London Shoreditch

[SteveOfTheStow]

Out come the crayons for Liverpool Street!

Background:

- Liverpool Street has 18 platforms (soon to be 17) serving 6 tracks.
- At Bethnal Green junction, 4 tracks from the Lea Valley Lines merge with 4 tracks from the GEML. The faster tracks on the LVL merge with the GEML Mains.
- Crossrail adds 2 extra tracks to the GEML Electrics branching off west of Stratford, with most trains intended to use these. This frees up the Electrics from west of Stratford to Liverpool Street for other services - intended to be peak time Crossrail services to Liverpool Street and extra capacity for outer GEML services.
- WAML services are thus still constrained to fitting into the 2 Suburban tracks west of Bethnal Green junction, limiting the service.

Speculative Idea:

At Bethnal Green junction, branch two tracks off of the Electrics onto the embankment that leads to Bishopsgate Goods Yard, raise the tracks above the viaduct for the East London Line heading into Shoreditch High Street, across Brick Lane and into a new London Shoreditch station with 2 or 3 210m or 240m platforms (whatever can be fit). 210m needed for a Crossrail train; 240m for a 12 car GEML train; plus the overlap for buffers. The station would serve the burgeoning Old Street area and connect with the Overground. May even connect with the Central line one day.

London Shoreditch could either be a peak-time only station for the peak Crossrail services that would otherwise go to Liverpool Street terminus in the current plans, or could be open for much of the day serving other trains. This releases track capacity to enable fast WAML trains to bypass Bethnal Green and enter Liverpool Street on the Mains (with some Mains trains moving over to the Electrics), meaning more services on the Lea Valley Lines and WAML would be possible.

Crossrail 2 would otherwise relieve some capacity issues with the WAML, but it would not serve the City, so should be seen as an addition rather than a replacement like Crossrail is.


Unlikely to ever have a positive BCR, but I think it would be technically achieveable without bulldozing anyone's house, which is my sort of benchmark for speculation.

 

[Dr Hoo]

I thought that the ‘answer’ for the WAML was Crossrail 2.

Single terminal stations are SO century before last.

 

[SteveOfTheStow]

I thought that the ‘answer’ for the WAML was Crossrail 2.

Single terminal stations are SO century before last.

See my sentence about Crossrail 2 - it doesn't serve the City, so is not a replacement for Liverpool Street for City workers. Crossrail doesn't have this problem because it continues to serve Liverpool St and Paddington. Arguably a mix of services from to both West End and City on Crossrail 2 and the old lines into Liverpool Street could be sufficient for the capacity growth required as many workers will want the West End (and currently change onto the Victoria line at Tottenham Hale).

Though, I think Chingford deserves a capacity upgrade to 6tph, and Enfield Town and Cheshunt 3tph each off peak, which Crossrail 2 will likely not help with because you've still got 4 Stansted Expresses into Liv St plus existing WAML trains to fit onto those 2 tracks west of Bethnal Green.

 

[PeterC]

My very old crayon box kept the line going across Shoreditch High Street to use spare capacity at Broad Street. As posted above CR2 would be a better way to release capacity. Certainly the Chingford branch, at least as far as Walthamstow, needs more trains and any additional capacity that CR2 frees up at LST should be shared with Overground.

 

[Bald Rick]

Two small problems with this:

1) how do you get “some” of the GEML Main services to the electrics, and “some” of the WAML services to the mains, without grade separation? At the current level of service (let alone a higher level of service) it would not be possible on the flat.

2) the site you propose for the station is also the site of the Bishopsgate Goodsyard development. That’s over £1bn of real estate that is about to be built. 1,300 homes would need demolition. Too late to do anything about that.

 

[SteveOfTheStow]

Two small problems with this:

1) how do you get “some” of the GEML Main services to the electrics, and “some” of the WAML services to the mains, without grade separation? At the current level of service (let alone a higher level of service) it would not be possible on the flat.

2) the site you propose for the station is also the site of the Bishopsgate Goodsyard development. That’s over £1bn of real estate that is about to be built. 1,300 homes would need demolition. Too late to do anything about that.

1) Yes, would have to be on the flat, but parallel sets of points means you could have trains moving across from each set of lines to another at the same time. Space is tight around Bethnal Green though such that you can have the Electrics branch off onto the new 'Goods' and the Mains then having points over to the Electrics within a short space before the fast WAML lines join the Mains.

2) Precisely why this is squarely in the land of crayons I would prefer to see a station there than more luxury flats that aren't lived in, but such is!