Southeastern to OLR: what could happen next?

[NorthKent1989]

Quite interestingly TfL update the Strategic Case for Metroisation every few years - the last update being in 2019. I believe the proposal is broadly the same as the one they sent to Grayling, but with updated modelling.

The 2019 document is an interesting one as it does look more detailed than the previous case for metroisation a few years before.

It interestingly has both the Greenwich and Blackheath/Woolwich lines as being the outer Kent services, the Greenwich route feeds into Thameslink while the Blackheath/Woolwich route feeds into Charing Cross, both at 2tph.

It also appears that Dartford would indeed be the boundary for the stopping services but does include the Sidcup semi fast running to Gravesend.

 

[jon0844]

But won't people struggle to see the trains and stations?

"Your Delay Repay claim has been rejected because the train ran on time."

"I didn't see any train."

"We hear that a lot these days."

 

[zcacmxi]

"Your Delay Repay claim has been rejected because the train ran on time."

"I didn't see any train."

"We hear that a lot these days."

Passengers have much experience in spotting trains on these routes, and also boarding them even when they're at 200% capacity..
No doubt the station staff will anounce anyway, 'please move down the carriages..'

 

[Horizon22]

The 2019 document is an interesting one as it does look more detailed than the previous case for metroisation a few years before.

It interestingly has both the Greenwich and Blackheath/Woolwich lines as being the outer Kent services, the Greenwich route feeds into Thameslink while the Blackheath/Woolwich route feeds into Charing Cross, both at 2tph.

It also appears that Dartford would indeed be the boundary for the stopping services but does include the Sidcup semi fast running to Gravesend.

If it was the case, I would say its much easier for one terminal to be the "Overground" side rather than the other. At present Charing Cross is more "mainline" than Cannon Street (outside peak specials, and who knows how they will go in future), so Cannon St is the more logical option. It would also allow the semi-fast to continue to run to Gravesend from Charing Cross as a Southeastern service, if that was wanted.

The easiest way to do things like metroisation (which I posted upthread is a bit of a pipe dream anyway right now) is standardisation which the Overground (and TfL Rail) love and it does make sense for that sort of service. The problem is passengers are actually very happy with their rather messy and irrational "all stations to all terminals" service which no doubt the Overground would chop up and indeed there would be much more changing at London Bridge. So yes the Overground would offer benefits, but there would be a bit of "give and take" as well.

 

[cle]

If it was the case, I would say its much easier for one terminal to be the "Overground" side rather than the other. At present Charing Cross is more "mainline" than Cannon Street (outside peak specials, and who knows how they will go in future), so Cannon St is the more logical option. It would also allow the semi-fast to continue to run to Gravesend from Charing Cross as a Southeastern service, if that was wanted.

The easiest way to do things like metroisation (which I posted upthread is a bit of a pipe dream anyway right now) is standardisation which the Overground (and TfL Rail) love and it does make sense for that sort of service. The problem is passengers are actually very happy with their rather messy and irrational "all stations to all terminals" service which no doubt the Overground would chop up and indeed there would be much more changing at London Bridge. So yes the Overground would offer benefits, but there would be a bit of "give and take" as well.

I think if a better service is available, passengers will survive and adapt. Chiltern passengers don't have much choice in terminal at all.

London Bridge was rebuilt for this exact purpose. Segregating the terminal lines and massively improving the interchange experience. Lewisham is subpar for this of course, but is an option for certain links.

Not to mention, there is no sole terminus. They all get London Bridge and everything that offers too - connectivity but a major destination for jobs and leisure too. So it's a bit silly.

Crossrail will help a good chunk of them in variety of locations, as HS1 did at the eastern edges for Medway - and the DLR and ELL have added new connectivity to SE routes over the years too. London has evolved eastwards too, and is less concentric in commuting. So I think those grumbles are slightly archaic and less relevant to the polycentric nature of today. That argument is over. The SE network 20 years ago was very single purpose. The map is very different now, as are the demand centres.

Make the change, people will adapt. And if their services are all 6tph and evenly spaced, as good as an outer tube line - they'll soon forget.

 

[Peregrine 4903]

I think if a better service is available, passengers will survive and adapt. Chiltern passengers don't have much choice in terminal at all.

London Bridge was rebuilt for this exact purpose. Segregating the terminal lines and massively improving the interchange experience. Lewisham is subpar for this of course, but is an option for certain links.

Not to mention, there is no sole terminus. They all get London Bridge and everything that offers too - connectivity but a major destination for jobs and leisure too. So it's a bit silly.

Crossrail will help a good chunk of them in variety of locations, as HS1 did at the eastern edges for Medway - and the DLR and ELL have added new connectivity to SE routes over the years too. London has evolved eastwards too, and is less concentric in commuting. So I think those grumbles are slightly archaic and less relevant to the polycentric nature of today. That argument is over. The SE network 20 years ago was very single purpose. The map is very different now, as are the demand centres.

Make the change, people will adapt. And if their services are all 6tph and evenly spaced, as good as an outer tube line - they'll soon forget.

They already are 6tph, so this post is extremely ignorant

 

[JonathanH]

I think if a better service is available, passengers will survive and adapt. Chiltern passengers don't have much choice in terminal at all.

The point you miss though is that Chiltern passengers have made their decision to travel on the basis of one terminal. Southeastern passengers from a given location will have made their decisions on the basis of their favoured terminal.

You rightly note though that services don't omit London Bridge now which makes a bit of a difference.

 

[yorksrob]

Express train to the Kent Coast from Charing Cross via Tonbridge and/or Maidstone East and Ashford please.

Yes, I know, but it was proposed for the last franchise thingy - and it would be more suited to the new leisure railway than the old commuter operation.

 

[cle]

They already are 6tph, so this post is extremely ignorant

On all routes and at even intervals to the same termini - that is the topic. Not just Greenwich. Standardisation.

Not an uneven mishmash. Your comment is the more ignorant for not grasping the context.

 

[Peregrine 4903]

On all routes and at even intervals to the same termini - that is the topic. Not just Greenwich. Standardisation.

Not an uneven mishmash. Your comment is the more ignorant for not grasping the context.

But there are 6tph on the Bexleyheath and Sidcup Lines, your not going to get much more elsewhere, as there really isn't any spare capacity.

And how is it an uneven mismash at the minute?

And plus why, is your method better? Is that what passengers want? I have it on good authority that tfl have greatly misunderstood passenger flows in and around Lewisham in their studies as part of their initial plans with their standardisation proposals.

 

[Horizon22]

I think if a better service is available, passengers will survive and adapt. Chiltern passengers don't have much choice in terminal at all.

London Bridge was rebuilt for this exact purpose. Segregating the terminal lines and massively improving the interchange experience. Lewisham is subpar for this of course, but is an option for certain links.

Not to mention, there is no sole terminus. They all get London Bridge and everything that offers too - connectivity but a major destination for jobs and leisure too. So it's a bit silly.

Crossrail will help a good chunk of them in variety of locations, as HS1 did at the eastern edges for Medway - and the DLR and ELL have added new connectivity to SE routes over the years too. London has evolved eastwards too, and is less concentric in commuting. So I think those grumbles are slightly archaic and less relevant to the polycentric nature of today. That argument is over. The SE network 20 years ago was very single purpose. The map is very different now, as are the demand centres.

Make the change, people will adapt. And if their services are all 6tph and evenly spaced, as good as an outer tube line - they'll soon forget.

Lewisham is indeed sub-par and there would also be service changes there no doubt if there was an even allocation of Overground services that are more clockface. Capacity is a real issue so compromises do have to be made.

I didn't say it can't be done, but it does require an adapation and a compromise solution. There's already 6tph as others have pointed out. I'm not sure the demand centres are all that different in reality other than whatever WFH /commuting looks like post-Covid, which is especially acute at somewhere like Cannon Street. Leisure travellers are still going to want the West End.

And plus why, is your method better? Is that what passengers want? I have it on good authority that tfl have greatly misunderstood passenger flows in and around Lewisham in their studies as part of their initial plans with their standardisation proposals.

I imagine Crossrail will have an impact too and its still a slight unknown as to what passenger flows will look like - although there's earlier modelling there's certainly some surpressed demand and people who have already moved towards LB of Bexley expecting the service to be running by now who are having to trundle into London on slower SE stoppers.

 

[Mikey C]

The Greenwiches seemed to lose their 6tph when Thameslink came in for some reason, now it's 4 (uneven) tph, 2 Southeastern, 2 Thameslink, leaving London Bridge at 09, 18, 39 and 48

 

[cle]

And it's not 6tph in a uniform sense, for true turn up and go. They are all 3x 2tph pairs, that is not a metro.

6tph should not be a cap, so perhaps I was remiss to use it as an indicator of good frequency. 8tph or 10tph is really what these routes should have, and possibly could have, if everything was super streamlined.

 

[EllieAquitrain]

And it's not 6tph in a uniform sense, for true turn up and go. They are all 3x 2tph pairs, that is not a metro.

6tph should not be a cap, so perhaps I was remiss to use it as an indicator of good frequency. 8tph or 10tph is really what these routes should have, and possibly could have, if everything was super streamlined.

Is 8-10tph on these routes even possible while also maintaining the outer services?

(I hope the answer's yes, but it sounds implausible)

 

[Peregrine 4903]

And it's not 6tph in a uniform sense, for true turn up and go. They are all 3x 2tph pairs, that is not a metro.

6tph should not be a cap, so perhaps I was remiss to use it as an indicator of good frequency. 8tph or 10tph is really what these routes should have, and possibly could have, if everything was super streamlined.

I think you understimate just how full the SEML and the Kent routes are and how there is very little capacity for extra services. Simplifying services won't help the fact that Cannon Street is pretty much full in the peak due to the constratins at Borough Market Junction. Charing Cross is similar as it doesn't have enough platform for more services. London Victoria is the only terminal with any spare capcity.

And a lot of TFL's proposals genuinley belong in speculative ideas and are crayonista. I know its slighty different but I've had a look at their 2019 strategy and 18tph stopping on the Sydenham Corridor is not even physically possible. The current stopping headway is 3 and a half minutes, meaning the absolute maximum you could get on the Sydenham Corridor stopping would be 17tph, so I'm not quite sure where TfL had got that from during their proposals.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Oct 2021 ==

Is 8-10tph on these routes even possible while also maintaining the outer services?

(I hope the answer's yes, but it sounds implausible)

There is 8tph on the Greenwich branch between Charlton and Slade Green. But the answer is no, it would be very difficult. Even if you reduced crossing moves at Lewisham, which I do agree from an operational perspective would make some sense, your then constrained by Charing Cross and Cannon Street being at capacity meaning you can't even run any more services anyway.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 8 Oct 2021 ==

The 2019 document is an interesting one as it does look more detailed than the previous case for metroisation a few years before.

It interestingly has both the Greenwich and Blackheath/Woolwich lines as being the outer Kent services, the Greenwich route feeds into Thameslink while the Blackheath/Woolwich route feeds into Charing Cross, both at 2tph.

It also appears that Dartford would indeed be the boundary for the stopping services but does include the Sidcup semi fast running to Gravesend.

A lot of what TfL have said in there will never happen. Either its genuinely impossible, ruin performance instead of improve it like they claim or would require huge infrastructure investments that ween't going to happen pre covid, and certainly won't happen post covid.

 

[317 forever]

This ties in with my experiences - one can find undesirables pretty much anywhere on the franchise, even in what might be thought of as the nicer bits.

I’d say this is fairly unique to a franchise, the only other one which might compare is c2c, but their services generally don’t have the same downtrodden feel - clearly no need for TFL there.

Having said all this, nothing compares to some of the provincial light rail systems. Certain parts of Tyne & Wear Metro are pretty unpleasant to use especially at night, as well as stones through the windows being a fairly typical experience at pretty much any time of day, whilst I’ve seen stops on both the Manchester and Sheffield tram systems where the local kids entertain themselves by throwing stones at any people unfortunate enough to be waiting for a tram. You’re probably less likely to get stabbed though.

Agreed about Dartford and the Medway towns. Horrific places, sadly.

In June we had to leave a train on Tyne & Wear Metro because a window had been smashed, and that was about 3.30pm

 

[NorthKent1989]

London Bridge was rebuilt for this exact purpose. Segregating the terminal lines and massively improving the interchange experience. Lewisham is subpar for this of course, but is an option for certain links.
Not to mention, there is no sole terminus. They all get London Bridge and everything that offers too - connectivity but a major destination for jobs and leisure too. So it's a bit silly.

Crossrail will help a good chunk of them in variety of locations, as HS1 did at the eastern edges for Medway - and the DLR and ELL have added new connectivity to SE routes over the years too. London has evolved eastwards too, and is less concentric in commuting. So I think those grumbles are slightly archaic and less relevant to the polycentric nature of today. That argument is over. The SE network 20 years ago was very single purpose. The map is very different now, as are the demand centres.

Make the change, people will adapt. And if their services are all 6tph and evenly spaced, as good as an outer tube line - they'll soon forget.

The rebuild at London Bridge was supposed to iron out and segregate the line until some bright spark decided to send the Thameslink Rainham service down through Greenwich, thereby rendering the segregation redundant as there is a conflict move at North Kent East Junction.

Yes London has moved eastwards but that doesn’t mean that the West End is no longer the centre.

In an ideal world there would be one line one terminal but the only way this could happen is if all Metro routes terminated at London Bridge while mainline trains went to CX or CS, there isn’t enough capacity for 10tph on any of the lines to allow for one line one terminal, ironically the 2009-2018 period did see the Greenwich branch of the NKL as being one terminal 6tph off peak to Cannon Street with Charing Cross trains in the peaks

The Chiltern comparison isn’t viable since it was built with only one terminal in mind, but even that isn’t completely one line one terminal, if we look at the Aylesbury line they have the fast Chilterns to Marylebone and the stopping Met lines to Aldgate in the city if we’re being technical.

 

[yorksrob]

People will always want to go to charing cross. No point pretending otherwise.

 

[NorthKent1989]

People will always want to go to charing cross. No point pretending otherwise.

This is true, whenever I’ve used the Woolwich line, the Charing Cross trains are usually the busiest, busier than the Cannon Street and Thameslink trains.

Also I saw far fewer people change from a CX train to a CS train at London Bridge, as opposed to a CS train being emptied at London Bridge presumably by those wanting CX trains

 

[theageofthetra]

I do wonder if this will eventually see the whole metro operation ending up with TFL. The 'job' is so different between the mainline and metro depots it may as well be two separate operations anyway.

 

[zwk500]

I do wonder if this will eventually see the whole metro operation ending up with TFL. The 'job' is so different between the mainline and metro depots it may as well be two separate operations anyway.

However it's very unlikely to happen any time soon because A. Many 'metro' routes run beyond the boundary of TfL responsibility and B. the Kent area timetable is very difficult to split into a segregated metro/outer without removing popular journey opportunities, and doing so would risk overloading other public transport options like buses and the DLR.

 

[ScotGG]

What strikes me again are the different perspectives of those who use HS1 and long distance routes into Kent compared to suburban metro services.

One is pretty good and metro is neglected.

That does lend weight to the separation argument, or alternatively someone to finally invest properly in Metro.

Refurbish the 376s and 465s at long last or work out a replacement. Get more staff either on trains or at stations.

Make it a desirable network in London. It isn't right now.

 

[TrenHotel]

Bringing SE Metro into the TfL fare scale rather than the National Rail fare scale would help here too - for example passengers who change at Cannon Street to reach Embankment (for Charing X) are charged more than those who change at London Bridge.

 

[hwl]

I do wonder if this will eventually see the whole metro operation ending up with TFL. The 'job' is so different between the mainline and metro depots it may as well be two separate operations anyway.

The problems is the scale of investment required to split the two.

If it is split then the government's indirect subsidy of HS1 via SE becomes much much more obvious.

 

[4-SUB 4732]

Express train to the Kent Coast from Charing Cross via Tonbridge and/or Maidstone East and Ashford please.

Yes, I know, but it was proposed for the last franchise thingy - and it would be more suited to the new leisure railway than the old commuter operation.

Nothing wrong with this idea. If we’re being totally honest, it should already be happening.

 

[Horizon22]

That would be good. Charing Cross for instance is closing up almost an hour earlier than pre-Covid currently.

 

[ScotGG]

It's not bringing service levels back to pre-covid on some metro routes.

 

[Horizon22]

It's not bringing service levels back to pre-covid on some metro routes.

Probably because some metro routes the demand is not there, and may never return. In some regards I'd say this is a good thing because the Southeastern network was notoriously completely at capacity and reliability was suffering.

 

[ScotGG]

Well it depends if ever more congested roads are acceptable.

And of course areas seeing reductions are also seeing some of the highest housebuilding in the entire country.

If they cut permanently and leave longer gaps they miss out on increased demand down the line.

It's the age old argument with service levels. Build it and they come (with a growing number of new homes) or drive people to other less sustainable forms of transport.