HS2 and WCML capacity

[YourMum666]

With the Goldborne link and phase 2 being effectively canned, how will handsacre affect capacity around the Birmingham area, and what does this mean for general capacity on the west coast mainline?

 

[The Planner]

With the Goldborne link and phase 2 being effectively canned, how will handsacre affect capacity around the Birmingham area, and what does this mean for general capacity on the west coast mainline?

Means nothing for Birmingham, screws up Colwich and Stafford.

 

[Nottingham59]

With the Goldborne link and phase 2 being effectively canned, how will handsacre affect capacity around the Birmingham area, and what does this mean for general capacity on the west coast mainline?

Huge uplift in capacity for commuters into Euston, but all those extra trains will only be able to run south of Litchfield.

No increase in length or frequency of trains to Manchester and elsewhere from London or from Birmingham, but journeys on these specific services will be faster. Other long-distance services likely to have more stops, and therefore be slower.

Increased capacity for freight on the southern WCML, but does nothing for freights north of Nuneaton, where the intermodal flows from Felixstowe and Southampton merge onto the WCML spine.

All long-distance traffic on six tracks gets crammed into a single flat junction at Colwich, which will become a massive bottleneck.

The design of Handsacre missed the opportunity to incorporate grade separation of the flows to Stoke and to Stafford, which would have made a huge difference at Colwich.

Apart from that, it's briiliant.

 

[The Planner]

All long-distance traffic on six tracks gets crammed into a single flat junction at Colwich, which will become a massive bottleneck.

The design of Handsacre missed the opportunity to incorporate grade separation of the flows to Stoke and to Stafford, which would have made a huge difference at Colwich.

HS2 couldn't have done anything at Colwich anyway, its not their network and they couldn't cross fund NR enhancements. Crewe is a case in point (now probably about to die as well), it was a NR renewal job that facilitated HS2.