Rail Franchises

[Ameecher]

It's fair to assume that a station stop, including acceleration and deceleration could easily increase journey time by 10 minutes. That's enough to severely reduce the Cost - Benefit Ratio to an unacceptable level certainly, especially if you start throwing lots of them in.

[JamieLei]

Sorry! Dyslexia - wrote the completely the opposite to what I meant to write!

[JamieLei]

Even at a slower speed it counts. The flagship headline service, non-stop from Birmingham New Street to London Euston omits International, Coventry and the 3rd stop (always one out of Rugby, MKC and Watford J), which saves 10 minutes. It's not as if the train is going very fast through International or Coventry anyway (I've been on it and it merely crawls through) but it does make a difference at the lower speeds too.

[Dave]

Even at a slower speed it counts. The flagship headline service, non-stop from Birmingham New Street to London Euston omits International, Coventry and the 3rd stop (always one out of Rugby, MKC and Watford J), which saves 10 minutes. It's not as if the train is going very fast through International or Coventry anyway (I've been on it and it merely crawls through) but it does make a difference at the lower speeds too.

Dunno where you get that from - trains do 100 or so through BHI. Cov is slower I admit.

[Dave]

If you add 15 minutes to the HSR journey then you make London-Birmingham only 10 minutes quicker. SIXTY BILLION POUNDS FOR TEN MINUTES!

Greater Birmingham ISN'T the West Midlands County. There is no such thing as "Greater Birmingham".

I don't see how having a through station would allow for more services north of Birmingham - if anything it'll do the opposite. By having the spur, you can do what they do now - send Manchester and Anglo-Scottish services to avoid Birmingham, and serve Birmingham frequently separate to these services.

Justifying the need for a through station in Birmingham because "the WCML already has one" is absolute bollocks, mate, and you know it.

There is NOWHERE to build. They've already got two sub-surface stations in Birmingham. Why would you destroy the modern and flowing design of HS2 with a New Street style dungeon?

[Geo Ghost]

What you want and what is logical are two different things. I want a line that links the ECML from Welwyn round to St Albans and then along to Watford. But I know it won't happen for a number of reasons.

Why do you want a HS through station at Birmingham anyway? You don't even live there

It is very much logical that HSR should go through Birmingham, they already have rail lines that do that (WCML for example)

If you honestly think it's logical, then tell us! Because I don't think it is and no one here seems to either. How on Earth is it logical for the HSR rail to go through Birmingham when it's going to terminate there. (Stage 1 HS2)

[Dave]

The main point of HS2 is not faster trains, but extra capacity, with more stations HS2 become a proper replacement of the WCML/MML (plus ECML north of Leeds/York)

No it isn't Alan. I'm sorry, but you're WRONG. The brief is to provide fast trains on a dedicated line, WHICH IN TURN will provide extra capacity on classic lines.

As for why I suggesting building a Central Birmingham Station, insted of having London-Birmingham Parkway-North of England/Scotland, London-Birmingham and Birmingham-North of England/Scotland, you would have London-Birmingham-North of England/Scotland which is better overall in terms of service.

It makes the service worse Alan.

If you run trains to Manchester and the north without stopping at Birmingham (why would you stop at both? There are plenty of Birmingham-Manchester services on CLASSIC lines), then FORCING trains through Birmingham will slow the service down even further.

Don't you get it? It's not better in terms of overall service - providing point to point services with minimal or NO station calls IS THE WAY HIGH SPEED RAIL WORKS EVERYWHERE.

I will remind you that Virgin have operated the West Coast in this way since privatisation and have seen almost exponential passenger growth. So please tell me how your system will be better!

Also I plan to build the undeground station on the same site as the current HS2 Central Birminghsm Station, only it will no longer need knocking down parts of Central Birmingham!

You clearly don't know the area - there's no way you can tunnel anywhere near there.

[Geo Ghost]

You clearly don't know the area - there's no way you can tunnel anywhere near there.

Its not like I am demolishing parts of the area around the station! (the UK has built Crossrail and the Channel Tunnel!)

Check up on your geography Alan. Sometimes it's not possible or easy to build tunnels through certain types of ground. Plus you have to take into consideration all the pipe work, electrics, sewage, water systems etc. It's not as simple as stick the tunnel bore underground and dig. Nor is it cheap.

[Griff]

Gawd Alan Fry. Elevated Rail ftw.

[Kevo00]

I never said I would be cheap or easy, but it prevents lawsuits and demolishing parts of the city

Really? And if the tunnel causes subsidence, what then?

[Dave]

HS2 allows trains to be twice as fast as the WCML, so there is nothing wrong with having Manchester services stop at Birmingham (if there is demand, my plan allows a lot of flexablity in terms on running services)

Your plan is a bag of w*** and you are a grade A tosser. Kindly remove yourself from my field of view. I thought we were getting somewhere but you're back to spouting utter tripe.

[GurraJG]

I never said I would be cheap or easy, but it prevents lawsuits and demolishing parts of the city

Really? And if the tunnel causes subsidence, what then?

I'm gonna assume Alan doesn't know what subsidence is and is too lazy to Google it, so here you go Alan: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsidence

[Griff]

If we can get Alan's beloved HSR trains to go fast enough, we could just add wings to them and let them take off. No need for tunnels, tracks or demolitions.

[Dave]

I am very sure that spending £60 billion on a railway with 4 stations is a bad idea!

I don't - because it will relieve the classic network. At the minute, Virgin expresses stop four times between London and Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool - by moving ALL of those services to High Speed, then you're opening up over half the paths on the classic lines.

[Kevo00]

I never said I would be cheap or easy, but it prevents lawsuits and demolishing parts of the city

Really? And if the tunnel causes subsidence, what then?

If it is done well, that that will not be a problem, anyway there are tunnels in Birmingham anyway and so far, the city has not fallen to the ground yet!

And do you know if that is feasible?

Noooooooooooooooo!

[Dave]

It's not about the number of services on High Speed Rail, it's about the number of services that it releases for the traditional railway.

Do you not get this? You keep saying that it's about increasing capacity - it is, and will move the expresses to High Speed leaving the commuter and semi-fast services to use the traditional lines.

What areas does the HS2 route not serve that the WCML Intercity franchise currently does on a regular basis?

[Kevo00]

I am very sure that spending £60 billion on a railway with 4 stations is a bad idea!

I don't - because it will relieve the classic network. At the minute, Virgin expresses stop four times between London and Birmingham, Manchester and Liverpool - by moving ALL of those services to High Speed, then you're opening up over half the paths on the classic lines.

But does not enough areas to take on the WCML Intercity services, so you the number of services that HS2 is not as much as it could be!

I think you should do some reading about transport theory, about nodal hubs and that sort of thing. Most of your posts on transport would seem to suggest that you don't understand the idea of hub and spoke systems.

[Kevo00]

I think you should do some reading about transport theory, about nodal hubs and that sort of thing. Most of your posts on transport would seem to suggest that you don't understand the idea of hub and spoke systems.

This is not about replacing Regional/Communter services, but Intercity ones!

And of the towns mentioned in your post at 12:59 how many of them are city sized? Not status, but in terms of size?

The one of the problems with speeding up UK IC services is that they end up stopping at many small towns because there are no local services to serve them. HS2 gives us a chance to get round that problem.

[Dave]

The point Kev is trying to drill into you is that the hub is Birmingham HSR station, the spokes are all the classic services that will then link into it.

Let me go through your stations - let's assume we're only talking about HSR between Liverpool/Manchester/Birmingham and London for now:

Watford

Served to pick up / set down only - poorly served by VT, better served by other operators.

Northampton (not well served by VT, but that due to the Rail line around there)

Answered your own question.

Milton Keynes

Same as Watford - most VT services have barred travel to/from the capital from MK. Again, much better served by London Midland.

Stafford

Poorly served by Virgin services, once again better served by London Midland Services. Only Liverpool expresses stop at Stafford

Crewe

Most Virgin expresses no longer stop at Crewe, only the North Wales expresses. Better served by London Midland.

Stoke on Trent

Any lost services would be made up in services to Manchester or Birmingham for High Speed connections.



So - any questions? Every single intermediate station that Virgin do or have previously served has seen service cuts because of poor use - so no, none of the above need a High Speed station. Every single one is within 45 minutes of a High Speed terminal (be that London, Manchester, Birmingham or Liverpool)

[Geo Ghost]

I never said I would be cheap or easy, but it prevents lawsuits and demolishing parts of the city

So you're willing to spend BILLIONS of pounds to build a sodding tunnel just for High Speed trains running through Birmingham when they won't even RUN high speed into Birmingham due to the fact trains have to slow down before they stop...
Plus the fact services will terminate at Birmingham anyway with stage 1 of the plan. So you'd have a useless through-line for nothing.

How... just how can you see any sense in what you say man? Seriously? Any idea I come up with I always look for flaws. You however... any alarm bells that should raise you to the blinding obvious problems in any of you plans, that you've ever mentioned, across all topic... are they just permanently malfunctioning?

Regarding tunnels Alan - Saying "there are tunnels there already so it's fine" is plain silly. Look at London. Why do you think there are very few underground lines South of the river compared to North? I'll leave you to work out the answer to that. It could be amusing.

I get the point about incresing capacity, but you HS2 cannot take on all the Intercity service unless it serve these stations as well
*List of stations which don't even have any relevance*

Alan for pity sake. The plan is not to take on ALL the express services. It never has been. We've mentioned it 20 times before no