HS2 delay

[ravenrover]

My impression was that BST was talking about Govt build it or cancel it. Putting it on hold must still bear contractual costs awarded to the contractors, obviously a lot less than the spiralling costs of actually building it. Wonder if we will get to know those costs associated with putting it on hold

[danumdon]

They should have spent a lot less and upgraded the East Coast mainline!

The reason they never considered upgrading the ECML was because of current capacity issues on that route. The existing signalling cannot allow any more head time to increase pathing on the route, its now at virtually maximum operation during peak hours with little capacity before and after. eE have run paths for our OTM's on the route for years but now are reduced to either having to divert via Gainsborough, Lincoln and Peterborough (GNGR) or take our chance down the ECML which usually means sitting in every loop and station to allow faster services to pass, what should be a trip of 2.5 hours now can take over 6hrs for our services.

To upgrade the ECML NWR are introducing ERTMS control (in cab signalling) but even this will take the best part of 5 years plus to reach the wilds of the north, to understake a root and branch upgrade to increase running lines would cause so much delay and cost so much it would not be worth it, and a totally new line would be a better option.

Thing's are now coming to a head and will require some decisions to be taken sooner rather than later for the overall good of the network. My opinion is that i would rather see incremental improvements over lager parts of the network than throwing the kitchen sink at grandiose projects, the rest of the infrastructure is rotting at an increasing state.

If people knew what their train was running on when sat in a train on some routes they would never do so again, it's that bad.

[Draytonian III]

I was at council meeting about 10 years ago and bloke came to speak about the ECML and the speed of the trains and he said that the stretch of track between Grantham and Doncaster has got numerous level crossing and if they were all closed,bridged, tunnelled, or removed the trains would be quicker. He said that the track and train wheels get damaged by vehicles leaving grit and small stones on the track when they pass over, he also commented the then trains could easily do 140 mph. Hopefully someone on here who works in that industry can back up what was I told

[danumdon]

I was at council meeting about 10 years ago and bloke came to speak about the ECML and the speed of the trains and he said that the stretch of track between Grantham and Doncaster has got numerous level crossing and if they were all closed,bridged, tunnelled, or removed the trains would be quicker. He said that the track and train wheels get damaged by vehicles leaving grit and small stones on the track when they pass over, he also commented the then trains could easily do 140 mph. Hopefully someone on here who works in that industry can back up what was I told

Your bloke was right on every point. its was actually over 30 years ago that they did running tests with the then new Inter City 225 electric trains that were introduced to replace the diesel inter city 125 trains after the route was electrified to 25kV AC.

They actually created a test loop between Stoke Tunnel just south of Grantham and New England just north of Peterborough, the signals on this stretch of the main line were originally 4 aspect colour light signals, (red, yellow, double yellow and green) they adjusted the signals to include another aspect, a flashing green signal, this created a 5th aspect so in effect the faster running trains now had a longer length of track to slow down from a higher speed. The tests demonstrated that the 225 trains could actually run comfortably at speeds of 150mph.

When the tests were first mooted to commence BR at the time wanted volunteer track men to be tethered to the ground 2.25mts (9foot) from the side of the running line to see what the reaction would be to trackside staff working alongside the higher speed trains, i kid you not, even worse they actually had a great many volunteers from track staff to be the guinea pigs!! in the end sanity prevailed and they actually used test dummies to complete the tests. The overall tests were successful and they actually shaved of 2 minutes of running time between the 21mile length of the test loop, when the extrapolated the whole data and included all the sections of the ECML where they could implement this faster running they found that it would in total reduce the running time from Kings Cross to Edinburg by approximately 24 minutes.Id say a far better result that what the HS2 is currently promising to produce at a very vastly increased cost.

Anyway, the tests were concluded and they reverted to running the trains at speeds of 125mph as that was the sweet spot for the track spec of the current railway infrastructure and also for the best cost benefit analysis for the maintenance of the rolling stock.

The remaining legacy of those trials was that to this day they complete all railway track renewals on the ECML to a standard that would allow increased speed running of the trains to 150mph if that was ever to be the requirement and they left the flashing green signals in situ still to this day. The ECML was always the best a fastest way to get from London to Scotland and still remains so, due mainly to its moderate track gradients and regular long straight sections of track, the WCML is one big long reverse curve after another over some large gradient rises and falls.

That fact that the ECML has so many level crossings across the route will always be a major cost hindrance to upgrading this route, bridges, underpasses and new roads bypassing the railway would in this day and age cost a massive amount to rectify, something that could never be budgeted for in this day and age.

One last thing, railway axels in train bogies are a very delectate thing, the steel tyres on the axels do get damaged by road salt and track ballast and stones, they pit the surface and create scuffing and fissures that unless they are treated on a wheel lathe on a regular basis will cause hollow wear and become dangerous to run at high speed. I don't know if anyone can remember a train crash in Germany, the Eschede train crash about 25 years ago when a inter city express train (ICE) crashed into a road overbridge, killing over 100 people, this was caused by a bogie axel tyre becoming pitted and causing a flat spot that weakend the axel and caused it to fracture at speed.

Next time you ride a train and you hear a knocking from a axel flat spot think about what could happen to your train when it speeds down the track!! its a rare occurrence, but it happens.