Published today at: http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/pi/ro...ityeasteng.pdf

Covers the London Liverpool Street to Cambridge/Stansted main line and
London area branches. Quick highlights of proposals:

* 12 car trains London to Cambridge and Stansted in 2012; 'longer'
trains on the other routes
* 10 to 15 minute reduction on London to Cambridge and Stansted
journey times
* extension of London Overground services from Stratford to
Northumberland Park (or a shuttle service)
* grade-separation of Coppermill Junction and four-tracking from there
to Tottenham Hale
* removal of many level crossings in the Lea Valley, both road and
foot
* 100mph ruling line speed
* second tunnel on approach to Stansted Airport
* signalling alterations to allow overnight services to/from Stansted
Airport

On Thu, 26 Mar 2009, wrote:

Published today at: http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/pi/ro...ityeasteng.pdf

Covers the London Liverpool Street to Cambridge/Stansted main line and
London area branches. Quick highlights of proposals:

* 12 car trains London to Cambridge and Stansted in 2012; 'longer'
trains on the other routes
* 10 to 15 minute reduction on London to Cambridge and Stansted
journey times
* extension of London Overground services from Stratford to
Northumberland Park (or a shuttle service)
* grade-separation of Coppermill Junction and four-tracking from there
to Tottenham Hale
* removal of many level crossings in the Lea Valley, both road and
foot
* 100mph ruling line speed
* second tunnel on approach to Stansted Airport
* signalling alterations to allow overnight services to/from Stansted
Airport

For a minute there, i read 'Progress Report' as meaning these things had
all been done!

It all seems pretty sensible. I'm most surprised by the idea of
four-tracking from Coppermills Junction to Tottenham Hale: i don't really
see how that buys extra capacity given that there are still only two
tracks north of there. I suppose this ties in with the addition of a third
track between Tottenham Hale and Northumberland Park, which would somehow
let trains reverse at Tottenham Hale without blocking the other two lines;
together, those things would allow the Liverpool Street - Tottenham Hale
line to run at full capacity, with services up the Lea Valley line
reversing at Tottenham Hale without interfering with them. Except that
there's always going to be capacity at Tottenham Hale anyway, because some
trains coming up through Hackney Downs head off to Chingford at Clapton
Junction (and i notice that they're not talking about grade-separating
that).

I can't help but feel that the idea of running services down the Lea
Valley line to Stratford has become something of a bee in the bonnet,
fuelled by the totemic power Stratford now has in the minds of planners.
Is there really that much demand for it?

In the context of the Hertford East junction, does 'remodelling' mean
'grade separating'?

I'd like to see more detail about the level crossings. I know there are
several, but how many, and which will be severed and which grade
separated?

I wonder why so many of the stations within London are so lightly used.
It's not as if there are tube lines nearby which are attracting people
away from them - although for quite a lot of the line, the main line and
Southbury loop are quite close together, and would compete for passengers.
I think the areas they serve are quite densely populated - see the long
spike of yellow protruding into greener suburbs he

http://www.maptube.org/london/map.aspx?mapid=136

Although the corridor of the line is nondescriptly 'multicultural',
lacking either 'city living' or 'prospering suburbs', and with enclaves of
'blue collar communities' and 'constrained by circumstances' (?!) further
north:

http://www.maptube.org/london/map.aspx?mapid=116

Could it be that those stations serve areas where people don't commute to
work in other parts of London, either working locally or, shock horror,
not at all?

tom

--
But for [Flavor Flav's] "YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAH BOYYYYYYYYYY"s alone he should
be given Rap Legend status. -- Nate Patrin, ILX

Tom Anderson wrote:

Could it be that those stations serve areas where people don't
commute to work in other parts of London, either working locally or,
shock horror, not at all?

That's about it.

Tom Anderson wrote:

I wonder why so many of the stations within London are so lightly used.
It's not as if there are tube lines nearby which are attracting people
away from them - although for quite a lot of the line, the main line and
Southbury loop are quite close together, and would compete for
passengers. I think the areas they serve are quite densely populated -
see the long spike of yellow protruding into greener suburbs he

snip

Could it be that those stations serve areas where people don't commute
to work in other parts of London, either working locally or, shock
horror, not at all?

That, and the service has effectively been subject to "closure by stealth".

Prior to the massive disruption caused during the A406 improvements, the
basic service pattern on the West Anglia Inners was, if memory serves:

2tph to Enfield Town
2tph to Cheshunt via Seven Sisters
2tph to Hertford East via Tottenham Hale
4tph to Chingford

With the improvements to the A406, the entrance to Angel Road station
(which SHOULD be convenient for Tesco Extra, IKEA, et al) was moved from
the Angel Road Viaduct to Conduit Lane, some distance from the country
end of the platforms.

Access is now via a staircase, which goes under the road bridge, and
then along a concrete "path" sandwiched between the Down Line and a
Scrap Yard, before emerging onto the Country End ramp of the Down
Platform. Passengers wishing to travel towards London then need to cross
the line by means of the concrete footbridge.

And the train "service" isn't much better:

There are 16 Up and 14 Down services Monday to Friday, with no service
at weekends and public holidays.

Of these, only the first Up and first Down trains (at 05:57 and 06:19
from Angel Road, respectively) run to/from Liverpool Street, the rest
start from/terminate at Stratford.

There's a gap of nearly 6 hours in the middle of the day (09:50 to
15:47) where NO trains call at the station, and the last Up train is at
19:50 to Stratford, with the last Down train at 19:17 to Bishops Stortford.

For a station in Travelcard Zone 4, that's *pathetic*.

Cheers,

Barry

In article
,
() wrote:

Published today at:
http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/pi/ro...ityeasteng.pdf

Covers the London Liverpool Street to Cambridge/Stansted main line and
London area branches. Quick highlights of proposals:

* 12 car trains London to Cambridge and Stansted in 2012; 'longer'
trains on the other routes

They're going to have to get their skates on to build the Cambridge island
platform then!

* 10 to 15 minute reduction on London to Cambridge and Stansted
journey times

Welcome for sure.

* extension of London Overground services from Stratford to
Northumberland Park (or a shuttle service)
* grade-separation of Coppermill Junction and four-tracking from there
to Tottenham Hale

But not North of there?

* removal of many level crossings in the Lea Valley, both road and foot
* 100mph ruling line speed
* second tunnel on approach to Stansted Airport
* signalling alterations to allow overnight services to/from Stansted
Airport

--
Colin Rosenstiel

wrote in message
...
In article
,
() wrote:

Published today at:
http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/pi/ro...ityeasteng.pdf

Covers the London Liverpool Street to Cambridge/Stansted main line and
London area branches. Quick highlights of proposals:

* 12 car trains London to Cambridge and Stansted in 2012; 'longer'
trains on the other routes

They're going to have to get their skates on to build the Cambridge island
platform then!

* 10 to 15 minute reduction on London to Cambridge and Stansted
journey times

Welcome for sure.

* extension of London Overground services from Stratford to
Northumberland Park (or a shuttle service)
* grade-separation of Coppermill Junction and four-tracking from there
to Tottenham Hale

But not North of there?

The paper does explain why.

tim

On Mar 26, 10:55*pm, wrote:
Published today at:http://www.dft.gov.uk/pgr/rail/pi/ro...ityeasteng.pdf

Covers the London Liverpool Street to Cambridge/Stansted main line and
London area branches. Quick highlights of proposals:

* 12 car trains London to Cambridge and Stansted in 2012; 'longer'
trains on the other routes

It would help enormously if National Express ran existing trains to
the advertised length. Having had the grave misfortune to use the
Chingford Line in last Friday's PM peak when only 4 rather than 8 cars
turned up I now understand why people get so upset at such antics. The
other issue here is whether these longer trains will be in use all the
time or just at peak times. While it is undoubtedly popular to
relieve overcrowding at peak times having new additional resources
sitting around doing nothing is not such good value for money.

* 10 to 15 minute reduction on London to Cambridge and Stansted
journey times

Lovely for people catching planes or who live in the bordering
counties. Not much use to anyone else.

* extension of London Overground services from Stratford to
Northumberland Park (or a shuttle service)

Not at all sure what that is supposed to achieve. While I would love
to see a service restored at places like Lea Bridge there is no talk
here about the obvious link which is the Coppermill Curve to the
Chingford Line - the alignment is still there and it would be a
marginal additional to any grade separation works. It would also allow
far better local services to be created if coupled with plans to add
extra stations. I think a shuttle service would be far better than
extending the NLL from Richmond. That strikes me as making the line
extremely long and prone to even more delays as it would interface
with yet another set of lines. A frequent local shuttle would probably
be better but they need to be inventive with stations and interchanges
- e.g. would they sort out Angel Road given its promixity to IKEA or
would they contemplate a Ferry Lane station to give interchange on to
GOBLIN but perhaps only with local line platforms on the 4 track
section? A station near Ruckholt Road in Leyton to the north of the
Olympics site would also be a good idea. The Chingford Line could
easily have 3 extra stations (Forest Road, Winchester Road / North
Circ, Chingford Hatch) added to improve its coverage.

In another post the issue was identified about local rail line usage.
Service frequencies are relatively poor via both Seven Sisters and
Tottenham Hale for stopping services. You only need to look at the
massive overcrowding all day, every day on the 192 bus to see that
something is amiss in terms of real demand and how the modes work or
more pertienently don't work. The Tottenham - Edmonton - Enfield
corridor has extremely high bus frequencies and very high demand and
yet I'm sure rail could cover a decent share of that market far more
efficiently if only services and fares were more affordable.

* grade-separation of Coppermill Junction and four-tracking from there
to Tottenham Hale

I am very surprised by this. I fail to see how they can get 4 tracks
in the alignment immediately south of Tottenham Hale. You have Ferry
Lane estate on one side and industrial and residential units including
the retail park on the other. Unless the tracks are going to be on top
of one another then it's going to be a very controversial move to cut
a big swathe through there. I'd also question whether Tottenham Hale
can be expanded to 4 tracks itself given the massive Hale Village
redevelopment that is under construction now.

They do seem rather fixated on how "low demand" at the inner stations
would drag down the business case for other improvements. Quite why
Stansted Airport needs 6 trains an hour I do not know. I also think a
15 minute inner suburban station is the bare minimum acceptable
standard - rail services would be much more acceptable if they could
run every 10 mins. I doubt there would be any issues about demand
levels at places like Brimsdown etc if trains ran that frequently.
They also need to think about stations to better serve developments
like Enfield Island Village.

* removal of many level crossings in the Lea Valley, both road and
foot

Well I can see why they wish to do this but that is not going to be an
easy task with some of the road crossing in the Brimsdown - Edmonton
area. Not a lot of space to either dig under or bridge over the rail
lines.

* 100mph ruling line speed
* second tunnel on approach to Stansted Airport
* signalling alterations to allow overnight services to/from Stansted
Airport

Anyone understand why signalling alterations are required for
overnight services?

The document is a reasonable start but it is completely lacking in
imagination when it comes to required service levels and the
opportunities for radical service developments to serve people in
London. It's a given that they want to shuttle the outer area
commuters in as fast as possible but I fail to see why scope for
decent improvements within London should be sacrificed as part of the
scheme.

--
Paul Corfield
via Google

In message
, at
02:34:55 on Fri, 27 Mar 2009, plcd1 remarked:
* 10 to 15 minute reduction on London to Cambridge and Stansted
journey times

Lovely for people catching planes or who live in the bordering
counties. Not much use to anyone else.

If it relieves some of the pressure from Cambridge - Kings Cross, it'll
be useful.
--
Roland Perry

"plcd1" wrote

Anyone understand why signalling alterations are required for
overnight services?

Presumably bidirectional signalling, to make single line working practicable
while the other line is under maintenance.

Peter

"Peter Masson" wrote in message
...

"plcd1" wrote

Anyone understand why signalling alterations are required for
overnight services?

Presumably bidirectional signalling, to make single line working
practicable
while the other line is under maintenance.


Nice idea, except that HSE rules don't allow such operations.

tim