What would the Bury line look like today - around 30 years on - if Metrolink had never happened?
I once indulged in an 'alternate history' thought experiment - whereby Manchester never adopted Metrolink, the Bury line was retained as a heavy rail suburban route and mused about how that route might have evolved today.
So, here's the background scenario . . .
- In the mid-1980s the Greater Manchester Council, GMPTE and BR looked into the future of the area's public transport.
- Rather than recommending a new Light Rail system (as they actually did), they concluded the future would be largely based around improved bus travel.
- Existing suburban rail routes would be retained, get a bit of a tidy-up and some modest modernisation.
- Despite a future focused on buses, closing any existing railway lines was deemed politically unpalatable - as was de-electrifying any existing electric lines in favour of DMUs (so no 'Tyneside approach' and no Pacers to Bury).
All this means the Manchester - Bury route would be retained pretty much as it was around 1990, but life-expired rolling stock and other infrastructure would need to be replaced or modernised.
What trains would have replaced the 504s, and what would happen to the 1200V DC third rail?
Here are a couple of fantasy suggestions:-
(1) The line's electrical substations & signalling are modernised, but the 1200V system is retained. A new, small fleet of 2-car EMUs is introduced - Class 509 - based on the Class 456 which were built at York around this time. Painted orange & brown (of course) these were OPO, fitted with side-contact shoe gear, based at Bury Depot and were a more-or-less direct substitute for Class 504. This is about the most status quo option.
(2) Conventional top-contact third rail is installed and the traction current reduced to conventional 750V DC. A small fleet of Merseyrail's surplus Class 508s are transferred from storage at Birkenhead North depot - so no 'new' rolling stock required. Presumably these will be painted into GMPTE livery and based at a downgraded Bury stabling point. To save costs, the 508s may be hauled back to Birkenhead North from time to time for maintenance (this being before privatisation and break-up of BR into TOCs). Inevitably, sooner or later, a Merseyrail-liveried unit ends up being returned to the Bury Line, and/or a GMPTE-liveried 508 finds itself working somewhere on Merseyside.
(3) As (2) except it's surplus Class 313s transferred north, used in third rail mode. These are painted orange and hauled around Manchester to Longsight for periodic maintenance.
(4) With national standardisation in mind and a developing aversion to dangerous live rails, the Bury line is converted to 25kV. This gives access to different second-hand EMUs for this backwater - but maybe it's still surplus Class 313s, operating 'pan up'.
Knock-on effects of 25kV conversion are that the Collyhurst Tunnel proves troublesome for OHLE clearance, so Bury trains are diverted at Queen's Road Junction and part of the Cheetham Hill Loop is retained to run into the northern side of Victoria.
In the mid-1990s, when Victoria station is rationalised and re-built, the wires are extended westwards to Salford Crescent (well ahead of any main line electrification at Victoria) providing a cross-town connection to Salford University. Trains to/from Bury start / terminate at Salford Crescent and reverse in the sidings between the Atherton & Bolton lines.
Later, after the Chat Moss and Bolton lines are fully electrified in the 21st Century, the 25kV Bury line is available as a run-through destination for shorter-distance local trains, in the same way the electrified Stalybridge line will be.
Anyone else have any creative 'alternative history' to share?
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