Suggestions for Dawlish avoiding route(s)

[Buttsy]

I would wager that the Okehampton route has a better BCR at this time than a Dawlish avoiding line regardless of Okehampton's possible use as a diversionary route. IF you add in the potential as a diversionary route, then it may stack up a sufficiently good BCR to re-open, whereas without diversions it wouldn't. Until the various BCRs have been carried out, no-one really knows.

 

[richw]

Just looking at satellite images of Devon, and to me the most sensible diversion route would be from Newton Abbot to Exeter following the route of the A380. The A380 is surrounded by fields from the location the railway currently passes under it all the way From the end of the A380 it can continue through fields to meet the existing line just outside Exminister

I have attached a illustration I have knocked up in about 2 seconds, and is very rough. All areas passed is currently fields/ wasteland on satellite images.
The red is the approx. current route, the purple what I deem to be a suitable route and will cut times/mileage from Exeter to Newton Abbot

 

[Bald Rick]

But these investments are a classically political decision because if we simply made investment choices based on BCR, nothing outside London/SE would ever get done.

That's just plain wrong. Hence the investment in countless schemes and projects outside London / South east with great BCRs, not least almost all the electrification projects. And, incidentally, several schemes in LSE not happening because of poor BCRs.
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Moreover, investing half a billion pounds in LHR before the airports commission had reported does feel a little like cart-before-horse.

Now that I do agree with. Although it is difficult to see any recommendation from the commission that does not include Heathrow with a long term future.

 

[The Ham]

well of course i'm not the decision maker so my opinion doesn't matter, but last year there was no doubt a clamour in many parts of the country for better gritting and snow shifting equipment, this year where's the snow?

Bad snow isn't an annual event, however unlike snow moving equipment which has a VERY limited use, a railway line which provides a diversion route as well as serving two towns and a national park which is popular with tourists would have a use regardless of whether the line through Dawlish is open or not.

 

[TheKnightWho]

And what are you doing exactly apart from,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton.

And we will try and come up with any justification for it.

Try reading the thread. You might notice I haven't actually posted very much.

 

[tbtc]

I would rather money be spent on a proper diversion which improves journey time on the mainline, and doesn't result in Torbay having to bus it

Agreed - the poor people of Torbay keep getting forgotten about on this thread - the passenger numbers down that branch are a lot bigger than you'd get to Okehampton.

If you want to make case for other parts of Devon to have better rail access then fine, but don't use Dawlish as an excuse.

Agreed. Let the Okehampton route be seen alongside other potential investments in the south west of England like reopening another route (Portishead), electrifying a line (B&H) or redoubling a line (Yeovil).

Just because it seems obviously far too expensive to you does not mean that it is the case. £500m for this sounds suspiciously like the £80bn for HS2 we keep hearing bandied about

...and yet some of those in favour of an Okehampton line were quick to jump upon the "TWENTY MILLION POUNDS A DAY" cost to Plymouth/ Cornwall of the Dawlish line being closed.

And what are you doing exactly apart from,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton.

And we will try and come up with any justification for it.

Your points on south coast travel are appreciated. I have posted here that I think a huge market is being missed and all because of the split between SWT and FGW

I think that there is a potential market there, but the limited capacity on the Yeovil line means that TOCs are only interested in using the paths on London services.

If it were to be (re)doubled then there'd be scope for Brighton/ Portsmouth - Southampton - Exeter - Torbay/Cornwall services without taking scarce paths from Waterloo trains.

Well, you get people hopping on and off, going for walks and visiting places, so I've no doubt the raw entries and exit data underestimates the value of the route

Whenever I quote the national statistics, people are convinced that they understimate the figures on a particular line...

They may understimate, they may overestimate - there are a lot of quiet midweeks in winter compared to weekends in the summer holidays - but in the absence of any other data, they seem a reasonable figure to use.

As I mentioned, those two-carriage (actually, very often 3-carriage DMU's as many services have to be strengthened by a 153) are often very busy when I'm on them

Its still generally just a 158 every two hours though - not exactly a busy route and not a lot of passengers for intermediate stations north of Settle.

The other point that I mentioned previously is that Okehampton and Tavistock are both rather larger in terms of population than Appleby and Settle, so they do begin with a greater intermediate passenger potential to start off with

Okehampton and Tavistock already have railway stations relatively nearby (Crediton, Bere Alston etc) - you'd have to consider that any new stations may cannibalise the figures for nearby stations.

An interesting conundrum. If we thought that redoubling the existing route were likely to generate the same number of new journeys (which I doubt would be the case, as it would not be suffering from the same level of suppressed demand)

I think it'd be easier to get an extra hundred passengers a day on an already busy route (where single track bottlenecks mean supply is suppressed) than in serving a couple of towns with a combined population of ~20,000.

But, it is something that they can take the credit for, and coming out of a recession (which frankly, most people haven't come out of yet) good news is something that's in short supply

Yes, but they aren't going to win votes by trumpeting the fact that they were in favour of something that their closest opponents were also voting for (and, lets face it, 90% of the seats west of Bristol have the coalition in the first two places).

Why should the peninsula be subsidising other areas by receiving less rail spending per head of population than others - and less than a third of the money than received by a resident of the South East. There has been substantial infrastructure investment in railways elsewhere and now good quantities of electrification coming on stream but Devon Cornwall and Somerset gets virtually nothing

the South West has received rail investment per head of £212 [2011] which reduced by 13% over the previous 5 years. The UK average was £363 which went up by £41 or 14% over the same period. So whilst you have a point about mass transit, the South West is not getting its fair share however you look at it

No ones suggesting that everywhere in the country should have the same level of infrastructure spend

I got the impression that LateThanNever thought that the south west should have the same level of infrastructure spend per head of population as the rest of the country - I'm trying to explain that (under) a couple of million people spread over several thousand square miles means that rail investment is always going to be weaker there than in big cities. I'm not saying "no investment", just that the "why do Londoners get more money invested in infrastructure per head of population" argument doesn't work.

Another thing to consider is that single track would most likely be cheaper

It would, but as I've said you can't have much single track if you want to be able to cope with two/three trains an hour through Okehampton in each direction on days when the Dawlish line is closed (since this is one of the chief justifications for the Okehampton route).

So, if the cost is £400m +/- 25%, is it good value? Well, I suppose it depends on whether this would be net new money (ie, that wouldn't be spent elsewhere on the network)? If so, I'm all for it (after all, the west facing junction at Heathrow which seems to be a large sop to Theresa May MP is costing £500m) - but if it had to come from other improvements it would be more difficult to justify

I agree that 500m for one curve seems like questionable value for money.

Its costing £9m (?) for 500m at Todmorden - these things cost money - especially when you have to reconfigure signalling (like you'd have to if linking two current branchlines, like at Okehampton).

I think that a west facing junction at Heathrow will see many more passengers than Okehampton or Todmorden though - there's a clear demand there.

last year there was no doubt a clamour in many parts of the country for better gritting and snow shifting equipment, this year where's the snow?

Yes, the SOMETHING MUST BE DONE lobby forget how hysterical they were a year ago - we had bad floods in Sheffield seven years ago but the Environment Agency spent a few quid on infrastructure (and slowing rivers down etc) and things have been generally okay since then.

 

[47802]

Bad snow isn't an annual event, however unlike snow moving equipment which has a VERY limited use, a railway line which provides a diversion route as well as serving two towns and a national park which is popular with tourists would have a use regardless of whether the line through Dawlish is open or not.

And a point which I repeat again and again is that you can serve the two small towns and the national park without spending £400 to £500 million, and yes it will provide a slower diversion but it doesn't really solve the problems of the Dawlish Mainline.

 

[yorksrob]

And what planned Signalling work are you talking about?, In the current proposal to Tavistock for instance I don't think there any significant changes to signalling planned that's why its only going to be a shuttle to Bere Alston.

I was thnking, are there any planned improvements unde Network Rail's massive nationwide resignalling programme that could be brought forward. Or are there any upgrade works on the Exeter - Okehampton section that need to take place anyway, regardless of the reinstatement of the central section.

 

[HSTEd]

£400m would probably come close to paying for relocating the existing line with underground stations in Dawlish, Dawlish Warren and Teignmouth.

 

[yorksrob]

Come on, it's a bit more than 'one curve'. And it opens up the whole Western corridor to direct rail services to Heathrow, something that today requires either a lengthy diversion with change, and/or a bus / coach.

So I suggest that it will benefit many more people, economically and socially, all year, than providing a diversionary route for Dawlish could ever do.

The assessment methodology will be the same, and they are both projects to open new railways by joining up bits of existing railways. So if the Heathrow western access comes out with a better BCR than Okehampton, will you accept that it should come further up the priority list?

I've already waxed lyrical about my views regarding BCR's on this thread, suffice to point out that those people already have options to travel by train to Heathrow, so whilst it would potentially generate revenue for the railway, the regeneration benefits for the area are small and the benefit to the individual amounts to little more than a time saving.
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If you want to make case for other parts of Devon to have better rail access then fine, but don't use Dawlish as an excuse.

Dream on. You'll never build a business case for such investment by concentrating on one beneficial aspect alone. That's why you need to combine local connectivity with resilience.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

And what are you doing exactly apart from,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton,
we must open Okehampton.

And we will try and come up with any justification for it.

we must not open Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton,
we must notopen Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton.

And we will try and come up with any justification for it.

Amended for you

 

[The Ham]

In what spending £500 million for a couple of towns with 20,000 people in them, which can have a service without spending £500 million.

I would rather money be spent on a proper diversion which improves journey time on the mainline, and doesn't result in Torbay having to bus it, and a reduced service and longer journey time on the diversion if Dawlish is out of action.

If you want to make case for other parts of Devon to have better rail access then fine, but don't use Dawlish as an excuse.

The problem is the best, in terms of journey time improvements, route for the Dawlish Avoiding Line (DAL) misses out the stations along the coast, which is where the majority of services to Torbay call (of the 35 services only 7 are express services and even then most of them call at at least one of the stations along the cost).

That then means that either most if not all of Torbay services carry on trundling along the coast which then reduces the amount of benefit that the DAL has as it is then only about 30 services a day in each direction which would benefit (in which case it is probably better to spend the money improving the line speed mostly between Reading and Exeter with a bit of an improvement Newton Abbot and Plymouth to get the same journey time improvements for passengers to Plymouth but it benefits more passengers as there is also some improvement for passengers from Exeter).

Although it does mean that Torbay is not cut off if there are problems at Dawlish. If you want better journey times in the SW the business case needs to stand on its own, but don't use Dawlish as an excuse.
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And a point which I repeat again and again is that you can serve the two small towns and the national park without spending £400 to £500 million, and yes it will provide a slower diversion but it doesn't really solve the problems of the Dawlish Mainline.

I never said that it would solve (long term) the problems of the Mainline, rather it is a (fairly) quick and (fairly) cheap fix which brings other benefits whilst we plan (well) what to do about the Mainline and not just do the bare minimum so that it works but miss out on other benefits.

For instance we could build a mainline which meets the requirement of today's services, however 10 to 20 years later we could be kicking ourselves for not doing x or y which was missed out as it would have lead to a longer building process and would then add a whole load of costs to do, making their business case non-viable.

 

[TheKnightWho]

...and yet some of those in favour of an Okehampton line were quick to jump upon the "TWENTY MILLION POUNDS A DAY" cost to Plymouth/ Cornwall of the Dawlish line being closed.

The big difference being who reported those figures. Conveniently easy to forget, though.

£20m a day is not a particularly high estimate when you consider all the potential spending lost - tourism is obviously only a small part of that.

Once again, just because something seems "obvious" does not mean that you're correct. I don't know how many times I have to say this before it sinks in.

 

[Cliveblackpool]

And what planned Signalling work are you talking about?, In the current proposal to Tavistock for instance I don't think there any significant changes to signalling planned that's why its only going to be a shuttle to Bere Alston.

Basically the line to Tavistock will be just a siding tacked onto Bere Alston where the stop blocks are, and a platform on the SW corner of Tavistock, just short of the A390 Callington road bridge was. Very much the cheapest option possible.
The Timetable is one train on the branch/es at one time, same as it is now.
One extra train required. The 2 trains will pass on the main line Plymouth side of St Budeaux junction.
Timetable Page 46. http://www.kilbridegroup.com/tavistock/Docs/Evidence of Deliverability - 03 Sections 12-18.pdf

Imo both a Tavistock, and a separate Okehampton branch as proposed will struggle initially.
A through route through Dartmoor would be successful. Two big cities either end of it.
Probably as a diversion for Dawlish helps to add another say 10% weight to its reinstatement.

 

[pistonvalve]

Why not single the Dawlish section along the seawall. Use the space vacated by the removed down line to reinforce the wall such that the up line is much less vulnerable to high tides etc. Re-instate the Bere Alston - Meldon link and use as a diversionary/local service route.

I am no expert, but I would have thought a couple of miles of single line on the GW main line would effect the throughput available to any extent.

Perhaps someone on here could give a clue as to the number of trains per hour which could be achieved over say a two mile single section.

Mike.

 

[po8crg]

It seems to me that there are two different things meant by the "Okehampton route"

1. A relatively lightly engineered, mostly single-track line, with a few loops, probably limited to 75 mph or so, providing tourist access to Dartmoor and commuter service to Plymouth and Exeter for Okehampton and Tavistock. This would not be able to carry 2tph HSTs Plymouth-Exeter plus the local services, but would offer some relief service for a Dawlish blockade.

2. A more heavily engineered line, either single-track with many loops or double-track throughout, capable of running a significant number of HSTs, and engineered and signalled for 90 mph or so on the straight stretches (slowing for curves). This would be able to cover both hourly HSTs.

For the purposes of local service, option 1 is entirely adequate. The additional costs of going to option 2 are very considerable, and the only benefit would be during a Dawlish blockade - the route stopping at Newton Abbot and Totnes is always going to be preferable for long-distance expresses when both lines are available.

However, as a alternative route during a Dawlish blockade, it would be inadequate for more than a token service. It would, though, keep the sleeper (used by a lot of the local MPs) running.

The key question will be what the political pressure looks like in May 2015. If it's still intense after the General Election (when the Lib Dems and Tories are much less likely to be in government together), then I'd prefer to see an option 1 Tavistock-Okehampton opened than a rush-job at the DAL.

The DAL will need a lot of careful planning and alternative route consideration, so it really shouldn't be built in a hurry under political pressure.

 

[swt_passenger]

Why not single the Dawlish section along the seawall. Use the space vacated by the removed down line to reinforce the wall such that the up line is much less vulnerable to high tides etc.

You don't need to single the section along the sea wall. The vast majority of the length is already reinforced outside of the wall - the problem area (which didn't have the same thickness for reasons explained a few times earlier in the other Dawlish sea wall thread) will no longer suffer the same problem once the current concrete pour is finished.

Indeed given the amount of concrete being pumped in it will probably still be there when the rest of Devon has been washed away...

 

[47802]

The problem is the best, in terms of journey time improvements, route for the Dawlish Avoiding Line (DAL) misses out the stations along the coast, which is where the majority of services to Torbay call (of the 35 services only 7 are express services and even then most of them call at at least one of the stations along the cost).

That then means that either most if not all of Torbay services carry on trundling along the coast which then reduces the amount of benefit that the DAL has as it is then only about 30 services a day in each direction which would benefit (in which case it is probably better to spend the money improving the line speed mostly between Reading and Exeter with a bit of an improvement Newton Abbot and Plymouth to get the same journey time improvements for passengers to Plymouth but it benefits more passengers as there is also some improvement for passengers from Exeter).

Although it does mean that Torbay is not cut off if there are problems at Dawlish. If you want better journey times in the SW the business case needs to stand on its own, but don't use Dawlish as an excuse.
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I never said that it would solve (long term) the problems of the Mainline, rather it is a (fairly) quick and (fairly) cheap fix which brings other benefits whilst we plan (well) what to do about the Mainline and not just do the bare minimum so that it works but miss out on other benefits.

For instance we could build a mainline which meets the requirement of today's services, however 10 to 20 years later we could be kicking ourselves for not doing x or y which was missed out as it would have lead to a longer building process and would then add a whole load of costs to do, making their business case non-viable.

So your saying that spending money on a Dawlish diversion is not justified for all Plymouth and Cornish expresses plus Torbay services when the Dawlish route is shut, but that it is justified to spend loads on an occasionally used diversion via Okehampton!.

Your saying open Okehampton and then possibly Dawlish at a later date. So why spend the money twice when you can just fix now with a Dawlish diversion.

As far as reduced journey time goes the key issue is not increasing journey time on route that isn't particularly fast as it is, but obviously any reduction is a bonus.

 

[najaB]

Is a Dawlish avoiding line required at all? The figures being bandied around (£400-500M) would pay for one heck of a breakwater protecting the current infrastructure! Surely it would be better to stop the line washing away in the first place, rather than spend millions on an alternative route to be used when it does.

 

[HSTEd]

Unfortunately the orthodoxy these days is that flood and sea defences are pointless and we must just adapt and abandon land close to sea level - even though the Dutch have no such model (creating artificial flood plains in polders doesn't really count since the land would be flooded with only freshwater in almost all cases).

 

[Trainbuff]

Basically the line to Tavistock will be just a siding tacked onto Bere Alston where the stop blocks are, and a platform on the SW corner of Tavistock, just short of the A390 Callington road bridge was. Very much the cheapest option possible.
The Timetable is one train on the branch/es at one time, same as it is now.
One extra train required. The 2 trains will pass on the main line Plymouth side of St Budeaux junction.
Timetable Page 46. http://www.kilbridegroup.com/tavistock/Docs/Evidence of Deliverability - 03 Sections 12-18.pdf

Imo both a Tavistock, and a separate Okehampton branch as proposed will struggle initially.
A through route through Dartmoor would be successful. Two big cities either end of it.
Probably as a diversion for Dawlish helps to add another say 10% weight to its reinstatement.

This tiimetable information is out of date. Please refer to the thread below

'Tavistock to Bere Alston reinstatement moves closer'

 

[yorksrob]

...and yet some of those in favour of an Okehampton line were quick to jump upon the "TWENTY MILLION POUNDS A DAY" cost to Plymouth/ Cornwall of the Dawlish line being closed.

Whenever I quote the national statistics, people are convinced that they understimate the figures on a particular line...

They may understimate, they may overestimate - there are a lot of quiet midweeks in winter compared to weekends in the summer holidays - but in the absence of any other data, they seem a reasonable figure to use.

These to quotes suggest that you're as quick as anyone to jump on a statistic that suits your case and pooh pooh one that doesn't (I suspect we're all guilty of it to an extent !)

Its still generally just a 158 every two hours though - not exactly a busy route and not a lot of passengers for intermediate stations north of Settle.

But still recognised for the value it provides in the community. It's hard to imagine the area attracting the same level of tourism without the access the route brings.

Okehampton and Tavistock already have railway stations relatively nearby (Crediton, Bere Alston etc) - you'd have to consider that any new stations may cannibalise the figures for nearby stations.

Residents of Okehampton and Tavistock are far more likely to drive to Plymouth and Exeter (thus adding to the congestion problems which help to justify the route) than drive to a station a long way away to change to another train.

I think it'd be easier to get an extra hundred passengers a day on an already busy route (where single track bottlenecks mean supply is suppressed) than in serving a couple of towns with a combined population of ~20,000.

Maybe so, but you could do that more easily and cheaply by shoving a 153 on the end of each train on an existing route (if they're compatible with 159's that is, but you see my point) Not to say that it doesn't deserve to happen (once the more pressing problems West of Exeter have been sorted out), but the economic and social benefit will be much less than to an area deprived of decent transport links.

Yes, but they aren't going to win votes by trumpeting the fact that they were in favour of something that their closest opponents were also voting for (and, lets face it, 90% of the seats west of Bristol have the coalition in the first two places).

It's not just their opponents though. Getting a large chunk of investment with a tangible benefit to the area helps to show that they've got something out of London/The Establishment/The party hierachy. Speaking as someone who lives in the "provinces" there's a lot of mistrust of "the centre". Politicians like having something local to show off.

It would, but as I've said you can't have much single track if you want to be able to cope with two/three trains an hour through Okehampton in each direction on days when the Dawlish line is closed (since this is one of the chief justifications for the Okehampton route).

I still dispute the fact that you would need anything like full double track to support three trains an hour. If you had a relatively long loop somewhere (I'm saying a double track between two intermediate stations) you could have two trains pass eachother in succession each way.

Its costing £9m (?) for 500m at Todmorden - these things cost money - especially when you have to reconfigure signalling (like you'd have to if linking two current branchlines, like at Okehampton).

I think that a west facing junction at Heathrow will see many more passengers than Okehampton or Todmorden though - there's a clear demand there.

£500m still seems very expensive for a curve though. £9m for Tod seems like a bargain.
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Is a Dawlish avoiding line required at all? The figures being bandied around (£400-500M) would pay for one heck of a breakwater protecting the current infrastructure! Surely it would be better to stop the line washing away in the first place, rather than spend millions on an alternative route to be used when it does.

£400 - £500 m for a hunk of concrete in the middle of the sea doing nothing for the 99% of the year when there isn't a storm ? I'd rather rebuild the coastal route as at present, but spend the big money on something that can assist when the main line is closed and provide a benefit all year round.

 

[34104]

Anyway,the Transport select committee met today,attended by diverse local politicians and businessmen from the Westcountry.Brief synopsis is that the repair of the Dawlish line is progressing better than expected and may be reopened at an earlier date than first thought.Network Rail,in the guise of their head Mark Carne,said that the focus was currently on getting the current line up and running but that alternatives were to be considered which would "complement" the Dawlish line rather than replace it.A report is to be drafted by NR by July this year to enable the transport secretary to assess the cost implications of any alternative route,so it's a question of wait and see,i suppose.

 

[najaB]

£400 - £500 m for a hunk of concrete in the middle of the sea doing nothing for the 99% of the year when there isn't a storm ? I'd rather rebuild the coastal route as at present, but spend the big money on something that can assist when the main line is closed and provide a benefit all year round.

That's the point - an artificial reef/offshore breakwater big enough to tame the power of incoming waves wouldn't cost anything close to £400M.

When I lived in the Caribbean I did some work with an organisation that designed offshore breakwaters to protect the top tourist beaches from erosion. I don't know what the seabed profile is like around Dawlish but I doubt it's so deep that a workable breakwater couldn't be built for a couple of tens of millions.

 

[Bald Rick]

I've already waxed lyrical about my views regarding BCR's on this thread, suffice to point out that those people already have options to travel by train to Heathrow, so whilst it would potentially generate revenue for the railway, the regeneration benefits for the area are small and the benefit to the individual amounts to little more than a time saving.

A time saving of up to 70% for 12million people a year, plus £2bn economic benefit and 40,000 jobs. If this is small regeneration benefit, I would like to see what is big. And this excludes the potential for diversions off the GWML when it floods at Iver...

Yes people on the M4 / GW corridor do have a rail option to Heathrow, but it is time consuming and generally difficult and often involves a bus. Similarly the good folk of Okehampton and Tavistock have a rail option, but it involves a bus/taxi and is thus also time consuming and generally difficult. So most people in both examples use the alternative, ie car, or don't travel.

Both projects enable people to travel more, connect people to employment and connect businesses to each other. There will be plenty of people in, say, Reading, who can not get to Heathrow easily at present, and so are denied employment opportunity there. Exactly the same as the people in Okehampton who can not easily get to Plymouth or Exeter. Opening the railway has exactly the same effect in both cases. Except there will be many more people benefitted with the Heathrow Western access.

Now if reopening the Okehampton line generates 40,000 new jobs, £2bn of economic benefit, and reduces journey times for 12 million people a year, then I'm all for it.

And Heathrow western access is not a curve. It is 5km of tunnel, a flyover at Langley, and a bit more railway besides. If you want an expensive curve, look no further than Ipswich.


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It seems to me that there are two different things meant by the "Okehampton route"

1. A relatively lightly engineered, mostly single-track line, with a few loops, probably limited to 75 mph or so, providing tourist access to Dartmoor and commuter service to Plymouth and Exeter for Okehampton and Tavistock. This would not be able to carry 2tph HSTs Plymouth-Exeter plus the local services, but would offer some relief service for a Dawlish blockade.

2. A more heavily engineered line, either single-track with many loops or double-track throughout, capable of running a significant number of HSTs, and engineered and signalled for 90 mph or so on the straight stretches (slowing for curves). This would be able to cover both hourly HSTs.

There is very little difference in heavy civil engineering (and thus cost) required for a low speed (say 60mph) mostly single track railway and a higher speed (say 90) mostly twin track railway. Any line would have to be built with passive provision for future expansion to two track, if anything so that in x years time this forum isn't full of people complaining that it was "done on the cheap" and "without any strategic forethought"

 

[yorksrob]

A time saving of up to 70% for 12million people a year, plus £2bn economic benefit and 40,000 jobs. If this is small regeneration benefit, I would like to see what is big. And this excludes the potential for diversions off the GWML when it floods at Iver...

Yes people on the M4 / GW corridor do have a rail option to Heathrow, but it is time consuming and generally difficult and often involves a bus. Similarly the good folk of Okehampton and Tavistock have a rail option, but it involves a bus/taxi and is thus also time consuming and generally difficult. So most people in both examples use the alternative, ie car, or don't travel.

Both projects enable people to travel more, connect people to employment and connect businesses to each other. There will be plenty of people in, say, Reading, who can not get to Heathrow easily at present, and so are denied employment opportunity there. Exactly the same as the people in Okehampton who can not easily get to Plymouth or Exeter. Opening the railway has exactly the same effect in both cases. Except there will be many more people benefitted with the Heathrow Western access.

Now if reopening the Okehampton line generates 40,000 new jobs, £2bn of economic benefit, and reduces journey times for 12 million people a year, then I'm all for it.

And Heathrow western access is not a curve. It is 5km of tunnel, a flyover at Langley, and a bit more railway besides. If you want an expensive curve, look no further than Ipswich.

Doubtless they've costed it somehow. But if all of this brand new tunnel, flyover, extra railway in one of the most expensive areas of property in the world, I'm still not convinced that reinstating the Okehampton route on an existing formation will cost so much.

 

[Bald Rick]

Doubtless they've costed it somehow. But if all of this brand new tunnel, flyover, extra railway in one of the most expensive areas of property in the world, I'm still not convinced that reinstating the Okehampton route on an existing formation will cost so much.

The beauty of tunnels is that you don't have to pay for the land they sit under, nor compensate the neighbours for the noise. Not that this is a problem when one of the neighbours has a few planes around.

 

[tbtc]

we must not open Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton,
we must notopen Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton,
we must not open Okehampton.

And we will try and come up with any justification for it.

You want the line reopened - you are the one who needs to be coming up with the justifications (and not just unquantifiable things like "regeneration" and "resilience").

And we're back to where we were before, which is you making random suppositions with nothing to back them up. Just because it seems obviously far too expensive to you does not mean that it is the case. £500m for this sounds suspiciously like the £80bn for HS2 we keep hearing bandied about

The big difference being who reported those figures. Conveniently easy to forget, though.

£20m a day is not a particularly high estimate when you consider all the potential spending lost - tourism is obviously only a small part of that.

Once again, just because something seems "obvious" does not mean that you're correct. I don't know how many times I have to say this before it sinks in.

So you are "suspicious" about the £500m figure from those in the industry (e.g.Patrick Hallgate of Network Rail), but you think the unsubstantiated £20m a day figure from BBC Radio Cornwall might be an understimate for the cost to Plymouth/ Cornwall?

There are only thirtyish services a day from Exeter to Plymouth - that'd mean that every train every day was worth almost a million pounds to the local economy (and that thirtyish figure includes two coach Sprinters).

It seems to me that there are two different things meant by the "Okehampton route"

1. A relatively lightly engineered, mostly single-track line, with a few loops, probably limited to 75 mph or so, providing tourist access to Dartmoor and commuter service to Plymouth and Exeter for Okehampton and Tavistock. This would not be able to carry 2tph HSTs Plymouth-Exeter plus the local services, but would offer some relief service for a Dawlish blockade.

2. A more heavily engineered line, either single-track with many loops or double-track throughout, capable of running a significant number of HSTs, and engineered and signalled for 90 mph or so on the straight stretches (slowing for curves). This would be able to cover both hourly HSTs

...or a short re-opening single track from Bere Alston to Tavistock (fifteen miles?) to allow a 153 to connect onto Gunnislake services, so see whether Tavistock to Plymouth is much of a market (and worry about the bigger ambitions at a later stage).

These to quotes suggest that you're as quick as anyone to jump on a statistic that suits your case and pooh pooh one that doesn't (I suspect we're all guilty of it to an extent !)

I agree that we all pick facts that suit our arguments, but the difference is that I'm quoting from Annual rail passenger usage statistics (http://orr.gov.uk/statistics/published-stats/station-usage-estimates) - with all of the pros/cons that they have - rather than "BBC Radio Cornwall came up with a headline grabbing figure of £20m a day" (for around thirty trains a day).

In the absence of anything better, I'll trust the ORR figures. For example, they say that Bere Alston gets around 45,000 passengers a year - around sixty departures a day - which seems a reasonable benchmark to assess Tavistock against (Tavistock is bigger so should expect more passengers, but I'd expect passenger numbers there to be in the same ball park - I doubt they'd reach six figures)

But still recognised for the value it provides in the community. It's hard to imagine the area attracting the same level of tourism without the access the route brings

Obviously rural lines like the S&C help tourism and that boost the economy - nobody is arguing otherwise - it's just about how you assess that benefit and how you compare investment on one line to investment on another (rather than a fuzzy "anything that increases passenger numbers must be good")

Maybe so, but you could do that more easily and cheaply by shoving a 153 on the end of each train on an existing route (if they're compatible with 159's that is, but you see my point) Not to say that it doesn't deserve to happen (once the more pressing problems West of Exeter have been sorted out), but the economic and social benefit will be much less than to an area deprived of decent transport links

You could extend the current services, but redoubling of the Yeovil route would allow more services to run, a better range of services (I suggested through trains from Cornwall/Devon to Portsmouth/ Brighton, which there isn't currently space for), it'd allow faster services (since additional trains wouldn't need to slow down to stop at places like Pinhoe, so may be a more competitive journey time).

It's not just their opponents though. Getting a large chunk of investment with a tangible benefit to the area helps to show that they've got something out of London/The Establishment/The party hierachy. Speaking as someone who lives in the "provinces" there's a lot of mistrust of "the centre". Politicians like having something local to show off

Lib Dems and Tories may argue over areas where they differed (Lib Dems blaming Tories for the extremes of austerity, Tories blaming Lib Dems for neutering them in Europe), but they aren't going to be able to argue about something that both parties agreed to spend money on.

Let the reopening campaign stand on its own feet, rather than trying to mix in other things

£400 - £500 m for a hunk of concrete in the middle of the sea doing nothing for the 99% of the year when there isn't a storm ?

So the Dawlish line will be open 99% of the year?

In which case the "diversion" argument for Okehampton can be forgotten about.

 

[yorksrob]

The beauty of tunnels is that you don't have to pay for the land they sit under,

At least the Okehampton route has one of them !

 

[Goatboy]

Who would even use the Okehampton Route?

XC wouldn't, would they? They'd cape at Exeter probably due to capacity and journey time increases. So thats half the long distance services out. Next up is FGW - do you send an HST around via Okehampton taking 90-120 minutes?

Or run an RRB direct from Tiverton Parkway in just over half the time?

 

[richw]

Who would even use the Okehampton Route?

XC wouldn't, would they? They'd cape at Exeter probably due to capacity and journey time increases. So thats half the long distance services out. Next up is FGW - do you send an HST around via Okehampton taking 90-120 minutes?

Or run an RRB direct from Tiverton Parkway in just over half the time?

Would it really take that time to go via okehampton?

If we're suggesting using RRB rather than okehampton, simply as they're quicker a RRB will do Tiverton Parkway to Plymouth quicker than the train going through Dawlish already, so why don't we just send RRB all the time and not bother at all with reinstating the line?


Tiverton Parkway to Plymouth is coming up as 70 mins by direct RRB, shows as around 80 mins by rail timetable. (It gets slower and worse as you get to Cornwall, Penzance to Exeter is timetabled by rail when it's open as over 3 hours, yet by road it's 2 hours at worse, normally less, but this is for another discussion about the speed of travel to Plymouth/Cornwall).