My idea for provision for more services at Acton Bridge

[Ianno87]

Good idea.

A very, very cursory glance at the timetable suggests that might actually work fairly well.

On the Up, you'd be chased out of Warrington by the Edinburgh-Birmingham-Euston about 8 minutes behind, so you'd probably have to go Slow Line at Acton Bridge to be overtaken by it (meaning the one of the hourly direct Warrington-Crewe services would overtake the other)

On the Down, you'd have to depart Crewe somewhere ahead of the xx33 'fast' Birmingham-Liverpool, and behind the xx10 Euston-Birmingham-Scotland.

You'd get about a 10-15 minute turnround at Crewe, using only one extra diagram.

Only trouble I can see is you'd need to be arriving at Crewe into bay Platforms 9 or 10 about the same time as the xx10 Scotland is departing Platform 11 - can't recall if these moves can be done in parallel or not.

 

[notlob.divad]

A very, very cursory glance at the timetable suggests that might actually work fairly well.

On the Up, you'd be chased out of Warrington by the Edinburgh-Birmingham-Euston about 8 minutes behind, so you'd probably have to go Slow Line at Acton Bridge to be overtaken by it (meaning the one of the hourly direct Warrington-Crewe services would overtake the other)

On the Down, you'd have to depart Crewe somewhere ahead of the xx33 'fast' Birmingham-Liverpool, and behind the xx10 Euston-Birmingham-Scotland.

You'd get about a 10-15 minute turnround at Crewe, using only one extra diagram.

Only trouble I can see is you'd need to be arriving at Crewe into bay Platforms 9 or 10 about the same time as the xx10 Scotland is departing Platform 11 - can't recall if these moves can be done in parallel or not.

The 319 Liverpool LS to Warrington BQ should be able to speed up when they finally get around to casting the timetable to 319 timings rather than 14x timings. Will that help in this situation. I had been looking at the same and I think it is a possibility, but as you say, I'm not sure how used it would be as a service beyond Acton Bridge, Hartford and Winsford with the Scotland-Birmingham overtaking it, combined with the faster direct services to Liverpool, I'm not sure how viable it would be.

I have to admit my reasons for looking at this was not to add an extra service at Acton Bridge, et al, but to remove all those stops from one of the Liverpool-Birmingham services to speed it up.

 

[Ianno87]

The 319 Liverpool LS to Warrington BQ should be able to speed up when they finally get around to casting the timetable to 319 timings rather than 14x timings. Will that help in this situation. I had been looking at the same and I think it is a possibility, but as you say, I'm not sure how used it would be as a service beyond Acton Bridge, Hartford and Winsford with the Scotland-Birmingham overtaking it, combined with the faster direct services to Liverpool, I'm not sure how viable it would be.

I have to admit my reasons for looking at this was not to add an extra service at Acton Bridge, et al, but to remove all those stops from one of the Liverpool-Birmingham services to speed it up.

I agree, the only way it'd be viable were if it were to provide a non-overtaken second train per hour between Warrington and Crewe. If you tightened up the timings a bit you *may* be able to get it to Crewe minimum headway in front of the Scotland-Birmingham, but it'd be very tight (and then you'd be crossing the bows of the Euston-Glasgow passing on the Down Fast Line).

You'd make this the main off-peak service at Acton Bridge, with Winsford and Hartford having 2tph - this train and one of the LMs - although the LM calls need not be in the same half hour.

 

[frodshamfella]

The 319 Liverpool LS to Warrington BQ should be able to speed up when they finally get around to casting the timetable to 319 timings rather than 14x timings. Will that help in this situation. I had been looking at the same and I think it is a possibility, but as you say, I'm not sure how used it would be as a service beyond Acton Bridge, Hartford and Winsford with the Scotland-Birmingham overtaking it, combined with the faster direct services to Liverpool, I'm not sure how viable it would be.

I have to admit my reasons for looking at this was not to add an extra service at Acton Bridge, et al, but to remove all those stops from one of the Liverpool-Birmingham services to speed it up.

Doesn't one of the LM services run fast from Runcorn to Crewe ? Maybe it now stops at Hartford, think the service from there has been improved. We have no late night service from Liverpool to Acton Bridge on a Saturday, which there is during the week. This is annoying if you are going for an evening out to see a show etc.