Playing with trains/ HS2 & 3

[Dave2002]

true - short links between electrified sections that should have been electrified years ago are finally being done - at a cost just a small fraction of cross-rail or the huge investment in London Transport
- the main links are just at the start of the study - quite a number of short links were handled by pacers - basically a decrepit bus running on rails and finally only just being got rid of 20 years past its use by date.
It would be good to see electrification return to Stalybridge - I recall travelling by electric hauled trains Manchester to Sheffield in the 50s in considerably more comfort than the rickety DMUs that ran the current service for many years afterwards - you could not work on these (in fact often lucky to even get a seat).

Is the Grindleford tunnel a big obstacle to the electrification of the (other) route between Sheffield and Manchester? Perhaps the earlier route you mentioned ended up at the Sheffield station which was closed I think in the 1960s, and is now a hotel.

Let's hope that if some of these lines are electrified that the rail people will buy enough carriages to avoid serious overcrowding, and maybe make an effort to run a service, with frequent enough trains.
That might, however, be a triumph of hope over experience.

The cost of providing reasonable services in those northern parts must surely be small compared to the services in the south, and minute compared with HS2, which just looks more and more like a pointless and expensive vanity project

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

It would be good to see electrification return to Stalybridge -

I don't recall there ever having been electrification at Stalybridge.

Many years ago, I proposed the electrification of the Stockport-Stalybridge-Leeds route, long before the East Coast electrification. BR never replied.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

Is the Grindleford tunnel a big obstacle to the electrification of the (other) route between Sheffield and Manchester? Perhaps the earlier route you mentioned ended up at the Sheffield station which was closed I think in the 1960s, and is now a hotel.

Tunnels are not normally a bar to electrification. The Severn Tunnel and the Standage Tunnel are both very long tunnels that are about to be wired. However, the Hope Valley route does have two long tunnels - Cowburn Tunnel, between Chinley and Edale, and Totley Tunnel, between Grindleford and Dore.

[teamsaint]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/hs2-national-audit-office-and-cabinet-review-poor-scorn-on-railway-plans-a6914261.html

the HSUK looks like a proper plan.

http://www.highspeeduk.co.uk/hsuk%20sysmap.html

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

the HSUK looks like a proper plan.

http://www.highspeeduk.co.uk/hsuk%20sysmap.html

It does indeed, and has much in common with the Great Central Line.

[ahinton]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk...-a6914261.html

the HSUK looks like a proper plan.

http://www.highspeeduk.co.uk/hsuk%20sysmap.html

The joke here (only it's by no means funny) is in the references to "high speed" when one realises that, however much or little of this proposal ever materialises, it sure won't be "high speed", given what else is happening in terms of high speed train research and development. London to Birmingham (or rather central London to north-west London) in 8-10 minutes by train would qualify as "high speed"; the proposals in the illustration here do anything but.

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

And now HS3 has reared its head again. This could be seriously beneficial, even if limited to 125 mph. Liverpool to Hull in just over an hour - a third of current journey times. Now that really would be worthwhile.

[Flay]

The HSUK looks like a proper plan.

http://www.highspeeduk.co.uk/hsuk%20sysmap.html

But not for the South West!

[aeolium]

Here is an interesting survey of the life of the HS2 project so far:

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2016/jun/07/hs2-the-zombie-train-that-refuses-to-die

I am starting to wonder whether this is the most expensive and useless major British infrastructure project to be undertaken during my lifetime. Despite numerous critical reports - including from Parliament - the project powers ahead. Has no major political party got the courage to stand up and oppose it, to actually look at the evidence and the costs versus benefits?

[Dave2002]

Very interesting. I didn't realise that Jim Steer was an engineer originally. Do we know how successful high speed trains have really been in other countries - France, Germany, Spain, Japan? What purpose do they serve? Are there features of other countries which make them more (or less) viable?

Although I tend to dislike air travel, both as a passenger, and for environmental reasons, for some journeys air travel is more sensible. The infrastructure demands of putting in long railway lines are considerable, and the lines require continuous maintenance. The infrastructure costs of air travel may be lower as they must surely be largely determined by the end points. There is environmental damage by both trains and aircraft, but if there are routes with lowish numbers of passengers, then the overall damage might still be less with air than rail.

Encouraging (!!) people to make pointless/useless journeys just to get demand up for any form of transport is also madness. Commuting to work by car and generating congestion is a disaster and it's "obviously" necessary - except that so many things can be done without travelling far using internet technology. I always thought that much "work" was over rated, and perhaps its main purpose is to occupy people's time, so that they are well under control.

[aeolium]

Dave2002, I am actually a great fan of train travel and that's one reason why this HS2 nonsense is such a horror show to me. We seem to have forgotten how small incremental benefits or relatively low-cost improvements can deliver so much more than these vanity projects:

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jun/05/hs2-railways-reopened-lines-britain-rail

[Dave2002]

I am also a fan of rail travel - certainly as an alternative to driving which is very often a wearisome business. I can think of so many reasons why HS2 is wrong though, given that (ha, ha) we have been sold a period of austerity, which politicians take as a mandate to do whatever they like. The only sensible thing would be to cancel this project and save the money, and then revisit the business later on.

However, one thing the project does do is to create employment "opportunities" for some, at all levels - construction workers, engineers, managers, and those finanical parasites etc., some of whom might otherwise be in the same situation as the steel workers at Port Talbot. Maybe that's the plan - get some of those people working on HS2 and similar projects - back to Keynsian economics and the Sydney Harbour bridge.

[cloughie]

I am also a fan of rail travel - certainly as an alternative to driving which is very often a wearisome business. I can think of so many reasons why HS2 is wrong though, given that (ha, ha) we have been sold a period of austerity, which politicians take as a mandate to do whatever they like. The only sensible thing would be to cancel this project and save the money, and then revisit the business later on.

However, one thing the project does do is to create employment "opportunities" for some, at all levels - construction workers, engineers, managers, and those finanical parasites etc., some of whom might otherwise be in the same situation as the steel workers at Port Talbot. Maybe that's the plan - get some of those people working on HS2 and similar projects - back to Keynsian economics and the Sydney Harbour bridge.

Cancel HST2 and 3 and spend, and it would not need vast amounts in comparison, on reopening the Exeter to Plymouth line via Okehampton and Tavistock, and a inland relief line from Newton Abbot to Exeter to bypass Dawlish. How the west can be won.
Just think of all the communities the railways would be reaching,
Were it not for the activities of Doctor Richard Beeching!

[Dave2002]

I quite fancy this one - but I don't suppose it would really be justified. It'd make getting to Cromarty a bit easier.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fortrose_railway_station

[Eine Alpensinfonie]

and a inland relief line from Newton Abbot to Exeter to bypass Dawlish. How the west can be won.