On Sat, 24 Apr 2004, Aidan Stanger wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:

On Fri, 23 Apr 2004, Aidan Stanger wrote:

Nitro wrote:

From King's Cross the line would continue to Dalston Junction station
and Hackney Central station.

Do you mean Hackney Downs?

Comes to much the same thing - they're only a paving-slab's-toss apart.

On the map, but have you ever tried walking from one to the other?

Yes, i've done it many times; whenever i get a train to fo shopping in
Hackney, in fact, since the high street (well, Mare Street, and in
particular Tesco, M&S and Woolworth's) is where Hackney Central is, and my
train comes in to Hackney Downs. It's a short walk.

The line would then surface near Clapton, or if this is not possible
an underground station at Clapton. Some trains would then continue to
Chingford,

Although you're not the first to suggest a Crossrail line take over the
Chingford branch, it doesn't seem such a good idea to me. The loss of a
direct service to the City would be very unpopular with many people who
moved to the area because of its good links to the City.

Okay, Crossrail Three And A Half:

Take over the Chingford branch, or even the entire suburban West Anglia;
get as far as the current Bethnal Green station (which should be closed
with extreme prejudice,

What have you got against Bethnal Green station?

In all the times i've been through it, i've not seen more than ten people
total get on or off the train; i therefore conclude that it isn't much
use. I think this is because it's not really in central Bethnal Green
(unlike the tube station), but i don't know the area well enough to say
for sure.

Would it be any different if it and the station on the Central Line had
different names?

Might be - i do get annoyed when there's a name shared by two stations.

and replaced with one over the road from, and joined by a tunnel to,
the Central Line station of the same name - hey look, now you can get
from northeast London to the Central Line without interchanging at
Liverpool Street!),

You could do that better if there were more trains to Stratford from the
North.

No i couldn't, because that would involve going via zone 3, which would
mean buying a more expensive ticket. Also, i suspect it would take rather
longer.

then dive and go underground to Liverpool Street (where cross-platform
interchange with the Central line would be lovely, but almost
certainly entirely impossible), possibly with a new stop somewhere
around Shoreditch, then carry on to Moorgate (probably, nay hopefully,
demolishing some - frankly very ugly - office buildings on the way)
and take over the Widened Lines (which by now have been given up by
Thameslink due to the platform lengthening at Farringdon); just before
Farringdon, veer off into a new bit of tunnel to King's Cross (yes,
that makes a grand total of three parallel tracks between Farringdon
and King's Cross), and thence follow whatever route Nitro proposed, or
just go crazy and tunnel to Cork or something.

More direct routes are usually better.

More direct routes between where and where? Not that i'm trying to defend
my plan here - beyond Liverpool Street, it's pretty random.

Note that i know **** all about the technical aspects of railways, and
have thought of this off the top of my head, so sorry if it's a bit silly.

It is, but silly ideas can be developed into sensible ones. Sensible
ideas can also be developed into silly ones, as can be seen at
http://www.crossrail.co.uk.

!

-- ... to build a space elevator, that's got to be hundreds of thousands
of pounds ... -- Mike Froggatt

Who's Mike Froggatt?

A friend of mine. Historian. Didn't have a clear idea of how much a space
elevator would cost.

tom

--
If you had a chance to do any experiment you pleased, unconstrained by any considerations of humanity or decency, what would you choose?