Speculation- New TPE routes or extensions?

[lrbvoyager]

Hi there. I’ve just watched a video from Brian Bancroft where he’s said there’s rumours/possibilities that TPE may be getting route extensions and or new routes. Does anyone know what these would be?

 

[Ballyheigue]

I wonder how possible it would be for TPE to take on the Yorkshire Coast route between Scarborough and Hull and beyond to Sheffield? Are there any limits as to what rolling stock can be used for example? If they can, then it could offer through workings which would piece together the North and South routes offering through connections between places such as Leeds and Bridlington, Beverley and Malton etc.

 

[bunnahabhain]

Hi there. I’ve just watched a video from Brian Bancroft where he’s said there’s rumours/possibilities that TPE may be getting route extensions and or new routes. Does anyone know what these would be?

If Brian told me the sky is blue I'd walk outside and check.

 

[lrbvoyager]

If Brian told me the sky is blue I'd walk outside and check.

I don’t appreciate your snarky comment, there is just no need.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 19 Oct 2025 ==

I wonder how possible it would be for TPE to take on the Yorkshire Coast route between Scarborough and Hull and beyond to Sheffield? Are there any limits as to what rolling stock can be used for example? If they can, then it could offer through workings which would piece together the North and South routes offering through connections between places such as Leeds and Bridlington, Beverley and Malton etc.

Sounds quite feasible. Do you think they would expand West coast operations?

 

[D6130]

I don’t appreciate your snarky comment, there is just no need.

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 19 Oct 2025 ==


Sounds quite feasible. Do you think they would expand West coast operations?

I would have thought that the main obstacle to expanding both routes would be availability of rolling stock. Anyway the advent of Great British Railways may well bring about a huge reshuffle of what are now known as TPE services.

 

[1D53]

If Brian told me the sky is blue I'd walk outside and check.

Bingo.

 

[Peter A]

Personally I think there's very few Northern services that would make sense under TPE's operation at this stage - and in fact the plan is seemingly for the Manchester to Huddersfield (and on to York via Castleford) stopping services to pass over to Northern from TPE in the future. The Scarborough to Sheffield service would neatly tie together the North and South operations, but I'd argue the Scarborough to Hull section is very much a local stopping service and only the Hull to Sheffield bit has more of an intercity feel.

The new Leeds to Sheffield express service Northern are starting in December I think is the only real contender - definitely more of an intercity service and would connect the North and South routes - would probs make more sense if it could continue somewhere east of Leeds

 

[Yorkshire09876]

How about the government stops wasting time rearranging the deckchairs and makes a start on designing in integrated system with far fewer business units than at present? Northern and Transpennine do not need to be separate entities at all.

 

[lrbvoyager]

I would have thought that the main obstacle to expanding both routes would be availability of rolling stock. Anyway the advent of Great British Railways may well bring about a huge reshuffle of what are now known as TPE services.

They are getting a new fleet after the TRU.

 

[stevieinselby]

I wonder how possible it would be for TPE to take on the Yorkshire Coast route between Scarborough and Hull and beyond to Sheffield? Are there any limits as to what rolling stock can be used for example? If they can, then it could offer through workings which would piece together the North and South routes offering through connections between places such as Leeds and Bridlington, Beverley and Malton etc.

What benefit would there be in the Scarborough to Sheffield via Hull services being operated by TPE instead of Northern? It wouldn't make any difference to anyone, and it would just confuse people who expect a "TransPennine Express" train to be an express service that goes across the Pennines, instead of an all-shacks train that hugs the east coast. I know there are already TPE services that don't really fit the model, but the all-shacks services to Huddersfield are due to revert to Northern in due course and so TPE will at least be back to only operating long-distance express services, which the Yorkshire Coast service really isn't.

 

[lrbvoyager]

How about the government stops wasting time rearranging the deckchairs and makes a start on designing in integrated system with far fewer business units than at present? Northern and Transpennine do not need to be separate entities at all.

So northern should be operating Liverpool to Glasgow up the WCML at 110mph?

 

[brad465]

So northern should be operating Liverpool to Glasgow up the WCML at 110mph?

GWR and EMR are prime examples of TOCs that run both intercity and local services over a large patch.

 

[Yorkshire09876]

So northern should be operating Liverpool to Glasgow up the WCML at 110mph?

Depends on what the business units were, but under a sensible system that would be in the intercity unit.

There really is no need to keep anything like the current number of operators. Three to five business units should be enough - Intercity, Network SE or something similar, and regional railways, which could be one unit or could possibly be split into two or three (north, midlands and south excluding the London area). Scotland and Wales & Borders could stay as they are, with longer distance services into them (e.g. from London) operated by the intercity business unit. Basically something similar to what BR did.

 

[61653 HTAFC]

I wonder how possible it would be for TPE to take on the Yorkshire Coast route between Scarborough and Hull and beyond to Sheffield? Are there any limits as to what rolling stock can be used for example? If they can, then it could offer through workings which would piece together the North and South routes offering through connections between places such as Leeds and Bridlington, Beverley and Malton etc.

Back in Northern Spirit days, some Manchester to Hull fast trains operated under the TPE brand were extended to Beverley and Bridlington. Not sure why Malton is on your list though, that's already served by the TPE Scarborough service.

If Brian told me the sky is blue I'd walk outside and check.

I've no idea who this Brian Bancroft fella is.

I would have thought that the main obstacle to expanding both routes would be availability of rolling stock. Anyway the advent of Great British Railways may well bring about a huge reshuffle of what are now known as TPE services.

As you say the advent of GBR means that things may look very different. Though if we assume that the current business units remain there will be stock freed up by Northern taking the Huddersfield stopping services back.

So northern should be operating Liverpool to Glasgow up the WCML at 110mph?

The argument is more that there won't be a "Northern" or a "Trans Pennine Express" at all, and whatever takes their place won't be left with the stock that those operations have in 2025 forever. I thought that by now we'd have all worked out that in most cases rolling stock remains with the routes regardless of who is operating those routes. I remember people thinking that Virgin Trains East Coast would mean Pendolinos to Leeds and Newcastle! If Northern and TPE were merged it would still be 397s operating those routes.

Back in the 1980s some cross-Pennine fast services extended as far as Holyhead. Leaving aside the rolling stock constraints for a moment I'd like to see that return, but I can't imagine the devolved Welsh government would be happy with it. Realistically I can't see many possibilities though I would like to see the regilar extensions of Liverpool services beyond Newcastle to Edinburgh come back.

There's perhaps more potential for changes on the south route, where Lincoln and/or Nottingham always struck me as more suitable destinations than the decidedly down-at-heel Grimsby and Cleethorpes.

 

[johntea]

Manchester - York takes roughly the same time no matter if you catch the 'stopper' service via Wakefield or the 'express' service via Leeds anyway - for us that live on the Wakefield line the fact we don't have to faff about changing at Leeds is very much welcomed! Very much a case of 'build it and they will come'

Although I do want to be slightly greedy and ask for maybe an extra 22:59 York departure even if it just terminated at Wakefield just to make some extra connections from York possible

 

[A S Leib]

Was the plan for Liverpool – Norwich for the Liverpool – Nottingham section to be given to TPE rather than staying with EMR after being split, and can it be assumed that that's not happening in the near future?

Restoring Saltburn extensions to hourly and having more Liverpool – Carlisle services would be nice, but neither would be new routes or extensions.

 

[mike57]

I wonder how possible it would be for TPE to take on the Yorkshire Coast route between Scarborough and Hull and beyond to Sheffield?

To be honest as a regular user of this route from our local station at Bempton, I would rather it was left alone. Its reasonably reliable, and uses 170s for the most part which are fairly comfortable. From a passenger point of view I cannot see what benefits moving it (back) to TPE would bring.

Back in the early 2000's the Hull Scarborough route was partly operated by the precursor of TPE as an extension of the Manchester Hull service, including the calls at the small stations. Whilst this gave better connections to West Yorkshire connections south were more difficult.

I also wonder if 185s would be subject to lower speed limits as they are quite heavy.

The current hourly service from Scarborough meets most peoples needs. The single line section from Bridlington to Hunmanby rules out anything more than an hourly service each way. If you are travelling south then the connection at Doncaster for the ECML is fairly easy, and for Birmingham and the SW a change in Sheffield. The more difficult journeys are North, but unless you had a new track giving access to Brid-Scarbourough from York which isn't going to happen joining up the routes isn't going to save much (Edit, and missing Scarborough isn't really an option anyway) and will potentially import delays from further afield, which will in turn then affect the single line sections giving knock on delays and making the service less reliable for local travellers, who are probably over 50% of passengers.

 

[Sir Felix Pole]

Rather more likely, I would have thought, that TPE is going to be divvied up between GBR (Eastern) and GBR (NW & Central) or whatever the regions are going to be called.

 

[lrbvoyager]

Was the plan for Liverpool – Norwich for the Liverpool – Nottingham section to be given to TPE rather than staying with EMR after being split, and can it be assumed that that's not happening in the near future?

Restoring Saltburn extensions to hourly and having more Liverpool – Carlisle services would be nice, but neither would be new routes or extensions.

I agree, Liverpool to Carlisle services being increased would be nice as we only see 3 return services a day!

== Doublepost prevention - post automatically merged: 20 Oct 2025 ==

Does anyone thing Manchester to Aberdeen up the west coast would be a possibility?

 

[The Planner]

Does anyone thing Manchester to Aberdeen up the west coast would be a possibility?

No. Not unless an OAO fancies losing some money on it.

 

[bunnahabhain]

Was the plan for Liverpool – Norwich for the Liverpool – Nottingham section to be given to TPE rather than staying with EMR after being split, and can it be assumed that that's not happening in the near future?

That was the plan in early 2020, Sheffield guards were in the recruitment process for drivers then Covid-19 hit and that was put on pause then cancelled outright as it was much more expensive to transfer the route to TPE. EMR then went through a process to open a depot for drivers and guards at Liverpool (they would've signed Liverpool to Nottingham, Crewe to Newark), they got as far as putting drivers into a talent pool before the plug was pulled as it was too expensive and less efficient to have a depot working the route from Liverpool. All this shouldn't be a surprise as Regional Railways looked into this in the early 1990s and concentrated the route on Nottingham for economy reasons.

 

[Ianigsy]

To be honest as a regular user of this route from our local station at Bempton, I would rather it was left alone. Its reasonably reliable, and uses 170s for the most part which are fairly comfortable. From a passenger point of view I cannot see what benefits moving it (back) to TPE would bring.

Back in the early 2000's the Hull Scarborough route was partly operated by the precursor of TPE as an extension of the Manchester Hull service, including the calls at the small stations. Whilst this gave better connections to West Yorkshire connections south were more difficult.

I also wonder if 185s would be subject to lower speed limits as they are quite heavy.

The current hourly service from Scarborough meets most peoples needs. The single line section from Bridlington to Hunmanby rules out anything more than an hourly service each way. If you are travelling south then the connection at Doncaster for the ECML is fairly easy, and for Birmingham and the SW a change in Sheffield. The more difficult journeys are North, but unless you had a new track giving access to Brid-Scarbourough from York which isn't going to happen joining up the routes isn't going to save much (Edit, and missing Scarborough isn't really an option anyway) and will potentially import delays from further afield, which will in turn then affect the single line sections giving knock on delays and making the service less reliable for local travellers, who are probably over 50% of passengers.

Having done a Leeds-Bridlington return last week, I’d be inclined to agree. If you want any more through trains reversing in Hull, then the station approaches need opening out -as it stands, you have about half a dozen platforms depending on a couple of approach lines and it’s far too easy to import delays from South Yorkshire to the coast line. Last Monday it was a speed restriction somewhere near Sheffield, but the knock on delays meant that I missed my connection and another service was turned back at Filey to pick up its southbound path.

 

[atntotpe]

I wonder if the TPE services that transferred to Northern in 2016 would go back to tpe as the drivers that are employed by northern are still on tpe contracts with sundays in the working week and the conductors are also on tpe contracts with committed sundays in the former tpe links at northern, also i see that class 350s were having tests this week again in manchester, they would be perfect for Liverpool to Oxenholme and Blackpool to Manchester Airport if they brought back a limited stop express service and could be used for scottish services if no class 397 available instead of cancelling a service, tpe conductors have commited sunday as well so at least you could guarantee a reliable Sunday service on the busy routes in the north west, i would also transfer Liverpool to MIA and Liverpool to Blackpool to tpe as Tpe preston sign liverpool to preston and Liverpool tpe depot sign to manchester as then you could guarantee a reliable sunday service on those routes as well.

 

[Howardh]

In my little ideal world, TPE would go to Blackpool and also cover the Furness lines (yesterday I travelled from Manchester Airport on a three-car Northern terminating at Millom); however they don't have the stock I presume, and as GBR approaches, will be all one company anyway(??). That aside if TPE did do Airport - Barrow - Carlisle, there would (hopefully!!) be catering on most services. Will GBR allow for catering on the now Northern services in future?

 

[coxxy]

Hi there. I’ve just watched a video from Brian Bancroft where he’s said there’s rumours/possibilities that TPE may be getting route extensions and or new routes. Does anyone know what these would be?

Usually it quantity over quality with Brian. He talks a lot, but its probably a good 80-85% waffle.

 

[Djgr]

How about the government stops wasting time rearranging the deckchairs and makes a start on designing in integrated system with far fewer business units than at present? Northern and Transpennine do not need to be separate entities at all.

Well isn't nationalising all the TOCs the required first step in all this? And isn't that what the government is doing?

 

[lrbvoyager]

I would really like TPE to take over Carlisle to Newcastle as the northern service is quite frankly shocking. The 2 coach 156s and 158s are always rammed and are extremely uncomfortable. Maybe if they did Dumfries to Newcastle? I know that something like this is really u likely to happen but it would be great.

 

[A S Leib]

I would really like TPE to take over Carlisle to Newcastle as the northern service is quite frankly shocking. The 2 coach 156s and 158s are always rammed and are extremely uncomfortable. Maybe if they did Dumfries to Newcastle? I know that something like this is really u likely to happen but it would be great.

Even if they did, that wouldn't improve the situation without more funding.

 

[lrbvoyager]

Even if they did, that wouldn't improve the situation without more funding.

I mean ideally it would be electrified which would allow for west coast and east coast diversions in case of disruption. I would rather have a 185 to a 156 any day.

 

[Bertie the bus]

I would really like TPE to take over Carlisle to Newcastle as the northern service is quite frankly shocking. The 2 coach 156s and 158s are always rammed and are extremely uncomfortable. Maybe if they did Dumfries to Newcastle? I know that something like this is really u likely to happen but it would be great.

It isn't unlikely to happen. There is no chance whatsoever of it happening, just like there is no chance of a Manchester - Aberdeen service or any of your other random ideas involving rail services in Cumbria.