In article
,
(allantracy) wrote:

Assuming the coalition of fools does not mess up the recovery.

Presumably then, you must believe that running up a national debt of
1.4 trillion pounds was not the slightest bit foolish.

I didn't even know what a trillion was until Gordon invented it.

Yes you did! George W. Bush got there first!

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Paul Scott wrote:
According to the Standard at least...

"Crossrail will go ahead, new Transport Secretary Philip Hammond announced
today. He ended fears that the Lib-Con government could pull the plug on the
landmark £16billion rail scheme for London."

"Speaking to the Evening Standard on his first full day in the job, he said:
"I think the funding for Crossrail is already established. We are making
sure that in delivering the project we absolutely optimise value for money."

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standa...e-23833771-.do

Boris however isn't advocating cracking open the fizz yet, not by a
long shot - see this story from yesterday's Standard:
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standa...e-23835810-.do

Pertinent excerpt:

---quote---
Mr Johnson's admission that the full plans for Crossrail are under
threat raises the prospect of the Maidenhead or Abbey Wood spurs being
abandoned. However, he pledged to fight “very, very hard” to protect
the rail link in its entirety.

“Whether we are successful in that is yet to be established. But it's
absolutely essential that we mount a Stalingrad defence of the London
transport settlement,” he said.

“I'm broadly confident that we can keep the project going but it's
going to take a huge amount of political effort to do so.

“Be in no doubt the Government will try and de-scope. Don't get the
impression that this is all over, folks. There's a huge campaign of
lobbying that is still to be done.

“I do not want you to rush away from today with the idea that it's all
signed, sealed and delivered. That is simply not the case.”
---/quote---

He also says he'll be pressing the new government hard to try and
ensure funding for the ongoing Tube line upgrades isn't cut.

On Thu, 20 May 2010 06:27:53 -0700 (PDT), Mizter T
wrote:

Boris however isn't advocating cracking open the fizz yet, not by a
long shot - see this story from yesterday's Standard:
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standa...e-23835810-.do

snip


Thanks for posting this. Boris's view of the status of Crossrail is
the most sensible I have heard since the general election - seems
strange coming from him, but there you are.

There would be nothing to be ashamed in these troubled times in going
ahead with only the "core Crossrail" as long as it didn't prevent
later additions to the Crossrail network being made in order to
realise the whole project at a later date.

Given the economic situation, the plans for electrification of the
Great Western and Midland Main Lines should also be put on hold. They
are desirable projects that should go ahead when fiscal prospects
improve, not now.

On May 20, 4:18*pm, Bruce wrote:

On Thu, 20 May 2010 06:27:53 -0700 (PDT), Mizter T
wrote:

Boris however isn't advocating cracking open the fizz yet, not by a
long shot - see this story from yesterday's Standard:
http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/standa...e-23835810-.do

snip

Thanks for posting this. *Boris's view of the status of Crossrail is
the most sensible I have heard since the general election - seems
strange coming from him, but there you are.

He seems to have taken the decision that he'll rock the boat a bit
(said boat having his fellow Tory chums who are now in government on
board), rather than meekly and quietly sitting in the corner.


There would be nothing to be ashamed in these troubled times in going
ahead with only the "core Crossrail" as long as it didn't prevent
later additions to the Crossrail network being made in order to
realise the whole project at a later date.

Though Boris is decidedly not advocating some sort of 'core Crossrail'
arrangement, he's arguing for the whole thing to go ahead.

Plus, I'm not sure how much sense Crossrail would make if bits start
getting cut off it, or indeed how workable such an idea would really
be.


Given the economic situation, the plans for electrification of the
Great Western and Midland Main Lines should also be put on hold. *They
are desirable projects that should go ahead when fiscal prospects
improve, not now.

Oh, I'd taken that as a given!

---quote---
Mr Johnson's admission that the full plans for Crossrail are under
threat raises the prospect of the Maidenhead or Abbey Wood spurs being
abandoned. However, he pledged to fight “very, very hard” to protect
the rail link in its entirety.

“Whether we are successful in that is yet to be established. But it's
absolutely essential that we mount a Stalingrad defence of the London
transport settlement,” he said.


I'm not normally a Boris fan. But he's impressing me with his fighting
talk on Crossrail. A "Stalingrad defence"! He also talked about "going
thermonuclear"! During the election he was also badgering Cameron,
trying to get him to commit. I hope this isn't merely talk, and he is
doing the hard work lobbying behind the scenes.

If he manages to save Crossrail in such an unfavourable financial
environment, in my opinion he will deserve nearly as much credit for
the project as Ken.

Although Ken is the one of the greatest individuals in the history of
public transport in London IMHO, ironically it may turn out to have
been for the best that he lost the 2008 election. He wouldn't have
been anywhere near as useful for lobbying Cameron.

Mizter T wrote:

Plus, I'm not sure how much sense Crossrail would make if bits start
getting cut off it, or indeed how workable such an idea would really
be.

Agreed - it already required the complete kludge of a 'ghost station' at
Wormwood Scrubs to turn round half the trains that wouldn't be going to
Heathrow or Maidenhead. If you cut either of the two western destinations
that problem increases about 50%. However, unless the core frequency is
around 24 tph it will fail to take passengers off the Central Line, and that
sort of frequency cannot all run to one eastern terminus either AFAICS, if
for instance they were toying with deferring the Abbey Wood branch?

Paul S

On 20/05/2010 16:37, Mizter T wrote:

Though Boris is decidedly not advocating some sort of 'core Crossrail'
arrangement, he's arguing for the whole thing to go ahead.

Plus, I'm not sure how much sense Crossrail would make if bits start
getting cut off it, or indeed how workable such an idea would really
be.

IMO Crossrail from Shenfield to Heathrow would be very heavily used. The
Maidenhead and Abbey Wood stuff is just icing on the cake.

Given the economic situation, the plans for electrification of the
Great Western and Midland Main Lines should also be put on hold. *They
are desirable projects that should go ahead when fiscal prospects
improve, not now.

I think we can safely say that's a given seeing as how they've already
cancelled the new electric trains required for running under the
wires.

It always was just election talk anyway.

"allantracy" wrote in message

Given the economic situation, the plans for electrification of the
Great Western and Midland Main Lines should also be put on hold. They
are desirable projects that should go ahead when fiscal prospects
improve, not now.

I think we can safely say that's a given seeing as how they've already
cancelled the new electric trains required for running under the
wires.

Which ones are those? I hope you don't mean the IEP, whose initial
batch was intended for the EC and EA lines.

On Thu, 20 May 2010 16:48:19 +0100, Basil Jet
wrote:

On 20/05/2010 16:37, Mizter T wrote:

Though Boris is decidedly not advocating some sort of 'core Crossrail'
arrangement, he's arguing for the whole thing to go ahead.

Plus, I'm not sure how much sense Crossrail would make if bits start
getting cut off it, or indeed how workable such an idea would really
be.

IMO Crossrail from Shenfield to Heathrow would be very heavily used. The
Maidenhead and Abbey Wood stuff is just icing on the cake.


Absolutely spot on. Shenfield to Heathrow is the "Core Crossrail" and
that is what should definitely be built. Once that is up and running,
and the economy is improving, that is the time to start extending it.

Maidenhead was always a waste of time. Reading was always the
preferred western limit, but the fear was that the cost of remodelling
and resignalling Reading, which is needed anyway, would become part of
the cost of Crossrail, which would then appear unaffordable.

But Reading can wait until the economy improves. Heathrow makes
perfect sense.