Silly Speculative Crossrail Glasgow Services

[Peter0124]

**Completely Speculative, Imaginary and Unrealistic service ideas**

How about linking Gourock and Helensburgh via a grand tour of Glasgow's East End?

Gourock - Fort Matilda - Greenock West - Greenock Central - Cartsdyke - Bogston - Port Glasgow - Woodhall - Langbank - Bishopton - Paisley St James - Paisley Gilmour Street - Hillington West - Hillington East - Cardonald - [New station at GLASGOW CROSS] - Bellgrove - Carntyne - Shettleston - Garrowhill - Easterhouse - Blairhill - Motherwell - Airbles - Hamilton Central - Hamilton West - Blantyre - Newton - Cambuslang - Rutherglen - {All Stations to Helensburgh Central via Singer}

What other services could you do with an electrified City Union line? What are the risks associated with running such services? This is purely for fun and not to be taken seriously as these are probably unworkable services.

 

[Dr Hoo]

What are the risks associated with running such services?

Bankruptcy? (Is there a prize?)

 

[507020]

At first I thought it was going to be about running through services to Glasgow from the Elizabeth Line Crossrail tunnel in London when it opens in a few weeks

 

[ian1944]

About as likely as linking Gourock and Helensburgh with a five-mile rail tunnel, which would probably cost more than issuing all those wanting to make the through journey with personal jetpacks.

 

[Falcon1200]

There have been many calls over the years for passenger services over the City Union Line, but I have never seen any detail of what service would operate; While on the face of it linking services through Glasgow would be a Good Thing, just like Thameslink, there is the great disadvantage that such trains would no longer serve Glasgow Central. I doubt there is enough traffic potential for these trains to be additional, ie over and above the existing timetable, so it would mean diverting trains away from a well located terminal, with a multitude of connections to other routes, to a stop in the Far East (of Glasgow), a long way from the city centre and shopping areas. For me it is a non-starter. Sorry !

 

[d9009alycidon]

The City Union Line was an integral part to the original Clyderail proposals, and included a new south to west spur at High Stret with the tunnel opened out to allow High Street Station to be move further West. This was also tied in with the proposed eastern link of the inner ring road that was never built. The High cost of the spur and the cancellation of the inner ring road resulted in the project being shelved

 

[numtot12345]

The City Union Line was an integral part to the original Clyderail proposals, and included a new south to west spur at High Stret with the tunnel opened out to allow High Street Station to be move further West. This was also tied in with the proposed eastern link of the inner ring road that was never built. The High cost of the spur and the cancellation of the inner ring road resulted in the project being shelved

The vacant land where the high street curve would be located has plans to be built over by a developer now too, unfortunately.

 

[jagardner1984]

Surely the much more likely (if at all) - Cross rail proposal involves a Central / Queen Street North -South Sub surface tunnel, opening the North facing lines (Edinburgh and the lines to Aberdeen / Inverness) and the south facing lines (Greenock, East Kilbride, Ayrshire Coast, and destinations on the WCML) to connect as through services.

A tunnel from Springburn to somewhere around Bridge Street / Tradeston.

This would obviously also be breathtakingly expensive, but once the new GLQ is full, running services without turning them around seems to me one of the few ways of increasing throughput. One would assume however COVID and new Working from Home has probably set back growth on the GLQ-EDB corridor (which is the majority of the traffic out of GLQ) by several years. So ultimately you run the services from Greenock to Edinburgh not specifically as a method of providing connectivity between the two, but to, in a Thameslink style - increase the frequency by taking the termini out of the city centre ....

 

[d9009alycidon]

Surely the much more likely (if at all) - Cross rail proposal involves a Central / Queen Street North -South Sub surface tunnel, opening the North facing lines (Edinburgh and the lines to Aberdeen / Inverness) and the south facing lines (Greenock, East Kilbride, Ayrshire Coast, and destinations on the WCML) to connect as through services.

A tunnel from Springburn to somewhere around Bridge Street / Tradeston.

This would obviously also be breathtakingly expensive, but once the new GLQ is full, running services without turning them around seems to me one of the few ways of increasing throughput. One would assume however COVID and new Working from Home has probably set back growth on the GLQ-EDB corridor (which is the majority of the traffic out of GLQ) by several years. So ultimately you run the services from Greenock to Edinburgh not specifically as a method of providing connectivity between the two, but to, in a Thameslink style - increase the frequency by taking the termini out of the city centre ....

This has been proposed on at least two occasions, and the last one was discussed on this forum at length. As you say cost is prohibitive and any such link is unlikely to be built

 

[Ken H]

Inverness - Dumfries?