HS2: onward connections from Birmingham?

[peteb]

Seeing the new HS2 station site being prepared in Birmingham the other day made me think about this.

Assuming a lot of HS2 customers will not live in Birmingham City centre, how long will it take to realistically get off HS2 in Birmingham and transfer to trains on the cross city, Walsall, Wolverhampton or Rugeley lines?

I'm specifying those particular routes as they are served by Birmingham New Street, where in theory it's possible to change trains in a couple of minutes, though booked connections are 15 minutes.

I'm just feeling that if there's a, say, 20-25 minute connection time, virtually all the speed advantage of taking HS2 from Euston vs current Avanti Pendolino will be lost!

 

[Fazaar1889]

Here Gareth Dennis walked the transfer, it's 4 mins and 43 seconds. It's likely that a transfer would take around 10 minutes.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Here Gareth Dennis walked the transfer, it's 4 mins and 43 seconds. It's likely that a transfer would take around 10 minutes.

And there will be a tram connection.

 

[X-City-WM]

Here Gareth Dennis walked the transfer, it's 4 mins and 43 seconds. It's likely that a transfer would take around 10 minutes.

That video starts right at the edge between Moor St Station and the current HS2 Curzon St building site, it would take a little longer from inside the station and longer still from a platform.

 

[Fazaar1889]

That video starts right at the edge between Moor St Station and the current HS2 Curzon St building site, it would take a little longer from inside the station and longer still from a platform.

true, which is why i added 5 minutes to account for getting in and out of the stations

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I'm just feeling that if there's a, say, 20-25 minute connection time, virtually all the speed advantage of taking HS2 from Euston vs current Avanti Pendolino will be lost!

That's...That's not the point of HS2

 

[Bletchleyite]

The walk between Moor St (as at present), not far from Curzon St and New St is about the same as between Liverpool Lime St and Liverpool Central, which I reliably had at about 6-7 minutes (a 10 minute connection was made easily). What the official connection time will be, however, I don't know.

 

[peteb]

The walk between Moor St (as at present), not far from Curzon St and New St is about the same as between Liverpool Lime St and Liverpool Central, which I reliably had at about 6-7 minutes (a 10 minute connection was made easily). What the official connection time will be, however, I don't know.

The problem is even knowing your platform at New Street, from entering the complex to getting through the ticket barriers, then descending escalator, stairs, or lift and getting onto the platform takes nearly 5 minutes. I've done it hundreds of times, in rush hour peaks add a couple of minutes.

The point I'm making is that having to arrive in Birmingham at another station and change stations is not as convenient as the present situation.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 May 2024 ==

true, which is why i added 5 minutes to account for getting in and out of the stations

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 May 2024 ==


That's...That's not the point of HS2

So what is the point of it? If it is merely to deliver people from London Euston to the edge of Birmingham City Centre what's the market for that vs the existing route with all its onward connections?

 

[Bletchleyite]

The problem is even knowing your platform at New Street, from entering the complex to getting through the ticket barriers, then descending escalator, stairs, or lift and getting onto the platform takes nearly 5 minutes. I've done it hundreds of times, in rush hour peaks add a couple of minutes.

But that's no different to arriving at New St at another platform, and therefore isn't added in the new situation compared to the present one.

So what is the point of it? If it is merely to deliver people from London Euston to the edge of Birmingham City Centre what's the market for that vs the existing route with all its onward connections?

The primary purpose of HS2 is to relieve capacity on the WCML and its branches around London, Birmingham and Manchester to allow for an enhanced local service and additional freight.

 

[peteb]

That video starts right at the edge between Moor St Station and the current HS2 Curzon St building site, it would take a little longer from inside the station and longer still from a platform.

Agree

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 May 2024 ==

My original post refers to connections, (i.e. being able to make other trains departing from New Street) having arrived on HS2. And is restricted to those connections currently made with the official 15 minute connection time at New Street.

I still think that the official connection time will be considerably more than 15 minutes, to allow for even the speediest of speedy commuters with encyclopaedic knowledge of Birmingham City Centre to detrain, get out of the HS2 station, navigate at least one dual carriageway controlled by pelican crossings, a jaunt through a shopping centre or a road tunnel, then through a concourse and so to the ticket barriers at New Street.......to hopefully make that connection to Wolverhampton, Walsall, or wherever.

I'd bet it'll be closer to 30 minutes when the timetables are drawn up.

 

[miami]

When the current "fast trains" stop at many shacks on the way down the HS2 service will save far more.

Currently the 1710 stops at just Coventry and Internaitonal and takes 1h17

When HS2 opens that train will be able to additionally stop at Watford, Milton Keynes, Rugby and possibly some other locations, adding a good 20 minutes to become more like 1h40

 

[Fazaar1889]

So what is the point of it? If it is merely to deliver people from London Euston to the edge of Birmingham City Centre what's the market for that vs the existing route with all its onward connections?

HS2 can be summarised as pretty much a 6 tracking of the west coast mainline... ish. All it is is new tracks solely for the fast express trains. As such, all the fast trains currently running from euston to birmingham will be transferred onto HS2. what's left is Regional trains, local trains and freight trains. Now, with the express trains gone, there are loads of gaps in the timetable, allowing more regional, local and freight trains. The point is not to get there faster, that is a stupid PR move by the government. It will get there faster, but that is not the point. If built in full (i.e including the two northern legs) HS2 will treble the number of peak hour seats at Euston from 11,300 to, up to 34,900. Source: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/high-speed-two-an-engine-for-growth/high-speed-two-an-engine-for-growth#:~:text=HS2 will treble the number,will triple the seats available.

 

[norbitonflyer]

Assuming a lot of HS2 customers will not live in Birmingham City centre, how long will it take to realistically get off HS2 in Birmingham and transfer to trains on the cross city, Walsall, Wolverhampton or Rugeley lines?

I'm specifying those particular routes as they are served by Birmingham New Street, where in theory it's possible to change trains in a couple of minutes, though booked connections are 15 minutes.

No need to change trains at all in many cases, such as Wolverhampton and Rugeley (and possibly Walsall if the proposed open access service from Shrewsbury to London via Walsall comes to pass)

HS2 can be summarised as pretty much a 6 tracking of the west coast mainline... ish.

Which is why deleting phase 2 and in particular the golborne spur is so short-sighted. The real point of HS2 was supposed to be to connect into the WCML at Hanslope and Golborne, with spurs to Birmingham and Manchester. (Look at the designs of the grade-separated delta junctions). Leaving just the two branches (and now only one) by first deleting the Golborne connection and then the whole of phase 2 means that HS2 will be able to siphon off very little of the WCML traffic which was its original raison d'etre.

The Birmingham stub is a white elephant. The need to change trains in Birmingham, there being no running connection between HS2 and the local network, will make it of dubious benefit to the good folk of the West Midlands, used to their direct trains to London from Solihull, Wolverhampton, Coventry, etc

 

[snowball]

The Birmingham stub is a white elephant, the real point of HS2 was supposed to be to connect into the WCML at Hanslope and Golborne, with spurs to Birmingham and Manchester. (Look at the designs of the grade-separated delta junctions). Leaving just the two branches (and now only one) by first deleting the Golborne connection and then the whole of phase 2 means that HS2 will be able to siphon off very little of the WCML traffic which was its original raison d'etre

The junctions were quite rightly designed so that the longest-distance trains could maintain the highest speeds, while trains starting or finishing at Birmingham or Manchester would be slowing down for the end of their journey, or picking up speed near its start. It is false logic to conclude that the longest-distance trains were the most important purpose of HS2. The most important purpose is the most frequent trains that carry the most passengers and do most to relieve the existing route, and these are the trains to and from Birmingham and Manchester.

 

[HSTEd]

HS2 can be summarised as pretty much a 6 tracking of the west coast mainline... ish.

It's more a four tracking of the Chiltern Main Line than six tracking of the West Coast.

It doesn't really go to most of the traffic centres on the section of the WCML it notionally parallels.
It avoids the population centres along the route and instead decides to burrow its way through empty countryside.

All it is is new tracks solely for the fast express trains. As such, all the fast trains currently running from euston to birmingham will be transferred onto HS2.

Whilst this might be what HS2 would like to imply, it can't really happen for political reasons.
Milton Keynes et al are not going to like the complete end of fast trains, so a large number of them will probably have to continue.

It's not really clear how many paths will actually be released, which hasn't been helped by HS2/Government not releasing any kind of concrete post HS2 timetable concept. A charitable interpretation is that they didn't want to preempt traffic changes 20 years in advance, a cynical interpretation is that they wanted to be vague to avoid any kind of backlash from Milton Keynes, Northampton, Wolverhampton et al.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The Birmingham stub is a white elephant. The need to change trains in Birmingham, there being no running connection between HS2 and the local network, will make it of dubious benefit to the good folk of the West Midlands, used to their direct trains to London from Solihull

Will still exist.

Wolverhampton

Will probably still exist. By the way, if you have a look at loadings on any Avanti service originating at Wolves, they're basically nil between Wolves and New St.

Coventry, etc

Coventry is probably the one big loser from HS2, having as it has 3tph fast to London which it really doesn't justify on its own. You can't, however, make an omelette without breaking eggs, so I think one loser has to be accepted.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 30 May 2024 ==

It's more a four tracking of the Chiltern Main Line than six tracking of the West Coast.

It doesn't really go to most of the traffic centres on the section of the WCML it notionally parallels.
It avoids the population centres along the route and instead decides to burrow its way through empty countryside.

That's the point of it. Fast trains from further north don't use paths on the WCML which can then be used for services calling at Rugby, Milton Keynes, Watford etc.

Whilst this might be what HS2 would like to imply, it can't really happen for political reasons.
Milton Keynes et al are not going to like the complete end of fast trains, so a large number of them will probably have to continue.

Improving the service at Milton Keynes (a growing city, likely to have a larger population than Liverpool within 50 or so years) is a key part of the purpose of HS2.

It's not really clear how many paths will actually be released, which hasn't been helped by HS2/Government not releasing any kind of concrete post HS2 timetable concept. A charitable interpretation is that they didn't want to preempt traffic changes 20 years in advance, a cynical interpretation is that they wanted to be vague to avoid any kind of backlash from Milton Keynes, Northampton, Wolverhampton et al.

Er, yes they have, 5 minutes with Google will find the proposed Phase 1/2A/2B/full Y service plans.

 

[HSTEd]

Er, yes they have, 5 minutes with Google will find the proposed Phase 1/2A/2B/full Y service plans.

Does that include the full service on the entire WCML, let alone the MML or ECML?
I've never seen a plan for that.

The relevant documents often say such plans "will be developed later"

 

[Bletchleyite]

Does that include the full service on the entire WCML, let alone the MML or ECML?
I've never seen a plan for that.

I've certainly seen a proposed one for the WCML in documentation published by HS2 Ltd.

Obviously there's no final decision - of course a final decision isn't going to be made many years in advance. That will perhaps be available a year or two before opening.

 

[Nottingham59]

I've certainly seen a proposed one for the WCML in documentation published by HS2 Ltd.

From
Full Business Case: High Speed 2 Phase One: April 2020

 

[HSTEd]

View attachment 159019
From
Full Business Case: High Speed 2 Phase One: April 2020

So Euston has four ICWC and ten regional departures per hour, compared to (I believe, before corona ruined everything) eight ICWC and five regional.
Milton Keynes goes from 3+5 today to 4+5, for a net gain of one ICWC

Tring goes from 4 terminators and 2 northbound to 3+3 per hour. I guess Bletchley wins two extra trains per hour!

Was this the first time this was released?
It is, obviously, several years after the project was a fait accompli.

EDIT:
Rugby seems to end up with a net conversion of one ICWC into one regional, so I'm not seeing any real transformative service level change here.
I'm assuming all the paths get swallowed up by freight? Their certainly don't appear to be five freight trains per hour per direction off peak on the WCML today.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Tring presently has 2 terminators, not 4. Bletchley has none. The present south WCML timetable is based around 2tph patterns with busier stations having 4 (2 fast, 2 slow) and quieter ones 2. It is quite a clever pattern but HS2 is designed to allow improvement to it.

COVID hasn't ruined anything with regard to the West Coast standard hour from Euston, just a few services are randomly missing each hour.

The nominal standard hour from Euston at present is (as per pre COVID):

3 x Manchester
3 x Birmingham (one onwards to Blackpool or Scotland)
1 x Liverpool
1 x North Wales/Chester
1 x Glasgow

2 x Tring
2 x MKC
2 x Birmingham
1 x Crewe

...for a total of nine IC (the second Liverpool takes it to ten) and seven regional. @HSTEd has gone a bit low there.

 

[Big Sam]

It's more a four tracking of the Chiltern Main Line

It really isn't.

 

[SynthD]

It doesn't really go to most of the traffic centres on the section of the WCML

If it did, how would it serve the north? You don’t serve anywhere beyond Watford by stopping at West Hampstead.

 

[Blackpool boy]

So Euston has four ICWC and ten regional departures per hour, compared to (I believe, before corona ruined everything) eight ICWC and five regional

Yes because, in theory, those who are doing 'Intercity' trips between the big cities will go onto HS2 thus releasing more paths for regional departures - hence why its what @bletchlyite stated as a 46 tracking of the WCML of sorts and not the chiltern line

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

The service diagram in post #18 was in an HS2 document endorsed by DfT, in full expectation of Phase 2a (just approved by parliament) opening soon after Phase 1.
It won't have been endorsed by Network Rail and the WCML operators, and is simply a means of demonstrating how much capacity will be freed up south of Handsacre (with more coming on completion of Phase 2a to Crewe).

Today's situation has Phase 1 being the only deliverable (with an OOC terminus: Euston will not be reached until some years later).
So DfT/HS2 Ltd/NR (which is rather more than just GBR) have to replan the WCML on that basis, including HS2 trains as far as Scotland.
Avanti, as prospective HS2 operator, had a minor role in this planning, but may not be in the loop after GBR takes over.
We have to add EWR services as well, other TOC/open access ambitions, and whatever freight paths are now commercially viable.

Chris Gibb's suggestion of WCML Pendolinos using HS2 is just one option of how a combined HS2/WCML timetable might evolve.
But we are a long way from knowing how it will all turn out under a Labour-run DfT.

 

[HSTEd]

If it did, how would it serve the north? You don’t serve anywhere beyond Watford by stopping at West Hampstead.

If it served major settlements such as Milton Keynes, Northampton, Coventry etc on the M1 corridor, as a Japanese Shinkansen would do, it would be able to far more comprehensively relieve the WCML.

Indeed, even if every train stopped every ~30km (a typical Shinkansen station spacing), they would still average high enough average speeds to beat existing classic services to Birmingham, Manchester etc. If you then went to Leeds it would still beat the classic line, it would probably even be competitive at York.

As it is they've built an incredibly expensive line that they can't hope to fill without an enormous high speed network that diverts essentially all long distance north-south traffic in the entire country onto it.
Now that the project has failed we are stuck with a line that will never use a large part of its capability.

HS2s design only makes real sense if you guarantee that the entire projected scheme will be built, it made no meaningful attempt to mitigate partial project failure.

 

[SynthD]

As it is they've built an incredibly expensive line that they can't hope to fill without an enormous high speed network that diverts essentially all long distance north-south traffic in the entire country onto it.

Ok, let’s do that. A key part of that is good onward connections from those stations that do exist, such as Birmingham. This map shows a tram stop about midway down the Curzon platforms, which resolves some of the objections above. https://cdn.ca.emap.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/9/2020/02/Proposed-BEE_16012020_v4.jpg

 

[Nottingham59]

HS2s design only makes real sense if you guarantee that the entire projected scheme will be built, it made no meaningful attempt to mitigate partial project failure.

I suspect that consideration was possibly in the frame, whether conciously or not. Rather like the way the planners at Milton Keynes built the ring road network first to make it more difficult for the politicians to cancel the whole project.

 

[Trainman40083]

If you think about HS2 south of Birmingham, it may well free up capacity for more Coventry to Birmingham stopping or Cross Country trains. Also frees up platforms at at New Street for other local services. When they were doing platform work at New Street, several trains were suspended as there was no platform available.

 

[Krokodil]

Indeed, even if every train stopped every ~30km (a typical Shinkansen station spacing), they would still average high enough average speeds to beat existing classic services to Birmingham, Manchester etc. If you then went to Leeds it would still beat the classic line, it would probably even be competitive at York.

What's the point? If you can reliably fill 3tph with London to Manchester passengers, another 3tph with London to Birmingham passengers, 2tph with London to Preston/Scotland passengers etc. what's the point in adding extra stops? If you can fill a train with through passengers it is pointless trying to pick up more passengers because the train is full.

Almost everyone from Milton Keynes is going to London. They can have more 110mph paths thanks to HS2. It's daft to take up half of the capacity of a Manchester or Birmingham train with people just going to Milton Keynes and then having a load of empty seats north from there (Milton Keynes to Manchester is less than 100 people per day) when you could have sold them all to through passengers.

 

[HSTEd]

What's the point? If you can reliably fill 3tph with London to Manchester passengers, another 3tph with London to Birmingham passengers, 2tph with London to Preston/Scotland passengers etc. what's the point in adding extra stops? If you can fill a train with through passengers it is pointless trying to pick up more passengers because the train is full.

Which doesn't come close to filling the capacity of the route.
The only way HS2 could get even close to filling its capacity was to propose an enormous country spanning system that would take over essentially all long distance services.

Almost everyone from Milton Keynes is going to London. They can have more 110mph paths thanks to HS2.

Which will cost money to operate and consume infrastructure that is extremely expensive.
We now have a scheme where HS2 will remain mostly empty and the WCML will be full of lots of expensive to operate trains that will have comparatively little income supporting them.

We have capacity, but we have an awful lot of capacity that will likely never be used.

It's daft to take up half of the capacity of a Manchester or Birmingham train with people just going to Milton Keynes and then having a load of empty seats north from there (Milton Keynes to Manchester is less than 100 people per day) when you could have sold them all to through passengers.

Thanks to the failure of HS2 to complete its programme, we will have more capacity than we will need for a very long time.

EDIT:
This is arguably off topic, so I will not respond further here.
if someone wishes to start a thread in Speculative Discussion I will be happy to take this conversation here.