On Fri, 28 May 2010 12:47:23 +0100, "Recliner"
wrote:

wrote in message

On Fri, 28 May 2010 11:47:34 +0100
Bruce wrote:
So the electricity used to power the railway was zero carbon, was it?
Didn't Britain have any coal, oil or gas fired power stations when
the Post Office Railway operated?

Gas produces less CO2 per unit work than petrol or diesel. Also a
significant amount still (despite the best efforts of the Campaign of
Nuclear Dunces and Greenpratts) comes from nuclear power.

The exhaust fumes are at the power stations. Lorries and vans are
needed to collect the mail and bring it to the railway, and then to
distribute it.

The lorries are still being used to take the mail to the sorting
offices
the railway joins up. Except now they're needed inbetween those
offices too.

I thought the main reason the PO railway shut was that the Royal Mail
changed the way that it sorted mail, so that the old railway didn't
serve the modern processes efficiently?


Exactly.

The logic is undeniable, but Boltar will never understand logic.

On Fri, 28 May 2010 12:58:51 +0100
Bruce wrote:
I thought the main reason the PO railway shut was that the Royal Mail
changed the way that it sorted mail, so that the old railway didn't
serve the modern processes efficiently?


Exactly.

The logic is undeniable, but Boltar will never understand logic.

Fill us in then. What makes the PO railway surplus to requirements?

B2003

a TBM won't care if it has to dig the whole
tunnel itself or theres a small tunnel already there , it will take more or
less the same time.
It won't you know. If it doesn't have to dig the middle bit, it
doesn't have to do the work. That means less work needs to be done.
And that means it takes less power. And that means that more power is
available to put into the work it does do. And that means its more
efficient, and it finds that work easier

Plus why inflict a windy route on a new
rail line when for high speed it needs to be as straight as possible.
If its going to have to stop every few hundred yards for a station, it
hardly matters whether high speed is possible or not. Its not that
windy anyway.

On 26 May, 14:02, Paul Terry wrote:
Deep enough to avoid all of the sub-surface structures (foundations,
tube tunnels, etc) that are in the way of Crossrail. The tiny Post
Office railway was able to skirt round these, but that's not possible
for Crossrail (see below) - and, of course, there are many more tall
buildings now than there were when the P.O. railway was built.
Looking at the detailed planning briefs for crossrail, it shows the
Post Office railway tunnels as well. They don't appear to skirt round
anything - they take a fairly direct route. And while its true that
there are more tall buildings now than when the P.O. railway was
built, the buildings actually on its route don't get much taller than
Mount Pleasant.

the Post Office Railway doesn't have a straight enough alignment - it runs
north of Oxford Street, curving up to Wimpole Street and then coming
back south before the big loop up to Mount Pleasant.
Straight enough for what?
Ten-carriage trains of mainline proportions travelling at up to 100kph
through the tunnels.
(a) Why do they have to have ten carriages? What's wrong with more but
shorter trains?
(b) 100kph when they have to stop at stations every 500 yards or so is
absurd.

Yes, but Crossrail is nothing like a tube line - it is for mainline
services travelling at nearly three times the speed of tube trains in
the tunnels (and up to 160kph on the surface sections).
I don't see that as convincing rational. There's nothing saying its
compulsory for any cross-london relief for the central line to be
built for mainline trains. And the speed of tube trains in central
london is around 15mph, so you're talking about a tunnel that can cope
with just 45mph.

It doesn't need to hug oxford street when its not at a station, not
that the current Crossrail's Hanover Square and Dean Street Stations
are on Oxford Street either.

No, it doesn't need to hug Oxford Street (in fact, it runs slightly
south of the Central line), but it does have to be relatively straight
to achieve the anticipated speeds. Incidentally, there's no station at
Hanover Square - it is simply the eastern ticket hall for Bond Street
station
(a) Its a station
(b) Its at Hanover Square

Do you know how to put those two facts together in a meaningful way?

Crossrail is not really comparable with a tube service, though.
That's an absurd, rather circular, claim.

On 27 May, 00:38, Bruce wrote:
However, what would kill the idea stone dead is that .... it is only one tunnel
The maps on Crossrail's planning brief show the Post Office railway
having two tunnels.

In article
,
(lonelytraveller) wrote:

On 27 May, 00:38, Bruce wrote:
However, what would kill the idea stone dead is that .... it is
only one tunnel
The maps on Crossrail's planning brief show the Post Office railway
having two tunnels.

Doesn't some of the running line have two small tunnels while other parts
and the stations have larger single tunnels.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

On 29 May, 23:28, wrote:
In article
,

(lonelytraveller) wrote:
On 27 May, 00:38, Bruce wrote:
However, what would kill the idea stone dead is that .... it is
only one tunnel
The maps on Crossrail's planning brief show the Post Office railway
having two tunnels.

Doesn't some of the running line have two small tunnels while other parts
and the stations have larger single tunnels.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

I'm not sure about the exact layout of the stations, but those bits
I'd assume would need to be rebuilt a bit anyway for non-conflicting
passenger ingress / egress.

lonelytraveller wrote on
30 May 2010 17:41:37 ...
On 29 May, 23:28, wrote:
In article
,

(lonelytraveller) wrote:
On 27 May, 00:38, wrote:
However, what would kill the idea stone dead is that .... it is
only one tunnel
The maps on Crossrail's planning brief show the Post Office railway
having two tunnels.

Doesn't some of the running line have two small tunnels while other parts
and the stations have larger single tunnels.

I'm not sure about the exact layout of the stations, but those bits
I'd assume would need to be rebuilt a bit anyway for non-conflicting
passenger ingress / egress.

Rebuilt *a bit*? There is no comparison between the scale and space
needed to cope with 10-car full-size passenger trains and what was
needed to handle a few mailbags. This idea of yours to take this toy
railway and its stations and enlarge it a bit to transform it into
Crossrail is just daft.
--
Richard J.
(to email me, swap 'uk' and 'yon' in address)

On May 28, 12:10*am, "
wrote:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwRBrUwhdio

A very good short film about the Post Office Railway

And at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj0-0q6bQOc

On 01/06/2010 09:30, CJB wrote:
On May 28, 12:10 am,
wrote:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bwRBrUwhdio

A very good short film about the Post Office Railway

And at

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj0-0q6bQOc

Many thanks for that, but the music and the sound of the railway itself
seems to drown out the narrator.

I understand that there are plans to eventually move the sorting centre
at Mt. Pleasant out to Hertfordshire, and convert the current building
into yuppy flats.

When is that due to happen and what will that railroad's fate be? I
would tend to believe/hope that it retains some practical use.

What state is the railroad in these days and is there any chance of an
excursion down that way?