140mph running, which on the long runs on the Brunel's Billiard table can be expected to reduce journey times by something approaching ten more percent and you are looking at 80 minutes to Taunton. WHich is only very marginally slower than the current fastest trains - but it would have far more stops and be more useful as it would have a higher frequency.

The costs of maintaining the bi-modes and fuel for them is likely to be higher than the benefits gained from a few extra minutes.
If the business community doesn't like it it can lump it - its not as if we are currently hurting for passengers, but we are hurting for subsidy money.

 

[DarloRich]

but is there going to be 140mph running?

 

[HSTEd]

but is there going to be 140mph running?

Well that depends if they actually come through on it - I am myself skeptical but I imagine it probably has a superior business case to B&H electrification.

I imagine it depends if HS2 comes in on/under budget or not - if it does not need the huge contingency then we will see more high speed rail.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

No different to Sydney Gardens in Bath, the Royal Border bridge at Berwick upon Tweed, Edinburgh Waverley station or countless other projects. Edinburgh Waverley and Sydney Gardens are in UNESCO World Heritage sites, and the Forth Bridge, which is in line for electrification, is similarly a UNESCO World Heritage site.

The absolute most you can hope for is some architecturally sympathetic masts onto which the prevalent OLE system of the day will be mounted upon, though for most of the route, I would probably suggest twin track cantilevers mounted on the cliff side of the route would be both sensible engineering solutions and will have the least impact on the landscape.

I do seem to find myself repeatedly reminding people that a far more historically important and significant railway, the Liverpool and Manchester Railway, has successfully been electrified, with stations including Rainhill being sympathetically treated.

Those hoping to play the landscape or architecture card to stop electrification really need not bother - focus your energies on ensuring the work is done as sympathetically as possible, suggest practical and affordable options when the Network Rail and contractor teams conduct public meetings, explain to them patiently where you wouldn't want a mast or portal and suggest alternatives.

It's worth bearing in mind that the designers, consultants and engineers who draw up the plans won't know your town or village intimately so if they're missing something, kindly point it out to them instead of assuming they already know and don't care.

Likewise the OHLE through the middle of Saltaire didn't prevent it being granted UNESCO World Heritage Site status either. To be honest I'm slightly surprised that the Dawlish sea wall hasn't been granted similar status, as it has similar historical significance even though Brunel's "Atmospheric Railway" wasn't really a success.

As for the larger topic of electrification beyond the current plans, diverting more services via Bristol might spell the death-knell for Westbury to Cogload Junction but I'd agree with the poster suggesting a "trans-Somerset" service from Taunton to Yeovil with stations at Langport and Somerton. I appreciate though that this has little to do with wiring the sea wall.

 

[Xavi]

Currently the route via the B&H takes either 1hr14 or 1hr31 depending on the stopping patterns used (rather strangely the Plymouth terminators are the former, I would have thought it would be the other way around but there we go).
Currently changing at Bristol Parkway takes 2hr03 with 16 minutes of connection time. Which means it takes approximately 1hr47.

IEP related acceleration and dwell time improvements are expected to cut something like 15 minutes off current Bristol journey times.
Which takes us down to 1hr32 (and yes there will be journey time savings on the B&H, but they will be smaller due to the lesser number of stops and lower speeds which reduce the acceleration and dwell advantage of the EMUs.)

So even with 125mph running we have matched the current best journey time for Penzance if we exclude the Cornishman which would be infeasible to run all the time.

Then there is 140mph running, which on the long runs on the Brunel's Billiard table can be expected to reduce journey times by something approaching ten more percent and you are looking at 80 minutes to Taunton. WHich is only very marginally slower than the current fastest trains - but it would have far more stops and be more useful as it would have a higher frequency.

The costs of maintaining the bi-modes and fuel for them is likely to be higher than the benefits gained from a few extra minutes.
If the business community doesn't like it it can lump it - its not as if we are currently hurting for passengers, but we are hurting for subsidy money.

80 min Reading to Taunton via Bristol? I doubt it very much. Or perhaps you believe all the Carne digital railway hype? More capacity, more speed etc out of existing infrastructure. We'll see.

Not that it's particularly relevant, but you'll actually find that many of the London- Penzance services are fast from Reading to Taunton - 1006, 1306, 1406, 1606 and 1803 off Paddington - and from Dec 2018 every Plymouth / Penzance service will be non-stop Reading to Taunton with Exeter semi-fasts serving the intermediate B&H stations. They're not doing it for fun, the business (inc leisure) is there to warrant the service.

Stuff the business community?! That's a one-way ticket to more subsidy.