West Coast Franchise

[tbtc]

It's a bit pointless giving the service to XC and having another TOC manage the stations that they don't actually serve

That's how it works on the New Street - Leicester line (etc)
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Another option of course would be a new Central franchise.

I think that'd be a backwards step. Central was a collection of routes which didn't fit into other TOCS, like a "miscellaneous" franchise.

Aberystwyth - Grimsby? Manchester Airport - Skegness? Stansted - Liverpool? Birmingham - Worcester - Cardiff? A whole muddle of services.

Much better to tie routes into a common area, so that (almost) all services on the Crewe - Stafford - Wolverhampton - New Street - Coventry - Rugby - Milton Keynes - Watford line are run by one TOC. Same with the Snow Hill line. Much easier to co-ordinate, to ensure that services meet passenger demand.

Essentially I suppose what I am suggesting is the first step back to what LMS used to do on their core

 

[Zoe]

Remeber we had Network SouthEast once though. I don't see any reason why the West Midlands couldn't have an equivalent.

 

[radamfi]

Remeber we had Network SouthEast once though. I don't see any reason why the West Midlands couldn't have an equivalent.

There was a short-lived Network NorthWest about 20 years ago and that was considered to be a huge flop.

I did like the big A5 book with all North West timetables in it.

 

[MCR247]

I think that'd be a backwards step. Central was a collection of routes which didn't fit into other TOCS, like a "miscellaneous" franchise.

Aberystwyth - Grimsby? Manchester Airport - Skegness? Stansted - Liverpool? Birmingham - Worcester - Cardiff? A whole muddle of services.

Much better to tie routes into a common area, so that (almost) all services on the Crewe - Stafford - Wolverhampton - New Street - Coventry - Rugby - Milton Keynes - Watford line are run by one TOC. Same with the Snow Hill line. Much easier to co-ordinate, to ensure that services meet passenger demand.

Essentially I suppose what I am suggesting is the first step back to what LMS used to do on their core

No it wasn't. Sorry, but that is rubbish. CT meant that you had a lot more direct services, and the ones you suggested were not part of the later part which was very successful.

 

[Invincibles]

I think most of this makes a lot of sense.

Ordering a lot more 390s would be a good idea (even if people do not like the windows) and could allow the ECML to benefit as well.

Additional service wise then I would look at:

A 4th London to Manchester extended to Scotland (London - Manchester Airport - Manchester Piccadilly - Preston - stations to wherever the voyager does not go that hour)

A 2nd Liverpool if possible

The blackpool/lancaster service sounds a good idea and does appear to be part of the thinking.

It would be interesting to see what sort of patronage a Blackburn - Wigan - Warrington (Connect with Lancaster to London fast train here) - Crewe - Stafford - slows down the trent valley (all stops) - Northampton - London train would get but I do not imagine there are the paths (are there any Northampton semi fasts that could be extended?) This would provide a lot of interesting journey opportunities anyway

 

[Aictos]

If new EMUs were to be build for the WCML then obviously a AC version of the popular Class 444 ought to be considered which could see use on the Manchester to Scotland services or the longer London Midland services to Liverpool or Preston.

 

[Failed Unit]

No it wasn't. Sorry, but that is rubbish. CT meant that you had a lot more direct services, and the ones you suggested were not part of the later part which was very successful.

Exactly. The ct routes maybe were not used end to end but they were very useful. Nuneaton - Nottingham, Stoke - Nottingham, derby - Skegness, Loughborough - Birmingham. Lincoln - birmingham and liecester - Wolverhampton, are all example of journeys ruined by DFT when ct was broken up.

Ct a good franchise badly managed!

 

[Nym]

Late arrival into the thread, but here goes.

Rolling Stock:

New 8 coach Pendilinos ordered, for some routes as specified below, such as Manchester Airport - Scotland etc. 2FO & 6SO

All Class 221 Voyagers to be exteneded and re-speced to be Electro-Diesel by inserting additional Generator and Transformer coaches, as can be done by Bombardier. Subsiquently all stock transfered to operate off wire services on the WCML. To become 7,8 or 9 coach units, any spares to be retained by XC for use on EPS routes.
Modifications would require for 4 to 7 coach units to add two transformer & pantograph coaches to the centre, and an additional generator coach between the two, with a HT Traction current bar across the top (similar to that on Pendelinos) 5 to 8 by the same technique, but using one of the current generator coaches between the two new ones. Alternativly, panto/transformer coaches to be at the 2nd coach in from each end, with traction bars added from one end to the other, Bombardier say it can be done, and we don't need QSK19F engines to be fitted to new generator coaches, they can be anything we want with a similar power curve.

All Class 220 Voyagers to be extended and converted to Electro Diesel all to be 8 coaches long, by insertion of additional pantograph and generator units.

Similar treatment to the Class 222 fleet as nessesarry.

Services:

A core of services would run as follows on the main section of the WCML, with additional destinations added later by extending these services.

Euston - Manchester (Via Stoke on Trent) 2tph (Class 390 11c)
Euston - Birmingham NS (Via Coventry) 3tph -
--Terminating 2tph Class 390 11c
--Wolverhampton - Shewsbry 1tph Class 221
Euston - Crewe 5tph (2tph fast through CWE) -
--Chester & Liverpool LS (1tph 221 to split at CWE)
---1tp2h to Wrexham
---1tp2h Bangor/Holyhead
--Liverpool LS (Class 390 11c via Runcorn run fast through CWE)
--Manchester Piccadilly via Wilmslow and Stockport 1tph (Class 390 11c)
--Preston 2tph (1 fast, 1 calling)
---Fast - Preston - Glasgow 1tph (Class 390)
---Calling - Warrington - Wigan - Preston 1tph
----Blackpool N 1tp2h (Class 221)
----Blackburn xtpd (Class 221)
----Lancaster - Windermere xtpd (Class 221 Summer Season)

Birmingham - Scotland 1tph as is Mini Class 390 or 221 for extentions to Aberdeen

Manchester Airport - Scotland 1tph Mini Class 390

As for TPE:

Manchester Airport - Blackpool N 1tph
Manchester Airport - Barrow 1tp2h
Manchester Airport - Windermere 1tp2h

Additional NT Fasts

Manchester Airport / Oxford Road - Preston via Chat Moss & Wigan NW Fast 1tph

PS: Additional stock to replace diesels for XC would be part of the new Mk6 Coach and Diesel Loco order...

 

[tbtc]

No it wasn't. Sorry, but that is rubbish. CT meant that you had a lot more direct services, and the ones you suggested were not part of the later part which was very successful.

You had a lot of direct services, but between anywhere that needed them? Skegness to Manchester Airport via Derby sounds good fun for rail enthusiasts, but the important parts are still linked (Lincolnshire coast to East Midlands, East Midlands to Staffordshire...), same with most of the other services. I could come up with a list of a few direct-links lost, but how many of them would you reintroduce? Most of those services are now more reliable (e.g. Aberystwyth/Chester - Shrewsbury - Birmingham works better now it's not dependant upon getting a slot over the ECML at Newark.

The Norwich - Liverpool service (and all the headaches that it brings) is the one awkward long-distance Central Trains left in 2011, everything else has been chopped and seems to work better as a result.

As well as the random long distance services, the other problem Central had was that they were second fiddle on a lot of the routes they ran on, so had no focus or "core"

 

[Failed Unit]

I mentioned quite a few flows that we have lost that should be re-introduced by DFTs butchering of ct.

Lincoln - Birmingham
Nottingham - crewe

To name the most valueable. Lincoln - Birmingham was a good flow alone but I am sure many would like to see the Nottingham - Nuneaton and Loughborough to birmingham flow return.

Another myth is the line runs any better, the delays still happen in all the same places. I guess the only difference is you don't have a train with no crew somewhere and crew with no train somewhere else.

 

[tbtc]

I mentioned quite a few flows that we have lost that should be re-introduced by DFTs butchering of ct.

Lincoln - Birmingham
Nottingham - crewe

To name the most valueable. Lincoln - Birmingham was a good flow alone but I am sure many would like to see the Nottingham - Nuneaton and Loughborough to birmingham flow return.

Another myth is the line runs any better, the delays still happen in all the same places. I guess the only difference is you don't have a train with no crew somewhere and crew with no train somewhere else.

I remember some of the delays at New Street a decade ago, with the Aberystwyth services often stopping short at Wolverhampton, and announcements informing people to take the next Virgin services to Wolves to change etc

Delays still happen, of course, but they are (more) self contained, and the squeeze at places like the flat junction at Newark means you don't want delays 100 miles away impacting

Nottingham - Nuneaton? Really a big flow? I could understand if you'd suggested Nottingham - Coventry, but Nuneaton? Nottingham, - Leeds is a better link from what I can see

 

[Failed Unit]

The reason I mentioned Nottingham - nuneaton was because it was part of the Lincoln - Birmingham service when they scrapped it. To be honest most of us from the region would have preferred to have had the line in XC and had Lincoln - Birmingham via derby like in the good old days. What we have no-one wants Lincoln - liecester via a load of shacks of no interest to Lincoln.

The delays still occur, but the impact is now much worse. If you train from Birmingham was delayed you got back to Lincoln as your train was direct. Now you are stuck in the cold at Nottingham so a 20 minute delay soon hits the hour as connections don't wait!

 

[Geezertronic]

The ATW services out of Birmingham International are delayed mostly by late running VT or LM services in my experience. Sometimes they do stop a late incoming ATW service at New Street or Wolves even now.

I used to frequently see the southbound WSMR service (Saturdays, around 1.30pm) get held up at International for a freight train waiting in Platform 5 to be released after the VT, XC & LM services had gone through

 

[Philip Elliott]

Nottingham - Nuneaton? Really a big flow?

Yes there is a considerable flow Nuneaton/Hinckley/Narborough to Loughborough & Nottingham whereas Nottingham to Coventry is quite small. Nottingham is the capital of the East Midlands:roll:

 

[MCR247]

tbtc: Seriously, after using CT all of my life, I can honestly say, from a passengers POV, it was not good that CT was split up.

Lincoln - Birmingham
Nottingham - Hereford
Skegness - Crewe

were good links

 

[Invincibles]

It is a shame that the Birmingham to Leicester service can not continue to Nottingham, but I suppose there are pathing reasons as well as the need for one more unit to operate it.

Personally I would move the Nottingham stopper to being a London to Manchester train (routed via Erewash and Dore south - whatever the proper name is) to offer connections from Leicester, East Midlands Parkway, Alfreton and Chesterfield to Manchester and relieve the Liverpool to Norwich a little. As far as I can tell this can be achieved by cutting the second Sheffield back to Derby. In fact the new Manchester service could serve Sheffield as well once Dore gets its' second line.

The only problem I can see with this is the loss of a Nottingham to London train, but with it being the stopper I am not convinced that would be a massive problem provided sensible connections were available at East Midlands (same platform) for the Derby - London or Manchester - London that would also stop there.

Not exactly West Coast, but it does seem to be linked in to the discussion on this thread.

 

[MCR247]

I don't understand, why nit just extend the Sheffield or just run a Leicester to Manchester DMU

 

[Invincibles]

The aim was to avoid messing around with too many of the paths, but obviously taking the existing Sheffield to Manchester is the simple thing to do.

Running a train up to Sheffield via the Erewash presumably has a slight time saving, which maybe useful, I do not know.

I think it was because the Nottingham stoppers go through Leicester at a similar time to the shuttle from Birmingham arrives and so making the Nottingham train go further north and the Birmingham go to Nottingham would appear to work.

I do think that a link from Leicester to Manchester could provide extra capacity on the hope valley line and open up more useful journey options (particularly for the "Parkway" stations it would serve). Making it a London stopper just seems logical to bring in Bedford/Luton to Manchester.

 

[tbtc]

It is a shame that the Birmingham to Leicester service can not continue to Nottingham, but I suppose there are pathing reasons as well as the need for one more unit to operate it

Ideally I'd give the Birmingham - Leicester - Peterborough - Cambridge - Stansted service to EMT. It has nothing to do with other XC services (other than it serves New Street), EMT already manage some of the stations on the line, EMT already serve Leicester/ Oakham/ Melton Mowbray/ Peterborough/ March/ Ely etc. Doing this would mean that the "short" Birmingham - Leicester service could be extended on to the existing "Ivanhoe" service from Leicester to Loughborough/ Nottingham/ Lincoln. I can see the merit in Birmingham - Loughborough (for the student population), for example. So Leicester would become a "one operator" city and should make things easier for EMT to co-ordinate services

Personally I would move the Nottingham stopper to being a London to Manchester train (routed via Erewash and Dore south - whatever the proper name is) to offer connections from Leicester, East Midlands Parkway, Alfreton and Chesterfield to Manchester and relieve the Liverpool to Norwich a little. As far as I can tell this can be achieved by cutting the second Sheffield back to Derby. In fact the new Manchester service could serve Sheffield as well once Dore gets its' second line.

The only problem I can see with this is the loss of a Nottingham to London train, but with it being the stopper I am not convinced that would be a massive problem provided sensible connections were available at East Midlands (same platform) for the Derby - London or Manchester - London that would also stop there

Not only does Nottingham lose some of its London service, it also loses some of its service to Leicester/ Kettering/ Bedford etc (the Leicester one being important). Sheffield also loses trains to Leicester/ London (the Sheffield - Derby link is a less significant loss given the half hourly XC service).

So, to give Manchester a fourth service to London each hour you take Sheffield and Nottingham back to hourly services.

Also, the London - East Midlands - Manchester service doesn't serve Nottingham or Derby, bypassing them both.

Then, there's the lack of paths in the Hope Valley. Look at how tightly the Northern stopper is squezed between the EMT/TPE services (leaving Sheffield just before one and arriving in Manchester just before the other), what with the freight etc. Spare paths through Stockport (where existing routes have lost paths to fit in more Virgin services)? If there were spare paths from the Hope Valley into Manchester then its likely there'd have been additional services from Sheffield to Manchester already

Sorry if this sounds cynical, just trying to be honest. The "Project Rio" trains weren't *that* heavily loaded, and that was at a time when Manchester had no direct WCML London service on a lot of days (due to the refurbishment)
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I don't understand, why nit just extend the Sheffield or just run a Leicester to Manchester DMU

If there was spare stock to run a new Leicester - Manchester DMU then EMT wouldn't be running two coach DMUs from Nottingham to Liverpool, they'd throw them at that first, surely?

 

[Invincibles]

Nottingham to Leicester would be served by the extension of the Leicester to Birmingham, which was the start point of this discussion.

In terms of Hope Valley paths I was going to stick to the Rio one, but in theory when the 2nd Sheffield arrives in Sheffield at xx5x then it could be sent back out 3 minutes ahead of the Cleethorpes to MIA.

If it did not go into Sheffield then it would end up just behind the EMT from Sheffield to Liverpool (which catches up with the stopper near Chinley) and so would be ok to stay behind that until Stockport. This obviously would not be used as a Sheffield to Manchester path as it is so close to the previous departure, but as another path it is a possibility?

At the Stockport end I know things would be hard, Rio went through Stockport sometimes and through New Mills others. Maybe the train could be pathed through New Mills and just be that little bit slower from Leicester to Manchester (the Rio timings could be pretty impressive until you got checked on the approaches to Stockport)

Getting a train from Nottingham to Birmingham via Leicester would seem to be the main aim. If this frees other routes or whatever then I see that as a bonus.

I think the suggestion of giving the Leicester - Birmingham route to EMT is a good one, but presumably does not happen because it would mean another company had 170s. Putting Nottingham - Cardiff under EMT seems less sensible so you would assume XC would need to still have 170s for that.

 

[Zoe]

Yes there is a considerable flow Nuneaton/Hinckley/Narborough to Loughborough & Nottingham whereas Nottingham to Coventry is quite small. Nottingham is the capital of the East Midlands

Are you sure that title doesn't go to Leicester? Remember also that Coventry is a quite a bit larger than Nuneaton.

 

[tbtc]

At the Stockport end I know things would be hard, Rio went through Stockport sometimes

True, but that was at a time when there was no Manchester - WCML - London service. Now there are three London services an hour over Stockport Viaduct.
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Nottingham to Leicester would be served by the extension of the Leicester to Birmingham, which was the start point of this discussion

Fair enough

I was thinking of combining the existing Birmingham - Leicester and Leicester - Ivanhoe Stations - Nottingham to achieve the same

 

[The Planner]

Giving New St - Leicester and Stansted to EMT would be feasible as the aspiration is to run the Herefords on to Tamworth in the future with a new turnback.

 

[Invincibles]

True, but that was at a time when there was no Manchester - WCML - London service. Now there are three London services an hour over Stockport Viaduct.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---


Fair enough

I was thinking of combining the existing Birmingham - Leicester and Leicester - Ivanhoe Stations - Nottingham to achieve the same

The only problem with the Ivanhoe train is that it means crossing the main line at Leicester. This is not as big an issue as it might seem though because the Ivanhoe goes onto the UF to get into platform 4 (I would look at changing the northern approach to Leicester so it did not have to) so it is only a matter of crossing the DF to get onto the Birmingham branch at some point.

On the current timings it is the Stansted train that arrives with perfect timing to form the next Ivanhoe train. However changing this could cause problems.

Because of the diagram share between Stansted and Leicester trains there would have to be some recasting of the timetable somewhere to allow a sensible service to run. Or all services would have to run with the same units to keep the share working.

I would be trying to find a way to get the Stansteds as 3 car every time, but whether that is possible or not I do not know. As I understand it the Stansted does not cause problems on the ECML at Peterborough?

There is a lot that could be done with trains through the Leicester / Derby / Nottingham triangle and maybe that should be a seperate thread.

 

[MCR247]

Ideally I'd give the Birmingham - Leicester - Peterborough - Cambridge - Stansted service to EMT. It has nothing to do with other XC services (other than it serves New Street),

The thing is, 170s would still need to be maintained in Birmingham, which is a bit awkward

 

[Zoe]

I don't know why it was thought two car trains would be suitable for the Birmingham to Leicester service, when I went I used that service from Birmingham to Nuneaton it was full and standing.

 

[Failed Unit]

I don't know why it was thought two car trains would be suitable for the Birmingham to Leicester service, when I went I used that service from Birmingham to Nuneaton it was full and standing.

When they were ordered, the manager of CT at the time said something along the lines of,"they may have less seats than the trains they replaced, but if demand picks up we can build more coaches to make them 3 or 4 coaches as required". As built many of the diagrams 2 car was enough (just) but since traffic had grown. Unfortunately they can't build more centre cars now either.

It looks like you need to get train length correct at the start or suffer for 30 years. MML and chiltern extending turbos, but I think that most operators that have got it wrong could do anything about it for various reasons including components.

TPE (185s and 170s) HT (222) XC and Virgin (221 and 220) have all suffered. The pendo which are to be extended seem the exception with modern stock.

 

[Zoe]

The pendo which are to be extended seem the exception with modern stock.

That's the advantage of using an off the shelf train. You can have more built at any time.

 

[tbtc]

It looks like you need to get train length correct at the start or suffer for 30 years

That's it - one of my bugbears!

One thing in favour of EMUs is that there's more scope to slot coaches in/around (like the 458/460 mix-ups being planned). If only someone could build a coach that could slot into Voyagers/ 170s/185s etc! (other firms make products designed to be electronically compatible with playstations/ipods etc, shame you can't design coaches that would fit into DMUs!)

 

[Failed Unit]

That's the advantage of using an off the shelf train. You can have more built at any time.

But the turbo's are as off the shelf as any DMU, but XC can't (and others) can't extend them. It may be more of a problem with DMUs but from what I know you can't put a 172 trailer in a 170. Happy to be corrected and if you can maybe TPE and XC should be ordering some to make their 2 car 170s upto 4 car. I am sure many services need them and the 3 cars could be moved to other services. Nottingham - Cardiff 4 car and the 3 cars onto stansted. Likewise on TPE 185s back to Cleethorpes and have the 4 car 170s on busy north pennie routes.