In our previous DLR article we looked at the DLR routes to the City. It is now time to look further east and see where future enhancement is expected. We now look at the routes through Canning Town and see how both they, and the DLR overall, can be expected to develop.
In our previous piece, we highlighted that the lines into the City are seen to be pretty much at full capacity, although there is some possible development to come on the route from Stratford to Lewisham. With sufficient rolling stock you could, in principle, run 15tph from Stratford to Lewisham. On this route all the trains are also generally 2-car, offering another easy way to achieve a 50% improvement in capacity if longer rolling stock were available. These possibilities aside, there is little that can be done until 2019 at the earliest when most, if not all, of the single track between Bow Church and Stratford is doubled.
Routes via Canning Town
In contrast to the west, there is a lot of potential east of Poplar. Indeed this really could be looked at as a potential two-phase development. The first phase would rectify any obvious deficiencies with the current service. A future second phase would cater for any major growth that may develop. Before looking at future growth here though, we must take a look at the eastern routes via Canning Town.
Beckton beckons
The current Beckton – Canning Town service in thick orange is off-peak only. It used to run to Stratford International
The addition of the Beckton branch to the DLR was by far the biggest single enhancement in terms of stations added – eleven in all. It also added the first new route of any significant length. Until then the only extension had been to Bank. The Beckton branch was, in a sense, before its time as it was built in advance of any redevelopment. This meant that in the early days passenger numbers were very low indeed. This turned out to be beneficial, as the branch was used as a test bed for a more advanced form of Automatic Train Operation (ATO) which took a couple of years of operation before it really worked satisfactorily – and could thus be extended to the rest of the DLR.
A consequence of the originally undeveloped nature of the Beckton branch is that passenger numbers at a station can significantly increase with a new development. They can also fluctuate wildly. This is particularly noticeable at Custom House, which is the main station for Excel, but must also affect stations serving the University of East London (Cyprus and Beckton Park). One of the quietest stations is in fact Beckton Park and the next station along the line, Royal Albert, probably only manages significant passenger numbers because the London Borough of Newham have located their main offices nearby.
Royal Albert station showing the short platform and Newham Council Offices. Undeveloped land is present on the left of the picture (towards Beckton Park DLR station)
From December 2018 Crossrail will serve Custom House, which is also a DLR station on the Beckton branch. One effect of this should be to reduce, or even eliminate, the need for the DLR to run a special timetable when there is a significant event on at Excel. Another will probably be that the DLR will be used more as a feeder for people to get to Custom House to continue their journey to London via Crossrail and less as a feeder to access the Underground via Bank.
The Woolwich Arsenal branch
The Woolwich Arsenal branch is now supplemented by an all day service to Stratford International. The off-peak only Beckton – Canning Town service is not shown.
Probably much more important than the Beckton branch is the branch that opened to Woolwich Arsenal. The trains on this route share track with the Beckton trains from Shadwell to Canning Town but then, instead of continuing directly east, go south briefly first. By doing this the branch serves the south side of the Royal Victoria Dock and King George V Dock, as well as City Airport. It then goes under the River Thames to serve Woolwich Arsenal National Rail station.
Woolwich Arsenal is one of the busiest stations on the DLR as it caters to passengers changing there from SouthEastern services. With a new Crossrail station being built at Woolwich just over 200 metres away and Abbey Wood station – the terminus for Crossrail’s south eastern branch – just two stations down the line, it is clear that this is the part of the DLR that will be most affected by Crossrail. It will probably lead to a significant drop in passenger numbers.
The route to Stratford International
The final DLR extension was from Canning Town to Stratford International. Unlike previous extensions this one replaced an existing passenger railway service for most of its length, with only the short extension from Stratford to Stratford International, following a former freight route for most of the distance between these two stations, offering a completely new passenger service. Stratford has become far more of a destination in its own right than could possibly have been imagined when the takeover of the route was planned. Stratford will, of course, also be served by Crossrail but on a different branch to that serving Custom House, Woolwich and Abbey Wood.
Hammer time
In addition to Canning Town and Stratford it is important not to forget the potential importance of West Ham as an interchange station. Whilst there must be some interchange with the Underground, the potential growth here comes from interchange with c2c services. The relationship between c2c and the DLR is easy to overlook. In recent years there has been growth at Limehouse as c2c passengers alight there to continue their journey to Canary Wharf or elsewhere on the DLR and most c2c trains already call there. This has been reflected at West Ham.
From December 2015 c2c have bowed to the inevitable and, partly in order to maximise capacity on their two track railway, every train will call at both West Ham and Limehouse. In fact they will all call at Barking as well (with the exception of just two in the shoulders of the evening peak – and those stops were omitted to placate users upset about losing all their fast trains). As can be seen from the expected level of crowding on each train the London trains will be at their most crowded on arrival at West Ham. It is well known that there is considerable unmet demand for travel to Stratford from c2c stations so, with the Jubilee line very busy at its eastern extremities, it is reasonable to assume that the best route available is by changing onto the DLR at West Ham.
Serving the Beckton and Woolwich Arsenal Branches
With the opening of the new line from Canning Town to Stratford International it became possible to run either a Stratford International – Woolwich Arsenal service or a Stratford International – Beckton service or, potentially, both.
Initially, on opening, a peak service every 8 minutes was run between Stratford International and Woolwich. This made sense due to the peak demand at Woolwich and the impracticality of boosting the Woolwich Arsenal – Bank service. Passengers would at least have an option to travel from Woolwich Arsenal and change at Canning Town, from where they could get to Canary Wharf by either using the Jubilee line or continuing on the DLR to Poplar and changing again. Rather curiously, initially in the off-peak, trains from Stratford International ran to Beckton instead of Woolwich Arsenal. Presumably, off-peak, there was greater demand on that route and it did help provide capacity for the erratic flows to Custom House.
In recent years Woolwich Arsenal – Stratford International has become an established all-day service conforming to the now-standard DLR frequency of every 8 minutes in the peak and every 10 minutes off-peak.
With most DLR stations now having 15tph (peak) or 12tph (off-peak), or better, the Stratford International branch seems to miss out. This is almost certainly due to a simple lack of trains. The Beckton branch, rather strangely, gets 7.5tph in the peak but, because it is supplemented by a Beckton – Canning Town service off-peak, actually gets 12tph off-peak. These trains used to continue to West Ham, but the extra trains for Stratford – Canary Wharf service mentioned in the previous DLR article had to come from somewhere and it was here. It would appear to be fairly obvious that if the trains were available then there would be an all-day Beckton – Stratford International service.
DLR system diagram – simultaneously out-of-date and futuristic
We can now see roughly what the aspiration of the DLR probably is for their ideal service at current levels of use. In fact for years this is precisely the routes shown on the DLR diagram. Currently the Stratford International – Beckton route is non-existent but, as described above, it did used to run in the off-peak. Since then the DLR diagram has not been updated and contains a couple of other out-of-date features. It claims that 3-car trains will not open all their doors at Pudding Mill Lane and it implies that some southbound trains from Bank – Lewisham stop at West India Quay when in fact none do.
Trains Galore – one day
What is abundantly clear is that the DLR really could do with new trains in the near future. This would allow it to run all the routes that TfL clearly aspire to. It would also allow the beefing up of existing services so that they were all 3-car – at least in the peaks.
It has also long been known that the desire is for future DLR trains to be walk-through. Originally it was proposed to stretch the most recently delivered units by adding a long centre section but this approach appears to have been abandoned and they are now looking for entirely new trains.
What is surprising is that at first glance the latest DLR-related press release appears to suggest that there will be new trains within three years. It is easy to overlook but the headline states:
Part of a three-year series of improvements to increase frequency across the whole DLR network
The press release does not explain how this would be achieved and more trains would appear to be essential but, even then, it is hard to take the statement literally and believe that we will soon see more trains to Bank. At times like this it is generally a good idea to have quick look at the TfL Business Plan 2014. If the Business Plan does not indicate that there is money set aside for new trains then they probably won’t happen. Sure enough there isn’t – but there is one very telling paragraph:
Along with the increase in demand on London Overground, demand for the DLR and Tramlink has also risen by 45 per cent and 17 per cent respectively, and we expect it to increase further. To meet this we intend to boost train and tram off-peak and evening frequencies.
The italics are ours and show what a difference a word can make. We still do not have a definite answer to the question of whether new trains are coming or not because it is not unknown for plans to be brought forward as passenger numbers grow faster than initially projected. Page 65 of this Business Plan refers to a “DLR Royal Docks Capacity Programme” with a timeframe well into the 2020s but nowhere in the rest of the plan does it describe what this entails.
All this would suggest that we won’t see any new trains any time soon, but then there is also the fact that way back in May 2015 TfL asked for Expressions of Interest to supply a new fleet of trains for the DLR. IanVisits picked up on this as did more the rail press generally such as
Railway Gazette. Now an expression of interest is not the same as a formal tender, but it does suggest that TfL want at least to be in a position to order new trains should they feel such a thing is necessary.
How many?
Of course the really surprising thing about the invitation for expressions of interest is the number of units that it suggests would be required. That is stated as 40 or 50 vehicles. As the vehicles are full length and cannot be joined together in normal circumstances they are complete trains roughly equivalent to an existing 3-car train. If the upper value is taken then that is actually the equivalent of more than the existing entire fleet. Currently there are 149 units (cars) and one needs three units to make up a 3-car train. The desire for 40 or 50 vehicles may include replacing existing B90/B92 trains, which would account for the equivalent of around 23 full-length trains, but premature replacement would seem unlikely.
It is unusual for London Underground not to get a good 30-35 years use out of its rolling stock unless it is seriously flawed, not fit for purpose or only intended as a prototype. Indeed the last example of mass premature retirement was the 1983 stock for the Jubilee line which was quite unsuitable for the Jubilee Line Extension. It is hard to see why the DLR should take a radically different attitude to rolling stock replacement. It is true it quickly ditched its single car early P86 and P89 stock which it sold on to Essen but, unlike those early units, there seems to be no fundamental reason why existing units cannot continue to remain in service. The last of the B92 stock was only delivered in 1995, which would suggest there is a lot of life left in some of these units.
Consolidation of existing and recent former services assuming sufficient trains available.
The DLR diagram gives the impression that this, or very similar, is what is actually run.
Clearly doubling the size of the DLR fleet would far exceed any requirement based on reinstating a full Stratford International – Beckton service and making sure all trains were of maximum length during peak hours. Even after allowing for extending all existing Stratford – Canary Wharf services to Lewisham one would struggle to find a need for all those trains based on a service roughly comparable to today. It would thus seem clear that future improvements are planned. The most obvious explanation is to run an intensive peak service to Stratford International with a train every 4 minutes to Woolwich Arsenal alternating with a train every 4 minutes to Beckton. This is not to say that there needs to be a train every 2 minutes at peak times to Stratford International, simply that it is a destination to which additional Woolwich Arsenal and Beckton trains can actually go.
Depot space
Unlike London Underground and London Overground it would appear that DLR depot space is not an issue. The main depot is generally referred to as “Beckton depot,” but it is actually at Gallions Reach. There is also a lot of undeveloped land adjacent to it. As the DLR has a notable record of continual expansion it is presumed that the land has been safeguarded for expansion.
Future developments
The DLR still runs through many areas that are undeveloped and we expect to see considerable further development in the next few years. As the title of this piece suggests, one needs to look to the east (at least of Docklands) to identify these sites. It may be that the unpredictable nature of these future developments is behind the call for expressions of interest in new rolling-stock. The DLR does not want to prematurely buy large numbers of extra trains, but at the same time it wants to be ready to respond quickly to any large development that does take place.
In terms of those potential developments, the largest and most significant is the ABP ports development along the waterfront of the north side of Royal Albert Dock. This is largely aimed at Chinese and Asian business, so it is doubly a case of looking to the east. Planning permission was given earlier this year for the £1.7 billion scheme.
The first phase of the Royal Albert Dock development is expected to open in 2018 with work complete by 2022. In a press release put out by the Mayor in 2013 about the development he managed not to mention the DLR at all, despite the fact that it would be vital to serve this large site. In true Mayoral style, despite no mention of the DLR, the cable car did get a mention – although we struggle to see how this is relevant to the development.
The critical development?
We can only speculate, but it does seem highly likely that the Royal Albert Dock development is the one that has finally made a new fleet of DLR trains necessary. One cannot seriously envisage only a train every 8 minutes in the peak on the Beckton branch once it exists. It is also clear that the existing DLR fleet is already insufficient and there would be no serious possibility of re-allocated trains to the Beckton branch.
One could argue that really the DLR has already left it too late to order new trains. The site will obviously have many construction workers descending on it in the next three years and that on its own could prompt a need for improved services.
Whilst the Royal Albert development is really the only one in the area that is finalised, the 2050 Transport Supporting Paper also makes mention of the Silvertown Quays proposed development around Pontoon Dock. Pontoon Dock is on the Woolwich DLR branch so this would, at the very least, require all existing trains to be 3-car or equivalent but could well prompt the requirement of even more trains on this branch.
General Development in Docklands
Anyone reading the property adverts in the Evening Standard will be aware of the massive residential developments that are appearing almost throughout the area the DLR serves. This is not confined to north of the river, with both Lewisham and Woolwich being affected as well. As few of these high rise blocks will have provision for any substantial amount of parking, a reliable DLR capable of handling the traffic generated would seem to be essential. With many services already full that would seem to indicate yet more trains.
It does not end with business and residential development. For some reason the DLR is attractive to the Arts world. In a Times article entitled “London’s cultural axis is shifting towards the east” (sadly only available by subscription) Richard Morrison describes how various Arts organisations are looking to set up in Docklands. After mentioning a proposal for the Smithsonian to have an outpost in East London he gushes:
It would join the Victoria and Albert Museum (promising a radically modern complement to its grandiose premises in South Kensington), the University of the Arts (planning a campus for 6,500 fashion students and staff, University College London (huge research facilities) and Sadler’s Wells (a 600-seat dance theatre accompanied by the inevitable “hip-hop academy”).
The article continues in similar vein.
If that were not enough, one could hardly forget that the East End has various sporting links not far from Stratford and Pudding Mill Lane stations. With the latter rebuilt so that it can handle large crowds it would seem that the ability to run a frequent DLR train service from Stratford on both the relevant DLR routes would be essential. Of course this has been done before but in future this will need to be handled as “just another sporting event” in the ordinary course of things and not something the nation has been spending five years preparing for.
Below is a speculative map where both the routes serving Stratford International have been doubled as well as maximal service to Lewisham and via Bow Church (which assumes no single track sections). This is really just about as far as the DLR can go with capacity. Only the section from Canning Town to Blackwall has spare capacity, but there is no obvious way of sensibly using this. Of course as we all know it is easy to draw a speculative map. Whether an intricate system such as the DLR could be timetabled for such a service, if it were one day desirable, is another matter. Nevertheless it would appear that, if the transport powers-that-be are serious about 50 additional trains, something like this must be what is being contemplated.
Suggested maximal service that could be offered on the DLR. Each line represents a train every 8 minutes (peak), every 10 minutes (off-peak).
Better stations
It is not only new trains. It is proposed that Beckton Park, the main DLR station that will serve the Royal Albert Dock development, should be rebuilt. It is also proposed to rebuild Royal Albert station, which is one of four remaining stations on the DLR that has a short platform. Like Gallions Reach, another station with a short platform, there would appear to be no technical reason why the platforms weren’t lengthened earlier. It is just that both stations were very little used and were on a viaduct so it was hard to demonstrate value-for-money.
Pontoon Dock is also pencilled in for a station upgrade for the development there. Both Canning Town and Custom House, which would be indirectly affected by higher usage elsewhere, are also on the list of stations for which improvements are proposed.
Beyond 2020
There is very little publicly available documentation about plans for the DLR beyond 2020. Most of what there is comes from the Mayor’s 2050 vision Transport Supplementary Paper.
Proposal in Transport Supplementary Paper to close Tower Gateway and run affected trains to Bank
One of the major DLR developments in around 2020 will be the Bank Station Upgrade. The third fairy godmother to come along and help the DLR is London Underground or, probably more accurately, their contractors, Dragados. By improving on the initial station plans, Dragados included proposals to substantially improve access to and egress from the DLR Bank platforms. Although nothing has been said about increasing the frequency, the 2050 Transport Supporting Paper suggests the closure of Tower Gateway and running all trains to Bank. The argument is that not many people want to go to Tower Gateway.
What is slightly curious about this proposal is that it is not planned to happen until around 2050, if a business case can be made for it. One would have thought that if a case can be made for it in 2050 then a case could be made for it in 2025. Another curiosity is that a sum of £80 million is suggested as the cost for doing this. It is strange that closing a line should cost so much money. As well as the stated proposed station underground with a direct link to Tower Hill it is probably the case that money would be required for an additional turnback siding at Bank. This would give more resilience and allow small delays to be more quickly rectified by reducing the layover time when necessary.
Platform Edge Doors
One of the things that is quite remarkable about the DLR is the total absence of Platform Edge Doors (PEDs) despite the trains being automatic and there normally being no member of staff at the front of the train. If the system was opened today it is unlikely that this would be allowed and, even if it was, a case could probably be made on the basis of reduced delays and disruption for having them at certain stations anyway.
New trains are expected to have doors over 30% of their length compared to the current 20%. Given that normally 50% of a train’s length is the maximum that be used for door openings (because the doors have to go somewhere when open) this is a substantial difference. In reality the value of 30% is unlikely to get higher in future. Obviously it wouldn’t make sense to install platform edge doors until the stations were entirely served by the new trains. It may make a lot of sense from that point onwards, however, at busy stations with Bank and Shadwell being more obvious examples.
Night DLR
It has been publicly stated quite a few times that the intention is to run a night service similar to the Night Tube on the DLR. It is not clear how much of the network would be covered or what frequencies would be run. One advantage of the DLR is that very few stations would need to be staffed, so it should be a relatively cheap service to implement. One suspects that it will start with the letting of the next franchise though, which is not due until the early 2020s.
The ongoing consolidation phase
As can be seen, the DLR’s immediate future will be one of consolidation and intensification, rather than the construction of new extensions. In ten years time this will likely mean it joins the many Tube lines that are considered to be “maxed out”. This is because the DLR came along and solved the transport issue in Docklands, but ultimately there is only so much a little bit of light rail can do. The Jubilee line has also come along, but that too is now full. Crossrail will come but will not be expected to dent the DLR ridership levels for more than a couple of years. By building the DLR before the developments a lot of the network could be built on viaducts but that will no longer be possible. It seems that “the next big thing” may need to come along in the 2020s.
The demand for better public transport in Docklands seems insatiable. The DLR was once the solution but, despite continually rising passenger numbers, it is more and more becoming just part of a solution rather than the totality. It remains to be seen whether Docklands will continue to grow, or whether somewhere else – such as Old Oak Common – will provide the continual expansion London seems to forever need.
If that expansion goes elsewhere, of course, then it will be interesting to see what happens from a transport perspective. Will there be the equivalent of a DLR? Or was the DLR just a one-off, a quirk of a combination of circumstances? Only time will tell.
@PoP.
Thanks for that. Also (just) worthy of note is that the three Stratford DLR stations move to Zone 2/3 (from 3) from 1st January 2015.
I guess that with any changes to Canning Townthe essential layout will not be changed? It was fine when there was just the Jubilee and the high level DLR, the integration of the Stratford International branch platforms is frankly terrible.
Interesting overview. A lot of Greenwich councillors (both Labour and Tory) seem to believe a DLR extension from Silvertown to Eltham is possible, as a figleaf for the Silvertown Tunnel and to run above the A102 – Greenwich spent £75k on a report, largely at the behest of Eltham MP Clive Efford – that said it could be a goer as far as Kidbrooke, then binned it.
This pretty neatly explains why that little scheme is just fantasy…
Great article, with some interesting insights. One area I might disagree (though prepared to bow down to your superior knowledge) is on the importance of the DLR between West Ham and Stratford as a route for passengers alighting C2C services. Surely they would use the (non-stop) Jubilee line?
@PoP
I’ve just re-read it and I’m so sorry to quibble but when you say
“The final DLR extension was from Canning Town to Stratford International. Unlike previous extensions this one replaced an existing railway service for most of its length, with only the short extension from Stratford to Stratford International being completely new.”
This isn’t correct. I’ve posted it back in 2014
https://ukfree.tv/styles/images/2014/stratford.jpg
showing that the line existed before it was “opened” in August 2011. The line was part of the existing “Good Yard”, and can be seen on the 1945 map on Google Earth.
https://ukfree.tv/styles/images/2015/1945map.jpg
Only the last few meters are “new build”.
As far as I know this section line was the “famous” Palace Gates line. http://tubedreams.london/woolwich-to-palace-gates-line/ It’s now the “goods diversion line” under East Village under Liberty Bridge Road.
“it is reasonable to assume that the best route [to Stratford] available is by changing onto the DLR at West Ham.”
Why not the Jubilee line, which has two fewer stops and is more frequent?
@PoP
“Although nothing has been said about increasing the frequency, the 2050 Transport Supporting Paper suggests the closure of Tower Gateway and running all trains to Bank. The argument is that not many people want to go to Tower Gateway.”
Sorry, another quibble. The 2050 plan says close Tower Gateway and replace it with an underground Underground-DLR interchange station at Tower Hill.
I would query a couple of assumptions made early on in the article. Why would passengers from the Beckton branch travel all the way into Bank to connect with the Underground when Canning Town gives a much nearer interchange, both for the City (via London Bridge) and for Stratford. Also, why would passengers off C2C services use the DLR from West Ham for Stratford when the Jubilee Line is quicker and more frequent?
“Given that normally 50% of a train’s length is the maximum that be used for door openings (because the doors have to go somewhere when open)”
This assumes sliding or plug doors. Folding or hinged doors, gullwing or garage type up-and-over doors could increase this proportion to almost 100% (less the thickness of the doors themselves). Even sliding doors can get to 2/3 if you allow them to slide past each other.
Sorry, I just saw the same question posted 10 minutes before me. A very thorough and interesting article, thanks PoP.
When I first moved here, the Beckton line was great… Now it is treated like some deformed sibling that should only be fed once a day.
The service is now so unbalanced in favour of the Woolwich Arsenal service that it is driving customers away.
You say once the Albert Dock development is completed, you can’t see a service only every 8 minutes, I am struggling to see one every 20 minutes. As soon as more trains hit the network they will go to fashionable routes.
The new franchise operator has been a disaster for the DLR and the Beckton line… It will only get worse!
Canning Town is not overly hard to sort out. Not easy, but not too hard. Build a second level over the old NLL platforms, divert the track from Blackwall to this new level’s east side, so both Beckton-/Woolwich-bound tracks are above each other, fill in the gap.
That way at least both Beckton-/Woolwich-bound platforms are only an escalator apart.
Briantist
Indeed – see my article(s) on the ex-GER (& other) lines in E London ….
PoP
This is really just about as far as the DLR can go with capacity.
…. excepting extensions, of course!
I see a second turnback siding is semi-proposed for Bank, once (during?) the rebuild is over/underway.
Could one have an automated reversal-&onwards to poor old Thamesmead, from Woolwich, I wonder, or will a second-extension-of-the Goblin cover that?
I’m assuming that all the 2000’s ideas about proceeding west of Bank are dead, or are they?
And that East of Beckton to Barking riverside is completely dead, with the previously-mentioned Goblin extension looking very likely.
No mention of any eastwards extensions?
Dagenham Dock may be all-but-dead but the consultation report into the Barking Riverside Overground extension seems to indicate there is still a desire for something along this corridor. The assumption has been that this will connect at Gallions Reach leaving Beckton as a one-station stub branch. Alternatively (or maybe additionally) there is pressure for a link from Gallions Reach to Thamesmead.
Service wise it would seem sensible for ex-City trains continuing to run to Beckton with the ex-Stratford trains using the new branch.
The article also fails to mention that the DLR will be the gateway to London City Airport for Crossrail passengers via Woolwich Arsenal (from Custom House it’s either a bus or two DLR trains via Canning Town) – this will surely add traffic rather than take it away?
Also not mentioned is the desire for a direct City Airport to Canary Wharf (and Greenwich/Lewisham) service, although I’m not sure this would be possible to timetable – particularly as it would involve using the low-speed turnouts east of Poplar.
Finally, regarding the off-peak service to Beckton, I was told (several years ago now, so how true it still is I don’t know) that the branches east of Canning Town have very different traffic profiles. The Woolwich Arsenal branch having significiantly higher demand in the peaks than the off-peaks, but the Beckon Branch (certainly east of Royal Victoria) being much flatter with ExCeL and the University generating traffic spread throughout the day. Thus sending off-peak services to Beckton is more profitable than sending them to Woolwich.
Rolling stock renewal – though not due – is possibly quite key to improved performance. Top speeds will always be limited by the sharp curvatures, but on the long straight stretches (especially noticeable in the Woolwich tunnel) the current trains have a strong tendency to sway from side to side, which rocks the passengers considerably and causes rhythmic wheel screech and wear. I’m sure a more stable ride would enable faster running, and hope that for passenger comfort’s sake that this can be dealt with next time around; I was surprised that it wasn’t with the B2K’s. Perhaps it is the ‘architecture’ of two cars with ‘free’ ends bound by a single articulation in the middle (looking at them on ‘plan view’) that can set up a see-sawing effect. Hopefully, this will be eliminated by full length through units. The superior ride quality of the Overground Electrostars shows what’s possible.
No mention of an extension from Gallions Reach to Thamesmead/Abbey Wood and beyond? Seems this could be the sweetener TfL give to Peabody for them not to object to Gallions Bridge landing in one of their development areas – also a far more suitable project for cross-river public transport links than an Overground extension.
Bexley Growth Strategy and Peabody Thamesmead Vision both give more details.
@NickBXN
My understanding is that the side-to-side swaying (known hunting oscillation or simply hunting) is a function of the wheel profile rather than the articulation. The DLR wheel profile is more similar to that of a tram than of a mainline train and is that way to enable/assist (I’m not sure which) the negotiation of the tight curvature on some parts of the line (I believe Poplar Depot has the tightest curves). The original system was not conceived with the idea of long inter-station gaps or with high speed running being required. Indeed there are several stretches of line that seem to feature curves (horizontal and vertical) included simply because they can be. The curves between the old and new South Quay stations seem particularly unnecessary.
If there is a secondhand market for the existing trains then an all-out renewal on one standard type might be the way forward. The original P87 trains found new homes, I seem to recall?
Moreover, DLR trains are not “heavy rail” – do they have the same projected lifespan as trains, or are they more like buses?
As for Canning Town, the ideal would be for trains to the same destination to all use the same platform, or at least opposite faces of the same platform. I don’t think Si’s solution meets this. It would require swapping the “from Bank” and “to Stratford” platforms (which would also put the Jubilee and DLR platforms towards Stratford closer together), although the area to the north of the station is quite constrained with the Jubilee below and the A13 above, so a flyover or diveunder for the “from Bank” line would be difficult to fit in.
Could the hunting not be reduced by reducing the gauge by a couple of millimetres on straight stretches, or is the actual profile of the wheels to blame?
I know high speed trains do have a different shaped profiles to lower speed trains. But I’m not sure if the profile somehow allows tighter curves to taken. I thought this done by allowing more play as is done with model trains.
West Ham – Jubilee or DLR?
1. There are places in Docklands where the DLR is more convenient than Jubilee
&
2. Assuming there is space to get on the Jubilee at West Ham if not then use the DLR…
Re DLR wheel profile and hunting, the Croydon trams seem to be much more stable at high speed and are still capable of tight corners – what have they done right that the DLR trains have got wrong?
If the new DLR trains are 86 metre long fixed formation units, they will be just four metres shorter than a Paris Metro train. At what point does the DLR cease to be considered “light rail”?
The DLR to Thamesmead has been mooted for as long as the railway’s been open. Greenwich Labour councillors want some sort of Thamesmead extension over a Gallions Reach road crossing and they’re getting a fairly sympathetic hearing at City Hall as far as I can gather. Perhaps we’ll see more as (or if) plans for the Gallions Reach and Belvedere road crossings develop.
IMHO they’d be better off demanding an Overground extension from Barking Riverside over to Abbey Wood, but both would be useful for the area.
In the section “Only the section from Canning Town to Blackwell has spare capacity”, ” Blackwell”, should say “Blackwall”
[Fixed. Thanks. PoP]
But regardless thank you for a very interesting article.
I have added a further diagram as I realised the article could do with one depicting the most likely service improvement that we would see first once we have a few more trains. As with a lot of these diagrams they are a bit speculative but based on an amalgam of comments (especially from the Transport Supporting Paper) and by what is physically possible.
On the subject of why anyone would want to use the DLR between West Ham and Stratford. Currently with only a train every 8 minutes I would agree with those who say one would use the Jubilee. The Jubilee line is every 2½ minutes but this is not expected to improve until 2019. If the Jubilee line is full up, as everyone says it is, and the DLR were every 4 minutes then things would be different. Plus of course the Jubilee line only serves the domestic station whereas the DLR serves Stratford High St and Stratford International as well. (Having typed this I see that ngh has said much the same thing.)
[Late edit: I have now amended the wording of the article to make it clear that the Jubilee line is very busy at the eastern end]
On the subject of further extensions we are back to the “already full-up” argument. Also there appears to be absolutely no appetite in TfL to promote these. Putting my crayonista hat on, I would argue that the one extension that would make sense would be a short branch westwards from Blackwall to Wood Wharf, Canary Wharf (Crossrail) or anywhere else vaguely sensible. This would then take advantage of the one section of DLR route that seems to have no plans for more utilisation (Canning Town to Blackwall) and is an underused asset. It also gives a potential destination other than Stratford International for any enhancement to the Beckton or Woolwich Arsenal branch.
Briantist,
If one travels on the section from Stratford to Stratford International is has the feeling of being entirely new construction. I am prepared to believe there was formerly a railway there but I suspect no trace of it would have remained and there is nothing to indicate there was the opportunity to take advantage of anything that was already there.
On the issue of closing Tower Gateway, I have added the relevant table entry to the article. As far as I can tell nothing contradicts what I wrote.
Chris McKenna,
The article also fails to mention that the DLR will be the gateway to London City Airport for Crossrail passengers via Woolwich Arsenal
But how is that different from today? It would add traffic in the sense that one would expect it to increase but Crossrail factors would have a greater effect. In any case don’t get too excited by City Airport. It is important to serve airports by public transport but the numbers using City Airport DLR station are not particularly large. They are slightly over twice that at adjacent King George V and well under half that at Woolwich Arsenal.
Also I suspect that City Airport is amongst the stations likely to show the least growth due to growth being closely coupled with the expansion of the airport itself.
I heard the same as you about the branch profiles but suspect that things may have changed since then.
Fandroid,
Why would passengers from the Beckton branch travel all the way into Bank to connect with the Underground when Canning Town gives a much nearer interchange, both for the City (via London Bridge) and for Stratford.
Because you have a seat? Because you want to minimise the number of changes? Because you fear not being able to get on a Jubilee line train? Because that is route that Journey Planner recommends (it’s only 15 minutes to Bank from Canning Town)?
Also the latest DLR press release link doesn’t appear to be working.
[Fixed too. PoP]
I *thought* that the ‘close Tower Gateway’ story went like this:
– Bank branch built with passive provision for subterranean station with link to Tower Hill LU.
– Subsequent thinking changes to decide that have a second redundant terminal station in the City makes engineering work at that end of the line much easier.
– Tower Gateway not closed and Tower Hill DLR not built; millions spent rebuilding two-platform Tower Gateway as single-platform.
What’s changed again to make closure of Tower Gateway attractive?
(BTW, does anyone else find it unfortunate that the millions allocated to rebuilding Tower Gateway didn’t include a few thousand for tidying the non-demolished bits, so the day the brand-new station opened the roofing over the access – stairs? escalator? I haven’t used it for years – sported decades of filth and mould?).
Martin Smith,
millions spent rebuilding two-platform Tower Gateway as single-platform.
Not quite true. More accurately, millions spent rebuilding a dangerously narrow two-faced platform station limited to 2-car trains with a two platform station with overrun allowance and ability to accept 3-car trains. It also now has a dedicated platform for arriving passengers and another for departing passengers.
The number of platforms has not changed. It is the number of tracks serving the platforms that has changed.
@Pedantic – I stand corrected. I don’t think I’ve used it since the rebuild, but I see it every morning as my c2c train approaches its destination.
Briantist,
I too need to stand corrected. I realise that the £80 million cost is clearly largely for this additional station. I have modified the wording to take this into account.
As a point of interest, if you sit at the front of the train you can see the straight level section of track where the station would go if built. The tunnels were aligned for passive provision for this when the Bank extension was bored.
timbeau,
“Given that normally 50% of a train’s length is the maximum that be used for door openings (because the doors have to go somewhere when open)”
This assumes sliding or plug doors.
Which is why I said normally. It really is inconceivable anything else would be used. The DLR originally had folding doors which (according to Wikipedia) “proved to be problematic”. If you could invent a reliable door suitable for use on trains that wasn’t of the sliding or plug type you would probably be a millionaire many times over.
@Darryl
“IMHO they’d be better off demanding an Overground extension from Barking Riverside over to Abbey Wood, but both would be useful for the area.”
Take a look at the TfL report on the consultation on the Overground extension; no shortage of SE London councils asking for just that.
Using the word “vehicle” in the “How many?” section to mean “full-length trains” is a bit confusing. I had to look up the OJEU notice to figure out what you meant.
Anonymous,
One of the proof-readers picked up on this paragraph as originally written and suggested that the different terms were confusing. I tried to clarify it but clearly did not do well enough. I have made a further attempt to make it clearer.
@Pedantic of Purley
Great about the Tower Hill bit.
Just back the end of the DLR, may I present an OS map from 1960:[1]
https://ukfree.tv/styles/images/2015/1960map.jpg
I’ve marked on in purple the three Stratford DLR stations, and the green line shows the line over the old yard. You can see it all quite clearly. Yes, it’s been reworked and boxed in to allow Westfield to be built atop, but it’s the same trackbed.
You can also make out the other “High Level” DLR platform where the black letters “Sta” are shown.
Apologies for *my* pedantry.
[1] http://maps.nls.uk/view/95750228
A full length train doesn’t really become a single ‘vehicle’ just because it has full width walk through gangways.
If it did we would probably all be referring to LO 378s and LU S7 & S8 as single vehicles, but I don’t think anyone does?
I think referring to the full-length trains as “vehicles” is Official DLR speak- not a LR concoction. To a certain extent I think it’s a light rail thing- a lengthy multiple section tram would usually be termed a single vehicle.
Another fascinating article, thank-you.
I was wondering if the western extensions to Charing X and Victoria(?) were finally dead? A useful add-on, especially if it made life at Bank easier.
@Briantist, 14 September 2015 at 19:25
“I’ve marked on in purple the three Stratford DLR stations”
The DLR International station is actually just a little further round the corner towards Temple Mills. See the rather neat NLS georeferenced overlay mode here:
http://maps.nls.uk/geo/explore/#zoom=16&lat=51.5457&lon=-0.0076&layers=10
(use the blue transparency slider control in the left-hand panel to transition between old map and new map/satellite images)
In DLR and tram-speak (remembering their vehicles are tram-derived) the operational unit is usually defined as a single car or vehicle no matter how many articulated sections are concerned. The sections are indivisble in service and difficult to split even in a depot just like a bendy-bus which I don’t think anyone would describe as a two car bus unit! By contrast, cars within Underground and Overground units, with full-width gangways or otherwise, whilst never being uncoupled in service, can be fairly easily split in depots. If articulation is ever introduced for such units perhaps the groups of sections so linked will also become known as multi-section cars or vehicles, which if the unit was fully articulated would also correspond to the extent of the unit.
Briantist,
I reckon my original wording just about got away with it because was implicitly referring to passenger services. However in the light of information provided I have added the word “passenger” and a reference to the former freight line so that it should cover all eventualities.
Like other people I find “vehicles” confusing but it seemed to be the terminology used.
Frustratingly I cannot view OJEU notices in either Chrome or IE for some reason so relied on reports of them, which I seem to recall, refer to vehicles. Mark Townend has explained it better than I can.
What I find even more confusing is what they call a single car unit, which is articulated, I think of as made up of two short cars.
Flare – is DLR to Thamesmead more suitable for the town and wider area than London Overground extension from Barking? It would still be a really quite slow trundle from Thamesmead to Canning Town / Custom House / Canary Wharf / City. About 45 mins all in to Bank. No quicker really after 2018 than a bus to Abbey Wood then Crossrail to Custom House / Canary Wharf / City, and the DLR from Thamesmead would duplicate most destination options from Abbey Wood Crossrail (Custom House, Canary Wharf then the City).
Whereas London Overground offers a huge extra range from Barking that Crossrail does not serve.
Also, would the Beckton branch be too busy? There could be a separate shuttle from Beckton to Abbey Wood but adding a change makes getting anywhere via DLR from Thamesmead even slower.
There is one huge development not mentioned and on the Woolwich branch – Royal Wharf. It’s very large, and already well underway with the backers pushing development along quickly.
Silvertown Quays is mentioned, and is pretty far along in development, so could perhaps be said to be as finalised as Albert Dock / Asian Business Park. Millenium Mills is now under refurbishment on that site. It’s closer to Custom House though so Crossrail will probably mop up most people there.
I’d ditch the word “vehicle” entirely. The OJEU notice says “train”:
“Options to be considered will include like for like single unit replacement or (possibly more likely) a single full length train (New Train, 86.4 m).”
(it even says “Through Gangway between vehicles”)
Dear “Pedantic”,
The word “whence” literally means “from where”. The construction “from whence” is consequently nonsensical.
Yours in smugness,
A Bigger Pedant
[Absolutely correct. I try to avoid “whence” because it is old fashioned, stilted and mainly suitable for pronouncements of the death. On the latter point one would have thought that the legal system would have got it correct but they didn’t. I am going to claim I had a moment of indecisiveness when writing. Now corrected. PoP]
The driver of all this passenger growth is the vast number of new housing units in the docks and along the river Lea. Plus continued growth of the wharf and the arrival of Stratford as a serious commercial and cultural hub. (Isn’t it amazing that once you blow £10 billion on an Olympics , then there shall be no stinting on new government funded attractions to ensure it is seen as a success).
The DLR handily nits all these sites together, so will always have strong demand, but now we are getting to the stage where it is all filling up and yet the tidal wave of development is only hotting up.
The key is then how do you increase capacity into the core areas?
In the short term we have Crossrail which will relieve the Bank Branch of the DLR. Crossrail with it fast access to the West End should also take some demand off the Jubilee, but considering the growth of commuting into Waterloo, London Bridge and who can forget the Overground, how much difference will it make?
I suspect most of Crossrails growth will result from new journey opportunities that result from those fast travel times, especially as the renters of London discover new neighbourhoods that are now within tolerable commute distance.
The Problem we now face in Docklands, is that is no longer possible to build new viaducts, especially in the core areas, that require the extra capacity.
Forget trams, as the DLR already effectively performs the function, with it’s close stop spacing. The biggest problem the area faces is that longer distance commuters are swamping the local distribution network.
So in the end it will come down to tunnels and there you run into some obvious problems.
The biggest being the cost and the other being all rivers and docks you might need to tunnel under, sending the tunnels deeper and more expensive.
The deep docks lend themselves to running lines in an East West direction, to avoid excessive tunnelling. A new North South route would need some deep tunnels and pretty deep stations to get under the existing ones.
A North South DLR would need to surface some where south of Cross Harbour and North of Devons road, if it was for the DLR. I can’t imagine how far you’d need to tunnel to create the extra capacity for Wharf bound commuter trains as well as those still heading for the centre of Town.
Ideally the South Dock presents the perfect space for the Dogs third large East West high capacity station. Again ideally this would be used by Crossrail 3 which connect various Kent Lines into one route up the Greenwich Peninsula across the Thames to the Wharf before shooting off to the City and West End via the old Fleet line route under the Strand to who knows where in a veritable smorgasbourd of possible routes in West to North Westerly arc.
But that’s a lot of money and best will in the world crossrail 2 will be lucky if it’s built before 2030. Unless some revolution in funding occurs, Crossrail 3 would be at least another 10 years after that. Frankly we don’t have the time.
Cheaper alternatives boil down to a tunnel linking the Overground or other Southern or South Eastern services to a new commuter station on the Wharf. Four platforms could provide an attractive terminal for direct commuter services. Again the size of this project is determined about what lines are connected and how far you need to tunnel before the line has spare capacity.
The advantage of this is a reasonably fast one seat side direct to the Wharf, either as a large collection of half hourly routes or a limited number of high frequency ones. This would also relieve the Jubilee line from Canada Water and potentially from London Bridge. Depending on routes it might also help the DLR from Lewisham.
While cheaper than a Crossrail (What isn’t) this could easily get caught up in project creep as adding more routes, while costing more, keeps adding to the business case and whoops before you know a £1 to £2 billion pound project is touching £5 or £6 billion.
To have any hope of being funded from London taxes and or government largesse (better hope Zac Goldsmith wins if you want extra goodies out if Mr Osborne)
The only cheap option (in tunnelled transport terms) is a new DLR line. I know I bored on about this before but a DLR line from Surrey Quays with a station or two under Marsh Wall on the Isle of Dogs before going across to a new Station, South of North Greenwich and then across again to the Woolwich branch line. It would reduce demand on the Jubilee line from the Overgound, allow the 16,000 new units going up on the Greenwich peninsula a chance of getting on a train to the Wharf.
Considering that a similar amount of units was enough for a 2 station extension of the Northern Line to Battersea I can’t see some one can’t argue for the need for extra capacity for the Peninsula. I know the counter argument is that it already has the Jubilee line, but that almost full now, never mind in ten years time.
Then we get to all the thousands of units at Minoco Wharf (Now Royal London and Pontoon Dock with it’s units and Brand Park (don’t ask) and potentially several more large dock sites to come, the crush at Canning Town could get quite severe. A direct route to the Wharf would allow a much higher frequency on the branch as well, with it’s much shorter journey times it would attract good numbers.
Who knows in the end what can be done it seems to be approaching a crunch point, where increasing the capacity of existing lines is coming to an end and the demand for multiple new lines for long distance and local commuting are piling up.
Where is the money going to come from and who is willing to pay London’s insatiable demands for new investment.
A more realistic approach might be to look at what mutiple smaller projects (under a billion) might get you. It might be easier to fund and be less noticeable politically (in a bad way).
@ Toby Fenwick. I think the DLR extension to the West End was being cooked up as a cheaper alternative to Crossrail. I remember reading that on arrival in the Treasury in 2010 George Osborne was gifted with a thick folders of potential cuts to make. Guess what was top of the pile in the presented to him by the Civil Servants , yes of course Crossrail.
I also remember reading at the time by informed sources that Crossrail was as good as dead, and certain Mandarins where crowing about it.
Politics played out differently in the end and it turns out this government likes eye catching transport projects.
At some point in the future that route will be used by a much higher capacity transport system.
Rational plan says “At some point in the future that route will be used by a much higher capacity transport system.”
Err, which route?
Also, not that it matters now, but I’d be curious to know whether your tales about the thick pile and the crowing Mandarins are from a reliable source, or whether they could have been invented by a mischief-maker of some kind. The two possibilites strike me as about equally likely.
Ed
“is DLR to Thamesmead more suitable for the town and wider area than London Overground extension from Barking? It would still be a really quite slow trundle from Thamesmead to Canning Town / Custom House / Canary Wharf / City.”
There is a tendency for people, and particularly politicians, to think the shiny new thing must be extended to them, even when they would be better served by using it to keep the locals off their existing trains. A letter in the Standard today from some Surrey councillor was typical – wanting Crossrail 2 to go further out. I don’t think his constituents would thank if their non-stop dash to Waterloo from the last stop at Woking or Surbiton were to be replaced with an all-stations odyssey via Tooting! Bromley council have the right idea – tubing the Hayes line is not an improvement.
Similarly the DLR is best as a local service – even Bank to Beckton is remarkably tedious, and any further would be too much. (Who would use the Tube from Upminster to Tower Hill when there’s a perfectly good C2C service which can do it in less than half the time?)
Thanks for the article. A few comments :-
1. I wonder if TfL and City Hall intend to “demand money with menaces” from the various big developments east of Canning Town to help part fund the extra rolling stock? Clearly it can’t show in a budget or business plan until the ink is dry on any agreement.
2. Post Autumn Statement TfL will have to revise its budget to take into the likely funding scenario. A new business plan should follow for next April. We might get a little more insight by then as to what might be happening to DLR development.
3. I know it is fashionable to say the DLR to Dagenham is dead but I don’t think it is in the minds of many London Labour politicians. There is also an emerging scepticism about the planning for the GOBLIN extension relative to it going under the Thames. The simple fact is that Boris made an enormous mistake in cancelling the Dagenham extension and the GOBLIN extension is the “el cheapo / el quicko” solution to get the next phase of housing built at Riverside. If nothing else that should be ringing some alarm bells. All it will do is pile pressure on to the tube and C2C at Barking . If we agree that a lot of the new jobs in East London will be in the Royal Docks, Canary Wharf and Stratford then the GOBLIN extension is the wrong answer because it serves none of those places directly and, worse, it overloads interchanges like West Ham and the routes serving it as your article states. In other words it’s a mess. It’ll still get built but it’s a very poor answer to improving the area’s accessibility to employment and does next to nothing to improve local transport. A DLR line would solve those issues and I fully expect it to come back on to the agenda if Labour win City Hall. I suspect the briefings with Mr Khan are already happening.
4. For all those people going “oh phooey, no one uses the DLR at West Ham or those awful platforms at Canning Town” well, you know, people do. Saw it only today with plenty of people waiting for a northbound train at Canning Town. The Jubilee Line really is horribly overloaded so if you want a modicum of comfort then the DLR can offer that but it’s not exactly empty on the Stratford International route in the peaks either. Within days of it opening I got a snap of 200+ people waiting for a train to Woolwich at Stratford Regional station and I suspect it’s got far far worse than that since. There is also more flow to / from Stratford International now that people live in the former Athlete’s Village and have also worked out it serves the top end of Westfield quite nicely. There are even noticeable numbers using Star Lane, Abbey Road and Stratford High St. I’m not saying any of these places are overflowing with demand but neither are they being ignored.
5. While I don’t disagree with your general musings about where extra service levels may be added I think we can’t be too far away from diminishing returns. There’s only so much more that can be squeezed in and I think the scale of developments near the DLR routes may overwhelm the network. I’d certainly be worried about places like West Ham and Canning Town which have particularly pinchpoints within the stations for which there are not cheap answers if you want to remove them. It’s noteworthy that you mention that DLR owned stations are possibly going to be expanded where it’s considered worthwhile but no hints at all where a TOC or LU are involved. It was ever thus – DLR have been pretty decent over the years in adding station capacity to keep pace with demand.
6. I know we have to take the 2050 Plan with a pinch of salt but I’m getting the impression that it’s becoming an ever more laughable document as the months go by. Whatever it suggests just seems to be being overtaken by events. The perils of long term strategy documents (!) and I say that as someone who supports the idea of having strategies and plans.
@ Timbeau – I take your point but the simple answer is that hundreds of thousands of people make long journeys on the tube even where faster parallel services exist. A former work colleague did Hornchurch to St Jamess Park every day with no thought of going backwards to Upminster, jumping on C2C and then joining the tube at Tower Hill. I know that’s a separate example to yours but people do tolerate slower routes where they’re direct and you can get a seat. I did it myself today – I toddled on the Overground from Forest Hill to Highbury to pick up the tube. I could have gone via London Bridge and then battled through two horrible interchanges (LOB and KX) to get on the Vic Line but why bother even if the Overground can sometimes be overtaken by a snail on crutches? 😉
Not everyone wants to go at hypersonic speed to everywhere.
@ Malcolm.
I meant the stretch between Charing Cross and City, under one of London’s oldest roads. Last part of the proposed Fleet line and once the District express proposal. I’m sure it will resurface at some point in somebody else’s scheme.
Re. my tale on crossrail. It come from several articles. One by Simon Jenkins mainly about Northern Devolution, but had a few juicy bits about Crossrail. Also I remember reading several Times articles in 2010 in the first few weeks of the Coalition and getting the sinking feeling that Crossrail would die, and was pleasantly surprised when it wasn’t. I also read quite a bit about George Osborne and he loves a bit of pork barrel politics and is amazed it has not been done more in this country. A big infrastructure project can have so many political uses.
For the Conservatives infrastructure is about showing they are building capacity for future growth. The long term economic plan etc etc. While a project can also be used to keep sweet certain MP’s and hopefully appeal to local electorates.
How surprised people were when East West Rail got the go ahead, when it had barely been knocking around as a local plan for 5 years or so. Usually these things take decades. Or how about the Metropolitan to Watford (oink oink) or HS2, while it has a genuine purpose and need, it can be sold as in the national interest and as £33 billion pound love letter to the North from the Conservatives.
The bit about george and pile of options for cuts to big showy projects on the day he arrived at the Treasury I’ve read in several different articles.
As to the Mandarins maybe I remember it wrong but it is a firm impression I formed at the time and was formed several non attributable quotes that sounded quite self satisfied and slightly boastful.
Thank you for this article. It was a great read.
Re. the comments above about curvature, the present and future rolling stock need to cope with this minimum curve radius — 40 m radius (38 m in Depots).
@Pedantic of Purley
@Mark Townend
Thanks for your comments. Given the need for accuracy I have re-done the maps using current maps and I have created this new map. This shows more current lines and also shows the correct locations of Stratford International DLR, Stratford DLR (both lots) and Stratford High Street DLR.
https://ukfree.tv/styles/images/2015/Stratford%20Site%20Map%20%20JPEG%2080.jpg
I have also included the Station Box of the HS1 station. (As I can see most of this from where I live in East Village, I thought it was worth the effort. )
Given that the Woolwich to Palace Gates Line only closed in 1963/4 – If someone could confirm if the Palace Gates services from Stratford Market Station went left (current DLR line – crossing the Lea streams twice) or right (removed line though the goods yard) after leaving Stratford Low Level on the way to Lea Bridge Station (I would be very interested)?
For those with some minutes to spare, this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tTN9UcMX8hQ
shows Tower Gateway DLR Station 1991 – 2015 Contrasts – “Filmed on a Bank Holiday Monday in May the 1991 scenes show the station as it was when it first opened. Also seen are some British Rail Class 310 (and/or Class 312) trains on the LTS (London Tilbury Southend) services which use Fenchurch Street Station as their London terminus.
The 2015 scenes include …. Class 357 trains on what is now known as the C2C mainline railway service, trains on the ramp to / from the tunnels built for the Bank extension, a DLR train using the cripple siding, a cab/front of train view arriving at this station….”
@ Graham F – if nothing else the video clip reminds me I haven’t been to Tower Gateway station in decades. It’s changed just a tad. The very early scenes of queues to enter the platform and travel on the tiny trains brought back memories as did the non working down escalator.
@WW – When *did* that down escalator start working so that folk noticed? Certainly not when I was there in those days.
Those “tiny trains” can still be seen running in Essen – and they run through tunnels – see or skim through this related clip:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hr_PtAIuD90
On the subject of the number of trains* mentioned in the invitation for expressions of interest:
PoP, you say that normal life for LU trains is at least 30-35 years, and that the newest of the current DLR trains was delivered in 1995. I’m not sure that’s inconsistent with starting to look at procuring new trains now: presumably if the newest was delivered in 1995, the oldest are getting on for 25 years old now? And as you say, it’s unlikely that new trains will be delivered within 3 years – I imagine 5 years plus is more realistic. So by the time new trains start to arrive, the oldest current units will be hitting 30.
*or vehicles!
@WW – P.S. If that latest clip is viewed (it has good explanation throughout), one might also note how smoothly those early, ex-DLR units now ride on the tracks. I wonder why that is…. Oops, I forgot, it’s Germany. Note, too, how they are often coupled to form 2-car units (vide perhaps PoP’s comment above concerning terminology).
Briantist,
Excellent annotated map that helps me understand the situation at Stratford better.
Anonymous 08:59
Actually I more or less agree with you. What I suspect has happened is that new trains always were in the plan for a few years time. The rapid growth of Docklands so soon after a recession has caught TfL out a bit and they have been forced to bring plans forward – or at least prepare for that eventuality. They will then have to make a decision about whether to prematurely get rid of the old trains or have a slower delivery schedule. I suspect the answer will be down to economics.
[Snip. PoP]
Briantist
The N Woolwich – Palace Gates services went through the works/sheds area, “direct”, usually, at any rate, as did the stub Tottenham Hale – N Woolwich services later.
I certainly went that way on the “short” services ( I never got to Palace Gates, boo-hoo.)
@WW which bits of the 2050 Plan do you think have been overtaken?
@Anonymous 0859
“the newest of the current DLR trains was delivered in 1995. I’m not sure that’s inconsistent with starting to look at procuring new trains now: presumably if the newest was delivered in 1995, the oldest are getting on for 25 years old now? ”
Yes and no: as the article states, it is the B92 stock whose delivery was completed in 1995.
Quick rundown of DLR stock – codes refer to year of ordering: entered service usually a year or so later.
P87 – 11 units: now in Essen
P89 – 10 units: now in Essen
(curiously, given the tunnel sections on the various DLR extensions was the reason they became surplus to the DLR’s requirements, they are allowed to operate in the tunnel sections of the Essen Stadtbahn)
Units still in operation on the DLR
B90 – 23 units
B92 – 47 units
B2K – 24 units
B07 – 55 units (delivery completed 2010)
Thus the oldest units on the DLR are now 24 years old, and nearly half the fleet (70 units out of 149) is over twenty years old. The original units, now nearly thirty years old, are still at work in Essen, alongside “Stadtbahn B” cars, some of which date back to 1976.
“automatic and there normally being no member of staff at the front of the train. ”
I guess it depends on the meaning of normally. In off peak hours, that’s certainly true. But whenever I travel the Lewisham-Bank service in rush hour, the “operative” (what is the correct word in DLR-speak?) commandeers the front left seat, has the control panel open, and their hand poised over the emergency stop button at the approach to stations.
“The first phase of the Royal Albert Dock development is expected to open in 2018” I’m a sceptic on this, given that 2015 is ebbing away and absolutely no construction has started yet. If you search the FT or WSJ, you’ll find articles casting doubt on whether the Chinese investors really have the wherewithal to follow through. Something will certainly happen, a site like that won’t lay empty for ever, but I really don’t think 2018 is realistic.
Short term the growth will be on the Woolwich-A branch. Anyone who hasn’t been down to Silvertown lately will probably be astonished at the riverside mini Manhattan that has arrived just west of the Tate & Lyle works. Also, if the next Mayor overturns Boris and allows London City to expand the terminal, there’ll be more passengers there. The majority of LCY passengers already use DLR.
Can we get a decent solution for Canning Town.
If TfL can find a funding source, surely there is a smart solution which can give protection from the elements. Even a light weight structure is better than current situation.
Not exactly the easiest site ,particularly with the limitations on bus station side. But surely a clever design team can find an imaginative solution
Great article, thanks. Enjoyed reading the many insightful comments too.
With regard to the tube/DLR interchange at Canning Town, I can’t help but think that this is not seen as a priority. Although I can’t think of any engineering workaround which would ever gain approval (due the frightening cost for modest gain), the current information displays are laughably inadequate. IMHO, an easy win would be the installation of simple platform-mounted displays above each Jubilee line carriage door, horizontally split, with whichever destination is leaving next from the top platforms at the top of the screen and the next destination from the ‘far’ platforms at the bottom. You would be left with potentially needing to ‘game’ the output slightly depending on crowding/timings/service patterns, but none of this is revolutionary.
Could we also put this myth of LCY passengers interchanging with Crossrail at Woolwich to bed. Please correct my understanding if wrong, but with the building of North Quay the easiest and most useful interchange will be at Poplar, with both stations connected via the new development. The distance looks similar to the distance on the ground in Woolwich, without the downsides (bar having to wait slightly longer for a Bank train).
Just to clarify what Micheal T is talking about, Wikipedia is our friend with an article on North Quay.
The Mayor’s approval states:
“The proposal very successfully responds to the current limited north-south permeability of the area, by providing a pedestrian link from the truncated Aspen Way footbridge to the rest of the Canary Wharf estate. This link will breach the barrier created by Aspen Way and the DLR and help to integrate Canary Wharf with Poplar“.
To clarify on what PoP has just clarified, the Wiki entry states:
“The site was an open-air car park managed by Britannia Parking until June 2006, following which it has since been occupied by construction equipment for the Crossrail station that is being built in the adjacent West India North Dock. This has prevented any construction of the three towers from proceeding.”
And to clarify even more this picture taken from the Crossrail (web)site may help.
IslandDweller – “Short term the growth will be on the Woolwich-A branch. Anyone who hasn’t been down to Silvertown lately will probably be astonished at the riverside mini Manhattan that has arrived just west of the Tate & Lyle works. ”
That’s Royal Wharf, and yes its a very large site and proceeding very quickly. As the DLR is the only half decent transport option practically everyone living there will use it. So from 2018 less people will come from Woolwich due to Crossrail, but the branch will see a huge number start using it from Royal Wharf, and then the ‘brand park’ and related housing there.
It’s an interesting idea – branch the Woolwich branch to come under the river via Wood Wharf, Heron Quay (?), Surray Quays and then possibly swooping up under the river to terminate in the old Fleet Line tunnels at Charing Cross (and maybe re-open Strand station as DLR only).
But there’s no other expansion. It’s probably better to keep the DLR as a local light rail scheme, and consider better alternatives for the longer distance issues.
@sykobee
“extend the Woolwich branch to come under the river via Wood Wharf, Heron Quay (?), Surray Quays and then possibly swooping up under the river to terminate in the old Fleet Line tunnels at Charing Cross ”
That’s a major project – almost as long as the existing DLR (and largely duplicating Crossrail )
@The Mayor
“. . . providing a pedestrian link from the truncated Aspen Way footbridge to the rest of the Canary Wharf estate. This link will breach the barrier created by Aspen Way and the DLR and help to integrate Canary Wharf with Poplar“.
Bloomin architect-speak! The ‘barrier’ of Aspen Way and DLR is already ‘breached’ by the footbridge which has a narrow stair-tower and small lift on the south side of the road giving access to a pedestrian pavement hemmed between the road and the building site. None of that is particularly capacious or pleasant but it’s not the transport infrastructure representing the barrier or preventing a nicer south termination of the footbridge, it is the incomplete footbridge south thereof and the building site in the way!
Nevertheless, as a ‘connectionist’ I’m pleased to see this improved link being planned and I think it will result in the combined or linked stations becoming a major interchange hub.
When the DLR was proposed the idea was to promote development in the Isle of Dogs and the Royal Docks. It succeeded at the former only because of Canary wharf developers. It failed in the Royal Docks because a similar private developer did not come forward. It is nearly 30 years and much of the land is still barren as is the Barking reach developments. The reason the DLR abandoned it’s Eastward extension plans.
@skyobee
@timbeau
In all seriousness I’d never suggest extending the DLR further west then Surrey Quays, the main idea was to relieve the most congested section of the DLR and Jubilee, while also providing more capacity to areas rapidly gaining high density housing.
It would be the ‘cheapest’ tunnelled option, and could be delivered relatively quickly. (in the relative terms of transport projects)
@Sykobee – I can’t believe all the attention (or potential attention) poor old Surrey Quays/Docks has been getting over the last few years. When I had an ex nearby back in 2003/4 and dismally awaiting the smelly ‘old stock’ Met trains things were quite different! Now Surrey Quays seems to be rapidly turning into a bottleneck analogous to others on the SE ‘heavy rail’ network, especially with the amount of disgruntled LB commuters changing at Canada Water and the *interminable* pauses from trains from Queens’ Road Peckham waiting to join the core. Also I can’t see where any new line would physically go (unless very deep bore) without terminally screwing over an already problematic, let us say, road network in the area during construction. Also I don’t think the existing (SQ) station could take much more throughput without almost complete rebuilding. Canada Water would on the face of things seem a more logical interchange, apart from it seeming to be the one Jubilee line extension station that wasn’t adequately ‘future-proofed’…
But back on topic, do we want/is there need for a ‘loop’ line for the DLR as suggested above?
At risk of being accused of fetching the crayons, what about expansion westward from Bank (as asked above, is this now definitely dead and gone?), or southward from Lewisham (ditto)? On a wider issue, I’m surprised there wasn’t more strategic planning to finally rationalise the whole Lewisham ‘problem’ as part of the current extensive redevelopment. I agree that Bakerloo to Hayes is a non-starter, even with expanded frequencies, but the constant to-ing and fro-ing re potential DLR expansion in the area will result in 5/8ths of ‘FA’.
To my mind (and especially selfishly given location), it is the outermost Catford Loop stations (and Bromley North branch – but this has been covered ad nauseaum here) which have been entirely devoid of any substantial ‘service improvement’ whatsoever in the focus on Crossrail/DLR/LO.
Why some of the Victoria trains running over the Catford Loop can’t be made at least semi-fast beats me, given the derisory 2tph off-peak ‘service’ the rest of the day…
Anyway, rant over, apologies for crayons and off-topic…!
Tim, I think that when Canada Water was designed the conversion of the ELL into the Overground was not even a glint in anyone’s eye… You’d have been talking 25 (or so) years ago here….
Another great article as ever!
On the subject of articles, in the Woolwich Arsenal Branch section, the last sentence refers to “an significant drop” which is the wrong article for this occasion!
[Fixed. Thanks. PoP]
Tim,
“Why some of the Victoria trains running over the Catford Loop can’t be made at least semi-fast beats me, given the derisory 2tph off-peak ‘service’ the rest of the day…”
1. The Catford Loop will be getting some more Thameslink services in 2018 so if you change at Peckham Rye or Denmark Hill there will be more Victoria opportunities both peak and off peak.
2. Are you talking about extra stops on the fast services or fewer stops on the stoppers at the inner stations? If the later making those services semi-fast would reduce the service levels at stations closer to Victoria / Blackfriars. If anything adding extra stops to some of those services at Wandsworth Road & Clapham High Street is more likely than removing existing stops.
3. there is quiet a lot of freight routed via the Catford loop off peak which has guaranteed paths as part of the agreement to build the Channel Tunnel…
@ngh
“If anything adding extra stops to some of those services at Wandsworth Road & Clapham High Street is more likely than removing existing stops.”
Can those stations take 8-car trains? And it should be noted that switching these services to the Atlantic lines affects capacity through Shepherds Lane as the crossing has to be made on the flat.
@TIM even assuming a tripling of rail investment (ha ha) there are still constraints on what you can do. The main driver of passenger growth is the desire to get to Canary Wharf and now Stratford.
The current and network is full and therefore there is no scope for further extensions further out as that will just overload the core.
So in the end you need more capacity in the core before you can consider anything else.
There are no cheap(ish) options left.
Ideally a new crossrail is needed, but the cost and timescales implied make that a 2040’s plus project. Crossrail will help the Bank section and traffic from the North Kent, but will do little for traffic from most of South London.
I suspect pressure will come for something to be done and as the Wharf has a lot political pull in London and Nationally then they will listen to some extent.
At the end of the day you could forget forming it part of the DLR and it could be just a little Mini metro shuttle running from the Dome to the Wharf and to Surrey Quays. The Drain II!
[Too heavy on the wax. The rest was snipped. LBM]
Re: The attractiveness of changing to the DLR (Stratford International branch) at West Ham, rather than the Jubilee Line.
My observation of travelling on this stretch in the peak relatively recently is that Jubilee Line trains are rammed throughout; so much so that a not-insignificant number of people choose to get the parallel DLR instead, just to avoid the congestion. So it does fairly effectively act as the Jubilee Lines “Relief Lines” in this sense.
Conversely, the Stratford International branch seems *very* quiet at the moment in the off-peak. I’d always reckoned that was the real reason why the original off-peak Stratford International-Beckton service was chopped back to West Ham then again to Canning Town, given the already large combined service provision between Canning Town, West Ham and Stratford (Regional). It can always be re-extended should passenger numbers grow with extra developments such as the one near Royal Albert*
(*Royal Albert station also being convenient for plane-spotting at City Airport on the opposite side of the basin)
@Rational Plan:
You’re not going to solve South London’s connectivity issues with sticking plasters. If you’re going to improve connectivity, you need to improve permeability and allow trains to run through London’s Central Activity Zone, without requiring multiple interchanges.
Trams and other alternative systems will have their part to play, but the Docklands area will likely be best served by a new north-south, cross-river Crossrail-scale project linking the Lea Valley lines north of Stratford with a couple of routes south of the Thames.
[Customary snip. PoP]
I find the amount of property development going to be staggering, but is this level of development sustainable going forward ? Of course, a lot of people would like to know the answer to that question, but where are all the people coming from to fill these new developments ?
@ngh – thanks for the reply.
Interesting to hear about additional services from 2018, along with the new stock, do we know whether this will make 4tph off-peak achievable?
I was really talking about the stations at the ‘far end’, namely Ravensbourne, Beckenham Hill, Bellingham and Catford. Loads of trains from Victoria steam through, the majority fast but some only stopping at Denmark Hill between Victoria and Bromley South. I just wondered whether there would be any scope to stop any of these at, say, Peckham Rye / Catford / Bellingham / Ravensbourne (perhaps alternately)?
I’m coming at this both from a commuter point of view trying an alternative route to London Bridge….and from missing the dearly departed Orpington semi-fasts from Victoria…
Does the freight access the Catford Loop via Latchmere Junction etc? Wonder if there is any prospect of an eventual Overground service…
Any more comments with references to the Catford Loop will be removed.
Try posting in Towards the start of a new era on the South London Line.
I know it doesn’t seem like an obvious place to post it but if you read the article you will see that it is appropriate (and may answer the questions being posed here).
A query to PoP. London 2050 thinking points to Stratford and Canary Wharf/Wood Wharf becoming Satellite Activity Zones for very large scale job numbers. Canary is already heading for 200,000 jobs and north of that. Yet it appears that future DLR service structures do not foresee a direct Royals to Canary rail service – you will have to change at Poplar, I guess. Would a direct service be feasible, given the other foreseen services? Many residents of new high density East London developments might appreciate that.
Jonathan Roberts,
Very interesting question.
In the early days there was talk about a service from Woolwich Arsenal to Canary Wharf. Beckton is an alternative possibility. There are potentially two problems. The first is that if you look at the existing layout at Poplar precludes this in combination with higher service frequencies elsewhere. Basically it needs to share the track with the service to/from Stratford. Which is more important – a very frequent service to/from Stratford or one via Blackwall to Canary Wharf? However there is the depot at Poplar so maybe there is space for the station can be reconfigured if necessary to accommodate any tracks and platforms needed. And they could always rebuild the “delta” between Poplar and Canary Wharf yet again with extra tracks to enhance capacity (what would Graham H think of that though?).
The second problem is the limited turnround capacity at Canary Wharf with just one platform available. You can send more trains to Lewisham (presumably not the ones from Woolwich Arsenal) but you would appear to have a limit of 30tph south of Canary Wharf so again you could send the extra trains to Lewisham but are you taking up a slot that would be used in future anyway?
As I mentioned in an earlier comment, if you provided a separate branch from Blackwall westwards you could send that where you want to deal with the issue you mention. How about to Crossharbour on dedicated tracks? The reason I did not include such a suggestion in the article and only referred to it in a comment is that I get the impression there is absolutely no appetite for extending the DLR. I also suspect with planning permission for so many developments already given that any proposal now will be ruinously expensive.
I am intrigued by your question. Something makes me think you have a scheme, or have heard of a scheme and want to see what thoughts are. I am sure you know the area from a planning perspective much better than any of us do.
@PoP
Well I’m certainly interested in views on the topic. It’s no secret that Canary Wharf is already thinking beyond Crossrail 1, as job volumes grow…
We’ve had elsewhere other ideas for better rail links to/via Canary. Not that I’m advocating a crayoning free-fall, but specifically in the context of the future DLR you have mentioned nominal spare capacity via Blackwall, and that via Stratford-Canary Wharf will be limited to 15 tph, so in theory 7½-15 tph more might be feasible.
” direct Royals to Canary rail service”
It is a slightly awkward journey now – the DLR computer seems to be programmed to ensure the cross platform connections always just miss each other. But in a couple of years, once the development between the Canary Wharf Crossrail site and Poplar station is complete, there’ll be a direct walking route from Poplar station into the heart of the wharf. It’ll use the walkway through the Crossrail station that’s already constructed and only take a few minutes. So I suggest the perceived need for a direct Royal Docks to CW DLR service will reduce once that easy walking route is open.
Moderators Note: There have been a number of line ‘non line proposals’ and ‘apologies for crayons’ on this thread recently. It seems it just takes one to start people submitting their own suggestions. The Thames Off-Topic and Crayon Barrier is intact however and has prevented them from proceeding. Commentator apologies or statements to the effect that they are not describing a ‘line proposal’ or wax based line are not carte blanche.
Jonathan Roberts,
you have mentioned nominal spare capacity via Blackwall, and that via Stratford-Canary Wharf will be limited to 15 tph
How do you know the latter is true? If the route was double-tracked throughout then, as far as I can tell, there would be absolutely nothing preventing 30tph Stratford-Canary Wharf. 15tph would terminate at Canary Wharf and a further 15tph would continue to Lewisham. What is more the Jubilee line from Canary Wharf to Stratford is 24tph and full and is only proposed to go up to 27tph by 2019. So any further demand above what the Jubilee line can handle has to be borne by the DLR or by Crossrail (but that involves a change at Whitechapel).
Will there not come a point where Canary Wharf is saturated? Businesses must be encouraged to set up in various places so a quarter of a million people aren’t all trying to arrive in the same place at the time.
@PoP
Fair point. I’d taken your 15 tph as the limit, but IF it can be fully double-tracked north of Bow then more is indeed possible.
I would still refer back to the potentially heavy demand flows from new eastern suburbs to Canary, where DLR could enable a direct service if there were merit. Of course you could walk in from Poplar as suggested by Island Dweller, or change at Custom House for Crossrail, as an alternative. However I can also begin to imagine that Crossrail (with its reduced branch frequency) could also ‘do a Jubilee’ and eventually become cubed out even east of Canary. Indeed the rate and scale of demand change is profound at present across all East London rail transport, so that there are then hard choices between different combinations of routes about which passenger flows to prioritise (which you have pointed out).
On the DLR, for example, the aggregate demand grew from 178m station entries+exits in 2011-12 (the first year of the present scale of DLR network) – so 89m journeys – to nearly 228m entries+exits in 2014-15. That’s plus 25m journeys (50m e+e) in just three years, over 8% pa compound on average from the 2011/12 starting point. Growth rates above 30% in that period (excluding the stations new in 2011) are seen at 12 already-established DLR stations. Yet Canary Wharf DLR station itself has only grown in usage by 2% from 2011-12 to 2014-15, while the combined Canary plus Heron Quays plus West India Quay have gone from 23.8m entries+exits in 2010-11 to 27.3m in 2014-15, just a 10½% rise – a good rate in any other context but low for East London. That might be a function of the rate of new office provision, or a knock-on effect from increased Jubilee Line capacity, or an indicator that the DLR service offer has some room for improvement.
@Hedgehog
Canary Wharf is a priority location for further expansion in the draft London 2050 planning material.
@LBM
This latter point has important implications for the supply of enough convenient future transport capacity, a principle which we know from our Fleet Line researches(!), so it is not unreasonable to consider what options are available on the DLR, in the context of the present article. Even PoP has felt some musings to be worthwhile, in the article itself.
Jim Cobb
“Level of (housing) development” …
I’ve posted a link about this on the “Diving into the Fleet” thread, which may be relevant:
HERE
PoP/JR
If arriving at Poplar from the east & wish to get to Canary Wharf … why not just walk across the dock, through the upper level of the new CR1 station?
See also Island Dweller’s comment on precisely this problem.
Greg,
In principle I agree entirely about people just walking from Poplar to Canary Wharf (Crossrail). However that depends entirely on how pleasant or unpleasant the walk is. The Hungerford footbridges (current) compared with their predecessor show us that as does the Millennium Bridge between St Pauls and the South Bank which is an attraction in its own right.
If the footbridge is to be made an attractive feature – or at least as little unattractive as possible – then it might work. However I have read nothing to suggest that more than the minimum will be done. This is a pity because pedestrian improvements are probably the public transport improvement with the greatest benefit compared to cost.
@Greg Tingey, 17 September 2015 at 09:08
“If arriving at Poplar from the east & wish to get to Canary Wharf … why not just walk across the dock, through the upper level of the new CR1 station?”
I think the idea of terminating at Canary Wharf with its extra platform is so extra frequency can be added to one or more of the eastern branches without overloading the line to the city or blocking any of the platforms at Poplar itself for longer than absolutely necessary (I’m assuming here that reversal and junction clearance, although very quick with driverless ATO still takes slightly longer than a stop and continue in the same direction). Most people on those trains may indeed alight at Poplar for Crossrail interchange or a walk across the docks, but a small number might find the ‘reversing siding’ at Canary Wharf a little more convenient for their destination.
One thing about a possible / eventual “Tower Hill DLR” – was the passive provision for a two-car service or a three-car one?
As bank station was built to accommodate three-cars I expect the passive provision would also have been built at the same time for three-cars as well.
@Hedgehog Arguably the Wharf exists at all because the City became saturated – though I suspect that’s more a factor of planning rules than fundamental constraints. So sure, there may come a point where the financial industry has to move even further out of town. Compare e.g. Addenbrookes (sp?) Hospital in Cambridge, which has already moved and was at one stage considering doing so again; also the various London markets.
But that time is pretty far off. Canary Wharf is talking about doubling the number of jobs there, and I think that only includes developments that have already been approved. Businesses seem to find it worthwhile to be co-located, and everyone else follows the jobs. There’s room for a fair few more transport links yet, assuming someone’s paying for them – and they are, at least as far as Crossrail is concerned.
(Good thing too – I’m looking at the Heron Quays West building site right now, and I dread to think what the Jubilee line would be like in the peaks if this was finished before Crossrail)
Imm
There’s room for a fair few more transport links yet,
Unless you live in Chingford, Walthamstow or N Leyton, in which case your’e stuffed.
The carefully-under-advertised emergency replacement bus, during the Vic-line closures was a revelation.
Regarding pedestrians walking to Canary Wharf from Poplar. This will be fine (possibly) if their destination is north of (roughly) the Jubilee line. South of there it’s getting a bit far to walk, certainly if they’re heading for Marsh Wall/South Quay (currently most of the development here is residential/hotels but office space is in the works I believe). The pedestrian link over the south dock is currently just a single footbridge (which is approaching capacity at peak times) and the route through the west winter garden is restricted by revolving doors at both ends. There is passive provision for a second footbridge in the replacement SQP development, but nothing more than that.
As for the putative branch from Blackwall to Crossharbour, the south dock still plays host to tall ships (it seems to be the go-to place for visiting navies) and so you will either have to go (a) end this money-spinner; (b) build very high (100ft clearance I think is what the Admiralty used to insist on I believe); (c) go very deep under the dock – not easy even for DLR gradients when starting on the viaduct at Blackwalll; or (d) have some sort of swing/lifting bridge on the route and suspend the service when necessary – a departing Spanish frigate required the road bridge to be closed for a good 30 minutes earlier this year. None of those options are going to come cheap.
I don’t know, you go away for a few days and the asylum is taken over by crayonistas, who have even introduced their own vocabulary now, with lines swooping up to join others (swooping seems to mean that all engineering, demand, and operational issues can be safely ignored in the wild access of the emotions generated by using a piece of existing infrastructure which has been rightly left oou. Calloo, Callay!)
More seriously, the article is – rightly – focussed on the limited scope for adapting the existing service pattern and enhancing capacity. What it doesn’t seem to say,however -for those like me, who haven’t studied DLR operations in detail – is where the actual pinch points are, and what would need to be done to remedy them. The system is not laid out rationally, having evolved as a series of sticking plasters, and it is not obvious at first glance how it could evolve into something high capacity. In particular, I fail to see how adding extensions (in nearly any direction) will do anything other than add to the overload on the core sections. (It may be that I am wrong, and all these extensions are going to carry merely local traffic, but that’s not what their advocates say).
@Graham H:
I think the line through the three stations serving the Canary Wharf complex is either already saturated, or very close to it. It’s hard to see how they can ram more trains through there without major, and very expensive, surgery.
Making the remaining two-car trains longer seems like the only ‘quick win’ option left now.
@Anomnibus – thank you – that’s what I suspected. Not that going to 3 car sets will be cheap ( and relieves only those services where they survive); as for going to 4 car sets…
Graham H,
What it [the article] doesn’t seem to say […] is where the actual pinch points are, and what would need to be done to remedy them.
Well obviously to some extent I have failed in what I set out to achieve.
In simple terms the DLR seems to be able to run at two minute intervals. It may be possible to reduce this slightly but I suspect not by much given that junctions are involved.
The trains can certainly maintain a two minute interval at a double track terminus. I make this claim on the basis that Lewisham in the morning peak has trains departing in an 8 minute cycle of 0-2-4-gap which I presume means 0-2-4-6 is also sustainable.
On the same basis as Lewisham, Bank can maintain a two minute interval and I believe it is the station capacity (to be resolved in 2020-1) which is the limiting factor here. If the station adjacent to Tower Hill were to be built on the straight level stretch of track in the tunnel (which was carefully put in place for this purpose) that might actually help at Bank as it would distribute the passengers better. Journey times would increase but, because fewer people would get off at Bank (and hopefully fewer get on), dwell time at Bank would get better.
So lets assume that there are no fundamental issues with junctions and the clever computer can dynamically programme the trains to optimise all junctions. The critical ones (the delta north of Canary Wharf and south of Canning Town) are grade separated – mini spaghetti junctions in their own right – so this may be reasonable. Let’s also assume there are no timetable issues of integrating all the services.
If we consider all the branches …
Westferry – Bank/Tower Gateway: already at capacity with 30tph between Westferry and Shadwell
Canary Wharf – Lewisham: Currently at 22.5tph in the morning peak with alternate trains from Stratford continuing to Lewisham rather than teminating at Canary Wharf. If all current trains from Stratford went to Lewisham then there would be 30tph on this branch.
Canary Wharf – Stratford: Currently limited to 15tph by single track sections. As a small point you wouldn’t see London Underground attempting 15tph over single track – however short – and as for Network Rail, you have to be joking. If the single track sections went in their entirety you could run 30tph with southbound trains alternating between terminating at Canary Wharf and Lewisham.
Canning Town – Stratford International: Currently only 8 minutes in the peak but no reason in principle why you can’t run every 2 minutes with trains alternating between Beckton and Woolwich Arsenal.
Beckton – Canning Town: You could have two trains to Stratford International and one (as currently) to Tower Hill. After that you are struggling with onward destinations. So 3 trains every 8 minutes (22.5tph) and potential capacity if you could use it.
Woolwich Arsenal – Canning Town : similar to Beckton branch except that 1 train every 8 minutes goes to Bank not Tower Gateway.
Finally …
There is the link between Canning Town and Poplar. which only has a 4 minute interval (15tph). Unfortunately there is absolutely nowhere for westbound trains at Poplar to continue to if the previously listed increases are put into effect. There is probably insufficient time to terminate in the platform at Poplar without causing problems and in any case this will probably cause crowd issues at Poplar. This is a pity because eastbound there is still a potential slot left to both Beckton and Woolwich Arsenal.
Now [Crayonista Moment alert] if you had a short branch from Blackwall westbound that turned south just short of Poplar station and had a station over the main highway (at an angle to the highway if necessary) with a southern entrance on the south side of Aspen Way so the station was double ended with direct access to both Poplar station and the Canary Wharf complex you could then add a further two services: Beckton – Not-quite-Canary-Wharf and Woolwich Arsenal – Not-quite-Canary-Wharf. This would then mean that all stations had a 2 minute service (30tph) or better except Bank station, Tower Gateway station and Not-quite-Canary-Wharf.
What I am trying to suggest is that I don’t believe there are any long-term pinch points as such. The system will be able to run 2 minute intervals practically everywhere simultaneously so any capacity issue is really system-wide.
Hope that helps but I suspect you probably now wish you never wrote that.
Four car trains will require engineering works at (almost?) every station – some very significant (e.g. Bank, Cutty Sark). I wonder if it might be cheaper to build a new line!?
New rolling stock could add a limited amount of capacity – a single indivisible vehicle the length of an existing 3-car train would probably add at least half a current car’s capacity. I don’t know whether trains longer than that (but less than the length of an extra car) are feasible.
36 or even 38tph is feasible on some tube lines, so with resignalling and a complete timetable recast (and sufficient extra trains) an increased throughput is theoretically possible – neither quick nor cheap though. It would be impossible without an expansion of passenger capacity at Bank though (and/or an extension to spread the load) and maybe elsewhere too (Shadwell? Heron Quays?). It might be though that you need to (expensively) remodel some of the track to raise line speeds to support this though.
For those who had a comment deleted recently I have explained elsewhere why. Basically nothing wrong with the comment itself but we were getting a lot of repetition or at least very slight variations on a theme.
Chris: “a single indivisible vehicle the length of an existing 3-car train” .. wouldn’t be able to bend around the tight corners that exist on the DLR?
AlisonW,
The length of the carriages – or the train – is irrelevant. All that matters are the bogies – assuming the train has bogies. In principle you could have a 90m single rigid carriage with bogies at either end and it would make no difference to its ability to take the tight corners. It might cause other problems though! See my previous comment elsewhere here.
Chris McKenna was merely making the point that the intermediate ends with their angled front, electronics in front of the first seat and huge great coupler had quite a bit of the length of an existing three car train wasted and unusable by passengers.
Well, the outswing on those corners would be ridiculous – trains passing on corners would clout each other and probably nearby buildings!
@PoP – thank you, that’s very clear now (and no,I’m not sorry I asked but I do apologise for any extra work involved).
@Alison W
““a single indivisible vehicle the length of an existing 3-car train” .. wouldn’t be able to bend around the tight corners that exist on the DLR?”
In DLR-speak a “vehicle” is an articulated set: all of which currently have two bodies and three bogies, and generally run in twos and threes (four or six bodies). What is envisaged, as I understand it, is something with six bodies on seven bogies – (or maybe eight slightly shorter bodies on nine bogies) which will have no more problem getting round corners than the existing trains.
A quick point: the easiest interchange from inbound C2C services to the Canary Wharf is at Limehouse: a short step-free walk across to the DLR platform for services from Bank to Lewisham.
I don’t have any numbers for that, but my glance-and-guess survey says 30-50 passengers on every peak time weekday service.
The interchange at West Ham is time-consuming and it ends at overcrowded Jubilee Line trains; you don’t always get to board the first service.
Outbound in the evening, I doubt that that as many as fifty people reverse that journey via Limehouse: the walking route of narrow stairs and narrow platform is worse than West Ham.
Walking routes matter…
…Which leads me to Poplar and the possibility that CrossRail opens up a better walking route to Canary Wharf.
Right now, that route is horrible, and very few commuters attempt it: a walk alongside a busy road, and up the stairs across a windswept footbridge.
But offices containing over fifteen thousand people on the Eastern end of North Colonnade are closer, on a map, to Poplar than to Canary Wharf.
Are Jubilee line trains rammed in the peaks at West Ham in both directions or are we just talking about in the peak direction towards Canary Wharf?
Evergreendadam
The eastern 2-3 carriages of Jubilee Trains are rammed heading towards Stratford in both peaks in my experience, the loads lessen slightly as you get further from the buffers at Stratford but the trains are still well loaded. In the evening peak you often have to wait for the 2nd, occasionally 3rd train heading in either direction from Canary Wharf.
Westbound, the loads are generally more balanced through the train but the rear (east end) of the train is still busier than the west end for the same reason (proximity to the platform entrance at Stratford).
@Greg Tingey I’m not sure I follow? There’s plenty of room to build a tube from Chingford, Walthamstow and North Leyton to Canary Wharf – *if* there were a business case for it / the BCR was right.
@PoP if we’re talking about 30tph Stratford-Canary Wharf are you sure Canary Wharf could handle reversing 15tph in the centre platform? Can the two tracks through West India Quay handle 45tph in each direction?
I agree that there’s spare capacity between Beckton/Woolwich Arsenal and near-Poplar. But the question remains, how many people want to go there? If your not-quite-Canary Wharf was where I think you’re suggesting you would run the risk of piling people onto the Jubilee via the East entrance. That would be a contra-peak flow which at least wouldn’t overload the trains any further, but I can see it disrupting the crowd flow.
@lmm. The centre platform at C Wharf is already turning around 15tph. Visit on a weekday evening rush hour.
As to the WIQ comment, there are four tracks through there, though only two of those tracks are accessible by trains heading to/from Poplar.
@ Imm – I think Greg was merely referring to the utter peak hour nightmare that is trying to get from E4/E17 to the Isle of Dogs. Buses are chronically overloaded and slow and in the height of the peak it’s tough squeezing on the Central Line at Leyton and then doing the same on the DLR / Jubilee Line. Heck it was awful on Saturday evening – I had to squeeze on to a full 58 at Leyton and endure the crush. A quick look at the 4 relevant bus routes (58, 69, 97, 158) shows very significant growth on all of them in recent years (we are talking about well over 3 million more pass jnys) but I can’t prove that’s all in Waltham Forest given the routes also serve Newham.
When I used to have early morning meetings at C Wharf it was nearly always 60-80 minutes to go barely a few miles. I could get to my Central London office in half the time. While I am sure other parts of London also have poor access times to Docklands it is extremely poor from Waltham Forest given the short distance involved.
I am sure Greg is referring to the never ending delays to the Low Hall Farm curve which would allow a direct train service from Chingford into Stratford. While it would not fix all the travel issues – especially for people in Leyton – it would radically reduce travel times to Stratford with only one change. The STAR service may help *if* people adjust to travelling via T Hale and then to Stratford. However the main purpose of that service is not to act as a replacement for overloaded buses in Waltham Forest. It may also not be wonderful for the lower Lea Valley users of STAR if their new train service is rammed full of people from Waltham Forest between Stratford and T Hale.
I doubt a tube line could ever be justified from Stratford to Waltham Forest. However a short stretch of track, wires, signalling and a few EMUs (even old ones held over in the short term) should not break anyone’s bank. Capacity at Stratford will be fixed by STAR given NR have said they will add extra tracks and platforms. It’s a relative bargain and I think a lot of people in Waltham Forest are utterly fed up with the lack of progress. I would simply not believe anyone who said there was no business case for scheme.
I thought the Beckton branch would see limited growth over the next 5 years but a recent visit to the eastern section has changed my mind. I saw about 300 homes under construction ‘Great Eastern Quay’ and 800+ planned over the road starting in 2016. Then another 700ish approved nearby with scope for more. DLR is the only real travel option there.
Those new trains probably do need a hurry up.
Imm/WW
“A new tube” – crayon alert!
Actually, it’s the dreaded Hall Farm curve, which is/would be a lot cheaper – & not just the peak hour.
Last week I went from home to Leyton on a Saturday afternoon, i.e. the opposite direction to WW……
Walthamstow Bus station arrival time, to Leyton arrival time …. 29 minutes. The roads were packed & so was the bus!
“no business case” = “not invented here” I suspect.
Also there was the Parliamentary-passed act, back in the 80’s that ran out of time & it’s probably “too embarrassing” to revive it?
Hall Farm Curve – I assume the Chingford line could cope with the extra trains, as the existing services y have to mix it with other services beyond Clapton, but is there the terminal capacity at Chingford, and, given the aspirations for more trains for the “STAR” route, at Stratford?
Is there any scope for diverting all Chingford line services to run via Stratford instead of Hackney? How many journeys are made between intermediate stations Bethnal Green-Clapton and the Chingford branch? What would the time penalty be?
@ Timbeau – I would sincerely hope that Chingford could handle 8 tph (assuming x15 to LST and the same to Stratford) from three platforms. If it can’t then serious questions need asking even with the need to handle some ECS workings from the sidings into LST.
If I have understood Mr Roberts’ updates about STAR then Network Rail intend to add some extra platforms at Stratford to give more capacity for services down the Lea Valley. Part of the issue is to ensure ECS trains can get to and from Temple Mills sidings while coping with terminating trains at Stratford. If they can squeeze in one extra platform then they should be able to handle 4 tph STAR, 4 tph Chingford and allow ECS workings into or out of LST as required.
I don’t have official numbers but you really can’t send Chingford trains solely via Stratford. There is quite a flow of people from Hackney borough stations across the marshes to Waltham Forest plus the obvious flow to Liverpool Street. If you diverted the Chingfords then you’d have to provide 4 tph at Clapton and I’d question if that was feasible with AGA’s services. I also suspect Clapton users wouldn’t want to lose their “Overground” presence given the place has staff now and actually looks managed rather than neglected as it has done since I first arrived in London in the early 1980s. I also think breaking the Clapton – St James St link would never be publicly acceptable as the alternatives take far too long and are more expensive. Would you really take 2 buses plus a walk instead of a 3 min train trip? Would you really go via T Hale and Walthamstow Central changing twice between rail and tube with all the hassle involved? London Travelwatch would easily create a case to demolish the case for service withdrawal.
A service from Chingford to Stratford should be additional to the core service to Liv St. Heck I’d be happy with a half hourly service initially – at least there’d be the choice of a quick convenient service even if you would need to know the times rather than just “turning up”.
WW
IF the Hall Farm curve was reinstated, I would expect 6tph Chingford-St James St, splitting alternately via Clapton to LST & round the curve to terminate at Stratford – change for Crossrail.
Everyone benefits.
All Chingford services give you either a direct LST or connection thereto.
You get a quicker route to Docklands & it frees up a path through Clapton for the valley services.
@WW
Understood – hope you didn’t mind me asking the question.
The network map is going to start looking horribly complicated around there though, rivalling some areas of south London.
@WW
Sorry, STAR is minimum infrastructure therefore so far as aware there will be no extra platforms/bays at Stratford on the Lea Valley lines. Not that that couldn’t be done, but you’d need a project and cost sponsor, which you understand about. In some options, it involved mods or a new bridge over HS1, which didn’t come in cheap. Maybe other variants can be considered – the problem arises as I see it with 8-car or longer trains – and it’s not unreasonable to anticipate that train length as Stratford and its interchange volume grows.
Just as a volume update, Stratford is, in 2014 LUL, 2014-15 DLR, 2013-14 NR + LOROL entry/exit (therefore also the bulk of the inter-systems interchange flows) at least 116m passengers:- LUL 59.3m (but excluding JLE-Central interchange), DLR 15.3m, NR+LOROL (probably underestimate as ORR) 26.4m + 5m NR interchange. 3 years ago, JLE-Central interchange was ca. 8m a year, and will be more now, let’s call it 10m. Overall 116m passenger volume a year, possibly more with better ORR numbers, so easily the 6th busiest station and rail interchange in the whole of Britain… (Beats Euston+Euston Square, and Paddington+Lancaster Gate, for example, and anywhere in the rest of Britain). And I’ve ignored Stratford International, another 2.8m yearly counting both SE (the tiddler at 0.9m) and DLR.
The LSE RUS 2011 wasn’t positive about Chingford-Stratford. Maybe things would change if someone redid the numbers now. But it’s possibly too late to include in the 2016 Initial Industry Plan for CP6, what with all the extra projects to be passported from CP5 with the Hendy Review. Would it attract any party funding? Local pockets have been emptied by Lea Bridge station and STAR.
I suspect any case might rely on continuing PIXC issues on the Chingford Line after introducing new LOROL trains. I covered off some of the Chingford-Stratford optioneering issues in section 4 of this report: http://www.railfuture.org.uk/CLUA-JRC+Report .
@IslandDweller Having paid more attention you are of course right – not sure how I’ve missed those tracks. There is a flat crossing where Bank->CW trains conflict with CW->Stratford ones though, unless I’ve missed something else too.
OK ignore me. Checked the map and there’s another track going around.
@lmm
That flat crossing allows some trains from the City direction to stop at WIQ. I don’t know the proportion of trains that do that today. The newer grade-segregated alternative route is climbing steeply as it passes WIQ station so could not incorporate a platform there when built. Trains heading from CW towards the City can serve the station easily using either northbound platform. I expect as the Stratford line gets busier it becomes increasingly difficult to use the flat crossing route, which is necessary if the train is then to access the centre platform at CW for reversing. A train from the City wishing to stop at WIQ can at least await a free path on a dedicated approach track before the junction track without delaying following traffic heading for CW (without stopping at WIQ) or indeed Poplar traffic, which can both overtake on the their own routes, diverging further back.
Mark Townend,
I don’t know the proportion of trains that do that today.
0%.
According to the DLR’s own publicity, “At certain times, trains from Bank towards Lewisham do not call at West India Quay”. Doesn’t that mean that at certain other times they do call there?
https://tfl.gov.uk/cdn/static/cms/documents/dlr-route-map.pdf
However, Journey Planner tells you to go via Poplar
I thought some of the very early trains (before 0630) from Bank towards Lewisham do use the crossover and serve WIQ. After 0630 they use the “Big Dipper” avoiding track and don’t stop at WIQ. It used to be that very late trains (after 2330) also served WIQ, not sure if that stopped after latest timetable revision.
IslandDweller,
I checked before writing the article (and I am pretty sure I was using the old timetable then) and there are definitely none. If you go to the DLR timetable and select Bank as your start point then the web page allows you to select West India Quay as your end point – indicating that there is a service between the two points – but when you click “show timetable” you get a message “No timetable data found for the route selected….”
This is one feature of the published DLR map that is out of date as it implies that, at certain times, DLR trains from Bank do call at West India Quay. The non-existent service between Beckton and Stratford International and the dagger by Pudding Mill Lane are also wrongly shown.
In the case of the dagger by Pudding Mill Lane indicating the first and last pairs of sets of doors of 3-car trains will not open this is double nonsense. First of all, if a 3-car train were to use Pudding Mill Lane all the doors would open and secondly, currently, no 3-car trains call at Pudding Mill Lane anyway.
Thanks POP. And special thanks for taking the effort with the tfl “timetable” feature, which doesn’t show anything that any of us would recognise as a timetable. Trying to get information out of that site does my head in. I hate the way it is dumbed down at every “upgrade”.
Re Puddingmill Lane. I’ve travelled on 3 car trains (this year) that have opened all doors. The weekend services often used to 3car, but I haven’t used it in the last month so maybe they’ve gone back down to 2 car with the latest timetable change.
Island Dweller,
They have.
It seems with no outbound services planned to call at WIQ and all CW routed trains from the City using the grade segregated ‘big dipper’ avoiding line, the flat junction route from Westferry to WIQ might be considered redundant now, except perhaps for emergency diversions or planned short workings during engineering works further south on the Lewisham branch (for which the reversing siding at Crossharbour or the Mudchute bay might be used under many circumstances instead). I wonder if there are any plans to remove this surplus infrastructure in the Poplar junction complex to save the long term maintenance and renewal costs of around 200m of plain track, 2 diamond crossings and 2 turnouts, as well as removing the failure potential of those turnouts. With the consequent ability to short-turn the City-Lewisham trains at Canary Wharf removed, that would strengthen the case for retention of the Crossharbour reversing siding and Mudchute bay platform, even though they are almost never used today as you noted in the previous DLR article. I note that both terminal crossovers at King George V were retained after the Woolwich extension, presumably so if the Woolwich Thames Tunnel has to close for any reason the full service frequency can be maintained north of the river. I suspect the Crossharbour and Mudchute arrangements may be part of a similar emergency turnback strategy with respect to the Greenwich Thames Tunnel.
MT
Very likely – there are one or two places in the ex-GER suburban lines, where cossovers have been retained for just such purposes.
And very useful they have proved upon occasion.
The immediate drive to save money in the short term, by removal of similar crossovers has come back to bite the ex-LBSCR lines more than once, I understand.
@Greg Tingey, 26 September 2015 at 08:57
I think the important thing is that those facilities that remain should be under proper signal control not the old C&P trailing crossovers all over the Southern where you had to send out operators in a van to use them – fine for a planned engineering job (albeit at cost of said handsignallers/point operators and difficulty and risk of rostering them at weekend) but often practically useless in a weekday emergency. Clearly (I assume) all such facilities on DLR are fully signalled for normal automatic working, so could be used instantly if required.
@ Mark Townsend You are right, and probably explains why when last month over the entire Bank Holiday weekend, a bridge was repaired near Arundel, all Arun Valley trains were reversed at Billingshurst rather than Amberley or Pulborough as would have happened in days of yore. The bus hirers did very well.
More recently (6 weeks or so ago?), a broken down SWT train near Wimbledon trapped everything behind it during the evening rush hour. Truly, those old trailing crossovers served a purpose and a lesson has been unlearned.
Although passive provision was made on the Bank branch for a station at Tower Hill, are we sure that a 3-car length of level track was created (rather than 2 car)? If not, then maybe replacing Tower Gateway might be much harder, and more expensive, than one might inaccurately (were that the case) presume.
@Theban
Bank seems able to take 3-unit trains. It would be odd if the passive provision had not been made for the same length.
For the stations that would be too difficult to lengthen, notably Cutty Sark, would SDO be possible with the existing trains – cut out the first and last half-units? Even if not, when the proposed multi-articulated units arrive, SDO might then be an answer.
@POP re Puddingmill Lane and 3 car units.
Bank branch is closed this weekend, so trains are running Lewisham to Stratford. They’re all running as three car units, so at least for this weekend, PML gets three car units.
@ timbeau. That’s exactly what happens now. Three car units serve Cutty Sark. First two and last two sets of doors are in tunnel and don’t open. This is announced (in English) but it always catches out the tourists who had made a bee line for the “driving cab” seats then find they can’t get off.
@Timbeau
One would expect a bit more space at the terminus so I don’t think one can draw an inference from that.
Which DLR stations are too short for all the doors of 3-car trains to open?
Theban,
One would expect a bit more space at the terminus
Why (when we are talking about platform length) ?
IAMhegdgehog,
As stated on the DLR diagram except for Pudding Mill Lane which has now been rebuilt. So that’s:
Elverson Road: Could be done but would involve compulsory purchase orders and engineering work so not really worth bothering for the number of passengers using it. Also the passengers are probably regular users so will be familiar with the situation. One can’t imagine there are many passengers travelling from Lewisham to Elverson Road so, if it ever were worth tackling, the platform for Lewisham would probably be the priority.
Cutty Sark: The station that really could do with not being 2-car. It’s position in relation to the previous station and the Thames, as described by Anomnibus a while back, may be a significant factor in the decision to go for 2-car as could engineering challenges but there has never been a satisfactory definitive statement as to why it was built as a 2-car station when Bank, built before it , was 3-car. Bank and Cutty Sark stations are probably the biggest factors when deciding that going to 4-car would be prohibitively expensive but there are undoubtless others.
Royal Albert: Almost certainly not done solely for cost reasons (it is on a viaduct) but it will be rebuilt as a consequence of the Royal Docks development.
Gallions Reach: Not busy and built on a viaduct and almost certainly not extended purely on the grounds of cost.
Even though they do not have full-length platforms wide enough for passenger use, all four stations where selected door operation (SDO) is used have narrow walkways present beyond the platforms so that if the SDO fails for any reason there is no danger of passengers experiencing a sudden drop into a void. There are also warning signs – see first picture within article.
I attended various public meetings before and during the construction of the Lewisham extension – at the time I was a representative of a local residents group who were affected by the construction. I’m doing this from memory – and inevitably that fades over time – and I can’t cite sources.
My recollection is that the Cutty Sark site was always recognised by CGL (the consortium who built the extension) as a very difficult build. A very constrained site under historic buildings and close to the river. My recollection is that Cutty Sark was the only optional station on the Lewisham route, the enabling Act enabled Cutty Sark to be built but didn’t require it (other stations were a requirement). CGL were keen to build Cutty Sark because it allowed them to redevelop and unlock land values in the site above the station – which is right in the heart of tourist-central historic Greenwich. At the time of constriction, trains were only envisaged as 2 car. Adding 3 cars was a distant vision, and I don’t think any of the team who were building the Lewisham extension expected 3 car trains to be added less than ten years after the extension opened. Given the constraints of the site, I don’t see any (affordable) way that the platforms at Cutty Sark can ever be extended.
Of course, as with every other recent rail development that crosses the Thames, the trains from Lewisham were full and overflowing almost from day one…..
As I said, doing this from fading memory – so if anyone has better info do correct me.
@PoP
Funding and construction issues were the cause of a constrained Cutty Sark station. The station nearly didn’t happen at all.
I was involved in negotiations to secure cross-Borough agreements and funding support towards the DLR Lewisham scheme, during the period when the Conservative government was explicitly seeking substantial third-party funding towards rail projects. I recall that Greenwich Council was facing problems in raising its share of a local authority pot. It had been agreed that the project, then estimated at about £100m, should be underpinned by a 10% LA contribution. Parties such as Deptford City Challenge and LB Lewisham had found funds or sold council assets. However Greenwich struggled to find £1m. There was a real risk that Cutty Sark station might be cancelled, leaving just one station in Greenwich at the main line stop.
In the end a contribution was achieved, which satisfied the Minister (Roger Freeman) to allow a private bill including Cutty Sark to be submitted to parliament. However the difficult site for Cutty Sark’s station box and high foreseen costs led to further compromises about its scale of construction downstairs. Even so the Lewisham extension cost over £200m to build.
@IslandDweller
I agree that 3-car trains weren’t then seen as a priority. However there was brief consideration of passive provision at Cutty Sark, because of the recognition that retro-fitting would be virtually impossible. Nothing could be justified, however, and it was hard enough to get even a 2-car station box to fit in the constrained surface space available.
A little nugget from Modern Rail, someone may have already mentioned it. 1/3 of all trains are to be converted to longitudinal seating. This will not result in fewer seats! Should be completed by the end of the year.
I assume these will be for Bank -Lewisham.
That’s a real shame about Cutty Sark. The station must cater to a lot of tourists, who are the least likely group of people to understand announcements about the doors not opening.
@IAmHedgehog:
The only problem I’ve seen at Cutty Sark is created by the existing trains, which are three independent pairs of articulated units with no interconnections between each other.
As the DLR is clearly looking at new rolling stock that is articulated throughout, this will not only provide more space for passengers (i.e. increased capacity per train, by removing the wasted space caused by the gaps between each of the present paired units), but it will also simplify the use of SDO as each door will be accessible from any part of the train, rather than from a specific articulated pair as is the case at present.
Over the long term, another solution is an indirect one: a new cross-river route that happens to relieve DLR’s Lewisham branch. (E.g. some kind of Crossrail-like project, a tram, or some other technology entirely.) The key problem being that the existing mainline railway (which could also use better, more visible, signage) runs east-west, rather than north-south under the Thames, so there’s only the claustrophobic pedestrian tunnel as an alternative today.
Buying fully walk through trains (of the same overall length as the current 3car sets) will create a bit more passenger space but won’t remove the Cutty Sark problem. Visitors (many not English speaking) don’t understand the message about the first/last two sets of doors not opening. So they sit at the “drivers cab” seats until the end of the train has stopped in tunnel and are totally bemused about why the doors in their part if the train don’t open. In current operation, There are always some doors within each of the 3 cars that open, but on very crowded services (and many are) it’s all but impossible to squeeze through the train to a set of doors that will open. To keep to timetable, the “train captain” (don’t think they still use that term?) has to close the doors and get going, and the confused visitors has to stay out and get off at the next station and make their way back. I’ve never seen anyone too upset about going one extra stop, they generally just have a laugh about it.
There is also a school of thought that even English speakers don’t “hear” the announcements because we are bombarded with endless babble announcements about keeping hold of belongings and beeping out etc etc that one just filters everything out….
@lmm 22 Sep 1240.
With the different timetable operating this weekend (engineering closure of route into Bank), the two centre tracks at WIQ and on to the two centre tracks at Poplar have been running at 54 trains per hour (ie 27 each way). Seems to have operated fine.
@Anomnibus Regarding a new cross-river route, the theoretical Wood Wharf extension might help here. There is capacity east of (and including) Blackwall station and a need for another route in and out of the Canary Wharf area, so an extension Blackwall – Wood Wharf – Crossharbour – either west to Surrey Quays or east to somewhere on the north Greenwich peninsula would solve a variety of problems.
It really depends where most of the Lewisham branch river-crossers come from.
My local line, as you may imagine.
@Andy Hessey : “The new franchise operator has been a disaster for the DLR and the Beckton line… It will only get worse!”
True. All the weekend trains on the DLR Beckton line, even the Tower Gateway ones, have recently been cut back from 3-car to 2-car. This is despite, as stated above, traffic on the line having risen by 45% in recent years, and TfL stating they are going to increase off-peak services as a result. It’s a strange approach to then cut the capacity of the service by one third. As a result, not only do I often not get a seat now, but at times of significant Excel weekend exhibitions there are passengers at Custom House and Royal Victoria who cannot even get on. Presumably new operator Keolis feel that if their Trans Pennine operation leads to people standing from Leeds to Manchester 7 days a week, that’s good enough for the DLR passengers as well, and the much of the fleet can be parked at Beckton depot for the weekend to save a bob or two on train costs.
Meanwhile there have been a surprising number of expensive additions over time to the rail infrastructure on the branch in recent years, most of which seem never to be used. A reversing crossover has always existed beyond Prince Regent, which worked fine when extra shuttles to that point for Excel large shows were running. Nevertheless, firstly another crossover was put in between Royal Victoria and Custom House, later a full scissors crossover west of Prince Regent, and finally a siding at Royal Victoria were added to the system. Each required a full bank holiday weekend of extended closure to commission, and none of these seem to have ever seen any use of consequence, let alone now having five separate provisions for abnormal operations in a short distance.
It’s a real shame that Custom House station has been rebuilt for Crossrail just as it previously was, instead of two island platforms with the DLR looping round the new system. It would have fitted the narrow site better as well as giving better interchange.
Not extending Royal Albert to take three car trains properly seemed strange, as there was a substantial project there to install the narrow walkway extensions, with supports, which until they were finished looked like they were proper extensions. Meanwhile there have been recent funds to rebuild all the steps and ramp into Beckton station, which seems to have ended up with just the same functionality as before.
I suppose a final question would be : Is the man who came up with the information screens design for those arriving by Jubilee Line (as most of us do) at Canning Town, about where the next Beckton train might go from, feeling better yet?
Mr Beckton,
I cannot comment on other issues with certainty. However the weekend service on the Stratford-Canary Wharf service has improved so it is not simply the case that overall the system is getting worse.
On the subject of Custom House I think you are suggesting cross-platform interchange. Firstly, I suspect this would not be possible as the Crossrail tracks need to be lined up to approach the existing ramp to Connaught tunnel. There isn’t much space and the platforms have to be straight. There is also the issue of crowd capacity and the dangers of a Crossrail train swamping a DLR train with passengers. No Crossrail station was planned with cross platform or same level interchange in mind. At Oxford Circus/Hanover Square they deliberately designed it so passengers couldn’t conveniently transfer from one platform to another but had to exit to the surface.
Forcing passengers to go a longer route may be unpopular but helps spread out the crowds. The long walk from Wembley stadium to Wembley Park station was deliberately planned that way for that reason.
When recently at Canning Town at platforms 1/2 I was at a loss to understand why the only announcements we got were automated ones about trains departing from platforms 3/4.
I suppose I’m old school when cross platform interchange, a la Victoria Line, was seen as an advantage for passengers and engineers took pride in designing for this. Nowadays things are generally completely the opposite. I’ve never noticed any crowding problems with the Victoria’s many cross platform interchange, and still feel, as with the JLE which seems to go out of its way to make interchange longwinded, that it comes from treating the project as independent rather than part of an integrated transport system – I believe with two islands the platforms at Custom House could have actually been wider than they are now. West Ham, where from either DLR or Jubilee you have to go up, then back down, then up again, to get to the District or C2C, is a particularly poor example – and of course managed to win a design award when built. Maybe there was lobbying of the design team by the escalator manufacturers.
The Beckton to Stratford route seems to have gone through too many changes. Provided outside peak hours only, and thus enhancing the service on the branch, it was regularly justified on the basis that demand was higher off peak. This is patently untrue, even with major Excel events one of the busiest times there is during the evening peak. This fiction has permeated a number of articles about the line, even one in “Modern Railways” a short while ago which sadly appeared to have been ghosted by the DLR PR department. Last year it was cut back to West Ham which suited nobody, and now is reduced to Canning Town. It would have been sensible to use the upper level platform here to reverse this, given that most passengers from the Beckton direction are heading for the Jubilee, and putting all departing Beckton trains on the same island platform, but no, it’s been put down on the Stratford DLR line where nobody goes to wait for it.
@”Forcing passengers to go a longer route may be unpopular ”
Also extremely inconsiderate to anyone with mobility problems.
“Custom House ……….cross-platform interchange……..would not be possible as the Crossrail tracks need to be lined up to approach the existing ramp to Connaught tunnel. ”
Could the DLR platforms not be put either side of the XR ones?
“Could the DLR platforms not be put either side of the XR ones?”
There isn’t much room here, squeezed in between a road to the north and the Excel site to the south. I’m not a construction engineer, but I’d guess that if they had selected this design it wouldn’t have been possible to keep the DLR platforms open whilst XR is built (because of the space constraints). Would four years of no DLR station (at Excel – a huge traffic generator) been acceptable? The solution we’ve got at least meant the DLR platforms stayed open whilst the XR platforms are built.
Anyway, far too late now.
@Mr Beckton. There may be overcrowding on the Beckton branch during during shows at Excel, but not on an average day. Whereas the Bank Lewisham service is full to bursting every single day during peak hours. So, given that the DLR management have to prioritise where the existing number of trains will be used, the new arrangements probably pass the “make the best of a bad lot” test.
The Beckton line is indeed “bursting” during normal peaks as well (I’m familiar with both routes at this time). Surprisingly, the busiest station on the whole line is Royal Victoria, especially since all the high rise apartments were built west of Excel, and in the morning peak there can be a substantial crowd on the platform squeezing in to each already full train. Likewise at Canning Town on the upper level in the evening peak it regularly occupies the whole dwell time of the train to get as many as can board into the train – whose frequency is nothing like the Bank-Lewisham service, so if you don’t make it then it’s quite a wait to the next one.
Mr Beckton 29 September 2015 at 12:01
“The Beckton line …………….. the busiest station on the whole line is Royal Victoria, especially since all the high rise apartments were built west of Excel”
That was also true a few years ago.
There are 1,353 dwellings south of DLR and west of ExCeL, with 360 under construction and permission for more
Recently there has been some discussion on the blog about development near / over the DLR ramp at Tower Hill / Gateway. By a sheer fluke I happened to end up stuck beside the site on a bus last week. I managed to get a nice snap of the area to be redeveloped with the DLR ramp in the background and the brick arches for the Tower Gateway line. In a number of months the view will disappear so I’ve added it to the LR Flickr Group for those who might be interested. Unfortunately a train didn’t oblige by passing by when I had chance to get a snap.
The PLASA (Professional Lighting And Sound) show is currently almost the only thing in a largely-deserted Excel – and this in the middle of the autumn ‘exhibitions season’. A few years ago, PLASA needed the whole of Earls Court 1 and Earls Court 2 combined. Today, the PLASA organisers have tried to disguise the lack of exhibitors by having extravagantly wide aisles. Next year, after a three-year trial at Excel, they are moving to Olympia.
The point being made here is that Excel has not been the success that its middle-eastern owners must have hoped. If it closes (not out of the question on the basis of today and other recent times when I have attended – the overheads must be colossal) then it removes a reason for running a more frequent service on the Beckton branch (and Custom House Station on the soon-to-be CR1 will be strangely quiet)
Is that causation or correlation? Is this because the shows are at ExCel or would they have been poorly attended anywhere else (eg because of the economy, state of the industry, alternative marketing strategies instead of shows)?
I am not suggesting it is nothing to do with ExCel but interested to test the evidence.
@RayL
Yet other big shows have moved from Olympia/Earls Court to Excel, for example, the Kennel Club’s discovering dogs. I rather think that the nation’s second major dog show will be rather more of a people attractor than what would appear to be wholly a trade show.
DSEi has grown steadily since it relocated to Excel – not least because it is an ideal location with the dock available right next to the exhibition hall
If it did close it’d hardly be a reason for less frequencies on the branch I’d have thought? The site would become housing of pretty high density lining the dock.
RayL. It’s only a couple of years since the owners went ahead with a significant expansion of Excel. I doubt they’d have done that if they weren’t confident of forward bookings and profitability. Every conference centre will have some “dead time” or low attendance trade shows, but Excel does also host some really huge shows.
Excel does create a few challenges for DLR operations. During really big shows (such as World Travel Mart, happening in a few weeks time), the entire service pattern across the DLR network is recast.
Excel is often chosen as the registration point for big events e.g, Marathon, 100 km cycle ride. Now the the DLR permits bikes I can tell you that the DLR in that area was busy for much of the day for the latter event and, as some had taken their bikes to the registration point, even more packed than figures would suggest.
I don’t doubt that Excel hosts many large events, but in financial terms it is the overall occupancy during the year that counts. Space for space I understand it is more expensive than Olympia, and Olympia is in the REAL London (particularly in overseas eyes), the London of entertainment and shopping and sightseeing and nightlife, whereas Excel is stuck out in a suburb.
The Excel website has a section for the DLR connection but it also says:
‘London’s main rail stations are:
Charing Cross (27 minutes from ExCeL)
Euston (32 mins)
King’s Cross/St Pancras International (32 mins)
Liverpool Street (26 mins)
London Bridge (16 mins)
Marylebone (31 mins)
Moorgate (26 mins)
Paddington (32 mins)
Victoria and Waterloo (no times given)
All of these London train stations have direct tube links which will take you to ExCeL London.’
Read that last sentence through the eyes of a stranger to London and you might easily get the impression that the tube will take you all the way there, which it won’t. There is that awkward and badly-signed change at Canning Town, with Beckton trains leaving from two widely-separated platforms.
London obviously needs exhibition space, particularly with the loss of Earls Court. It is just a shame that in addition to its location, Excel has other flaws. A visitor’s first impression will be of a considerable walk from Custom House station, part-covered but still open to wind and cold over much of the year and with a ‘hold-your-breath’ time as you run the gauntlet of the smokers outside the main doors. Once inside, it would be nice to freshen up. That’s when you discover that all the toilets at the western end are down several flights of stairs. And so on. A potentially good ship spoiled by a ha’pth of tar.
That seems to conflate some internal design details with the wider accessibility argument. I’ve been there as to other exhibition centres and they all have warts, and lots of walking, think of the NEC for example, while Glasgow isn’t a lovely pedestrian access from its railway either!
If I were a shareholder I’d look to the medium term where the Excel land holding will increase in value whether or not it is an exhibition centre or high density housing as East London grows in importance. I’d also know that Crossrail arrives in three years’ time, and will have direct Heathrow trains (and Gatwick via Farringdon, Stansted via Liverpool Street, London City on the doorstep).
Then do your accessibility maths again. Olympia is pretty desperate if you want all week rapid rail access. On a comparable basis, the Battersea Power Station project (and wider VBNE development) doesn’t really need tubes to every main line station, nice though that would be, it just needs one tube, which it will get. Crossrail + DLR should do nicely for Excel.
@Jonathan Roberts
“Battersea Power Station project (and wider VBNE development) doesn’t really need tubes to every main line station”
It already has direct NR services to two of them!
“Olympia is pretty desperate if you want all week rapid rail access”
It’s not that bad: three stops from Clapham Junction, with connections to much of southern England including Gatwick Airport.
One stop from West Brompton, which is on a direct Tube line from both Paddington (for Heathrow) and Victoria.
Direct services also from Watford Junction and Stratford, with connections to the GEML and WCML.
If Excel charges more per sq ft than Olympia, that is almost certainly market driven (ie other things being equal organisers prefer Excel to Olympia). If organisers preferred Olympia, then Excel would have to charge less than Olympia to attract business.
In my opinion, Excel compares well with other international big-city exhibition centres.
It does have a silly unnecessarily capitalised name (why not call it the London Docklands Exhibition Centre? Probably because Earls Court or Olympia have copyrighted the phrase), but accessibility-wise, it’s OK, lots of food options inside, and bars and hotels outside.
I agree the Canning Town change is awful, but this won’t be an issue when Crossrail opens. And if RayL thinks it is a long walk from the station to the hall doors, he has a very different definition of a long walk than I do!
Last year, Excel hosted the world Science Fiction convention.
Really good fun & I can tell you that the USAians were very impressed with London’s transport system – which goes to show you something or other ….
ChrisMitch,
I have to admit that I was rather taken aback by that comment when I read it. I keep reiterating, much as people want everything on their doorstep, you have to have a certain distance between the venue and the station simply to control the crowds and be able to safely close platforms when necessary. So in fact I think it could hardly be shorter!
Furthermore Custom House will have escalators (after a saga which Jonathan Roberts would delight in going into) so that is:
1. get off a train at a Crossrail station
2. get escalator to upper level
3. more or less flat short walk with protection from the elements to exhibition door.
Far from being financially worried I would have thought the owners of Excel would be looking forward to the future where they have probably the most accessible exhibition centre of all.
Foreign visitors, especially Germans, will be used to the idea of catching a train from the city centre to a purpose-built exhibition hall. They will also probably be impressed that the arrangements are even better than anything they have. And there are lots of local hotels with more, it seems, being built daily. To top it all there is the very convenient DLR to get from your hotel (or local Airport) to the exhibition centre.
Excel/Canning Town, etc.
A brief collection of random, disconnected thoughts having attended IPExpo “Europe” yesterday.
i) Canning Town would suck a lot less if there were more than one screen (on P1/2, I think) that you have to hunt down to find the “next train” list for the DLR. Was only an issue for my on return journey, seeking out the next Woolwich Arsenal train.
I toyed with trying the bridge across the dock (which I hadn’t realised was there…) and getting the Woolwich branch direct at West Silvertown or Pontoon Dock, but met a friend travelling back via Canning Town, so didn’t. An interesting and unsigned option for that journey.
ii) Yes, toilets are a pain. I would have been less cross about traipsing out, across the concourse, downstairs and then through a labyrinth if there had actually been signs to them in the main exhibition halls.
iii) Don’t judge a venue’s success by individual exhibitions. ITExpo was clearly a confused amalgamation of a number of previous shows. The “Datacentre World” bit had probably no more than a dozen stands (half of which seemed to be people still optimistically punting rack servers…..). But that’s a reflection of that marketplace.
Crufts, on the other hand, I expect to continue growing.
One of the big advantages of ExCel (and Earl’s Court 2) is the underfloor services which make it a lot easier to set up the exhibition stands.
Olympia is a poor relation.
@Chris L – 8 October 2015 at 16:42
One of the big advantages of ExCel (and Earl’s Court 2) is the underfloor services which make it a lot easier to set up the exhibition stands.
One of the big advantages of ExCel is (and Earl’s Court 2 was) is the underfloor services which make it a lot easier to set up the exhibition stands.
Earls Court is now a roofless shell … perhaps the underfloor services are still in situ 🙂
The papers for the October 2015 Rail and Underground Panel include an update on Overground and DLR growth. This sets out some of the plans TfL have to improve services.
http://content.tfl.gov.uk/rup-20151016-part-1-item09-lo-and-dlr-growth.pdf
I do wonder if the inadequate information screen arrangement at Canning Town, about where the next DLR train to Beckton or Woolwich might be leaving from, is some sort of Turf War between LUL and DLR. Most passengers for the DLR here arrive not through the station entrance but by Jubilee Line, and need to know when they step off the train whether to turn left (and down) or right (and up). There is just one screen, which will only be passed by a minority of such passengers, and it’s stuck up in the roof where many won’t even notice it. It’s a contrast to Camden Town southbound, where the Northern Line has a comparable split platform arrangement, which has indicators specifically for the purpose. Do LUL provide the signage on the Jubilee platform and have they gone for the cheapest possible approach for another operator’s system?
Walthamstow Writer,
Very, very interesting although of course much was already known but it is nice to have confirmation. I will now waste much time trying to work out how
4.16 Tranche 2 of double tracking of the section between Stratford and Bow Road is included in the Business Plan and will be completed by 2020 to enable an increase in frequency from 15tph to 20tph
could be implemented in the morning peak and still allow some trains to run Stratford-Lewisham.
I just cannot see how
+ Two tph Dalston Junction to Clapham Junction
can be implemented in 2019 given that in 2018 we have
+ Two tph Dalston Junction to Crystal Palace
and the maximum signalling capacity of the core section is 18tph.
So that is either over-optimism, some limited resignalling is involved as well as some changes at Clapham Junction (with what is now referred to as platform 0 reinstated) or an incredibly early introduction of ERTMS on the East London Line following hot on from its (hopefully) successful use on Thameslink.
@ PoP – yes it is interesting. Various things like fleet size increments for the DLR being cited, more DLR station upgrades, an assumed reduction in Woolwich – Bank services post 2019. On Overground it’s nice to see a package of improvements on the GOBLIN including a x12 headway, better early and late services plus an extra 2 tph Enfield Town – Liv St but the latter not until 2019 (presumably somehow contingent on Crossrail opening?).
I also note the interesting remark about possibly leasing extra trains before the new Bombardier trains turn up from 2018. I note also that electric trains are stated to start in 2017 on the GOBLIN even though new stock won’t be delivered by then. I wonder if TfL have their eyes on class 315s freed up from the Shenfield Line or elsewhere in the UK.
Most commentators will probably be familiar with the general shortage of serviceable diesel trains UK wide. However, I went to a meeting yesterday where it was made pretty clear, by a very informed observer, that there will be more EMU sets available than the ROSCOs would be able to lease. Thus, if TfL need some extra sets short term, something will be available.
Does that comment about Tranche 2 double tracking imply that Tranche 1 is complete?
IAmHedgehog,
Yes. Tranche 1 must be the short section done by Crossrail (on suitable payment) beyond what was necessary for them to comply with their obligations under the Crossrail Act when relocating Pudding Mill Lane station. It is the bit east of Pudding Mill Lane up to a point (well set of points) between City Mill River and Waterworks River.
I am still trying to work out how you can run 20tph between Stratford and Canary Wharf once tranche 2 is complete. If they all terminate at Canary Wharf that is 20tph terminating in a single platform – well technically 2 platforms but a single track. Probably doable on the DLR but it does seem tight. If you run some trains onward to Lewisham that doesn’t really help because you are still going to have some 3 minute turnrounds. It would help if you could run every other one to Lewisham but you can’t do that because it doesn’t fit in with the Bank – Lewisham service pattern (every 4 minutes).
As I see it, it would actually be easier to run 30tph with 15tph terminating at Canary Wharf and 15tph continuing to Lewisham – except they haven’t got the rolling stock and according to their last page they won’t have more until 2020.
Maybe I am missing something.
@130
“there will be more EMU sets available than the ROSCOs would be able to lease.”
presumably because the rolling stock had already been ordered before the civil engineering was put on hold.
PoP
There’s still a n other centre-reversing road at Crossharbour, though, isn’t there?
Greg,
Yes. I did wonder if they were planning trains from Stratford to run 10tph to Canary Wharf, 5tph to Lewisham and 5tph to Crossharbour. Ideally the Crossharbour one would closely follow a Lewisham train from Bank to maximise time available to make sure everyone one has alighted at Crossharbour. On the returning journey it just slots into the appropriate position in the cycle.
Crossharbour would appear to make quite a bit of sense as the report talks about how much Heron Quays is now used and Crossharbour would be your first opportunity to terminate after Heron Quays when coming from Stratford.
I think the Crossharbour centre siding is restricted to 2car sets (too short for the 3car sets that run Bank Lewisham). As the weekday Stratford Canary Wharf service is now 2car, that reversing at Crossharbour option seems viable.
Meant to add that if terminating at Crossharbour from Lewisham then on the return journey the train would have to fit in with the service from Lewisham as far as Canary Wharf. It then would cross to platform 3 at West India Quay and may have to sit there for a minute or two to regain its correct slot back to Stratford.
Timbeau: The electrification “pauses” or “delays” or whatever don’t help use up all the vehicles….but…. an awfully large number of new electric trains have been ordered or delivered, with more to come (Gatwick Express being built, Moorgate line trains, L. O. Trains). Yes some of the trains they replace are old and tired, but if more are needed in the short-medium term, there are lots of things that can be done to them to make them better. Look at’s what being done on the class 321 Renatus (what a terrible name) project
I’m also puzzled by the LO/DLR growth report about +2tph from both Clapham and Crystal Palace. Apart from core section signal capacity, my observations at Clapham Jn suggest that they would struggle to get terminators in and out every 7 minutes, particularly with the slow running speeds through the Ludgate chord/junction. My grand plan to solve this would be to equip some ELL stock with pantographs and run eastbound South London trains into Platform 1 with an instant crew swap and reverse straight out onto WLL (and vice versa in the other direction) with scant more dwell time than an intermediate station. Castro Metro suggests the track switch closest to the station would need be become a scissor. It would save a lot of passenger bother and become a truly orbital service. I also sympathise, however, if the operator would be reluctant to allow a situation in which delays on Southern, Southeastern, Thameslink and ELL could affect WLL and NLL.
The 5-car trains have helped for now, but as with Cutty Sark, It’s surprising how many people in the morning commute also ‘wade’ through the long and crowded last carriage to get off at Canada Water – it’s not just the tourists. It won’t be long before they are just as rammed as before, and people will end up missing the stop. All this despite stickers on the doors and the very irritating way the long audio warning is repeated. It would help if the door stickers actually named the stations affected. Very positive, though, to see such planning for further growth in progress.
@NickBXN
“they would struggle to get terminators in and out every 7 minutes, particularly with the slow running speeds through the Ludgate chord/junction. My grand plan to solve this would be to ……..run eastbound South London trains into Platform 1 with an instant crew swap and reverse straight out onto WLL (and vice versa in the other direction) ”
Not sure how this would solve the problem as stated because the Ludgate chord would still be the rate-determining factor. You also add the problems associated with incoming and outgoing trains crossing each others paths, and the loss of network resiliency because of the loss of the ability to recover time in layovers.
Could work be done on Ludgate chord to support more/faster trains?
I do wonder to what extent DLR passengers will reduce when Crossrail opens. There are several flows which are likely to divert. From the Beckton line many will change to Crossrail at Custom House, even if only going to Canary Wharf. Woolwich will likewise see diversion. Even the Stratford-Canary Wharf line sees a lot of traffic changing from the GE line, which will now find it easier to continue to Whitechapel and then come back on the other Crossrail branch to Canary Wharf. The heavy flow from The Wharf to The City will likewise transfer in bulk to Crossrail, particularly given the better distribution of stops across Central London.
Yes, Crossrail does helpfully link several branches of the DLR. Carto Metro has omitted the Crossrail station at Woolwich, which is rather annoying.
@Mr Beckton and IAmHedgehog:
It should be noted that the Crossrail station in Woolwich has no direct interchange with any other station there. It’s not a convenient interchange for anywhere. Note, too, that unless your destination is in Canary Wharf, or very close to it, the DLR will likely remain the quicker option, so it’s not a given that Woolwich’s DLR station (which does have convenient interchange with the adjacent Dartford line) will be heavily affected right away. It takes time for travel patterns to adjust to new infrastructure.
Re. changing at Custom House:
Custom House won’t be a cross-platform interchange, so you need to factor in the time taken to (a) change platforms, and (b) for your new train to turn up.
Yes, it’s only one stop via Crossrail, but it’s one stop AND walking up and down multiple flights of stairs / lifts / escalators. At each end. The platforms at Canary Wharf Crossrail station are about five floors down in the basement level of a shopping centre!
The Faff Factor(TM) of the stations’ designs means I’m not convinced that many will be making this change for such a short journey.
Indeed, I suspect the designs for the new Canary Wharf and Custom House stations were deliberately intended to discourage such a travel pattern. It makes more sense to change at Custom House if you’re heading further into London itself, but for Canary Wharf, you’d be spending more time going up and down stairs / lifts / escalators *(delete as applicable) than you would on the train itself.
The DLR also covers more of the area, rather than just the one particular spot, so the same point I made about Woolwich’s Crossrail station also applies: if your destination is in Docklands, but not in or particularly close to the Canary Wharf complex itself, the DLR will usually be the quicker option.
Anomnibus,
Woolwich does not need to be an interchange. If starting at Woolwich it is irrelevant. If changing at Woolwich from further down the line you do it at Abbey Wood. OK, it is not cross platform (unless starting your journey from Plumstead) but other benefits (assuming a Crossrail station near your destination) outweigh that. There will also be the people who start at Abbey Wood who currently change at Woolwich Arsenal for the DLR who might be tempted by Crossrail. Abbey Wood is a busy station as it is the station for Thamesmead.
I believe that journeys to and from Woolwich Arsenal is where the bulk of the temporary reduction of DLR use is expected to be. Note that the report says:
“Woolwich [Arsenal] is a major generator and attractor of demand and accounts for around 10 per cent of DLR journeys”.
That could account for a lot of the temporary reduction when Crossrail opens. I suspect, as Mr Beckton has pointed out, Crossrail will have an effect on Stratford – Canary Wharf. Probably most of all it will affect Bank – Canary Wharf as people go via Liverpool Street (Crossrail) to make their journeys to Canary Wharf instead of via Bank.
Of no direct relevance but interest is just how important Shadwell is:
“Seven stations have contributed 50 per cent of DLR’s growth over the last four years. These are Woolwich Arsenal, Stratford, Bank, Canning Town, Shadwell, Heron Quays and Lewisham.”
@ Anomnibus – the TfL report, that I linked to earlier on this thread of comments, states quite clearly that the Woolwich line will see a temporary tip in demand upon the opening of Crossrail. That makes sense because people will swap from transferring from buses to DLR to buses to Crossrail. Also I expect there will be very significant changes to the bus network to channel people into Abbey Wood Station from a wide surrounding area including Thamesmead, Plumstead, Erith, Bexleyheath. The bigger challenge will be whether people who use buses over long distances to reach North Greenwich will change their habits. North Greenwich is attractive because it’s in Zone 2 and people trade time vs cost. Will they be prepared to pay higher fares to use Crossrail if they current railhead at North Greenwich? I suspect that is TfL’s bigger challenge especially if they want to take resources from routes to North Greenwich to create a better feeder network to Abbey Wood.
I take your point about DLR local travel and I suspect that we will see a few months of people flitting back and forth between various routes but I don’t really see DLR losing that much patronage on Stratford to Canary Wharf as the service is pretty convenient really and it’ll depend on how crowded CR trains are at Whitechapel. If they resemble “hell on earth” why put yourself through the hassle if you can get a nice DLR train at its terminus and which runs more frequently that CR will? Where there are clear trade offs people are pretty sensible about choosing the best option for them even if it doesn’t appear strictly logical.
Walthamstow Writer,
But if you are already on a Crossrail train and going to Canary Wharf surely you will get off at Whitechapel instead of Stratford, cross the platform and get a train one stop to Canary Wharf?
@PoP
“get off at Whitechapel instead of Stratford, cross the platform and get a train one stop to Canary Wharf?”
maybe, if
– 1: the trains from Whitechapel to Canary Wharf are not overcrowded
– 2 Canary Wharf XR is close to where you want to be – otherwise you may find one of the DLR (or indeed Jubilee) stations more convenient. The slightly less convenient interchange at Stratford has to be balanced against having to extricate yourself from underneath below a dock at Canary Wharf .
The balance of convenience may be different in different directions, of course – or indeed according to the weather.
Abbey Wood may be relieved if/when the London Overground is extended under the river from Barking Riverside to Thamesmead. There is a lot of support for the proposal.
@ PoP – well not everyone changing trains at Stratford today is on the future CR1 route. I take your point but all I was saying was that people do not always apply 100% logic about staying on crush loaded trains and then changing to another crush loaded train *if* there is an alternative without the same crush. People place quite a value on travelling in “not crushed” conditions – why else does congestion relief score so well in business cases? I’ve no doubt that CR1 will be very busy coming in from the east but I certainly don’t expect tumbleweeds to be the only passengers on the DLR service from Stratford to Canary Wharf.
It’s also important to look at new developments. A number of towers now u/c around Stratford will be 5-10 minutes quicker walk to certain DLR stations than the Crossrail station.
It’s similar in Woolwich. Most of the Crossrail speed advantage to CW would be negated by a 5-10 minute longer walk to a less frequent service if coming from the south, where Tesco want to build many more homes.
In the quest to enhance capacity in the shorter term, the longitudinal seated layout as so far rolled out looks quite flawed – the cranked vertical grab rails stand too far forward of the seat line, forming an obstructive chicane through the area that they are trying to encourage passengers to move down. Unlike the “ballooned” car profiles S Stock or Class 378’s the actual space in the gangway remaining between people’s feet is not a great deal more than on Tube stock. I would be very surprised if the poles don’t get reconfigured – they really deter people from moving from one vestibule to the other, and will cause ‘fun and games’ with the selective doors at Cutty Sark. Even on a lightly loaded train, I saw the ‘captain’ having to dodge from side to side to walk down the car.
This is an image to illustrate what NickBXN is talking about:
http://www.stationmasterapp.com/blog/2015/09/new-dlr-seating/
Oh dear, that looks really bodged. If the anchor points of the grab rails can’t be moved, at least the point where the cranking is should be moved higher – maybe re-install them upside down if new ones are out of budget?
Not sure, timbeau, that upending those rails/poles will work but how about reverting to traditional, flexible grab handles as in e.g. the 1962 tube stock?
http://www.tubeprune.com/67%20TS%20orig%20interior.jpg
I recall that there was some objection raised to these for more recent stock but I cannot think what.
With the DLR stock before the latest rearrangement, at least the transverse seat corners are provided with ‘grab’ corners:
https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3196/2436584309_f7f7cf7bc8_b.jpg
The area concerned as shown still accommodated eight seats per side but was likely to hold probably more just in the pairs of short longitudinal seating bays and certainly no less than this latest arrangement as a result of those cranked poles. If the idea is as NickBXN explains, then I agree that neither arrangement is going to permit passengers to move freely between vestibules, whilst my guess is that the original arrangement actually encourages standing passengers to occupy the area and be able to hold onto something, as opposed to the newer arrangement, which will not in my view. ‘Open plan’ doesn’t equal greater accommodation.
Nothing to it at all & no advantage, IMHO.
There is a “reason” for this, though – it’s called “Fashion”.
Ceiling-hung grab handles are unusable by those of shorter stature. I don’t know if this is the “objection” to which Graham F refers, but I wouldn’t be surprised.
As a regular DLR commuter who sat on one of these sideways seats just this morning, they seem to me to be pretty successful. Contrary to Graham Feakins’ thoughts, the old arrangement was a massive hindrance to people moving through the train, and those little hand-grabs were always way inferior to a vertical pole to hold onto when the DLR wobbles itself into full-on hunting mode. Most people I’ve observed on the DLR, myself included, much prefer a pole to a grab.
There’s plenty of space between the new poles to walk through, although it does set up a slight chicane. I’m guessing they’re designed to project into the walkway a little in order to get them away from the seats, so standees aren’t put off from using them by the thought that they’d be looming *right* in front of people sitting down.
The split arrangement of the poles is something that I’m still mystified is so rare—it’d be nice if the centre poles in the door vestibules could be replaced by a split version too.
And as to the ‘fashion’ comment, which was presumably in response to the death of the flexible bobble grabs: I for one find any sort of flexible hand grab awful. I’m short, and yet I’d always prefer to stretch up a bit more and grab a higher fixed pole (as on the S Stock and 378s, where there’s a choice of the fixed horizontal pole or a dangly stirrup)—the whole point of providing grab points is to give a *fixed* thing to hang onto, which anything dangly seems to pointlessly undermine!
The cranked arrangement takes up more space than a straight pole would though – since no-one taller than about 2 feet can stand on any part of the floor under the cranked section, or walk past it. Or perhaps you are supposed to sit on the lower crank?
@timbeau: If standing human beings were rigid vertical prisms, you’d be right about the more space (though it’s only marginal). But we are much more interesting shapes than that (for instance sticky-out feet could use the bit of floor you mention). What is more, how closely we pack depends on all sorts of physical and psychological constraints, so it could be the case that experiment has shown that cranky poles result in better packing. Or maybe not.
@Malcolm
You may be right about standing passengers, (although discussion of which parts of which particular human beings would best fit round those poles would perhaps be too indelicate a subject for this forum) but they are most definitely a greater impediment to passing through the car than a vertical pole would be.
I’m confused. The last time I travelled on the DLR I was on one of these modified vehicles with longitudinal seating and the split arrangement grab poles (as Rich Thomas refers to them) with – I think – three vertical poles at hand-grab height spreading out from the single pole at floor level.
But the photo linked by Graham Feakins (22.59) does not show these split poles.
Perhaps the cranked poles are to allow more passengers to grab onto them, and fewer ‘free floating’ without stable support (other than leaning on their fellow passengers). The crooked poles could also allow space for the ubiquitous backback…
I’ve only travelled on one example with the modified longitudinal seating. I don’t recall seeing those chicane poles. Either I wasn’t being observant (entirely possible) or there are different variants out there.
There’s only the one design that I’ve seen, with each pole splitting into two—in Graham Feakins’ 22:59 photo the photographer is end-on to the split so you can’t see it. Another view is here.
These new poles are especially designed for Monday mornings. Cranky poles for cranky people!
/I’ll get my coat …
@Rich Thomas – So they are cranked in one direction and split in another, thereby taking up even more space or volume that could be otherwise be occupied by passengers than by a simple vertical pole. Compare my photo link with yours to get ‘the full picture’.
Why the split? Someone afraid of unnecessary familiarity with a fellow passenger?
So they are cranked in one direction and split in another, thereby taking up even more space or volume that could be otherwise be occupied by passengers than by a simple vertical pole.
I… have no idea what you mean by this, sorry. But really, they don’t take up much space, and they have significantly greater utility than a single vertical pole:
Why the split? Someone afraid of unnecessary familiarity with a fellow passenger?
It’s to help more people hang on
, obviously. It particularly helps when you get someone selfishly leaning against the pole, stopping anyone else from grabbing on—now, with the split pole, there’s a second one available. Frankly we should have more of these across London’s trains.(And at the risk of being snarky: Compare my photo link with yours to get ‘the full picture’. I use the DLR every day; I’m pretty familiar with them.)
I’m with Rich Thomas on this. I’ve seen similar designs on Rome’s metros too. They seem to be popular too.
@Rich Thomas – I realise what you have misunderstood in your latest comment. You said that in my 22:59 photo the photographer is end-on to the split so you can’t see it. I agree. However, in your view at 16:08 showing the split, one cannot easily see the cranked bit down to the floor because it’s also in line/end-on to the photographer but extends away from the pole in anther direction and towards the photographer. In other words, there are three, spaced-apart vertical axes and hence my thought that there is a ‘circular’ area, small as it may be, that is taken up surrounding each pole. In tramway terms, let’s call it a ‘swept path’ of pole.
That’s why I was suggesting that others (rather than you) should need to look at both views to get an idea of the complete 3-dimensional arrangement.
I agree with you that the split arrangement can particularly help when you get someone selfishly leaning against the pole but I am afraid that I am from an era when some knuckles of another person newly grasped around a single pole tends to work in the back of the leaning body to persuade that body to shift if that body cannot be bothered otherwise to stop leaning through lack of consideration for fellow passengers.
P.S. I may have still myself got the interpretation of those cranked bits wrong. Does the split pole rise from the lowermost bent portion of the crank or the upper?
Re Graham And Richard Thomas,
Split grab rails – I think the best example of the concept is seen on the Alstom Trams in Dublin (Luas) at the centre of the vestibules 1 main pole with 4 sub poles at grab heights:
see this photo (not mine):
http://ktransit.com/transit/Europe/Ireland/dublin/luas/photos/Dub-lr-int-032713-03.jpg
Beckton gets way less trains than Woolwich Arsenal.
The service is poor
The Newham Recorder has an artist’s impression of the proposed ‘Rotunda’ entrance to Canning Town station. (I couldn’t help but notice the DLR unit in the background looks like it’s a tram, a throwback to the original proposals of street running or a nod to the original units working as trams in Essen perhaps 😉 )
http://www.newhamrecorder.co.uk/news/canning_town_set_for_new_station_entrance_1_4322052
Anon5 24 November 2015 at 12:17
The new entrance is for people crossing the River Lea on the new footbridge. Most Jubilee line or DLR passengers entering or leaving at Canning Town will not notice it.
Following the earlier discussion here (comments 16 September and subsequent days) about the direct walking route from Poplar DLR to the Crossrail station.
The first stage of this route, the bridge from the CW Crossrail building over the short stretch of the north dock, is now open. The rest of the direct walking route won’t be available for a few years. An indirect walking route (via the Marriott hotel) to Poplar DLR is possible, but it’s a pretty vile walk – alongside the Limehouse tunnel “motorway”. Picture from the Canals and Rivers Trust twitter feed. (Presume it’s OK to link that?)
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CVKbyjcWsAAoPHg.jpg
I hope this is the best DLR article to post this. Today’s announcement about City Airport’s expansion included this DLR mention from the Guardian
“Transport links around the airport will also be improved as part of the latest investment, with £2.6m earmarked for more trains for the Docklands Light Railway.”
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2016/jul/27/london-city-airport-expansion-gets-green-light-from-ministers
£2.6m eh? That’ll buy, oooh, one extra unit at a push.
THC
@THC
In all honesty, I’m sure that all it buys is an improved walking route from the station?
Briantist,
Is an improved walking route from the station possible?
It sounds to me like the cost of an extra unit to cover the additional dwell time caused by the increase in passenger numbers. I suspect this is a bit hypothecated. Extra dwell time might be possible to absorb into the existing or any future timetable or might require a complete (equivalent of an) extra 3-car train.
Why don’t they extend the DLR northwards towards Walthamstow From Stratford international up through Temple Mills ,Lea bridge road then towards Walthamstow through Low hall and St James street and then into Walthamstow Central station 29/11/16
Because it’s not worthwhile?
@ Anon – because there are National Rail lines in the way which are used by regular and busy passenger services. The tracks out of Stratford provide a diversion route to / from Liverpool St if the Lea Valley route via Hackney is closed. The tracks are also used by freight services and empty stock workings from Temple Mill sidings. There isn’t really the space at the south end to squash in two extra DLR tracks so you’d be faced with losing NR tracks that I can’t see DfT, Network Rail or the TOC / FOCs wanting. The time to have extended the DLR north of Stratford International was about 20 years ago before a lot of redevelopment plans were put in place but, of course, the lack of those developments then meant there was no business case for an extension …. .
I’d be much happier just to have the Low Hall curve reinstated and for a modest Chingford – Stratford service to run but that’s ruled out by the STAR plans and ever declining budgets at TfL, NR and local authorities that might have helped pay for reinstatement.
What is being done towards the tunnel entrance into Bank? Are they installing a ‘box’ over the line and then building on top of it?
DEL_TIC …………… yes!
@DEL_TIC
Yes they are. There’s an info board on Royal Mint Street but tl;dr they’re capping the portal so they can start constructing an over site development.
Oh no! That might mean the prices will go up at the Blind Beggar!
Aaarrggghhh! I meant the “Artful Dodger”! How the heck did I get that wrong????
I see. Royal Mint Gardens – Luxury Apartments
http://www.royalmintgardens.com/index.php?v=true
http://www.royalmintgardens.com/gfx/slides-content/rmg-Apartments_1-hr.jpg
http://www.royalmintgardens.com/gfx/slides-content/rmg-Facilities_Piazza.jpg
http://www.royalmintgardens.com/gfx/slides-content/rmg-Facilities_Reception-hr.jpg