HS2 in the press

[Haydn1971]

Things change, if Euston isn't working now, other options will be explored. It ain't over till the fat lady sings.
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multiple stations increases costs dramatically

Old Oak is being built anyways, Stratford is already there. Heathrow will be required at some stage. Reusing existing platforms at St Pancras & Euston following HS2 opening would be less disruptive than a full rebuild at Euston whilst WCML services are running at capacity.

 

[deltic]

Things change, if Euston isn't working now, other options will be explored. It ain't over till the fat lady sings.
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Old Oak is being built anyways, Stratford is already there. Heathrow will be required at some stage. Reusing existing platforms at St Pancras & Euston following HS2 opening would be less disruptive than a full rebuild at Euston whilst WCML services are running at capacity.

HS2 is highly unlikely to serve Heathrow as Davies Comission noted, the link from HS2 to HS1 was highly expensive and disruptive and hence why it was dropped, putting in additional platforms at St Pancras will be just as disruptive as works at Euston.

The death of Euston is much exaggerated.

 

[Haydn1971]

Reports are always geared towards the wishes of the client, if the client wants to play down building to Heathrow to calm voters the report will reflect that, similarly if the report wants to pay the tummies of Northern voters, yes, we need HS3 will go into the report. When the government finally grows a pair of balls, the third/fourth runways will get built, new capacity will fill up quickly, new means of getting passengers to/from will be built - timescales ? Who knows, but it's inevitable that HS2 will go to Heathrow in my lifetime

 

[NotATrainspott]

In terms of feasibility the only other real options for a central London terminus is to dig up a royal park and build an enormous station box in the gap. From a constructability perspective there is absolutely nothing wrong with such a suggestion, and if David Higgins were to go to the DfT and say that Euston was no longer feasible it would likely be his suggestion, but it would have to deal with public opposition and the need for onward connectivity. Building such a thing would prevent any realistic form of an HS1-HS2 link and it would simply leave the necessary redevelopment of Euston up to someone else with less clout.

 

[HSTEd]

Heathrow can't possibly deliver the numbers of passengers actually required to support a HS2 connection.
If it is built it will be as political posturing as part of Heathrow expansion - its a very bad idea no matter what happens at the airport.
It throws away paths that have been obtained a great expense to save handfuls of passengers a change of train at OOC.

 

[Haydn1971]

So, the third busiest airport in the world by passenger numbers can't justify a high speed rail connection to the rest of the UK - An airport blighted by road based traffic access issues on the M25/M4 ? That's pretty damning of those dozens of other airports with HSR links across the world :-/

 

[NotATrainspott]

So, the third busiest airport in the world by passenger numbers can't justify a high speed rail connection to the rest of the UK - An airport blighted by road based traffic access issues on the M25/M4 ? That's pretty damning of those dozens of other airports with HSR links across the world :-/

Yes.

The problem that HS2 faces is that to justify its high price tag, the line between London and Birmingham has to run at capacity with services to various places. Demand to central London is massively higher than any demand to Heathrow and it has been found that it is not worth it to go via Heathrow when there would actually be only a handful of people on each train wanting to go there. Also, an HS2 station at Heathrow would still make people need to transfer to other terminals, and so if direct services to the full range of terminals are available from Old Oak Common there's really no great loss by not going to the airport directly.

 

[quantinghome]

So, the third busiest airport in the world by passenger numbers can't justify a high speed rail connection to the rest of the UK - An airport blighted by road based traffic access issues on the M25/M4 ? That's pretty damning of those dozens of other airports with HSR links across the world :-/

How would a direct high speed rail connection relieve the M25/M4 which is mostly local traffic?

Even if a high speed connection were built to Heathrow, most passengers would still need to change trains to get to their particular terminal, and that's assuming a station could even be built at one of the terminal locations (which is highly unlikely). It will be no less convenient to change to Hex or Crossrail at OOC for a direct train to the desired terminal.

Let's remember the current plans already transform connectivity to Heathrow from the North. Currently it's a 2+ hour journey from Manchester/Leeds/Sheffield/Liverpool, then a battle through the underground with baggage and onto Hex or the Pic. Most passengers would need to factor in another hour or so for potential disruption or missed connections. HS2 via OOC solves most of these problems. A direct link is only of marginal benefit.

At some stage there may need to be a new HS line built West. That is the logical stage to build a high speed station at Heathrow.

 

[Haydn1971]

This represents the limitations of the minds we are working with, why do people take regional flights to Heathrow ? For onward connections, relief for the M25/M4 would be a transfer of passengers to rail - currently travel from the north to Heathrow required a trip into central London via Euston/St Pancras/Kings Cross - I wouldn't chose to travel to Heathrow by rail because of that transfer and I'm relatively fit enough to lift luggage, walk up and down steps etc - don't underestimate the numbers of people that could transfer using a direct HSR link - the potential also to reduce regional flights is huge, there's 800,000 a year transfer to Manchester alone, 500,000 to Newcastle, 2.2m to Glasgow/Edinburgh, that's currently enough for an hourly service North, with potential for better linkage options to all the places on the HS2 routes.

 

[Deerfold]

don't underestimate the numbers of people that could transfer using a direct HSR link - the potential also to reduce regional flights is huge, there's 800,000 a year transfer to Manchester alone, 500,000 to Newcastle, 2.2m to Glasgow/Edinburgh, that's currently enough for an hourly service North, with potential for better linkage options to all the places on the HS2 routes.

Which way will this hourly service go to get to Manchester, Newcastle, Glasgow and Edinburgh?

If you have to connect into it, I don't see it being any harder to go direct to OOC from any of those and then change for Heathrow.

 

[quantinghome]

This represents the limitations of the minds we are working with, why do people take regional flights to Heathrow ? For onward connections, relief for the M25/M4 would be a transfer of passengers to rail - currently travel from the north to Heathrow required a trip into central London via Euston/St Pancras/Kings Cross - I wouldn't chose to travel to Heathrow by rail because of that transfer and I'm relatively fit enough to lift luggage, walk up and down steps etc - don't underestimate the numbers of people that could transfer using a direct HSR link - the potential also to reduce regional flights is huge, there's 800,000 a year transfer to Manchester alone, 500,000 to Newcastle, 2.2m to Glasgow/Edinburgh, that's currently enough for an hourly service North, with potential for better linkage options to all the places on the HS2 routes.

My point is that the current plans for HS2 already eliminate the need to transfer through central London by providing a simple, single change at OOC. Unless the direct HSR link stops right by the terminals (which it almost certainly won't), passengers are going to have to transfer at some point anyway. I don't see why that transfer point needs to be located within the Heathrow campus.

As for the M4/M25, I would hazard a guess that journeys from the North to Heathrow form a miniscule proportion of overall traffic. The vast majority is local. WRaTH will have a greater effect on reducing traffic, at much lower cost.

 

[Haydn1971]

Rolling back a few posts, my comment about Heathrow was linked with thoughts on distributing the load at the London end of HS2 across several stations, to mitigate against the current cost benefit issues being raised for the current Euston plan. Dropping 20 HS2 trains with 1000 odd passengers per hour onto the local infrastructure at Euston was never going to be pretty.

 

[HSTEd]

So, the third busiest airport in the world by passenger numbers can't justify a high speed rail connection to the rest of the UK - An airport blighted by road based traffic access issues on the M25/M4 ? That's pretty damning of those dozens of other airports with HSR links across the world :-/

Those other HSR lines are not on routes that are going to have to run at capacity from day one.

Do you really think Heathrow can support 2 trains per hour (at the least), each of which has thirteen hundred seats.
That translates into something like 41,600 seats each way each day. Or 83,200 'passengers' per day.
That translates to roughly thirty million passengers per year.

Do you really think a third to a half of Heathrow's passengers will use the High Speed connection? And that is the absolute minimum of 2 trains per hour - the economics of the connection with that low service interval do not look good.

I can fill every train if it departs from Euston through OOC - I cannot fill those trains if they run from Heathrow instead.

Also Heathrow is far too far out to serve as a meaningful London railway station.

 

[Haydn1971]

So how are you going to distribute 26,000 (that's just seated passengers) per hour in the peak from Euston using just Northern and Victoria lines ? Virgin can currently being in a maximum of 5500 (just seated) passengers per hour on the 9x 390's per hour.

 

[Deerfold]

So how are you going to distribute 26,000 (that's just seated passengers) per hour in the peak from Euston using just Northern and Victoria lines ? Virgin can currently being in a maximum of 5500 (just seated) passengers per hour on the 9x 390's per hour.

Some passengers will get off at OOC; links to Euston Square are due to be improved.

How many of those 26,000 passengers/hour were you planning to take to Heathrow? Do they want to go there?

 

[HSTEd]

Between Euston and Euston Square you have (or will have):

Crossrail 2
Victoria Line
Northern Line
Hammersmith and City
Circle Line
Metropolitan line

And if you allow significant flows to KGX-Pancras then you also gain access to Thameslink and the Picadilly line.

Far better than half of Crossrail and the Picadilly line at Heathrow.

 

[MidlandMainlie]

So how are you going to distribute 26,000 (that's just seated passengers) per hour in the peak from Euston using just Northern and Victoria lines ? Virgin can currently being in a maximum of 5500 (just seated) passengers per hour on the 9x 390's per hour.

A third of those 26,000 passengers (which will take years after the opening of HS2 to reach those numbers anyway) will get off at Old oak Common for Crossrail to Heathrow/Reading or the Docklands . That leaves 14,000 + whatever numbers London Midland (or its successor franchise) to distribute via the tube network at Euston and Crossrail 2
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Between Euston and Euston Square you have (or will have):

Crossrail 2
Victoria Line
Northern Line
Hammersmith and City
Circle Line
Metropolitan line

And if you allow significant flows to KGX-Pancras then you also gain access to Thameslink and the Picadilly line.

Far better than half of Crossrail and the Picadilly line at Heathrow.

I suspect that the rebuild of Euston will allow for an easy access to the Kings Cross/St Pancras complex for passengers wanting to access HS1 an E* probably via moving walkways.

 

[MarkyT]

I suspect that the rebuild of Euston will allow for an easy access to the Kings Cross/St Pancras complex for passengers wanting to access HS1 an E* probably via moving walkways.

Which in addition to easy International connections would provide correspondence with Thameslink and Kent HS1 domestic services.

 

[MidlandMainlie]

Which in addition to easy International connections would provide correspondence with Thameslink and Kent HS1 domestic services.

And would be significantly cheaper than any HS2-HS1 link.

 

[Haydn1971]

Sorry, I'll have to disagree, putting all your trains in one basket is just reckless, I've thought that all along.

 

[NotATrainspott]

Sorry, I'll have to disagree, putting all your trains in one basket is just reckless, I've thought that all along.

It's really not. Euston will be more than capable of dealing with the projected passenger numbers, especially when Old Oak Common is going to take off around a third. It's not just tube links that are available - it's buses, taxis, cycle hire and it's not infeasible to walk from Euston to a reasonable chunk of Zone 1.

 

[Class 170101]

So how are you going to distribute 26,000 (that's just seated passengers) per hour in the peak from Euston using just Northern and Victoria lines ? Virgin can currently being in a maximum of 5500 (just seated) passengers per hour on the 9x 390's per hour.

I assume that is based on todays figures, I would suggest these are likely to rise over the next 12 to 18 years (12 years for Stage 1 and 18 years for stage 2).

You will need to also factor in LM services which are likely to see increases in passenger loadings plus are replace some Virgin services with more commuter flows (from Rugby (possibly Nuneaton) and stations south to London).
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Some passengers will get off at OOC; links to Euston Square are due to be improved.

How many of those 26,000 passengers/hour were you planning to take to Heathrow? Do they want to go there?

Some will almost certainly will leaving at Old Oak Common as it will be easier to get to Canary Wharf via Crossrail 1 and some to Heathrow and other destinations to the west The other issue to consider with Crossrail 1 is that by the time HS2 stage 1 opens Crossrail 1 will have been in operation for around seven years with its space being slowly 'consumed' by increasing passenger numbers. Similar issues will almost certainly apply to the Northern and Victoria Lines which have recently had money spent upon them but by then wil have been 10 years up the road.
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Between Euston and Euston Square you have (or will have):

Crossrail 2
Victoria Line
Northern Line
Hammersmith and City
Circle Line
Metropolitan line

And if you allow significant flows to KGX-Pancras then you also gain access to Thameslink and the Picadilly line.

Far better than half of Crossrail and the Picadilly line at Heathrow.

It should be said that the existing tube lines that operate through this area today are not exactly looking like they have much spare capacity which ten years from now may well be non-existent.

 

[deltic]

I assume that is based on todays figures, I would suggest these are likely to rise over the next 12 to 18 years (12 years for Stage 1 and 18 years for stage 2).

You will need to also factor in LM services which are likely to see increases in passenger loadings plus are replace some Virgin services with more commuter flows (from Rugby (possibly Nuneaton) and stations south to London).

but offsetting that will be some diversions of LM services on to Crossrail. Unlike some other mainline stations Euston does not deal with that many passengers in the morning peak and I have never seen crowd control put in place at Euston underground. Given how Victoria "copes" with just the Victoria and District/Circle line not sure Euston is really the problem it is made out to be.

 

[Class 170101]

It's really not. Euston will be more than capable of dealing with the projected passenger numbers, especially when Old Oak Common is going to take off around a third. It's not just tube links that are available - it's buses, taxis, cycle hire and it's not infeasible to walk from Euston to a reasonable chunk of Zone 1.

I think its an heroic assumption that a third of passengers will leave via Crossrail. Also until the plans for Euston are made available this cannot be proved either. Growth assumptions for the railways in recent years have been found wanting and therefore should HS2 be built at Euston (HS2 still not passed into law yet) I would not be surprised if the station itself and distribution of passengers from Euston will prove to be inadequate.
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but offsetting that will be some diversions of LM services on to Crossrail. Unlike some other mainline stations Euston does not deal with that many passengers in the morning peak and I have never seen crowd control put in place at Euston underground. Given how Victoria "copes" with just the Victoria and District/Circle line not sure Euston is really the problem it is made out to be.

Victoria doesn't and access to the tubes have been known to suspended for short periods at peak times. As for Euston when compared to stations like Waterloo or Canary Wharf its a very small site. Euston Square is even smaller than Euston.
In respect of LM services diverted I would say its more likely means they come in fuller and therefore these services will be more difficult to board discouraging people from using them leaving Old Oak potentially apply more pressure to Euston as people 'try' their luck there instead.

 

[deltic]

I think its an heroic assumption that a third of passengers will leave via Crossrail. Also until the plans for Euston are made available this cannot be proved either. Growth assumptions for the railways in recent years have been found wanting and therefore should HS2 be built at Euston (HS2 still not passed into law yet) I would not be surprised if the station itself and distribution of passengers from Euston will prove to be inadequate.
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Victoria doesn't and access to the tubes have been known to suspended for short periods at peak times. As for Euston when compared to stations like Waterloo or Canary Wharf its a very small site. Euston Square is even smaller than Euston.
In respect of LM services diverted I would say its more likely means they come in fuller and therefore these services will be more difficult to board discouraging people from using them leaving Old Oak potentially apply more pressure to Euston as people 'try' their luck there instead.

The forecasts for number of passengers changing at Old Oak Common are based on standard passenger modelling using existing distribution of passengers using Euston long distance services throughout London and the southeast and are independent of the design of Euston. If Crossrail 2 is built more people might use Euston but then it would have the capacity to deal with them.

Euston underground will be rebuilt and a link to Euston Square added with HS2 providing more circulation space

 

[Haydn1971]

"Will" ? It's not cast in stone yet, it's clear that the ideas thrown about in reports so far offer slightly different sanarios - it wasn't long ago that two trains per hour were heading to Heathrow, we has a HS1-HS2 link too... Let's see what comes out in the act before saying things like "will"

 

[Nym]

but offsetting that will be some diversions of LM services on to Crossrail. Unlike some other mainline stations Euston does not deal with that many passengers in the morning peak and I have never seen crowd control put in place at Euston underground. Given how Victoria "copes" with just the Victoria and District/Circle line not sure Euston is really the problem it is made out to be.

Euston is in control measures quite frequently whenever there is a hint of disruption.

 

[NotATrainspott]

I think its an heroic assumption that a third of passengers will leave via Crossrail. Also until the plans for Euston are made available this cannot be proved either. Growth assumptions for the railways in recent years have been found wanting and therefore should HS2 be built at Euston (HS2 still not passed into law yet) I would not be surprised if the station itself and distribution of passengers from Euston will prove to be inadequate.
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Victoria doesn't and access to the tubes have been known to suspended for short periods at peak times. As for Euston when compared to stations like Waterloo or Canary Wharf its a very small site. Euston Square is even smaller than Euston.
In respect of LM services diverted I would say its more likely means they come in fuller and therefore these services will be more difficult to board discouraging people from using them leaving Old Oak potentially apply more pressure to Euston as people 'try' their luck there instead.

The Underground station is planned to be very heavily revamped, providing a second set of escalators down to each platform to enhance safety and circulation. The Crossrail 2 works can then improve things further without adding to the HS2 Ltd budget, and a direct link to Euston Square is guaranteed.

Something to remember is that the station will be designed for the highest number of passenger numbers possible with the configuration of the three lines into the station. Only 18 1100-seater trains per hour can possibly arrive at Euston at any realistic point in the future and there's a similar calculation available for the number of WCML fast and slow passengers as well. If passenger numbers grow above this, the only way of going forward is to run more trains and that would require a new Crossrail line with its own Euston station underground.

 

[HSTEd]

The station will essentially be brand new - with the overengineering evident elsewhere on this scheme I imagine Euston will be overspecced to a huge degree. Especially considering the problems Euston has now/

 

[NotATrainspott]

The station will essentially be brand new - with the overengineering evident elsewhere on this scheme I imagine Euston will be overspecced to a huge degree. Especially considering the problems Euston has now/

Probably the biggest single capacity increase comes from being able to use the western, northern and eastern sides of the station for passengers as well. At the moment, all passengers have to funnel through a single concourse at the south, coming off the trains via the single large platform ramps at their southern ends. In the full rebuild, as the platforms are lowered several metres further underground, the concourse is built on top of them at street level, meaning there are several escalator/lift banks distributed along each platform and then passengers may exit the station by the nearest wall.