On Thu, 2 Sep 2004, Dave Arquati wrote:

"Dave Arquati" wrote in message
...

More pie-in-the-sky, but if such a service were run from Wycombe to
Maidenhead instead of London (relaying the Wycombe - Bourne End line),

The High Wycombe Society has been lobbying for the reinstatement of the
Wycombe to Bourne End rail route using Ultra Light Rail, with through
trams between Wycombe and Maidenhead.

http://www.highwycombesociety.org.uk/hblreport.htm

Interesting scheme. I'd always wondered what that funny little line
through Maidenhead was! Anyway, it seems to me that if it couldn't be
resurrected as heavy rail, then rather than just making High Wycombe -
Bourne End light rail, the whole line down to Maidenhead (and Marlow)
ought to be converted - as it stands, that branch is a joke. The report
doesn't really go into that idea, but i assume that's what they're
thinking - they do say "... the HBL corridor (which could include an
extension to Maidenhead)".

Perhaps i'll start a campaign to reinstate the Wivenhoe to Brightlingsea
line as light rail ...

tom

--
Mathematics is the door and the key to the sciences. -- Roger Bacon

Tom Anderson wrote:

The High Wycombe Society has been lobbying for the reinstatement of
the Wycombe to Bourne End rail route using Ultra Light Rail, with
through trams between Wycombe and Maidenhead.

http://www.highwycombesociety.org.uk/hblreport.htm

Interesting scheme. I'd always wondered what that funny little line
through Maidenhead was!

There's a long article on Wycombe station and the Maidenhead branch in the
current (Summer 2004) Great Western Railway Journal

"Stimpy" wrote in message ...
Tom Anderson wrote:

The High Wycombe Society has been lobbying for the reinstatement of
the Wycombe to Bourne End rail route using Ultra Light Rail, with
through trams between Wycombe and Maidenhead.

http://www.highwycombesociety.org.uk/hblreport.htm

Interesting scheme. I'd always wondered what that funny little line
through Maidenhead was!

There's a long article on Wycombe station and the Maidenhead branch in the
current (Summer 2004) Great Western Railway Journal


The matter of the High Wycombe- Maidenhead branch has suddenly ( and
unexpectedly) moved up the agenda, with the decison to teminate
crosrail at Maidenhead. Needless to say the Property Board were
selling ( giving away) the trackbed only 3 months ago, so much for
joined up government.

Tom Anderson wrote:

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004, Dave Arquati wrote:


"Dave Arquati" wrote in message
...


More pie-in-the-sky, but if such a service were run from Wycombe to
Maidenhead instead of London (relaying the Wycombe - Bourne End line),

The High Wycombe Society has been lobbying for the reinstatement of the
Wycombe to Bourne End rail route using Ultra Light Rail, with through
trams between Wycombe and Maidenhead.

http://www.highwycombesociety.org.uk/hblreport.htm


Interesting scheme. I'd always wondered what that funny little line
through Maidenhead was! Anyway, it seems to me that if it couldn't be
resurrected as heavy rail, then rather than just making High Wycombe -
Bourne End light rail, the whole line down to Maidenhead (and Marlow)
ought to be converted - as it stands, that branch is a joke. The report
doesn't really go into that idea, but i assume that's what they're
thinking - they do say "... the HBL corridor (which could include an
extension to Maidenhead)".

I think the plan is to track-share to Maidenhead. Wycombe to Marlow via
Bourne End would be an unattractive service as it is about double the
length of the direct road route. The service from Marlow to Maidenhead
isn't that much of a joke; with a half-hourly weekday service, it's
well-used in the peaks and there are some direct services from Bourne
End to Paddington, so a full conversion to light rail might provoke
protest from London commuters (as well as those to Slough).

So full conversion to light rail would benefit Wycombe as a centre at
the expense of Slough. Journey times would be a significant factor too.
A good Wycombe - Maidenhead journey time could attract car users between
Wycombe & Maidenhead, Wycombe & Reading and Wycombe & Slough as car
journeys are becoming increasingly delayed, and Reading in particular is
a nightmare by car.

If it were possible to retain the through services from Bourne End to
Paddington (which connect to a Bourne End - Marlow shuttle) with at
least the existing frequency between Marlow & Maidenhead, and a good
frequency between Wycombe and Maidenhead, then the line would have
excellent traffic prospects.

However, achieving all three together seems improbable! It would
certainly require extra infrastructure (passing loops & expensive
signalling for inter-operation); converting the whole lot to light rail
would probably be acceptable if a relatively high frequency were
achieved with good onward connections at Maidenhead.

Perhaps i'll start a campaign to reinstate the Wivenhoe to Brightlingsea
line as light rail ...

tom



--
Dave Arquati
Imperial College, SW7
www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London

On Fri, 3 Sep 2004, Dave Arquati wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004, Dave Arquati wrote:

"Dave Arquati" wrote in message
...

More pie-in-the-sky, but if such a service were run from Wycombe to
Maidenhead instead of London (relaying the Wycombe - Bourne End line),

The High Wycombe Society has been lobbying for the reinstatement of the
Wycombe to Bourne End rail route using Ultra Light Rail, with through
trams between Wycombe and Maidenhead.

http://www.highwycombesociety.org.uk/hblreport.htm

Interesting scheme. I'd always wondered what that funny little line
through Maidenhead was! Anyway, it seems to me that if it couldn't be
resurrected as heavy rail, then rather than just making High Wycombe -
Bourne End light rail, the whole line down to Maidenhead (and Marlow)
ought to be converted - as it stands, that branch is a joke. The report
doesn't really go into that idea, but i assume that's what they're
thinking - they do say "... the HBL corridor (which could include an
extension to Maidenhead)".

I think the plan is to track-share to Maidenhead. Wycombe to Marlow via
Bourne End would be an unattractive service as it is about double the
length of the direct road route. The service from Marlow to Maidenhead
isn't that much of a joke; with a half-hourly weekday service, it's
well-used in the peaks and there are some direct services from Bourne
End to Paddington, so a full conversion to light rail might provoke
protest from London commuters (as well as those to Slough).

[...]

If it were possible to retain the through services from Bourne End to
Paddington (which connect to a Bourne End - Marlow shuttle) with at
least the existing frequency between Marlow & Maidenhead, and a good
frequency between Wycombe and Maidenhead, then the line would have
excellent traffic prospects.

I didn't realise there were through trains from to Paddington; are those
from Bourne End only, or Marlow too? Or is there just a Marlow - Bourne
End shuttle? If Marlow - Bourne End is only a shuttle at present, then
converting it into light rail is a win - through journeys to Wycombe might
not make much sense, but if all you want to do is get from Marlow to
Bourne End to catch a real train, light rail will be better, as it's more
frequent, and it can't be much slower.

However, achieving all three together seems improbable! It would
certainly require extra infrastructure (passing loops & expensive
signalling for inter-operation); converting the whole lot to light rail
would probably be acceptable if a relatively high frequency were
achieved with good onward connections at Maidenhead.

If the two modes can share the track down to Maidenhead, that's great; if
not, you've either got to leave it as heavy rail (in which case you have a
linear Wycombe - Marlow light rail line) or convert it. It's far from
obvious that the former will provide a better service to people wanting to
get to London: as you say, if there was a high frequency and good onward
connections, it would work. In fact, if the trains can be timetabled
accurately, they don't even need to be frequent - there just needs to be
one train which gets to Maidenhead a few minutes before each London-bound
train departs. Not that i'm suggesting that - it would be missing much of
the point of light rail not to run frequent services.

In fact, even with untimetabled, metro-style (is there a word for this?)
light trains, as long as the frequency's good, it's still a win (of sorts)
over heavy rail, as trains from Maidenhead to London are much more
frequent than those from Bourne End to London.

tom

--
Crazy week so far, which at one point involved spewing down the inside of my jeans! -- D

Tom Anderson wrote:

On Fri, 3 Sep 2004, Dave Arquati wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:

On Thu, 2 Sep 2004, Dave Arquati wrote:

"Dave Arquati" wrote in message
...

More pie-in-the-sky, but if such a service were run from Wycombe to
Maidenhead instead of London (relaying the Wycombe - Bourne End line),

The High Wycombe Society has been lobbying for the reinstatement of the
Wycombe to Bourne End rail route using Ultra Light Rail, with through
trams between Wycombe and Maidenhead.

http://www.highwycombesociety.org.uk/hblreport.htm

Interesting scheme. I'd always wondered what that funny little line
through Maidenhead was! Anyway, it seems to me that if it couldn't be
resurrected as heavy rail, then rather than just making High Wycombe -
Bourne End light rail, the whole line down to Maidenhead (and Marlow)
ought to be converted - as it stands, that branch is a joke. The report
doesn't really go into that idea, but i assume that's what they're
thinking - they do say "... the HBL corridor (which could include an
extension to Maidenhead)".

I think the plan is to track-share to Maidenhead. Wycombe to Marlow via
Bourne End would be an unattractive service as it is about double the
length of the direct road route. The service from Marlow to Maidenhead
isn't that much of a joke; with a half-hourly weekday service, it's
well-used in the peaks and there are some direct services from Bourne
End to Paddington, so a full conversion to light rail might provoke
protest from London commuters (as well as those to Slough).

[...]

If it were possible to retain the through services from Bourne End to
Paddington (which connect to a Bourne End - Marlow shuttle) with at
least the existing frequency between Marlow & Maidenhead, and a good
frequency between Wycombe and Maidenhead, then the line would have
excellent traffic prospects.


I didn't realise there were through trains from to Paddington; are those
from Bourne End only, or Marlow too? Or is there just a Marlow - Bourne
End shuttle? If Marlow - Bourne End is only a shuttle at present, then
converting it into light rail is a win - through journeys to Wycombe might
not make much sense, but if all you want to do is get from Marlow to
Bourne End to catch a real train, light rail will be better, as it's more
frequent, and it can't be much slower.

1577+2260 explained the rather odd set-up in a separate reply; basically
it all depends on the fact that Bourne End has two platforms, enabling
the line to be run either as Marlow - Maidenhead (off-peak) or Marlow -
Bourne End and Bourne End - London (peak).

All trains connect to something: the mini-shuttles to Marlow in the
peaks connect to Paddington trains, and the full shuttles connect to
Reading and Paddington trains at Maidenhead. This makes it reasonably
easy for people to use the train to get to work in Slough or Reading
which are both major employment centres for Marlow and Bourne End.

So light rail conversion would be OK if Marlow - Maidenhead through
journeys were maintained with appropriate connections at Maidenhead
(although as I mentioned before some people would bemoan the loss of
direct trains to London).

The difficulty comes with maintaining the Marlow - Maidenhead service as
well as running a through Wycombe - Maidenhead service: passing loops
would be required between Bourne End and Maidenhead (and on the rebuilt
section obviously in order to get a reasonable frequency). The current
journey between Maidenhead and Bourne End is about 11 minutes so without
those loops you can only run 2 tph one way and 3tph the other. A speed
improvement might be possible (it's 7km so current average speed is only
about 38kph, including the station stops at Cookham and Furze Platt) but
not enough for a decent frequency.

There should be at least 5tph to Bourne End (ideally 6tph given that we
are talking about small Ultra Light Rail vehicles like Parry People
Movers) as current bus frequencies on this corridor are 6bph Loudwater,
4bph Wooburn Green & 3bph Bourne End. Current public transport frequency
to Maidenhead is 1bph connecting to the train at Bourne End. I don't
think anything less than 3tph would attract people out of cars.

With a passing loop between Cookham & Furze Platt, you could squeeze
5tph in each direction; that would give 2tph Marlow - Maidenhead and
3tph Wycombe - Maidenhead (with a separate 2 or 3tph terminating at
Bourne End). Two passing loops and you can get 7tph in each direction
(say 3 for Marlow and 4 for Wycombe). Maybe it would help missing out
some stops at Cookham, but I'm not sure of the figures for working that out.

Of course squeezing so many services in means reliability would probably
go to pot!

However, achieving all three together seems improbable! It would
certainly require extra infrastructure (passing loops & expensive
signalling for inter-operation); converting the whole lot to light rail
would probably be acceptable if a relatively high frequency were
achieved with good onward connections at Maidenhead.


If the two modes can share the track down to Maidenhead, that's great; if
not, you've either got to leave it as heavy rail (in which case you have a
linear Wycombe - Marlow light rail line) or convert it. It's far from
obvious that the former will provide a better service to people wanting to
get to London: as you say, if there was a high frequency and good onward
connections, it would work. In fact, if the trains can be timetabled
accurately, they don't even need to be frequent - there just needs to be
one train which gets to Maidenhead a few minutes before each London-bound
train departs. Not that i'm suggesting that - it would be missing much of
the point of light rail not to run frequent services.

It's hard to consider light rail in this reference because light rail in
Britain is always urban, but we are talking about ultra light rail which
runs partly through an urban environment (Wycombe - Loudwater and
intermittently to Bourne End), partly interurban (Marlow to anywhere
else) and partly rural (Cookham). Certainly Cookham would be surprised
to get the 7tph to Maidenhead and Bourne End I was talking about earlier!

I think the connections at Maidenhead are absolutely vital for the
project to be a success; timetabled well you could provide 45 minute
journeys from Wycombe to Slough and 50 minutes from Wycombe to Reading.
Given the absolutely chronic traffic congestion throughout the area,
these could become attractive; although not desparately faster than
existing public transport, they would be congestion-free.

--
Dave Arquati
Imperial College, SW7
www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London

Dave Arquati wrote:

There should be at least 5tph to Bourne End (ideally 6tph given that we
are talking about small Ultra Light Rail vehicles like Parry People
Movers) as current bus frequencies on this corridor are 6bph Loudwater,
4bph Wooburn Green & 3bph Bourne End. Current public transport frequency
to Maidenhead is 1bph connecting to the train at Bourne End. I don't
think anything less than 3tph would attract people out of cars.

With a passing loop between Cookham & Furze Platt, you could squeeze
5tph in each direction; that would give 2tph Marlow - Maidenhead and
3tph Wycombe - Maidenhead (with a separate 2 or 3tph terminating at
Bourne End). Two passing loops and you can get 7tph in each direction
(say 3 for Marlow and 4 for Wycombe). Maybe it would help missing out
some stops at Cookham, but I'm not sure of the figures for working that
out.


At that frequency you'd get some pretty vociferous objections from road
users at the level crossing in Cookham and the one(s) that would have to be
re-instated at Bourne End.

The Cookham one looks a potentially serious accident spot as well.