On 29 Sep, 07:16, Roland Perry wrote:
But poor old St Pancras, already overcrowded, in the frame again (I
suppose they could scrap the Javelin services and run to the north from
that part of the station):

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7641094.stm

The proposed 180mph rail link would run between St Pancras in London and
Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds.

The Conservatives hope the line would increase use of the Eurostar,
based at St Pancras, to the continent, and free up the West Coast
Mainline for more commuter journeys.

Journey times would be cut from 125 minutes to 80 minutes from London to
Manchester, and from 55 minutes to 17 minutes between Manchester and
Leeds.


Wow, that would appear to be a fairly unequivocal policy commitment
from the Tories - the decision not to allow Heathrow expansion is a
really big one in itself, and as Ms Villiers points out this is a
distinct departure from the attitudes of old of the Conservatives.
Could they now renege on this commitment? I find it difficult to see
how they could. If not expanding Heathrow really does become a
manifesto commitment then I dare say it will prove a vote winner in
certain quarters - both people under the flight path and perhaps a few
'greenies' as well.

Whether the North - South HSL would ever happen is another question,
especially in light of the Crossrail funding concerns. Dare I suggest
that the choice a London terminal is flexible - as others have said
beforehand Euston would appear to be the most appropriate choice.
Though is the mention of St. Pancras perhaps more indicative of a lack
of any real research behind the Tories 'plans' - have they really
grasped the issues an HSL would present (including a potential
plethora of 'nimby' objectors in blue counties)?

Incidentally - before anyone mentions it - I really don't think this
proposal should be read together with Boris's comments about a new
artificial island airport in the Thames estuary - Bozza's comments do
not constitute Tory policy, instead they were more of a pie in the sky
fantasy plan (after all, it's easy to dream up such schemes - it
happens all the time here! - but rather more of a challenge to
actually make them happen).

Mizter T wrote:


Incidentally - before anyone mentions it - I really don't think this
proposal should be read together with Boris's comments about a new
artificial island airport in the Thames estuary - Bozza's comments do
not constitute Tory policy, instead they were more of a pie in the sky
fantasy plan (after all, it's easy to dream up such schemes - it
happens all the time here! - but rather more of a challenge to
actually make them happen).

Agreed - the airport plans really come from Deputy Mayor for Policing
Kit Malthouse, who's been involved with aviation before (his budget
airline failed to get off the ground in 2004) and wrote this article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/com...cle2925884.ece

which, to me at least, reads like someone who doesn't know what he's
talking about (the cruising speed on the GWML for instance). All the
talking points are identical to the ones Boris came out with last week.

Boris is easily swayed by the enthusiasms of others - don't take it
seriously, they're better at getting stuff in the papers than concrete
into the ground. At least the main party appears to be talking to
someone sensible.

Tom

On 29 Sep, 09:07, Tom Barry wrote:

Mizter T wrote:

Incidentally - before anyone mentions it - I really don't think this
proposal should be read together with Boris's comments about a new
artificial island airport in the Thames estuary - Bozza's comments do
not constitute Tory policy, instead they were more of a pie in the sky
fantasy plan (after all, it's easy to dream up such schemes - it
happens all the time here! - but rather more of a challenge to
actually make them happen).

Agreed - the airport plans really come from Deputy Mayor for Policing
Kit Malthouse, who's been involved with aviation before (his budget
airline failed to get off the ground in 2004) and wrote this article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/com...st_contributor...

which, to me at least, reads like someone who doesn't know what he's
talking about (the cruising speed on the GWML for instance). *All the
talking points are identical to the ones Boris came out with last week.

Boris is easily swayed by the enthusiasms of others - don't take it
seriously, they're better at getting stuff in the papers than concrete
into the ground. *At least the main party appears to be talking to
someone sensible.



Aha, interesting, didn't know about Mr Malthouse's interest in
aviation. I also see that the Times article he penned is linked to
from his own personal website www.kitmalthouse.com.

Interesting to ponder whether the Mayor and his advisers knew about
the upcoming announcements at the Tory party conference and thus went
public with their own 'plan' a week beforehand - was this thus an
attempt to upstage the conference announcements, or less
conspiratorially an attempt to throw some of their own (or should that
be Mr Malthouses's own) ideas into the mix for the new grand Tory
transport plans?

On 2008-09-29 09:07:41 +0100, Tom Barry said:

Mizter T wrote:


Incidentally - before anyone mentions it - I really don't think this
proposal should be read together with Boris's comments about a new
artificial island airport in the Thames estuary - Bozza's comments do
not constitute Tory policy, instead they were more of a pie in the sky
fantasy plan (after all, it's easy to dream up such schemes - it
happens all the time here! - but rather more of a challenge to
actually make them happen).

Agreed - the airport plans really come from Deputy Mayor for Policing
Kit Malthouse, who's been involved with aviation before (his budget
airline failed to get off the ground in 2004) and wrote this article:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/com...cle2925884.ece

which,

to me at least, reads like someone who doesn't know what he's talking
about (the cruising speed on the GWML for instance).


I think you have misunderstood Malthouse’s remarks about trains’
speeds. He compared Brunel’s approach to civil engineering, which
allowed for speeds in the future to be much higher than those current
in 1833, to that of others active at the time. Malthouse then stated
that “And he was right: trains can run at well over 150 mph today.� In
my reading this sentence does not refer directly to speeds on the GWML.

Malthouse could have strengthened his argument by adding the airport at
Munich to his list of relocated airports. About 10 years ago the new
airport in the Erdinger Moos ('Franz Josef Strauss') was opened to
replace the cramped site very close to the city at Riem. I have used it
frequently over the last three years; it is spacious, is well laid out
and has a micro-brewery on the premises, the Air-Bräu which sells beer
at very democratic prices. What more do you need? The only snag is the
all-stations S-Bahn link to Munich via routes S1 and S8, both of which
take 45 minutes to the Hauptbahnhof.

Nevertheless the main thrust of his arguments is reasonable. However,
without the airport nearby the value of the land released by Heathrow
will most likely not be as high as land prices in the area have been.
(By the time the airport is moved we will be in the
financial/economic/political crisis after the one after this one ).
However relocating Heathrow to a site east of London will have huge
knock-on effects to those companies who have set up shop in the Thames
Valley and other areas west of London because of easy access to
Heathrow. Bracknell, Slough, Reading, Basingstoke and others will no
longer be so attractive to globally active high-tech industries unless
easy and simple access to London’s future airport is maintained.


All the talking points are identical to the ones Boris came out with
last week.

Boris is easily swayed by the enthusiasms of others - don't take it
seriously, they're better at getting stuff in the papers than concrete
into the ground. At least the main party appears to be talking to
someone sensible.

Tom

On Mon, 29 Sep 2008 12:55:57 +0100, Robert
wrote:

I think you have misunderstood Malthouse’s remarks about trains’
speeds. He compared Brunel’s approach to civil engineering, which
allowed for speeds in the future to be much higher than those current
in 1833, to that of others active at the time. Malthouse then stated
that “And he was right: trains can run at well over 150 mph today.” In
my reading this sentence does not refer directly to speeds on the GWML.

Brunel designed a level straight route because the available engines
were too underpowered to climb hills at speed and the shortest
distance between two points is a straight line. He was designing the
best route for the trains he had at the time and wasn't considering
what might be running on it 150 years later. The fact that the route
is suitable for modern 1970s high speed trains is just luck and not
design.

On 2008-09-29 19:11:14 +0100, said:

On Mon, 29 Sep 2008 12:55:57 +0100, Robert
wrote:

I think you have misunderstood Malthouse’s remarks about trains’
speeds. He compared Brunel’s approach to civil engineering, which
allowed for speeds in the future to be much higher than those current
in 1833, to that of others active at the time. Malthouse then stated
that “And he was right: trains can run at well over 150 mph today.” In
my reading this sentence does not refer directly to speeds on the GWML.

Brunel designed a level straight route because the available engines
were too underpowered to climb hills at speed and the shortest
distance between two points is a straight line. He was designing the
best route for the trains he had at the time and wasn't considering
what might be running on it 150 years later. The fact that the route
is suitable for modern 1970s high speed trains is just luck and not
design.

What you say is true, but it is not the whole story. Before Brunel
became Engineer to the nascent London and Bristol railway others, such
as William Brunton and Henry Price had tried to survey a route: they
proposed a route via Bath, Bradford-on-Avon, Trowbridge, Hungerford,
Newbury, Reading and so to London. W. H. Townsend was building a
tramway (the Bristol and Gloucester Railway) from the Floating Harbour
to coal mines near Mangotsfield - it was suggested that this be
extended to London.

Although these proposals had to use the same locomotive technology as
Brunel, in no way could these be described as high speed routes. The
organising committee of the London and Bristol railway intended to hold
a competition to select a surveyor. Brunel said that he would not enter
for the competition because he was convinced it was the wrong approach,
but he would agree to survey one route from London to Bristol. It would
not be the cheapest but it would be the best. He was appointed to the
post in March 1833.

By August of that year the initials 'GWR' had started to appear in his
diary - in his imagination he had already journeyed far beyond Bristol
to Cornwall and even New York City. It was indeed, a Great Western
Railway. Not for him 'Liverpool and Manchester', 'London and
Birmingham' or 'Canterbury and Whitstable'.

The 7 foot gauge was adopted for speed. After initial teething troubles
with the track, in March 1840 'Firefly' drew the Directors' Special
train (following the opening of the railway to Reading through the
cutting at Sonning) from Twyford to Paddington, start to stop, in 37
minutes at an average speed of 50 mph. This was unheard of in 1840.
Being able to run at 125mph on the GWR's trackbed without tilt and
balises is not luck - it is the result of superb engineering.

I rest my case. Brunel thought and built on the grand scale. Nowadays
Britain does not (generally - there are exceptions) do public works
well. New hospitals seem always to be a size too small; Stansted has
been made uncomfortable at a time of increasing numbers of passengers
by reducing the circulating floor space by building shops; Heathrow is
cramped, an artifical island in the Thames Estuary with enough space
for sufficient independent runways would seem to be a good solution.
But don't fill the buildings with shops....

Robert

On Tue, 30 Sep 2008 22:31:09 +0100, Robert wrote

I rest my case. Brunel thought and built on the grand scale. Nowadays
Britain does not (generally - there are exceptions) do public works
well. New hospitals seem always to be a size too small; Stansted has
been made uncomfortable at a time of increasing numbers of passengers
by reducing the circulating floor space by building shops; Heathrow is
cramped, an artifical island in the Thames Estuary with enough space
for sufficient independent runways would seem to be a good solution.
But don't fill the buildings with shops....

By all means provide plenty of shops but design them in from the start so
there are still more-than-adequate circulating areas

On Wed, 1 Oct 2008 17:51:00 +0100, Stimpy
wrote:

By all means provide plenty of shops but design them in from the start so
there are still more-than-adequate circulating areas

In Euston they are being removed, and it is providing an improvement.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Thu, 2 Oct 2008 06:29:09 +0100, Neil Williams wrote
On Wed, 1 Oct 2008 17:51:00 +0100, Stimpy
wrote:

By all means provide plenty of shops but design them in from the start so
there are still more-than-adequate circulating areas

In Euston they are being removed, and it is providing an improvement.

That is because they were crammed onto the circulating area. If the station
had been designed to accommodate the shops in addition to the large
circulating hall then they wouldn't need to be removed.

On a related note, anything that restores something of the original beauty
and space of Euston is to to be applauded

Mizter T wrote:


On 29 Sep, 07:16, Roland Perry wrote:
But poor old St Pancras, already overcrowded, in the frame again (I
suppose they could scrap the Javelin services and run to the north from
that part of the station):

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/7641094.stm

The proposed 180mph rail link would run between St Pancras in London and
Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds.

The Conservatives hope the line would increase use of the Eurostar,
based at St Pancras, to the continent, and free up the West Coast
Mainline for more commuter journeys.

Journey times would be cut from 125 minutes to 80 minutes from London to
Manchester, and from 55 minutes to 17 minutes between Manchester and
Leeds.


Wow, that would appear to be a fairly unequivocal policy commitment
from the Tories - the decision not to allow Heathrow expansion is a
really big one in itself, and as Ms Villiers points out this is a
distinct departure from the attitudes of old of the Conservatives.


I'm surprised that no-one has noticed the Conservatives' equally
unequivocal commitment about where the money for the high speed
line(s) would come from.

The Conservatives are absolutely committed to put not a single penny
more into the railway so, as I have already predicted, all the money
for the high speed line would come from swingeing cuts to Network
Rail's subsidy.

Perhaps, when (and if) the Tories get into office, they will find the
economy in such bad shape that we will get the swingeing cuts, but no
money for the high speed line(s).