On 9 May, 15:13, "Andrew Heenan" wrote:

But the main attraction of Reading is (and always was) the interchange
opportunities. And to take full advantage of them, I'm happy to speculate
that stopping patterns won't be the simple 'all stations' that has been
claimed and rarely questioned.

The Metropolitan line has demonstrated for decades that LU have no
difficulty understanding mixing stoppers with semi-fasts, and the Crossrail
tunnels will (easily) accomodate some fasts or semifasts from Reading, even
a few non-stoppers in the peaks, relieving FGW's problem of the
trains-formerly-known-as-Intercity being assimilated by Reading-London
commuters.

But the Met has access to a fast line south of Harrow-o-t-Hill for
fast trains to overtake the all-station stoppers, something that
Crossrail certainly won't get is access to the fast lines twixt
Reading & Padd. And terminating platforms at Padd on the up lines,
like there are at Baker Street - every train coming from LHR or
Maidenhead / Reading has to go through the portal, interlinking with
the starters coming from the yard just outside the portal.....skip
stopping is just about the only way you might get a slightly faster
trip - if you were to accept that stations wouldn't get a regular xx
mins past each hour 'Metro' service.

The latter might just work, but I think they'll go for a regular
clockface timetable at all but the very small stations.

I'm sure others with imagination can foresee many other possibilities; wires
to Oxford becoming viable is just one dream for the decade after Crossrail
opens.

I'm certainly with you on that one, assuming the money can be found.

There's an interesting side debate on the future of all the DMUs being no
longer required, especially when DaFT is still planning to order more new
ones, just as electrification is being taken seriously all round.

There's always a demand for DMUs in parts of the country where usage
doesn't demand electrification. At the moment, they could always be
cascaded to the SW, where they are desparate for more stock.

Just don't get sidetracked by the 'Heathro Hub'; more of a successor to
Jethro Tull than a policy, at this stage.

Yup.