Kenilworth Station Opening Delayed.

[edwin_m]

S Wigston is served only by XC though managed by EMT. It's on the Nottm-Cardiff route so it's a long distance service.

South Wigston is on the Leicester-Birmingham route as the previous poster said.

 

[The Ham]

My bold. If that is the true state of how franchises are dictating service provision, then it would appear we are in a worse situation than we were in the Grouping days!

I see lots of comments here on UK Rail (certainly not you The_Ham, on the contrary) that ignore the fact that railways are joined by switches and crossings but see them as (e.g.) 'GWR' or 'Chiltern'. The job of DfT and NR should be to ensure that this does not occur. The RUS procedure tends to confirm this faulty approach. Sorry, a wider point, but seemed appropriate here. Clearly, it is desirable to push trains through New Street as fast as can be achieved with as little reversal as possible.

A very valid point, and although not aimed at me personally there is one thought that I didn't make in my post which was part of my thinking. That was that to run such a service with rolling stock other than that coming off of the GWR service could cause more problems that it would solve. As such it maybe that Chiltern or LM effectively sub lease the unit (maybe staff too) off of GWR to run the service, but it could still be part of the ITT of the relevant TOC(s).

Of course it is not possible for GWR just opt to run such a service without the approval of the DfT (who could probably listen to concerns of loss of income from the other TOC's from services by a TOC from which they don't currently see competition when making the decision, but that would mostly impact XC and it could be argued that until XC are able to lengthen services in that area that they could potentially benefit from a few less passengers using their trains to allow for growth).

 

[Starmill]

I really don't think there's any capacity for Bournemouth to Manchester services to call at Kenilworth.

 

[LesF]

If that is the true state of how franchises are dictating service provision, .....Clearly, it is desirable to push trains through New Street as fast as can be achieved with as little reversal as possible.[/QUOTE]

Franchises don't dictate service provision. The gov'ment pretend that it's all left to the TOC's - then they put their oar in when it isn't going as they want it. Yes, reversing trains gobble up platform time and that's presumably why the Arriva carries on to Int. And since Arriva and Chiltern are both owned by DB there shouldn't be any squabble over use of the Chiltern line for an extended Arriva.

A question: does anyone know whether the recent substitution of a 2x5 car Voyager for one of the 3 Eust-Bham Pendo's, extending to Shrewsbury, is intended to be permanent? Is it that they wanted the Pendo's for ECML?

 

[MidnightFlyer]

Voyagers must run to Shrewsbury owing to the lack of electrification between there and Wolves. The increased provision of Voyagers on Birmingham-Euston services not to / from Shrewsbury was part of the general rejigging of units in December 2013, when the Euston-Wolves and Birmingham-Scotland got combined and became a mixture of Voyagers and Pendolinos, instead of exclusively Pendolinos and exclusively Voyagers respectively.

 

[The Planner]

Point taken. Some XC's have 10 mins to turn back at NS and I was counting on reducing that assuming a crew change there. But other XC's seem to have no turn round time at NS so how do they do it?

Not sure which ones you mean that have no turn round time?

The idea of extending an existing service to L Spa-Cov sounds a lot better than a dedicated shuttle like the Wolves-Walsall one that was scrapped. LM will disappear this year so the field is open to TfWM to find a TOC.

Will still be a shuttle even with the new TOC.

Easier still, stop the hourly Manch XC at Kenilworth. No need for extra stock that isn't available anyway. No new staff. No effect on LM staff's TUPE rights on transfer to a new employer. Plats designed as 102m. 5 car XC = 115m. Lengthen them to 120m. Job done.

Except it again doesn't work in the down direction. The XC stop will add 3 minutes. XC is currently xx.27 at Cov and the LM xx.30. That hits the down LM from Euston at Coventry with a Kenilworth stop, if the LM is shunted out with a long dwell then the Virgin behind it will catch it by Stechford which extends its Euston to New St journey time.

Then when Kenilworth is established and diesel stock becomes available, extend the ATW from Int to Marylebone. A train starting from Aberystwyth early morning will not arrive at M'bone until after the peak congestion is finished.

Doubt the ATW would work anymore south of Bicester, let alone the issue of stock which would probably end up with pretty much all of the ATW 158s being 2 car.

I also don't see why XC are expected to stop at every shack on a long distance service, they are not there to provide that. Kenilworth has connectivity at Leamington and Cov, especially so as the shuttle is due in before the XC anyway on the same platform in the down.

 

[59CosG95]

They have told us many many times, it should be in the West Mids and Chilterns route study too.

Ah thanks, sorry it took me so long to get back to you on that front!

 

[LesF]

Not sure which ones you mean that have no turn round time? .

Not sure which ones you mean that have no turn round time?

Trying to verify this. Difficult when XC website recommends taking their train Derby arr. NS 07.12, dep. NS 07.04 to L Spa!
TfWM's Traveline site has a XC timetable completely different from XC's own.
I give in.
If we can't get additional through services to Kenilworth because of WCML congestion, that leaves 4-tracking between Cov and NS as the only means of getting a through service instead of a threadbare L Spa-Cov shuttle. The A45 bridge over WCML near Int has recently been rebuilt with space for 4 tracks at the insistence of Centro. But they propose 4-tracking only from Int to Stechford. Would it be of any use? The length of the loop would be inadequate to allow a fast train to overtake a stopper. Two intermediate stations (MG and Lea Hall) will only give 3 mins advantage while it needs at least 6 mins for an express to pass a stopper, even if everything is on time. 4-tracking all the way from Cov to NS is needed, not all at once but enough to allow overtaking without any hold-ups.
Tonight's meeting in B'ham between Railfuture and the candidates for WM mayor only served to show that politicians only pay lip-service to transport issues. Let's hear some sensible ideas.

 

[The Planner]

Use RealTimeTrains to get a proper understanding of the WTT times.

You do not need full 4 tracking along the corridor, for one you have the constraint of New St at one end and Coventry at the other. Stechford to Beechwood was all that was ever considered anyway, it has never been the whole lot. If you 4 track Stechford to International you have 3 stations to overtake the stopper, not Lea Hall and Marston Green only, you could get a fast train past a stopper easily in that section.

 

[Ianno87]

Trying to verify this. Difficult when XC website recommends taking their train Derby arr. NS 07.12, dep. NS 07.04 to L Spa!
TfWM's Traveline site has a XC timetable completely different from XC's own.
I give in.
If we can't get additional through services to Kenilworth because of WCML congestion, that leaves 4-tracking between Cov and NS as the only means of getting a through service instead of a threadbare L Spa-Cov shuttle. The A45 bridge over WCML near Int has recently been rebuilt with space for 4 tracks at the insistence of Centro. But they propose 4-tracking only from Int to Stechford. Would it be of any use? The length of the loop would be inadequate to allow a fast train to overtake a stopper. Two intermediate stations (MG and Lea Hall) will only give 3 mins advantage while it needs at least 6 mins for an express to pass a stopper, even if everything is on time. 4-tracking all the way from Cov to NS is needed, not all at once but enough to allow overtaking without any hold-ups.
Tonight's meeting in B'ham between Railfuture and the candidates for WM mayor only served to show that politicians only pay lip-service to transport issues. Let's hear some sensible ideas.

There is a committed plan to (in effect) 4 track the Coventry corridor. The two additional tracks being called HS2.

This will mean that there is opportunity for the Cov corridor timetable to be recast back from a 20 minutes to a 30 minute pattern (the current 20 minute interval Pendolino service effectively transferring to HS2 for the London-Brum market). This would be much more compatible with operating XC every 30 minutes along the corridor.