Back in November last year we covered TfL’s plans to launch the first Crossrail services under a TfL Rail brand. As we explained at the time, the idea of launching the first MTR-run Crossrail services between Liverpool Street and Shenfield under a different brand made a considerable amount of sense. With takeover of those services happening in 2015, this would avoid any inflated expectations on the part of passengers who might otherwise understandably assume they would be getting new trains and other service improvements from day one.
What wasn’t entirely clear at the time was just what this would actually mean in practice, although we posited at the time that we would likely see a similar approach taken to that used by TfL on takeover of the North London Line. Thanks to the papers for the upcoming Rail & Underground Panel, however, we now have a slightly better idea of what this approach is likely to be.
Getting colourful
As we wrote back in November, given the intention to launch under a “TfL Rail” brand it seemed unlikely that the Crossrail Roundel would likely feature on the trains and stations themselves. Instead, we made a thoroughly un-LR-like prediction:
We are likely to see the Roundel on the services and stations taken over by MTR under the concession, because not to do so would be to miss an opportunity to highlight that changes and improvements are underway. The betting money here at LR Towers, however, would be on that Roundel not being in Crossrail purple, which would lead to confusion between TfL Rail and the future Crossrail brand, but in a transitional colour – blue.
Readers can find the reasons as to why this made considerable sense from a branding perspective in the previous article, but thanks to the Crossrail operational papers submitted to the Rail & Underground panel we can now confirm that we were correct. Indeed the Roundel in question makes what is likely its first public appearance.
As well as including the new Roundel, the presentation also confirms that TfL Rail services will feature on TfL’s various maps (including the Tube map) and journey planner. The initial timetable will though, perhaps unsurprisingly, remain unchanged. The presentation does confirm, however, that a “turn up and go” service is a key goal. Given that Crossrail’s Operations Director is ex-Overground supremo Howard Smith, a man more than cognizant of what “turn up and go” actually means and a strong advocate of the positive impact it can have on both railways and the communities they serve, it seems safe to assume that despite the lack of timescales investigating the possibility of bringing this in as quickly as possible is likely something that sits high on the TfL Rail priority list.
A Wash and Dust Up
Perhaps more importantly, the presentation also gives us our first idea of what will be happening to the twelve stations handed over in May and beyond – and it does indeed seem to be broadly similar to the Overground approach. All stations are to be staffed from first to last train, with the goal being to improve security and attain Secure Stations accreditation. They will also receive a deep clean, with subsequent twice-daily cleaning schedules for each station to maintain standards.
This will be followed by the installation of new ticket machines during this year and next, with these and gatelines to be in place at all stations by December 2016. The presentation includes several artists impressions as to what these will look like once in place and whilst one must be cautious not to read too much into such visualisations, it seems worth noting that signage and display screens seem set to follow the style first suggested by the Crossrail station mockup (and recent TfL station changes). It thus seems likely that what we have here is confirmation of the style we can expect from Crossrail stations in general going forward.
Look closely at the ticket machines above and we suspect you will also see a rough approximation of what the new ticketing software interface will look like for both Crossrail and TfL going forwards, although again one must be wary of jumping to conclusions just yet.
The rolling stock
As with stations, the presentation confirms that the existing rolling stock will be subject to a deep clean and refreshed internally, in terms of seating, signage and panels. A more rigorous ongoing cleaning schedule going forward also features.
The existing stock will gradually be replaced from December 2017 as the new Crossrail class 345s enter service. Just how those new trains are planned to enter service – and indeed the initial service pattern – is also something the presentation provides some confirmation of. The relevant images are included below.
May 2017: Introduction on Great Eastern
May 2018: Paddington to Heathrow
December 2018: Central Section – Abbey Wood
May 2019: Central Section connected to Great Eastern
December 2019: Full service pattern operating, including to Reading
Finally, we also have confirmation of the initial service level in December 2019, including the split between branches, at least as currently planned.
Those wishing to read the report themselves can find it here.
While not shown on the map, I assume that the until linked with the tunnels, services from Shenfield, will still continue on to Liverpool Street (mainline station) rather than terminating in Stratford?
Intersting to see the dot between TFL and Rail. The Taxis.Private Hire roundel has this but I suggest it’s meant to be read as two quite separate modes whereas TFL Rail is meant to be one department. You’d catch a minicab or taxi but you’ll be catching a TFL Rail service not a TFL or Rail service.
@MrWeeble: Yes, they will continue to operate into the mainline station at Liverpool Street. Until 2017 they will also be operated by a subset of the Class 315 EMUs that currently work for Greater Anglia.
Aside from that nothing much has changed since I last worked on this – the only major difference is the extension to Reading. Presumably at least 2 of those 4 trains will skip some of the smaller stations (Burnham, Taplow, possibly also Langley and Iver).
Has there been any mention regarding the Thames Valley branches? Will they retain their direct peak trains to Paddington or are we set to hear rumbles of discontent from that direction soon?
I’m having difficulty understanding the tph diagram here. Presumably it is meant to indicate 12tph from c. London to Shenfield AND 12 tph from c. London to Abbey Wood (therefore 24 tph in the central section as far as Whitechapel). As drawn, it indicates 12 tph from the Abbey Wood branch terminating at Whitechapel! On another point, any idea whether the Heathrow and Maidenhead trains will each receive 2 tph from each of the eastern branches?
Oops…missed the 24 tph line right at the top.
@straphan,
Your supposition regarding stations trains not stopping at is correct. The relevant web page was updated on the Crossrail site after the Reading announcement. One gets the impression the idea is to provide an off-peak semi-fast service to Windsor from central London. It then goes fast to Maidenhead and I reckon that is simply because that is the first convenient place to terminate.
The plan is for some direct peak services to remain. From memory it is only one per branch but I might be wrong.
By the way, for some reason, the Western Section cannot be accessed from the menu on the Crossrail website and you need to go to one of the other sections to find a link to it!
Hopefully we will get back on topic with the North Eastern branch soon.
I find those TfL stage 1 to stage 5 graphics utterly bewildering. If the broad background arrows are to be believed, there never will be a service between Liverpool Street and Stratford. It’s also bit odd that the service on the main line between Stratford and Liverpool Street is never shown. Also, the Abbey Wood branch seems to become isolated in stage 4! Probably too much detail provided. Do the graphics really need to show the shafts and portals ? (There might be some operational sense in showing depots/sidings). Presumably there is some significance in the colours used to show the route. All I can guess is that purple means fully operational!
I’d suggest it’s best to ignore the clutter on those graphics and just use the purple bits as a general guide as that’s clearly how they’re intended to be used in the presentation.
I suspect what you’ve got there is a repurposing of graphics that were originally designed for elsewhere. It’s worth remembering that although this is a public document, it isn’t intended for wide-viewing by the general public and hence probably hasn’t gone through the external comms team in any major way for design checking etc.
@Fradroid,
The “stage” bits are utterly confusing I agree. Ignore those and go by the caption beneath it and remember that if it is in purple it is Crossrail. Also take no notice of the fact that it only goes out as far as Maidenhead.
Very interesting that for some time, there will be “crossrail” trains running into Paddington, at the same time as other “crossrail” trasins are running from just outside Paddington, through to Abbey Wood, & even (later) Shenfield, but never the twain shall meet – until the Reading services start.
I think this will confuse quite a few punters.
The full report shows a mockup of the re-liveried class 315 units, which also looks rather odd and also smacks of re-purposed graphics. Are they really going to put yellow warning triangles on the outside of the doors to warn you about closing doors ?
Odd that the TfL diagram misses out the West Anglia services, and implies that the non-Crossrail parts of Bond Street and TCR won’t be step free.
One small point – I’d half expected the central area part of the tubemap to be redrawn to show CrossRail as a (more or less) straight line but the slides suggest otherwise. Maybe in the too difficult basket?
Another good LR spot (your old summaries of some of the board minutes are missed).
Is there a (good) reason for why this is the only TfL roundel branded ‘TfL’? Eg it’s not TfL Buses or TfL DLR.
Am I correct in interpreting that frequency diagram as 24tph east of Paddington and 10tph to the west? I feel like that can’t be right but presumably I’m mistaken.
@Low Headways,
Sadly you are correct. And that is the peak frequency. Something discussed on many occasions. And yes, everyone who hears about this for the first time probably has the same reaction.
At least with only 9 carriages and 24tph to start there will be room to later increase capacity by about 33pc when required.
@Graham H and James
that base map is odder than that – although West Anglia is missing, Tramlink is there!
So current trains will continue into Liverpool St High Level, and eventually 4tph will continue to do so at suitably lengthened platforms, but what about interim when new trains are phased in but tunnel is yet to open? Will there be sufficient lengthened platforms for current service with new trains?
I thought one of the objectives of Crossrail was to relieve the Central Line. It’s hard to see how this will happen west of Bond Street. How many of the 10 trains west of Paddington will call at Ealing Broadway?
@fandroid
“It’s also bit odd that the service on the main line between Stratford and Liverpool Street is never shown.”
I think it’s a misinterpretation of TfL taking over the stations from “Shenfield to Stratford” (they will not be responsible for Liv St)
@taz
“Will there be sufficient lengthened platforms for current service with new trains?”
the predecessors of the 315s were the LNER-design Class 306 which were 3 car sets and often ran as 9-car trains.
Wikipedia has the class 506 (identical to the 306 except they were not converted from dc to ac) as 54.2 m long whilst a single class 315 car is 19.8m. Thus 3×3 class 306 is 162.6m and 2×4 class 315 is 156m. The 9 car class 345 is apparently 200m. However as far as I am aware all platforms on the east side of Liv St are the same length, and many of them see 12 car trains (3 x class 321) on a regular basis.
According to the station plan in the sectional appendix (p. 117), platforms 16-18 are 162m (177 yds) long. It would seem that some rebuilding is necessary between now and May 2017.
The planned stopping pattern on the western section in 2019 is available here. Broadly speaking, this is 8tph off-peak/10tph peak + 2tph semi-fast Great Western into Paddington main line.
My links don’t appear to be working: link to sectional appendix and western section timetable.
Interviewed for Metro Report International (Dec 2014 issue), Howard Smith confirmed that ‘of the 24 trains/h through the core [at peaks], 14 will turn back at Paddington, and 10 will go west. Four will go to Heathrow, four to Maidenhead and Reading and probably two to West Drayton. That is the plan, although the timetable for the western branches might be refined slightly.’
While the projected ridership in the west is significantly lower that either the Shenfield or Abbey Wood branches, even that ‘thins out towards Maidenhead and Reading’. He also pointed out that the GWML Relief lines will still be used by freight trains ‘and some residual passenger services’ for FGW.
Although the off-peak timetable was still being finalised at the time, Howard confirmed that the original plan was to run 16 trains/h through the core, with eight from each branch in the east. ‘There would also be eight trains west of Paddington: four to Heathrow and four to Maidenhead and Reading.’ However, given the fact that ‘off-peak ridership on the Underground, Overground and DLR has risen disproportionately’ he suggested that ‘there may be a case for running a more frequent off-peak service.’
Asked about “fast” trains to Reading, his answer was that ‘not all trains would call at all stations.’ However, ‘there will probably not be distinct fast and slow trains, but services making a mixture of stops. It is quite complicated, and the danger is that if each train only serves half the stations then the ability to travel between adjacent stations could be severed.’ The stopping patterns were being examined with Network Rail as part of the timetable development process.
Between the peaks, FGW currently runs four trains/h to Reading on the Reliefs, beyond West Drayton. Of these, two miss out Iver and Langley and run fast to Slough, while the other two omit Burnham and Taplow between Slough and Maidenhead.
As a final word from Howard, ‘as with all major projects, the service pattern will evolve over time. We have got a track access option that clearly defines our base service, but the pattern that we inherited in 2004 is not set in stone forever. For example, Crossrail is expected to serve Heathrow Terminal 4 but not Terminal 5. Is that still right?’
On a not unrelated point, I see that Network Rail has just launched its consultation for the Western Rail Access To Heathrow, which would potentially add another local service between T5, Slough and Reading. How about joining this up with the Crossrail service to Heathrow, so that all eight trains/h go to Reading, four direct and four via the airport? Or is that too radical?
@Edgepedia I gather that as well as platform lengths, one of the constraints on running Class 345s into Liverpool Street is the length of the signal blocks on the approaches, which will also have to be tweaked before 2017.
@Chris J – the idea of through running via the airport has been put forward before. Before one says snap to that, there appear to be three issues to resolve:
– will the diverted trains mesh conveniently with the direct service or will you have an uneven (and potentially capacity consuming) pattern of services on the main line as a result?
– in the same vein, will it take so long to divert via the airport that the direct train overtakes the airport deviator – in which case you have done nothing for adding capacity to Reading?
– will the fares be the same by either route? If so, that will preclude any attempt to finance WRATH by a premium fare
@Chris J – Network Rail’s West Route Study recommends running 4tph semi-fast from Paddington to Reading via Heathrow T5, and onwards to Oxford (2tph), Basingstoke (1tph) and Southampton (1tph). This combines several different services to provide better connectivity and to reduce the number of trains terminating at Reading, as terminating Crossrail trains will use up valuable platform space.
Sorry, that should be “Western Route Study”. It can be found at http://www.networkrail.co.uk/long-term-planning-process/western-route-study/
@JimCobb – thank you for that (which I had overlooked). Presumably that policy precludes integration with CrossRail. It also seems to be at risk from the non-ac-ification of the line to Southampton. Whether the Oxonians will take kindly to a 12 minute journey time extension to London via the airport is unclear.
@Jim Cobb, Graham H
The Oxonians would still have their direct trains running on the fasts. These so called semifast trains to Oxford and Basingstoke could actually be the stoppers beyond Reading. I think it makes most sense to combine these with Heathrow Express between Paddington – Old Oak Common – Heathrow, pick up the limited WRAtH stops to Reading then go all stations to Basingstoke/Oxford beyond. Lots of local links across Reading would be provided and direct services to Heathrow (T5 AND T1,2,3) facilitated from a wide area of the Thames Valley. I think an hourly Southampton extension is rather wasteful and complex however needing dual voltage stock that wouldn’t be required for the rest of the network and only being hourly it could be fairly unattractive. Better just to make good regular connections with the LSWR network at Basingstoke. With a much better Crossrail service to Heathrow (than current ‘connect’ branded trains) abstracting passengers, HEX could get away with a four or five car service every 15 minutes rather than their current 9 cars that could still be marketed and priced as a premium service to the airport from London and at a small premium from the Reading direction, but those same trains would magically morph into a kind of Thames Valley Metro service beyond the airport, for non airport journeys linking local stations at normal ticket prices. Passengers would not normally use such trains from the ‘inner’ Thames Valley (east of Reading) to Paddington as the limited stop Crossrail service proposed from Reading would be faster.
@Graham H
will the diverted trains mesh conveniently with the direct service
I did some maths on that here on a previous article and figured that, based on current timings to T5 and published timings for WRATH, the penalty of looping via the airport was roughly a “neat” 15 minutes, which would mesh nicely into the main line as a 4tph service.
will it take so long to divert via the airport that the direct train overtakes the airport deviator
I don’t think this is the point particularly. Taking the airport train between Reading and Paddington is going to be as silly as taking the Hertford train between Stevenage and Kings Cross, or the Hounslow train between Staines and Waterloo.
The point is more that:
– More far-flung stations get a direct service which may have a time penalty but avoids and interchange penalty. Eg the new South Reading station, Tilehurst or Appleford.
– Reversing trains at the airport in both directions doesn’t make any sense, given that it would cost more operationally and eat platform capacity.
– The airport itself is a destination from both directions but not a single one; if a WRATH service terminates at T5 from the West, a passenger wanting T4 will have to endure two changes. So WRATH needs to go at least to T123, which has only two platforms to handle 16tph to and from Paddington, a 4tph shuttle reversing to T4 and 4tph reversing to WRATH – it’s not going to work, and so its far easier and cheaper just to run HeX and WRATH as a single through service.
Whether the Oxonians will take kindly to a 12 minute journey time extension
Ah, but there’s already the xx.27 slow stopper to Oxford, which I’m sure is what this is getting at. Once the inner stops are served by Crossrail this could run via the airport and then fast from Slough to Reading and the timings won’t change much for those at the not-quite-Oxford end of the line – yes they can swap at Reading for a quicker journey but with a time saving of 20m at best most don’t bother.
(and I imagine Oxford itself would keep the existing fast service as-is, and besides, it’s going to get an even faster service to Marylebone by then anyway!).
Also, on the point about premium fares, it’s worth noting that Sydney handles this by imposing a “premium station” fee included in direct tickets or available as a tax at the gateline.
If the new trains will reverse at LivSt High Level before the tunnel opens, does that mean it will be available for service diversion should the tunnel route be blocked by failure from time to time in future or are these paths promised elsewhere?
In the point about premium fares, it’s worth noting that Sydney handles this by imposing a “premium station” fee included in direct tickets or available as a tax at the gateline
This is also (effectively, although less transparently in fare terms) done for Gatwick now that peak Expresses are through trains to the south coast.
@Greg T: for some time, there will be “crossrail” trains running into Paddington, at the same time as other “crossrail” trasins are running from just outside Paddington… I think this will confuse quite a few punters.
Won’t it be “TfL rail” trains terminating from west and “Crossrail” trains through the core? Or will the new trains have arrived on the ex-Heathrow Connect services by May 2018?
@Taz
Is anything planned that would use the electric (Shenfield) lines between the junction for the tunnel and Liverpool Street high level? I don’t recall anything. Looking at the track layout yesterday I was struck that these lines serve four platforms, and this would be excessive for the 4tph peak service planned after the tunnel opens. I would imagine that then there would be pressure to re-model the station throat so that perhaps platforms 15 and 16 are accessible from the main line.
So I guess that number of platforms at the high level station would be the limiting factor in any relief service when the tunnel was closed, but I’m thinking it would be prudent to stable a Class 345 at the station between the peaks in case of an incident.
WRATH, OOC and the crossrail extension on the WCML are planned to open during the 2020s, and this will allow the western branch timetable to evolve.
@Mark Townend
I lived in Southampton for many years and feel that an hourly service to Heathrow would be very attractive – more so even than cross platform interchange at Basingstoke (which it wouldn’t necessarily be – fast trains tend to use Plat 3 not 4, from memory). Access to Heathrow from Southampton, whether by car or public transport, was always a bit of a chore. Thank goodness it has its own airport (a peculiar pleasure of living in that city was having an international airport just within walking distance of home).
And a direct train to Reading that wasn’t a Voyager would be nice, too!
It should be noted that Network Rail’s proposals are long-term planning. The western link to Heathrow doesn’t open until 2021 at the earliest and the proposals require overhead wiring of various lines because dual-voltage stock is not planned. These proposals are also to alleviate the over-loading expected by the 2040’s and are at draft stage so can easily change. They are worth a read and Network Rail are asking for comments, so if you are interested, please have your say.
Services beyond Reading are well off topic, so before the moderators start awakening, I would suggest that is enough discussion on this subject
@The OtherPaul – I agree that the net time difference between via LHR and direct is about 15 minutes (18 minutes plays 3 1/2 minutes) – maybe closer to 14 depending on dwell times and pathing allowances. Whether the difference is such that Oxonians will/will not change to save 20 minutes depends, I suspect, on the precise positioning of the “with airport” journeys in the hourly cycle. BTW -how long before the cry goes up to extend CrossRail to Oxford, therefore?
@john B – yes, you can enforce a premium fare at the airport stations themselves (and would have to do so to prevent “underriding” on cheaper non-airport tickets) but, as we discovered with Brussels airport link, which is similarly on a through loop, the station design needs to accommodate that. The courts have not been very supportive of operators who attempt to prevent “under-riding” and so space is needed to deal with sorting sheep from goats. Don’t know how easy that would be at the Heathrow stations. Gatex is not a good parallel as there is time to check tickets on train,which there wouldn’t be for Heathrow.
Regarding the post-Crossrail utilisation of the GWML relief lines: I know 10tph west of Paddington doesn’t sound like much, but:
– If the WCML link gets built that will take up at least 4 additional paths
– WRATH will require 4 paths west of Heathrow
– I doubt you will be able to get away with anything less than a Class 4 (75mph) and a Class 6 (60mph) freight path IN EACH HOUR between Reading and Acton.
– Add to that whatever ‘residual’ Great Western trains – say 2tph
TOTAL between Heathrow and Reading: 12tph. Given the 3 minute headway and all sorts of running time variations (A Class 6 path will be slower than a stopping service, and you will not be able to put any pathing time on it), I don’t think you can squeeze much more out of it.
Regarding Great Eastern:
– Plans are for Anglia to run up to 30tph on the fast lines into Liverpool Street in the am peak. The only way this will happen is by transferring some trains onto the Electric Lines west of Stratford, so that they don’t clash with whatever is coming off the West Anglia line at Bethnal Green.
– In the off-peak, Crossrail will have to share tracks with freights (at least 2tph), particularly between Forest Gate and Stratford.
– There is also the not so insignificant issue of getting trains out of Ilford depot in time for the peak at Liverpool Street.
And before someone says anything: I will not enter discussions into the routing of freight trains away from London through the use of ‘cheaper’ and more circuitous routes. Freight companies operate on wafer-thin margins and have to compete in terms of journey time with road haulage: therefore they will not endure very long diversions even if you paid them. Furthermore, the construction industry in London will continue to require a steady supply of aggregates. Therefore Crossrail will have to share tracks with a substantial number of freight trains whether you like it or not.
@Greg
“for some time, there will be “crossrail” trains running into Paddington, at the same time as other “crossrail” trasins are running from just outside Paddington”
We already have so-called “Thameslink” services which actually terminate at London Bridge from the south, with no connection to the other Thameslink services passing through Elephant and Blackfriars half a mile up the road.
Something tells me trying to terminate 14 tph at Paddington is not going to last long…
The busiest station, and largest intermediate town, on the western section is Slough, which has a heavy usage to/from London. It does seem that the only option will be a 15-minute all-stations Crossrail service. Confining all GW trains to the Fast lines (you aren’t going to get much, if any, GW capacity on the Reliefs with 10 per hour coming out of the Core) means it will also not really be practical to stop on the Fast at Slough, particularly in the Up direction where long-distance services from multiple origins just cannot be relied on to present themselves precisely to the minute. This issue was indeed one of the reasons why Virgin stopped serving Watford Junction with many services, delays constantly occurring to services behind those booked to stop.
The Anglia connectivity consultation (page 53) suggested remodelling Bow Junction with a flyover to allow the Lea Valley lines from Stratford to access the electrics into Liverpool St as well as grade separating the down electric-main movement.
I get the impression that this is a little bit of crayons rather than a committed and designed scheme, but that could be me misreading the document, but it does seem like a good use of the electrics west of the Crossrail portal.
@Chris J
You highlight that Howard Smith reopens the question about serving Heathrow T5. This is much a bigger terminal than T4, which Heathrow has contingent plans to close. Currently, passengers will have to change at T123 station for a HEx train to T5. In the other direction, passengers, some with little English, will have to change off HEx at T123 to get on Crossrail and avoid the differential fare.
Even if there was cross-platform interchange at T123, this is just not going to be understood and Crossrail and hence TfL will get the blame.
But of course this setup is supposedly the will of Heathrow Airport plc, who seem to want to protect their revenue from HEx rather more than they want to deliver passengers to T5, the home of their biggest single customer, British Airways. I find this incomprehensible.
The Whitechapel bit is confusing beacause it suggests that a journey from Canary Wharf to Heathrow might involve 2 changes. I guess trains will merge at Whitechapel and not terminate.
@Benedict,
At least with only 9 carriages and 24tph to start there will be room to later increase capacity by about 33pc when required.
They could go to 30tph with 11 carriage trains – a capacity increase of more than 52%.
@Mr Beckton,
The table is confusing to read but the relevant Crossrail page shows that in the peaks Slough will be 4tph Crossrail (from Reading) all stations and 2tph (not Crossrail) to Paddington calling at West Ealing and Ealing Broadway only.
Off-peak it is actually marginally better for the majority of Slough users with 2tph Crossrail all stations (from Reading), 2tph Crossrail fast to West Drayton (fast from Maidenhead) and 2tph (not Crossrail) to Paddington calling at Hayes & Harlington, West Ealing and Ealing Broadway.
At least that is how I interpret it.
Re Answer=42
As has been covered before:
They need to protect the revenue till the borrowing that paid for the building of the tunnels and stations is paid off, things may change in 2023 when that is scheduled to happen. HEx has the 4 paths guaranteed till then to enable it to do this.
The fixed term rolling stock and maintenance contracts expire several years before then so it may be possible to strike a deal slightly earlier than 2023.
DfT may still be looking for £160m back from Heathrow that the CAA denied them:
http://www.standard.co.uk/news/taxpayers-to-cover-heathrows-160million-crossrail-shortfall-9082768.html
Good summary John Bull; frequencies shown and commented on are weekday peaks.
For some of us who live on the line, the interesting questions are between the lines and not yet publically discussed.
The ones that come to mind (other questions may be asked by other people) are:
1) How soon does work done on signalling allow TfL rail to run more trains and/or fewer skip-stop trains?
2) Are they really intending no significant changes to the timetable between 31 May 2015 (MTR Crossrail takes over from Abellio Greater Anglia) and May 2017 (first new trains in services)?
3) Presuming 2) turns out not to be correct, how soon can we find out what improvements might be possible and when?
4) If delivery of new trains and commissioning of new railway goes well, what are the prospects of stage 4 happening earlier than May 2019?
@Silent Lurker: that scheme is not planned for CP5, so as such it is not committed.
@Alan Griffiths:
1. On the Western? Don’t know, but how much of an upgrade was done there?
2. How much of a change can you make if you have the same fleet as currently to play with?
4. They still haven’t finished digging all the tunnels yet, nor have they completed a single carriage. Now is not yet the time to ask such questions…
straphan @ 11 February 2015 at 14:21
1) No; Great Eastern, where signalling improvements have been made alongside replacement of electric power.
2) I don’t know, but I believe that are people who have expertise in this area!
4) Now is not the time to expect answers to such questions, but there’s no harm in asking them.
@pop 13:16
The 2 non-Crossrail services between Slough and Paddington do not call at West Ealing. The 2 services referred to in the Crossrail table are the 2tph greenford shuttle.
Has it actually been confirmed that when Cattlerail becomes operational that the line will actually be called Crossrail, and not some other identity?
Do the commuters into Liverpool Street realiase that when the Class 345s replace the class 315s, that their opportunity for getting a seat is greatly reduced. (2 * 4-car class 315 – seating capacity 636, Class 345 seating capacity 450). Crossrail’s over the top hype, spin and propaganda always refer to the 200 metre trains with a capacity of 1500, they very rarely mention the no of seats. Other than the number of vehicles, the vast number of commuters would not have a clue how long their current trains are, let alone the capacity.
The TFL specified class 345s are just a stretched and extended S8 (an S9), with a pantograph and a designer front end – what does that ‘S’ stand for: Sub-surface? Sub-standard? Standing? Sardine?
@ Southern Heights re terminating at Paddington – if you mean in the sense of physically doing it, they are building sidings at Westbourne Park to reverse the trains, which will be cleared for passengers i.e. they don’t have to worry about emptying the train at Paddington platforms.
If you mean in the sense of it’s a waste of capacity etc. then presumably they will need to order more trains first as I can’t imagine there is enough slack to run much more than the planned service
@Alan Griffiths – to judge from straphan’s comments over the last few years, I would suspect that he is someone who indeed has the professional knowledge you seek. And by all means ask the questions, but a note of practicality might intrude in the sense that the longer you leave it, the clearer the answer?
@Westfiver – Well, TfL seem to think in every publication so far that it will be called CrossRail. Who are we to doubt that? Which, by the way, do you think the punters would prefer – a lower capacity train with more seats, or a higher capacity one with fewer seats, given that the number of trains is fixed?
@Westfiver:
One of the key goals of Crossrail is to provide relief for the Central Line’s core section through the centre of London. Shenfield – Liverpool Street has been a commuter metro service for years now, and seating has been very much an optional extra for some time for most passengers. The journey doesn’t take that long. (Shenfield is roughly the same distance from central London as Slough. Reading is roughly the same distance out as Chelmsford.)
That the line has a small number of services that terminate way out in Reading is irrelevant: only a few trains per hour will be going out that far. Most will terminate at Paddington or Heathrow.
@Graham H: I’m flattered…
@Alan Griffiths: Signalling on the Great Eastern has been ‘tinkered with’ rather than ‘improved’: there were a few issues back in 2012 that required resolving through some modifications to signals (so that drivers do not see yellows too often in the inner area, and so that they can leave Gidea Park siding without blocking the line all the way from Shenfield). I don’t think much else could really be done: the signalling headways there are already 2 minutes, which Network Rail think is the maximum you could achieve with conventional signalling and a human being doing the actual driving.
Regarding fleet deployment, bear in mind the Class 315s will be split between two organisations from May 2015: some of these will transfer to the new West Anglia Overground. Such splits only make fleet deployment less efficient if anything. No modifications for the fleet are planned (since they will be got rid of soon enough), so no improvements in reliability either. As such, there is really no scope for increase in services until the Class 345s are in operation.
@Westfiver: Take a trip to Tottenham Court Road station. The signs on the Northern Line platforms next to the ‘Way Out’ signs are taped over, but you can clearly make out the sign beneath the tape spells ‘Crossrail’. If that isn’t proof of TfL’s intentions I don’t know what is!
Commuters into both Liverpool St and Paddington have trouble actually boarding their trains. Making this particular activity easier will no doubt be perceived as an improvement by most, even if this will cost seats. Also, the journey from Shenfield to Liverpool Street will be 40 minutes: I can name you plenty of journeys on the tube network where passengers have to stand for longer.
Also: has it been finally confirmed who will operate the Greenford branch? Will it be TfL or Great Western?
I’d expect it to be Paddington terminators that get extended out to Tring with the WCML-Crossrail link (https://www.londonreconnections.com/2014/coming-across-rail-turmoil/) so that’s a bunch of those trains not terminating.
Before today, I had seen an idea that some services should not run along the GWML, but instead some up to Aylesbury via Wycombe. On these boards I have now seen Buckingham “aired”, and because of my connection with Stowe, I must commend that idea as it is an idea that has already had positive local interest, (because of the Oxford – Bletchley re-introduction)
I know some contributors seemed to be censored and dismissed as being “off-topic” which sometimes seems a bit of a lottery, but truly, I tell you that north Buckinghamshire, because of the M1 and the M40, is now commuterland, and the pent-up demand for restoration of rail services is TREMENDOUS. The line already exists from Aylesbury to Calvert, and extending this to a new railhead at Buckingham IS “doable”. Direct services to London from Buckingham would require MASSIVE carparking at Buckingham as I am certain that it would be a catchment for an area of many square miles. Similarly, some services should divert at Calvert for the old LNWR line route to provide a service to Oxford. PLEASE do not dismiss these ideas as being “crayonist” or off topic. A bit of vision rather than immediate criticism please. I am confident, because of local my knowledge, that seats would be filled. Yes, the area is out in the sticks, but the big difference between today and when the line was closed is the fact that the local agricultural economy has been eclipsed by those who now commute from the area (and north into the south Midlands) to Oxford (traffic chaos in spades) and London. IF some (a few) Crossrail services could run up to Buckingham, I am sure the untapped market would fill the trains
@Richard Gadsden: Indeed, those will be the ones that will get extended – but those will be about 4tph, as that is how many trains terminate at Tring in the current peak.
@Dr Richards Beeching: I’m all in favour of reactivating railway lines, but not sure whether Crossrail should go that far out of London…
@Dr RichardsBeeching – I dare say the trains might be filled if Crossrailwas dragged out to Buckingham,but since all the likely capacity will be used up on the existing system very quickly indeed, there would be little point. Nor is it a good idea (see Westfiver’s post passim)to send trains out that far with so few seats. The best way of doing what you want is almost certainly going to be CR3 (CR1 is not, for the reasons stated, a quick temporary fix), unless you can persuade the estimable Mr Shooter that Buckingham should be his next target – a much quicker fix.
@Westfiver:
Crossrail class 345 trains will feature 23m long cars, the same length as the Mk3 coaches used with HSTs and as seen in the 444 units used on SWT. The 315 EMUs currently used on the Shenfield line have 20m long bodies while the S stock on the Underground is even shorter – coming in at 15m or 17m (depending on whether its an intermediate or a driving car)
Stations on the central section of Crossrail has passive provision for the 345s to be extended to 10 cars, which will make them equal to 12 x 20m Thameslink stock. In fact 10x 23m / 12 x 20m has long been the maximum length of train most stations in the South East can accommodate (including the entire BML, SWML to Bournemouth to give a couple of examples)
For a S Stock train to be the same length as a 9 car Crossrail train would need it to be made up of around 14 cars.
Its also worth noting that despite wide gangways etc, having more cars actually decreases the amount of space you can provide inside for passenger seating etc thanks to the “dead space” the couplings take up between cars. This is the reason Crossrail dropped their original proposal for 10 x 20m car trains in favor of 9 x 23m. Its also why the DfT went for 26m cars for the IEP trains despite the problems this brings at stations with curved platforms like Bristol Temple Meads.
@Westfiver:
Oh and the 345s are most certainly NOT just “a stretched and extended S8” train. They are a COMPLETELY NEW product sharing absolutely nothing with the S stock. Yes it will feature longitudinal seating and wide gangways between cars – but these can be applied by any manufacturer to any train – as Bombardier did for the TfL speced Overground stock (which have 20m long car bodies by the way)
Re anon
Passive provision for 345s to be extended to 11 car not 10 car? ? ?
I though they are slightly shorter than 23m so they could fit 11 cars in the platforms?
@Dr. Richards Beeching:
TfL’s remit, like that of the Greater London Authority itself, is Greater London (hence the name), not the entire Home Counties. They literally don’t have the authority to build what you’re asking for.
Crossrail 1 is an unusual project in that it crosses multiple political empires: Network Rail, DfT, TfL, various train operators, multiple borough councils, and so on. (Thameslink was opened by British Rail, so had far fewer interfaces to deal with.) Adding a branch out to Buckingham, especially at such a late stage, isn’t going to happen. Not yet…
That said, there’s no reason why such services have to be nailed onto Crossrail. They could potentially be run into Marylebone or Paddington. In fact, running into Marylebone allows you to get something up and running without the up-front costs of electrification. Assuming you can find enough diesel trains to run the service, this might be your best option for now. You could always call for integration into a future Crossrail project when that time comes.
@ngh:-
True if the cars are slightly shorter, say 22m, the station tunnels are a fraction longer than 10 x 23m plus if the door positioning on the train allows for the extreme ends of the train (i.e. the cabs) to be within the running tunnels then yes 11 cars might well be possible within the built infrastructure.
However I believe that the original station tunnel designs (which were drawn up a good few years before the stock design was finalised) used a maximum 12x 20m or 10x 23m as the design basis. Also going much beyond 12 x 20m / 10 x 23m would IIRC cause significant issues with some platform on the GEML / GWML surface sections where platform extensions beyond this notional standard would be problematic.
Re fares set to retain the Heathrow premium: I assume cross rail will be oysterised? Just set Heathrow as zone Eleventy-Zillion and let through journeys be routed by the cheapest route (as per LO ELL charging you non-Z1 fare between CLJ and HHY even if you route via Shoreditch. Appreciate this doesn’t solve the non-Crossrail routes but it’s surely not beyond the wit of man to work something out.
As a point of comparator, tickets with the outward portion leaving PAD in the evening peak are Anytime, but if you buy a ticket that starts across London (e.g. FPK) so there’s other precedents on the line of shorter journeys attracting a premium.
A simple fare system? That’s just not cricket.
[As a general note, please use actual station names unless there is a lot of repetition, in which case one needs to define the station acronym at the first instance. This will make it easier for others to fully understand the comment. LBM]
(An edit button! An edit button! My kingdom for an edit button!)
On closer examination, it seems Buckingham is about the same distance from London as Witham to the east, or Ashford in Kent. That’s too far for any metro line, so nailing it onto any form of Crossrail is out of the question.
Also, Buckingham is just not big enough to justify making it the terminus. It would be more logical to run all the way into Banbury instead, but there are some obvious problems with reopening the line at all: firstly, bits of it have been lost to other developments; the line would need to be modified to avoid level crossings; Verney Junction would likely require grade-separated junctions at both ends, and the route runs through an awful lot of nothing, restricting the potential for attracting lots of passengers.
At this point, it occurred to me that a better solution might be a regional light rail network. You could connect Buckingham to Bicester, Milton Keynes, and a ‘Parkway’ station on the East West Rail Link. That gets you Oxford, London, Cambridgeshire, (and even Bedford and Luton, via the EWRL). Light rail is easier to adapt to serve intermediate towns and villages too, increasing the potential catchment area, as well as improving local public transport generally.
That’s a lot of potential jobs, and arguably a better financial case than reopening a single radial railway through largely open countryside, that can only get you to London and back.
(Note: this doesn’t have to be a tram, although that’s the most common form of light rail. An automated “DLR-lite” system may be a better fit.)
@ Herned
A passenger-cleared siding at Westbourne Park? For marginal capital cost of a wider platform and access, the significant Canary Wharf and City demographic that lives in the locality would gladly mop up those empty seats!
@ LBM
Re: previous
Pad = Paddington
CLJ = Clapham J
HHY = Highbury & Islington
FPK = Finsbury Park
LO = London Overground
ELL = East London Line
@Anomnibus – technically, TfL’s statutory remit (cutover from LRT [London Regional Transport, set up in 1984 prior to the GLC being abolished in 1986. LBM]) does in fact enable them to take an interest in transport to and from London as well as within London – a subject hotly debated with Ministers at the time of the 1983 Act. That said, I do agree with you entirely about dealing with north Bucks by way of Marylebone as a quick fix which can be picked up later by way of CR3 or whatever -hence my throwaway reference to Adrian Shooter.
I like the idea of a Vicinal operation around Buckingham* but fear that it would be very difficult to put the business case together.
Short workings from Winslow to be numbered Bu Barre, perhaps?
London Infrastructure Plan 2050 shows the extension of some Paddington reversers to Watford Junction and Tring in 2026 to provide relief at Euston for HS2 is the first improvement, whilst the merger of Heathrow Express services in 2030 would allow a 6tph semi-fast service to Terminal 5, a 50% improvement. Anticipated longer trains are mentioned in a graphic, but the table shows that a frequency increase in 2029 could provide 30tph, a 25% capacity increase allowing additional destinations on the West Coast Main Line. 2030 could also see an extension to Dartford/Ebbsfleet and perhaps to a new inner Thames estuary airport, although perhaps not now!
Re Anon (11 February 2015 at 20:20)
See the LR article and especially the commentary on the CR rolling stock contract:
https://www.londonreconnections.com/2014/bombardier-crossrail-rolling-stock/
The platforms are 250m and it appears the the 9 car trains will be 205m giving and extended to 11 car at 250m.
MU end cars are usually slightly longer than middle cars – circa 0.5m but these are sloping front and tapered so the difference will be longer so back of the envelope calculation won’t quiet make the numbers work. However a quick bit of algebra taking 9 car at 205m and 11car at 250m then suggests end cars at 23.75m and middle cars at 22.5m (the end car being very similar length to the existing 23+m Turbostar body shell @ 23.62m). This might explain previous comments about the car length looking long…
Re Graham H Anomnibus & Dr Beeching
Winslow
Buckingham Parkwaywill be reopening on EWR in the next few years. and there has always been a big potential for North Bucks commuter-ville to occus but the rail transport has been to bad for this to happen with not enough stopping capacity at Bletchley (or MK) on the WCML and not enough capacity at Marylebone to do anything useful via Aylesbury. Aylesbury Vale Parkway was a good effort by Chiltern et al a few years ago.@Alan Griffiths: what are the prospects of stage 4 happening earlier than May 2019
Crossrail bidders were asked to price options for a one-year delay to stages 3-5, and for advancing stage 5 by six months so it happens at the same time as stage 4. But no option for stage 4 happening early, which suggests TfL didn’t think it likely to happen (and if it did they’d have to negotiate a price with MTR).
@Straphan: has it been finally confirmed who will operate the Greenford branch? Will it be TfL or Great Western?
It’s in the proposed specification for the replacement Great Western franchise (although I think there has been speculation bidders might subcontract the actual operation to Chiltern).
@ngh – I thought that the plan was for at least an hourly Aylesbury-MK via Winslow service? (I have to say,though that the proposed journey times don’t look too attractive for commuters -but then CR1 wouldn’t be any faster…)
@ngh 11 February 2015 at 13:23
@Jim Cobb, Mark Townend
Crossrail to Heathrow Terminal 5
Yeah, well I referred to the revenue implications of losing HEx in my original post. If Heathrow plc wanted, they could assign the HEx slots to Crossrail, accepting a reduced revenue stream in return for a happier (and perhaps slightly higher paying) BA. Only real barrier might be in Heathrow’s borrowing / bond covenants. Otherwise, the ball is in their court – all they have to do at any time is to snap their podgy little fingers and their will will be done.
But I can see why they won’t do this. With WRATH, as discussed above, Heathrow plc has the prospect of developing a medium distance rail network based on their home airport, serving Paddington, Reading, Oxford, Basingstoke, Sothamption and beyond.
The only solution is to completely separate HEx and Crossrail. Crossrail should serve T5 directly. At T123, a Crossrail shuttle, perhaps using the old Heathrow Connect stock, should serve T4. No interface with HEx; separate platforms at T5 exist. Since separation is in Heathrow plc’s interest, they should pick up part of the tab for the extra costs.
Re Graham H
The plan is also to extend 1tph of Marylebone – Aylesbury Vale Parkway services [41miles in 63minutes] to Milton Keynes
I didn’t say there would be any useful commuter service level from the station!
See:
http://www.eastwestrail.org.uk/frequently-asked-questions#Q:%20What%20train%20services%20will%20run%20on%20East%20West%20Rail%20%28Western%20Section%29?
Anything more is non-starter as no space at Marlylebone hence why I can see plenty of potential suppressed demand for a NW CR3 alignment. Given that there are relatively few stations or potential ones, a CR type route could go out slightly further than in some other directions. The station density is/would be relatively low and electric services should hit the linespeeds of 90-100mph in between stations.
Adding a Bletchley Parkway
Swanbourne Marshalling yardStation would definitely fit in with a Chiltern type strategy as seen with Oxford Parkway at the moment (A421 road access)The Aylesbury – Calvert Freight route is part of the East West Rail scheme upgrade. Calvert will be the maintenance logistics centre for HS2 South so good rail access to the traditional network is very useful.
@Dr Beeching
” Similarly, some services should divert at Calvert for the old LNWR line route to provide a service to Oxford.”
An Oxford – Calvert – Bletchley – Bedford service is part of the EWR plans.
As the trackbed of the Buckingham branch joins the EWR route at Verney Junction facing away from Calvert, (and therefore Oxford and Marylebone) it would actually be easier to extend the proposed Tring services to Buckingham.
I know of no serious proposals since the early noughties to incorporate the Chiltern Line into Crossrail. Earlier proposals were associated with plans to close Marylebone
http://husk.org/www.geocities.com/athens/acropolis/7069/gbcrossrail.gif
http://74f85f59f39b887b696f-ab656259048fb93837ecc0ecbcf0c557.r23.cf3.rackcdn.com/assets/library/document/c/original/crossrail_a4_new_document.pdf
@Westfiver 15:14
I was not aware of that seating capacity change, that’s good to know. However, currently there is often no standing room on these trains, let alone seating. I did a quick count this morning and I estimate about 50 people standing in each carriage, crammed in as tight as they can (except towards the ends – people just will not move down! An advantage of walk-through carriages, methinks).
This adds up to just over 1000 per train, so an increase of nearly 50% capacity when the 345s come in. I think this is something to be pleased about, especially if you are one of the many left on the platform awaiting the next (delayed) train.
Who knows, maybe the 315s could be run as 12 car services as the 345s are phased in? This seems unlikely, somehow (and maybe not possible as that would make ~240m long sets).
Re Answer=42
One of Heathrow’s targets is apparently 50% passengers accessing the airport by public transport which pricing HEx high won’t necessarily help meet.
HEx apparently own the trains outright (332s) and they have a maintenance deal with Siemens till mid 2017.
Given the potential for delays to Crossrail services starting( see Ian J’s post above), Heathrow might as well hold off making a decision on HEx till Crossrail is operating to Heathrow with happy passengers. The question is how many passengers transfer from the tube (often passengers standing from after leaving T5+123) black & mini cabs and HEx to CR.
straphan @ 11 February 2015 at 16:24
Thank you for contributing these two key details.
“signalling headways there are already 2 minutes”
” the Class 315s will be split between two organisations from May 2015: some of these will transfer to the new West Anglia Overground.” I’m inclined to assume that for most operational uses they already are. They run in and out of opposite sides of Liverpool Street with lots of other trains using the platform in between.
I conclude that the key constraints in running more trains on the slow (Electric to railway insiders) lines are turning trains around at Liverpool Street and available trains. Therefore more trains in service probably is not possible when MTR Crossrail take over, but timetable changes might be. The problem with timetable changes being that they would favour passengers at some stations at the expense of others.
Between 07:52 and 09:47 27 trains arrive at Liverpool Street.
6 start from Gidea Park and call at all stations.
10 start from Shenfield and skip Manor Park, Forest Gate and Maryland.
5 start from Gidea Park and skip Manor Park, Forest Gate and Maryland.
3 start from Ilford and call at all stations.
The latest 3 start from Shenfield and call at all stations, as per regular service.
If you miss the 08:05 at Manor Park (08:07 at Forest Gate, 08:09 at Maryland), there isn’t another until 08:21; a source of perpetual irritation to regular passengers.
Regarding the (slightly off-topic) Chiltern service to MK, the discussion above by Graham H and ngh describe the same thing, i.e. there is only one hourly service to MK, it is to be formed by extending existing Marylebone to Aylesbury via High Wycombe trains through to Milton Keynes.
That main aspect doesn’t seem to come across clearly above.
@Paul – indeed, but I didn’t wish to be too rude to ngh by pointing that out! Any use of marylebone would be at best a very short term palliative and there are a number of possible long term solutions. Given the undesirability of dragging a CrossRail out all the way to Buckingham, not least because of the usual problems of rolling stock design, the better solution may be – if HS2 is ever built – to extend some partof the WC* outers. But enough of crayonism.
@timbeau -No, closing Marylebone was not part of the original CrossRail plans.
*Extendadors please note: this “WC” is the West Coast, not the unmentionable line from Waterloo…
@timbeau – 10:09
While the EWR Oxford-Bedford service (likely to be Reading-Bedford, but that’s by the by) will run past Calvert, there is no intention on the part of the promoters to provide a station there. In any case, the old GC Calvert station is on the Aylesbury branch. I understand that Bucks CC has spoken to EWR about passive provision for a station at Steeple Claydon to serve the proposed HS2 maintenance/construction depot and to HS2L about paying for it.
@Paul – 10:39
That’s correct – Chiltern’s study for Buckinghamshire CC, “North-South Rail Links in Bucks”, makes the case for the Marylebone-MKC service to run via High Wycombe on the basis that it will connect Buckinghamshire’s three largest urban centres. The Marylebone-Amersham-Aylesbury service will AIUI revert to a self-contained operation.
THC
Re Graham H,
[Don’t worry about being rude! Just comment] I was just adding a bit of detail for all the other LR readers, i realised it wasn’t explicitly clear we were talking about extending to begin with so wanted to make it clear.
Getting the extra DMU stock could prove entertaining unless they go for the Goblin 172s?
@ngh – that’s supposing that the said 172s haven’t been scooped up elsewhere- spies tell me that bidders for Northern and TPE are getting very frustrated as to where any additional stock is supposed to come from, especially as some of the electrification schemes seem to be wallowing in delay . How DfT must regret not proceeding with the smallish build they envisaged a few years back – so much for their strategic thinking!
Re Graham H,
The same possibly goes for Greenford Shuttle if the new GW franchise subcontracts to Chiltern unless some stock (165s) are thrown in.
Northern or TPE need to get the check books out – oops DfT won’t allow them.
Mr Shooter appear to have a partial solution for them.
Should be plenty of 170s ex-Scotrail but not enough to go around (Southern grabbed the first available for Uckfield extras).
It’s a jungle out there…
The sooner HEx is history, the better. It’s ridiculous and confusing for visitors to have different trains going to different combinations of terminals, from different parts of Paddington, with different fare structures. Also, it seems from the plans for WRAtH that this will only serve T5. At present, the RailAir coach from Reading drops passengers right at the door of terminals 1,2,3,5. All of the trains to Heathrow from east and west should be part of Crossrail, and go to all terminals.
The dedicated HEx platforms and associated capacity at Paddington are a waste. They could be well used by long distance services. I was at Paddington last year on the one day when HEx wasn’t running, I forget why, but it was planned and widely advertised. It was very strange to catch my FGW HST from Platform 7. If they found it convenient to use the platform just for that single day, it surely indicates sub-optimal pathing of the FGW services at all other times.
Re Graham H
A market behaving like a market, just possibly not the one DfT intended?
The chancellor has apparently asked NR to look at even more electrification.
Some Bi-Mode Dual Voltage Aventra or equivalent would certainly help overall even if it is to cascade more older DMUs to no growth franchises that have an
unexpectedhabit of growing!)On one hand, I’m going to benefit from Crossrail by having only one interchange when I go from New Southgate to Canary Wharf – the one missing link in the GN&C line. Currently, the line directly links to Old Street and Moorgate and has an easy short onward journey to London Bridge and Bank, but it was always missing a good link to Canary Wharf. Glad that Crossrail would fix this.
On the other hand, I worry that Moorgate would become even more crowded. You see, I mostly take the GN&C line to work but I hardly ever take the Picc Line because King’s X is truly a shambles in peak times. I recall having to wait 15 minutes just so I could get the train to London Bridge from King’s X. As Crossrail would be added to Moorgate/Liverpool Street and the eventual plans of improving the frequency of the GN&C line, I believe that my safe haven line won’t be a safe haven anymore. So I believe that rail projects like Crossrail are just like fixing a leaking pipe. You fix some problems (like the Canary Wharf link to GN&C) but introduce others (overcrowding the major stations even further).
It does seem bizarre to spend billions on the tunnels and stations in Central London. but not (for a fraction of the cost) then buy out the Heathrow infrastructure to optimise services to there
@SilentLurker
Remodelling Bow Junction is a CP5 scheme, work is due to start on site in 2017 – more details can be found on page 65 of the ‘Draft Enhancements Delivery Plan’
http://www.networkrail.co.uk/cp5-delivery-plan/cp5-enhancements-delivery-plan.pdf
AG
Turning emu’s around @ LST is often very quick & slick.
Some are timetabled to take only 8 minutes & I’ve seen it done in less than 5 upon occasion.
Jonathan
Also, it seems from the plans for WRAtH that this will only serve T5. Yes, well, I commented on this earlier, but it vanished – if this is true, it strikes me as potty though, along with, as we agree high HeX fares, deliberately turns passengers away at the price. Highly environmentally-unfriendly, too, but this was agreed with DfT back in the days when they were still “the ministry of roads” was it not?
I’ve commented before on HeX’s (low ) loadings ….
[Speculation about vested interests without any evidence given deleted. PoP]
@Alan Griffiths: There could be a number of reasons for this service pattern: either it is needed to maintain turnround times at Liverpool Street (minimum for an 8-car EMU is 7 minutes according to train planning rules), or it is because the trains were predicted to be already so full you would only end up with two sets of passengers staring at each other rather than any meaningful boarding/alighting.
And regarding the DMU shortage: if relatively serious people are starting to propose converting ex-LU trains to DMUs then things are clearly not going well…
@Greg Tingey & @Jonathan – Remember that HeX is a purely commercial venture, fully owned by Heathrow Airport Holdings. It is a private rail system and they paid a lot of money for it, so they must get their money’s worth out of it. They have allowed Crossrail trains to use it, but TfL will be paying them for that privilege.
Trains do not start running on WRATH until 2021, so the actual services haven’t been decided yet. HeX’s GWML access agreement runs until 2023, and so then there will be an opportunity to change the train services at that time. As mentioned earlier, Network Rail are proposing/assuming that by the 2030’s, services to Heathrow will be through services between Paddington and Reading, and so will presumably serve T123 as well. Nevertheless, any changes will have to be beneficial to Heathrow Airport Holdings, or Network Rail will have to buy the system of them.
One should ask the question that if Heathrow (BAA) had not invested in Hex in the 1990s would the current Crossrail scheme be being built. It may well have gone the same way as its predecessor did in Parliament.
Hex’s competitors are the taxis and not the Piccadily Line. People do have a choice of whether they use it or not, having spent £100s on an air ticket, how can anybody quibble about paying a few quid on the Connect service. And of course airport workers get a massive concession with regards to Hex and Connect.
By the way Connect services now go to/from Terminal 4 and 5, this is not displayed on the screens at Paddington. At Ealing Broadway the screens display “Heathrow Airport”. The on train announcements actually say where the train is going. Realtime Trains website also shows where the trains are going.
@Westfiver
“By the way Connect services now go to/from Terminal 4 and 5, ”
Both? How do they manage that?
@Graham H
“No, closing Marylebone was not part of the original CrossRail plans”
The Marylebone closure proposals overlapped in time with the Crossrail to Aylesbury plans, although may not have been specifically mentioned in any of the many consultation documents. But if Crossrail had taken over the Aylesbury and Banbury services what would have been left for Marylebone to do? (it ran no services north of Banbury in those days, all services from London – Leamington etc ran via Reading).
Sorry, I meant to say “to ot from either Terminal 4 or Terminal 5”, but I am sure you knew what I meant.
@Jim Cobb: I’m aware of the commercial nature of HeX, I was speaking from the view of what would be best for passengers. The fact it is a private railway makes me resent even more its dedicated platforms at Paddington, and the fact its trains seem to be prioritised, meaning HSTs often have to sit outside the station while HeX trundles past, and following disruption it’s HeX that starts moving first, while everyone else mills around the concourse.
@Westfiver: I don’t see why the absence of HeX would have jeopardised Crossrail as a whole. I don’t see the current Crossrail as being about getting to the airport; rather it’s about serving commuters from west and east of London, and much needed capacity in the central section. Heathrow is an add-on. As for the cost on HeX, I see it this way. If I’ve paid £100s on a flight, a good proportion of which goes in fees to the airport, I don’t want to be ripped off by the airport operator getting to the airport too. Although, as I live west of Reading, I’ve never used HeX and stick to the coach (except for the free section the time I needed to get to T4!)
@West Fiver – Heathrow Connect goes to T4. It doesn’t go to T5. You have to change to the HEx at Heathrow Central. (Inter-terminal transfers are free)
Timbeau
Looking on Realtime trains, why did the 16.11 from Ealing Broadway go to Terminal 5 then, and why when I have been on the trains have they announced they were going to T5?
I know perfectly well that Heathrow is a Free Travel Area.
@timbeau – Nevertheless, as a member of the CrossRail team at the time I can assure you that closure of Marylebone was not on the cards; the closure put forward in the mid-80s was all about bus conversion and not taken seriously by anyone in the industry – see my post on the subject.
As someone who used to fly from Heathrow rather a lot I only once ever tried using HEx, and the reason wasn’t cost. It was time of day. If I’m on the first flight out then I’m needing to check in around 6am, and public transport can’t do that at present. (And if I’m taking a taxi to Paddington then I might as well be comfortable all the way) Usually I drive there & back and used a car service to store my car at Heathrow until my return.
The possible “24-hr tube” might slightly change that decision – though one and half hours on a slow tube don’t compare to 30 minutes by car – but if Crossrail also provides an around-the-clock service that might be point-to-point fast enough to actually consider.
LHR bought the trains and built the tunnels, so arguably they can decide what happens in the future. At least XR is being allowed into the complex – we could have had a XR without any access to our main airport.
@AlisonW – irritatingly, looks at Real Time Trains for Heathrow Central (http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/search/advanced/HXX/2015/02/12/0200-0159?stp=WVS&show=all&order=wtt) there are empty stock movements from Paddington into Heathrow that’s drive before five. You would think there would be a huge market for trains at this time
@Chris, many thanks for that. It looks like it is due to complete in Jan 19, i.e. ready for Stage 4 Crossrail when the Electric lines’ capacity is released by Crossrail using the tunnels.
Although that plan didn’t mention the Lea Valley, merely an extra 2tph to Southend.
@westfiver
Both HEx and HCon websites say that the former goes to T5 and the latter to T4.
I note that as I write the 2215 HCon is going to T5 but that appears to be filling a gap in the HEx service – the timetable doesn’t say it should.
I’m sure you were aware it’s a free travel area, but I included that fact for the benefit of any other readers who may not have done.
Graham H
So under the plans that had Crossrail taking the Aylesbury and Wycombe services, what would have been left for Marylebone?
@timbeau – the Wycombes. Btw, the 1989 CrossRail project was published well after the Marylebone closure saga had come to an end. The 1991 version even more so. The two things aren’t related at all.
@THC: I understand that Bucks CC has spoken to EWR about passive provision for a station at Steeple Claydon to serve the proposed HS2 maintenance/construction depot and to HS2L about paying for it
Why would a rail infrastructure maintenance depot need its own station? Wouldn’t it (almost by definition) be busiest at times when trains aren’t running? (I realise that expecting logical thinking from Bucks CC might be pushing it a bit).
@Jonathan: All of the trains to Heathrow from east and west should be part of Crossrail, and go to all terminals
Can you explain how that is physically possible? Heathrow is fairly unusual in European airports in attempting to serve individual terminals with multiple different rail services – having a station at one terminal and having passengers from other terminals get a shuttle, Gatwick-style, is more common and perhaps a more sensible way of doing things.
Aaaagh! You’ve been bitten by that corporate-speak disease of dropping “going forward” onto the end of random sentences. It’s meaningless. It is implicit in our understanding of the universe that we know time to be going forward. A discussion of future plans cannot possibly involve time going backwards, so please stop reminding us. Please, please stop it!! Thank you.
And it was an interesting article, reading downwards.
Supporting Alison W I will get a Taxi to Heathrow for a 7am flight, anything later I tend to get the train (and yes HeX) as the taxi starts to take that much longer.
So there are still 14tph terminating at Paddington from the east. Our commenter Straphan reckons just 4tph of those will eventually go to Watford Junction and Tring, which Taz thinks will happen around 2026. That still leaves another 10tph to play with. Any suggestions? Hounslow or Richmond perhaps? Mirroring the Central line up to West Ruislip (conveniently leaving the Central free to turn left into Uxbridge)? Or even replacing all Chiltern metro services as far as High Wycombe?
@Graham H
What about the 1974 proposal? I’m sure that included Aylesbury too.
Re disappointed kitten,
What do you make of ” backcasting” then?
@Andrew M
Although 4 tph to the WCML is routinely proposed by comments here, the number mentioned in the London & SE RUS was eight. That, together with an additional 6 tph to Heathrow (in a world without Heathrow Express) is intended to soak up the whole 24 tph.
I sometimes wonder if the reason 4tph to the WCML keeps getting mentioned is that the people posting still want to go to Euston…
@timbeau -yes-Aylesbury only disappeared with the current version of CrossRail -but still no closure proposal for Marylebone in 1974…
@ngh
I have heard meteorologists talk of “nowcasts”. They are what the weathermen witter on about before getting on to tomorrow’s weather. I have a suspicion they do it because they don’t know enough about what’s going to happen to fill their allotted time so pad it out with some information they know to be 100% accurate because it’s altready happened.
@disappointed kitten
A notice on a lift at work recently said it was out of service due to work being done to improve its reliability going forward. I’d rather they sorted out the going-up-and-down bits first, rather than branching out into other dimensions.
@timbeau
Heathrow Connect goes to T4
My understanding is that, of late, that HCon is officially timetabled only to T123 on Mon-Sat. If you search NRE for Ealing Broadway to T4 you’ll find requires a change. I believe this is because HCon actually goes through to T5 and T4 is run as a shuttle. Not sure when this change was made or why. For some reason on Sundays only (maybe because HCon is only hourly?) it’s still advertised through to T4.
@timbeau
Both HEx and HCon websites say that the former goes to T5 and the latter to T4.
Not seeing that on those sites now – in fact https://www.heathrowconnect.com/train-times seems quite clear that a change is required for either T4 or T5 at most times.
@Ian J
Late evening and early morning trains would seem perfectly compatible for those doing night shifts at Calvert, and it will be very busy during the years of construction, but realistically this is perhaps more of an excuse for a station than a reason in itself.
@West Fiver/the Other Paul
Whether or not HCon goes through to T4, my original point was that it does not go through from London to T5. If the websites are correct (and HEx, HCon and the NR site all agree) that only HEx does that, contrary to W5’s assertion that “By the way Connect services now go to/from Terminal 4 and 5” (1538 yesterday).
HCon provides the shuttle to from T123 to T4. Isn’t the connecting “shuttle” to T5 actually just the HEx trains to/from Paddington or are there extra trains as well, and if so are they HEx or HCon trains?
Capacity to terminate trains at Heathrow T123 is very limited. Although advertised as terminating at Heathrow T123, HCon has for some time continued as empty stock to T5, returning empty to T123 to resume public service. However Realtimetrains would appear to indicate that it is now in passenger service through to T5, whereas the National Rail site only shows it to T123. Can anyone confirm what is currently happening “on the ground”?
Andrew M
As some of us (especially me) repeatedly say, turning all those trains around just outside Padders is going to be a huge mistake, as there is a large suppressed demand between Padders & Reading. The rush-hour trains are ridiculously crammed in both directions. [ i.e. there is a strong contra-flow in both AM & PM peaks ]
My guess is that more trains will run to Slough (at least) & not reverse in central London, in pretty short order, once CR1 is fully open – my guess is by 2021 …..
timbeau
“sideways is nice” – quote from Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy”
HEx using 2 platforms at Paddington does seem like a waste considering the poor loadings of the trains.
I wonder what HEx pay NR for access and how long the contract is for?
Since December Heathrow Connect trains run to T5 and are in service.
Confirmed by my trip this morning to Hayes & Harlington – announced by driver before we left Paddington & on train announcements thereafter.
@Chris
I stand corrected – shows you shouldn’t believe everything you read on the internet, even from official sources.
(neither NR real time departures, nor the HEx or HCon websites, make any mention of this development). Table 118 of the National Rail timetable only shows HX services, plus the T123/T4 shuttles, whilst Table 117 only shows HC services and doesn’t even have T5 in the station bank!
http://www.networkrail.co.uk/browse%20documents/eNRT/Dec14/timetables/Table%20117.pdf
@Chris
Thanks – it looks like common sense has finally broken out and the HCon services actually serve T5 rather than laying over in the platform with the doors locked!
Somebody suggested platforms at Westbourne Park for terminators. Not a good idea as this would establish a new service and there would be objections when they want to send the trains somewhere else (which they surely will).
If they are not going to check the trains are empty before terminating, how long are all the foreign tourists going to have to sit in the sidings before being taken back to Paddington ? I assume crossrail only has two platforms at Paddington so there is no time for delays in terminating ?
Are HSTs going to stop anywhere (eg Ealing Broadway) to allow convenient change to Crossrail ?
Is there going to be a situation where people boarding at Paddington Eastbound have to wait for full through trains to go past until an empty one turns up ?
@Capitalstar – Heathrow Airport Holdings have an agreement with Network Rail until 2023 for access paths on the GWML and Paddington station. The value of the agreement is commercially confidential and so unknown.
Under what criteria do you consider the loadings to be poor ? I recall reading somewhere that as this is a premium service, HeX consider it important that everyone gets a seat. Therefore, perhaps HeX considers the current loadings as just right. They negotiated with Railtrack for the platforms at Paddington for a 25 year contract and so why is it their problem that the rest of the station is now over-loaded ? Their customers are getting a good service, so why should they care about anyone else ?
I am being deliberately provocative here and I actually believe that there is a huge waste of precious resources here, which HeX could do more about. Nevertheless, Heathrow Airport Holdings is a private company and they fully funded this railway themselves, so their responsibility is to their shareholders, and they do not have a Public Service Obligation. I am sure they would be happy to re-negotiate the contract as long as it was beneficial to their shareholders. If you want to blame someone for this situation, blame Railtrack for entering into the contract in the first place.
@CapitalStar: I can’t remember off the top of my head, but I think it’s either 2023 or 2026.
@Anonyminibus: They will not go through carriage by carriage like they do on the Underground, but rather cast a quick glance and turf out any stragglers – bear in mind dwell times there are meant to be 1 minute. While TfL is religious about not allowing anyone into the sidings on the Underground (little wonder given that would be a huge security risk), they do not mind so much on the Overground (e.g. at West Croydon or Willesden Jn) and are happy for terminating trains to have the same length of dwells as those that do not terminate.
I don’t think it is planned for long-distance trains on the Western to make any further intermediate calls at present, as that would erode what little spare capacity exists on the fast lines. However, the future Old Oak Common station is planned as an interchange between HS2, Crossrail, Great Western and Overground.
Not quite sure what you mean by the last point, but if you will be looking to board a Crossrail train at Paddington going eastbound there will be a sequence of trains coming from the West which will have passengers on board, followed by some that will come empty from sidings. All will stop at Paddington though so you will be able to board any of those (in theory anyway).
@Anonyminibus – Out of the 24tph arriving at Paddington, 10tph will carry on along the GWML to Heathrow, Reading etc. and 14tph will turn around and return. So 58% of the Crossrail trains heading east from Paddington will be empty – at worst, you will have to skip 1 train, waiting an extra 2-3 minutes.
Re: Heathrow Connect services: here’s an example of a HC train that terminates at T5:
http://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/train/P11052/2015/02/13/advanced
Wash and Brush Up perhaps?
Dust Up = a fight or loud argument.
But perhaps there is a political issue, known to the cognoscenti, and given an oblique reference here!
@Anonymous 13 Feb 1809
To what do you refer? This entry is totally baffling.
@Jim Cobb: I think it was Good Old British Rail, not Railtrack, that negotiated the Heathrow Express agreement with BAA – work started in 1993 and the whole thing was dependent on the ill-fated Paddington resignalling. It took longer than expected for services to start because of the tunnel collapse during construction (which also caused a lengthy delay to the Jubilee Line because it used the same tunelling technique).
To return to the issue of seating on the new Crossrail stock (which also applies to the transfer of West Anglia to Overground:
Anyone who has travelled on a train with 3+2 seating knows that the 3-seat blocks are completely impractical now given the increase in average human girth and peoples’ desire to read something on paper or electronically during their commute. Reducing seats to 2+2 would not attract any hostility at all.
I do think, though, that having Overground-style longitudinal seating will cause eruptions, especially from people at the outer end of services to Shenfield and to Cheshunt-via-Seven-Sisters.
@Philip
Not to mention the safety hazards of 3+2 seating, imagine if the train had to be evacuated, people wouldn’t be able to get off or would get crushed. I personally hate 3+2 seating as they leave next to no standing space in the aisle so all standing commuters must stand by the doors. Also (rather trivial) the middle seat is always the last to be filled as no one wants to sit next to anyone else.
@Philip – During the conversion of the SouthWestTrains 458’s into 458/5’s, the 3+2 seating is being replaced by 2+2. The same seats are being re-used but they now have a small gap between them. This means the double seats are more comfortable, the aisle is much larger and there is a lot more standing room. It also means that a 5-car 458/5 has only slightly more seats than a 4-car 458/0, but as they are used on outer-surburban services, the much higher overall capacity is far better.
@Kingstoncommuter, 14 February 2015 at 11:37
“Also (rather trivial) the middle seat is always the last to be filled as no one wants to sit next to anyone else”
And typically as a train fills up the two occupants of the end spots on the 3-bench intuitively cooperate to employ every passive ‘spreading’ technique in the book to try and discourage anyone attempting to squeeze in between them!
It would be interesting to see loading figures for Heathrow Connect. In my experience, the loadings between Hayes and Harlington and the airport are really quite light (but I never use it at times when airport staff might be commuting). However, I have seen ‘full and standing’ on a Heathrow Connect up service on the mainline west of Ealing Broadway in the early afternoon! I suspect that the conversion to full Crossrail (ie using the core tunnel and 4tph) will cause some significant changes in travel patterns. I suspect that I will then abandon Heathrow Express (which I use for speed alone) and use Crossrail plus a short Tube journey.
I arrived at T5 after 10pm in January and found that the only apparent train choice was Connect 17mins later. I gave up on that and took the Piccadilly Line instead.
Crossrail trains cannot possibly have completely longitudinal seating. The declared capacity is 450 seats, spread over 9 carriages. Although they are nominally 23m cars, they also have a third set of double doors, so in terms of space available for seats the extra length can be ignored.
We know already that LO 378s have about 32 seats per 20m car with two sets of doors, so I suggest that is about all you’d get in a 345 with 3 sets of doors. Where do the other 18 seats per car go? My fiver is going on at least 50% of the seating being in conventional pairs.
@ Jim Cobb 12:01
If my references are right then the 458/5 has slightly less seats than a 458/0 – the overall numbers are apparently 270 (now) and 279 (then).
Expressed in terms of overall seating capacity increases ‘on the route’, that seems only to be provided by the 6 extra trains. The benefits on an individual train come only in terms of standing capacity, which is clearly much greater.
Not much wrong with getting rid of 3×2 seats for 2×2. I have no idea why this quick fix wasn’t done on Networkers before the London Bridge rebuilding begun. It would have helped get more passengers on trains with less being left behind as we’ve seen recently. A reason could well be because the DfT don’t seem to give a damn for SE London and NW Kent so never bothered specifying it, and SE wouldn’t as they never knew when the franchise would end due to DfT incompetence.
3+2 survived far longer than it should because it affected the way that overcrowding was calculated – the PIXC measure used to be expressed as the ratio of standees to seats, so more seats meant more seats – not a happy arrangement, and one which has led to absurdities such as those d—-d seats that block the gangways in the 450s. Arguments in the ’90s that it should be total capacity, with the mix left to be determined pragmatically fell on deaf ears in the great privatisation rush, where nothing like that was to be undone, so that politicians could argue that nothing had really changed… The 700s appear to be the last fling of PIXC; the 345s seem to have moved away from it (maybe because they are TfL-specified).
@Kingston commuter
“the middle seat is always the last to be filled”
But the point is that is was filled – people preferred to squeeze into it rather than stand. As the loadings on my line are such that I was usually one of those people, who now usually has to stand for half an hour (a clear breach of PIXC standards) I know I’d rather squeeze between two other people than risk falling on top of them.
@ Timbeau 3+2 seating depends on whether you have just boarded a train and spot an empty middle seat and thus plonk yourself in it or you are already on the train in say the window seat and an equally large person spots the empty seat and plonks themselves into it. I once had the experience of a very large person with his burger and chips and diet coke doing this at Fenchurch Street Station !
As mentioned this seating layout also makes it difficult to move through a train and reach doors to alight .
While the new layout on S stock trains has introduced the walk through passengers who board and then walk towards where their station has its entrance , while the approach to terminal stations has passengers walking through at say Barking to front of train something that District Line passengers are only beginning to develop !
As for services serving airports I remember the BR days pre Thameslink when Gatwick Airport was not shown on departure boards for BML services as they wanted passengers to use more expensive airport service they ran which was also I think the first to be privatised and suddenly Southern discovered its trains stopped Gatwick Airport on Victoria Station departure boards !
Long term it would make more sense to make Crossrail a through service at Heathrow and connect it to South West Trains Network a far cheaper option than Crossrail 2 …
@Paul – Fair enough. I based my estimate on counting seats in photos and guessing !!
Personally, I prefer to stand for my journey of 40 mins rather than use a middle seat, so in my view, more standing space is better.
@Melvyn
“As for services serving airports I remember the BR days pre Thameslink when Gatwick Airport was not shown on departure boards for BML services as they wanted passengers to use more expensive airport service they ran !”
Talk about re-writing history! Gatwick was not shown for stopping services for the same reason Birmingham stoppers were shown as Northampton, Aylesbury via Wycombe as Little Kimble (even on the destination blinds), to stop people getting the wrong (slow) train when there is a fast one to the same destination. It was only in the privatistaion era that the operators of the stopping services insisted on their services being shown too. Where there is no competition, Aldershot via Ascot is still shown as Frimley and Cambridge stoppers are shown as Foxton.
“As mentioned this seating layout also makes it difficult to move through a train and reach doors to alight . ”
Debatable – the gangways in most 2+2s are still not wide enough to squeeze past the (rather larger number of) standing passengers, and indeed the paucity of perches in my local units (the old seats had a perch on the end of each bank of seats) means fewer people choose to stand.perch in the gangways, making the door areas even more crowded.
@Melvyn
In addition to the reason given by Timbeau, I think that the fare differential for GatEx services was only introduced after privatisation.
IIRC – Oxford stoppers are still labelled & announced as “Radley” at Paddington …..
Don’t worry about the dot, Anon5, between TfL and Rail.
The Dial.a.Ride roundel set the precedent
In BR days Victoria trains that were not Gatwick Express ones were advertised as Clapham Juntion. As there was no fare differential this mean that those passengers going straight to Victoria did not get on, and overcrowd, the slower trains (421s and 423s) which did not have luggage capacity.
Now we have people getting on at Gatwick blocking aisles and extending dwell times to the detriment of the service as a whole.
I do wish it was included in the service announcements at East Croydon if the train had come from Gatwick Airport because then you know to wait for the next train to avoid falling over all the suitcases which seriously restrict standing room. Maybe a solution would be to make the Gatwick Express the same fare as other trains. IMO it’s only slightly faster than the Southern branded services and the trains with Southern branding are much nicer and more modern. Southern are just taking advantage of tourists’ ignorance by charging more for the service they are more likely to use as it has Gatwick written on the trains.
@Kingstoncommuter – apparently about one third of Gatex revenue comes from through airlines so a significant slug of the punters have no choice in the matter… and yes,it’s only about 5 minutes longer even with the Clapham and East Croydon stops.
If you were to charge the same fare,you might as well integrate the Gatex service into the rest of the Victoria service. The trade-off is tricky,however: for integration, you get 4 extra full length paths per hour – say roughly an extra 2500-3000 seats/hour; against,you have the luggage. There was a school of thought amongst the TLK bidders that in practice, the airport’s busy hour was considerably offset from the morning peak, and that with the migration of so many easyjet /ryan air and similar operations which charge for extra luggage,the volumes of bags was likely to decline. How true that is, I’m not sure – statistics are hard to find.
Some European metro systems require extra “Baggage tickets” for large items of luggage – I’m not sure how enforceable or enforced these really are but it would surely be feasible to restrict large luggage items from non-GatEx trains at the airport?
Before the age of accessibility you might have just made sure there were nice lifts and escalators down to the GatEx platforms and only a crowded staircase to the others!
I have a recollection of premium fares to Gatwick in late BR days. However, I think it was for all trains – the premium was over fares to Three Bridges and Crawley. The problem (for BR) then became that ticket holders for those stations were filling up the GatEx trains and changing at Gatwick for the remaining one or two stops – all for the lower fare.
@timbeau – also my recollection – Gatex was specifically transferred to InterCity so that it could price up. The resultant problem of “under-riding” became quite significant quite quickly.
The Other Paul @ 15 February 2015 at 15:00
” restrict large luggage items from non-GatEx trains at the airport”
That’s not very helpful for passengers who don’t want to go to Victoria, an obscure place somewhere in west London.
While we have all this discussion about Crossrail to Heathrow (and somewhat off-topic about Gatwick) the announcement this last week of a substantial capacity increase at London City airport just makes it more ludicrous that Crossrail actually physically passes underneath the aircraft apron at London City, but there is no station there.
@Mr. Beckton:
London City (LCY) Airport moves roughly the same number of passengers a month that Heathrow alone shifts in a single day. [Sources: LCY’s own passenger stats; LHR’s equivalent.]
Even assuming every single air traveller going via LCY travelled via Crossrail, and ignored the DLR station right outside entirely, that’s a mere 6000 or so passengers at most per day. Even Lewisham’s DLR station deals with over 23k passengers per day. And that is for the DLR only, which uses smaller, shorter trains than Crossrail will.
Finally, Crossrail’s Abbey Wood branch will likely relieve the Woolwich DLR branch, which currently bears the brunt of passenger demand to Docklands from northern Kent. This is the same branch that serves London City Airport, and means the DLR should be sufficient to cope with LCY’s demands for some time yet.
For info, this morning I was waiting at Goodmayes station and the 0558 Down Shenfield class 315 was in Abellio Greater Anglia ‘interim’ white with red doors (without fleetnames) on the 1st 4 coach unit, and the second unit was in the TfL Rail livery of white with blue doors and blue skirt (no fleetnames) per the example within this post.
The unit numbers were also in New Johnson font. The rear cab still had ‘safety yellow’ and older class code font. As it caught me by surprise, I didn’t note the unit number nor obtain a photo unfortunately.
Another small indication of what is going to happen is that weekend closures affecting the future TfL services are now included from June onwards in six month lookahead.
Strange to note that the changes to both West Anglia and Great Eastern Metro commence on 31st May whereas the traditional timetable change date is 17th May.
Interesting to note that the Emerson Park line is listed under “Overground”, despite being physically isolated from the rest of the network.
And slightly depressing that that the first real sign of the changeover from Anglia to LO is a long list of closures.
@Pedantic of Purley
It interesting to see the Enfield Town/Cheshunt/Chingford Services under the London Overground banner on 27th June 2015 on that link!
Can someone please explain to me why the current overground routes seem to be closed so often at weekends. Is it the platform extensions? I understand that the West Croydon and Crystal Palace routes might be affected by the London Bridge Works but I’m confused about GOBLIN.
@Kingstoncommuter: Some of the work is for the platform extensions, given as the reason for this weekend’s Gospel Oak – Stratford closure, for example.
Other disruption this weekend on the ELL is attributed to Crossrail works, and on the WLL due to Earl’s Court development works.
@Kingstoncommuter: Bear in mind that the GOBLIN is due to be electrified over the next few years. Network Rail also replaced the bridge over Tottenham High Road (by South Tottenham stn) and over the River Lea. I imagine this was the main reason of the number of weekend closures leading up to the replacements at Christmas this year.
Elsewhere I imagine it is a combination of platform lengthening and the associated works to do with resiting signals, etc. Also, don’t forget the NLL and the GOBLIN are major freight arteries, and so require a bit more maintenance with all the heavy freight trains trundling through.
I recall a 465 or 466 having a carriage reconfigured with 2+2 seating as a trial by either Connex or the directly-operated South Eastern Trains. I’m not sure if this was a precursor to the 465/9 conversion but I certainly remember when I commuted on the current Southeastern, a 465/9 pulling up in place of a regular 465 on the Orpington line was a welcome relief because of the extra standing space. On many occasions I also managed to get a seat, albeit in first class, because Southeastern drivers don’t announce when a 465/9 first class is declassified and lots of commuters won’t risk sitting there. The 465/9s also have a disabled toilet which has meant ripping out seats but again offers more standing room on these busy commuter routes.
I was just thinking through how much of the current network Crossrail will relieve. It seems to be principally –
Central Line : Stratford to City/West End; City to West End; West End to Ealing.
Jubilee Line : Stratford to West End; Canary Wharf to West End; Stratford to Canary Wharf (via Whitechapel)
Circle Line : City to Paddington
H&C : Whitechapel to City and Paddington
DLR : Stratford to Canary Wharf; Custom House to City/West End; Woolwich to City/West End; Poplar to City; Canary Wharf to City.
The DLR does seem to be a significant beneficiary. I also wonder about the need for additional trains on the Jubilee, which seem likely to come on stream just about the same time.
@ Mr Beckton
Don’t forget mainline services as well – Crossrail will relieve a lot of surburban services on the Great Western Mainline. Whilst Crossrail replaces some services, it does so with much bigger trains and goes to more useful destinations than Paddington.
@Jim Cobb:
As someone who has had to endure a journey on one of the ‘Thames Turbo’ stopping services in the past, (for a trip to an interview in Oxford), I think the electrification of the Great Western network is probably going to be at least as big a deal as Crossrail itself, if not more so.
For all my complaints about the Kent and south London rail network, at least I’ve never had those awful DMUs to contend with. Electric trains are mercifully quiet and a lot less likely to make you start every day with a splitting headache.
Rob Healy @08:51 – 315837 is the unit in white body, blue doors, blue band, etc
@ Rob Healy – the 31st May is the first day of Period 3 accounting period. No great shock that the switchover is aligned to give a clean financial / reporting break between operating companies. Makes life an awful lot easier if it can be achieved. Given there will be no massively obvious difference in services between the 30th and 31st there will not be much for the passengers to notice. I’m sure there will be a grinning Mayor and dutiful Directors and Managers smiling for the cameras but I don’t expect a miracle when the services switch over.
For those who want to see better resolution images of the “Crossrail” branding then I’ve just seen some at http://www.dhub.com/portfolio/transport-for-london/
@ Mr Beckton – I suspect the Jubilee Line will only get a few months relief at most once Crossrail gets going via Stratford and the tunnels into London.
@ Kingston Commuter – much of the Overground work is 5 car related but there are also linkages to the London Bridge works plus ongoing bridge and clearance works on the GOBLIN. I expect closures on the GOBLIN will start picking up again once there is completion with the 5 car works on the NLL.
Not sure why people are surprised to see the Overground colour / name associated with West Anglia or Romford – Upminster. It’s been clear for months that the lines would be depicted in those colours and be under that name given LOROL are the operator.
Having taken a few days to catch up with the zillions of comments I expect that we will see changes to how Crossrail serves Heathrow as a result of political pressure. I don’t expect fares or frequencies to change but I can see T5 being served instead of T4.
@MrBeckton
You missed out the most obvious relief: Great Western, Great Eastern and (to a lesser extent) Kent suburban rail services.
@GrahamH PIXC is still around but nowadays (as of PDFH5) standing space is taken into account as well as number of seats when calculating a stock unit’s capacity.
@James – thanks – at last! (Since retiring, access to the latest PDFH is always a bit fraught…)
What is a PDFH when it’s at home?
PDFH – Passenger Demand Forecasting Handbook
if you want to know more –
http://www.atoc.org/about-atoc/commercial-activities/passenger-demand-forecasting-council/
WW & straphan
There are two GOBLIN bridges by the Tottenham/Walthamstow boundary, plus the connecting viaduct/embankment;
One is the one over the Lea Canal, which I think has now been strengthened/replaced & the other, a little to the East is over the original course of the Lea – at present I think this one is still subject to a 20 mph restriction, but the adjoining viaduct has now been strengthened ( I think )
@Mr Beckton
Don’t forget the Northern Line Bank Branch, as Crossrail will link to the GN&C at Moorgate.
Someone clearly had fun when putting together the last image in WW’s link (look closely at which line is part suspended).
Re MR Ed,
Greg T. will be Happy!
Good spot! Though the odd thing is not just that Crossrail’s rainbow boards will apparently show the Emirates Dangleway (which is surely *entirely* suspended – that’s the point!) but DOESN’T appear to show any information about, erm… Crossrail.
Oh God. Well spotted. Was thinking about doing a second post with these images. Will see if I can find the Shakira ones from earlier in the year…
That link appears broken for now …
However – I earlier pointed out to them that their images of new, shiny (etc) Crossrail stations were missing an essential item …
Electrification masts/knitting, power etc – I DID ask them if they were using diesel power, cough.
@Anonymous
Not any more we don’t. Not as far as I can see.
[Note: reference to deleted comment. PoP]
Ah, the perils of doing a Google Image search for “TfL rainbow board” and grabbing the first image that comes up without looking at it too carefully, then having it noticed by someone on a blog thread which already has senior TfL management posting on it…
This is getting to be like a game of “Mornington Crescent” … can we find the appropriate web-page today?
Re Greg,
Like PoP I also took a copy and will forward on if you want? Presumabley still cached some where?
@ ngh and others., if all else fails try the Internet Archive. If you know the original url you can input and then browse and search on date. Unless it was very shortlived the page was probably harvested to be kept in perpetuity.
Greg Tingey on 13 Feb,
The current Reading to Paddington stoppers are indeed crammed, particularly within London. However they are only 6 coaches long (sometimes just 3 coaches). Crossrail will relieve much of that overcrowding simply by having 50% (or 200%) longer trains.
@Westfiver (Has it actually been confirmed that when Cattlerail becomes operational that the line will actually be called Crossrail, and not some other identity?)
At least one sign in the new bit of Tottenham Court Road suggests it will be.
How is Stratford being improved for Crossrail? Will in soon to be Crossrail platforms get a makeover once TFL takes over? Much like the London Overground fashion?
Relier
How?
They cannot widen those platforms, though they can be lengthened a bit, without much difficulty, though whether they will need it for the first iteration of CR1 trains, I’m not sure.
Greg, i’m not speaking of making the platforms any bigger. I’m talking about making them more appealing then it is now. As done with stations on the London Overground. It has the 1980s feel to it.
Relier
Do passengers / taxpayers want their money spent on fashion or transport?
Safe, clean and tidy is one thing, trendiness is something completely different.
@ Kit Green – I think the improvements that Relier had in mind were not about fashionable gimmicks but overall improvements to the station ambiance at platfirm level. London Overground has done a spectacular job on its station by use of paint, removal of redundant and partially ruined facilities, regular cleaning and presence of identifiable staff in recognisable uniforms. All this is done via or with use of a common brand. The colour scheme is the same at each station, the signage is consistant throughout etc. These features meet I think your criteria of safe, clean and tidy but you may feel they are excessively trendy as they represent a particular brand as is also apparent at London Underground stations. When you refer to trendiness did you have something particular in mind?
Stratford was only updated recently for London 2012. Bearing in mind the fact that it is really four stations in one complex (DLR terminus, DLR through, Jubilee low level and then the high level NR/Central/LO platforms), I think it is unlikely that much more work will be done to improve it before Crossrail, apart from maybe some crowd management measures.
RichardB
Yes, the things you mention do fit my criteria. As for tumbledown facilities then of course they should be refurbished, when economic to do so, or renewed from scratch. Any refurb should be sympathetic to the original if it deserves it. Renewal will inevitably reflect current design thinking.
My point was really that renewal just because things look dated is a waste of money. Most people (although I have not carried out a survey) have no issue with well presented Victorian, Edwardian and art-deco stations if well maintained. On the other hand there is a lot of 1960s utilitarian cheap stuff about that can pose a problem. No problem with good design of that era, just that BR could not or would not afford it, except perhaps Euston.
Branding is all part of marketing, so a unified colour scheme as part of a clean up will also be of its age. Surely all past railway companies have had their own colours and typefaces to make themselves recognised?
@Relier:
I suspect TfL will want to spruce up the Central Line platforms as well, so it’s all nice and consistent. However, Crossrail are a separate legal entity to LUL and LOROL, and don’t currently have any control over the Shenfield slow platforms. They may have to wait until the platforms are handed over for the interim “TfL.Rail” service before they can start working on sprucing them up.
Network Rail and / or Abellio may want to join the party and split the costs, otherwise the ‘plain’ railway platforms will look rather dowdy compared to the rest. The station’s certainly big enough for economies of scale to apply, so that’s one incentive for doing the entire high-level section in one go.
That said, we’re not talking about a major rebuild or anything like that. This is the sort of thing you can leave until quite late in the project’s Gantt chart.
@Anomnibus I agree, expanding would be near impossible. Any overcrowding problems could be sorted by just installing short platform screen doors on the LU and CR platforms. Much like the ones on the Paris Metro. A spring clean of the platforms would make them look more in line with what being done down and up the tracks.
Stratford is currently managed by Abellio (Anglia) – this presumably includes the Central Line faces of the island platforms and (probably) the Overground ones, but not the separate DLR and Jubilee platforms downstairs. I assume TfL will take it all over come May, including the platforms that will continue to by served by Anglia’s longer-distance services.
Actually, it’s virtually certain that come “real” crossrail opening, the number of platform transfers at Stratford will drop by a very large amount.
No more vast hordes of people emerging from the Shnefields, to cram themselevs on to the Central line ( or the other way around in the evening) – they will mostly rmain on their CR1 trains to central London
I wonder, how would the existing lines announce the interchange opportunities to Crossrail?
Would it be “Change here for Crossrail services” or something else?
At the launch of the Overground brand at a talk at the London Transport museum some years ago, one of the major projects was to tidy up at stations all the extra cabling and ducts that had built up over time as ticket machines, TVs, dot matrix displays, gates and CCTV got installed with little thought to the visual ambience. The pictures were quite remarkable. It mightn’t seen important but it adds to the perception of a clean and tidy station – and is probably a whole lot easier to clean and maintain. I don’t know what condition the Stratford platforms are in but you can certainly feel the difference in Overground stations on the North London line and the route south of New Cross compared to some years ago, not least from the rigid cleaning rota. At Penge West I regular saw staff cleaning the top of shelters, sweeping and dusting ticket machines.
Anon 5
Yes
The revolting pigeon-nest & vast collection of droppings over the Up-platform dot-matrix display & cctv camera at Walthamstow Central.
( Yuck )
Greg Tingey @ 27 February 2015 at 16:25
“it’s virtually certain that come “real” crossrail opening, the number of platform transfers at Stratford will drop by a very large amount.”
I can’t agree with that prediction. As regular travellers learn about the new possibilities, I expect considerable changes both ways, as seen no further away than Mile End.
timbeau @ 27 February 2015 at 16:13
“Stratford is currently managed by Abellio (Anglia)”.
It’s complicated. New signs, following all the new lifts and stairs, went up quite promptly on the London Underground parts of the station. The Network Rail / Train Operating Company parts of the station still didn’t have signs until after the new shops opened and the TOC changed.
I take it the track through Stratford will be upgraded for Crossrail given the state of the track one sees alongside Platform 5 which is currently used by Shenfield services to Liverpool Street and stoppers from beyond . And will these trains continue to share the same platform ?
One improvement at Stratford was the additional platform for Central Line Trains ( westbound) giving exit from both sides of the train to main station and Liverpool Street platform 5 ( time it right and one can walk through a central line train to change on the level !). So could a similar platform be built to allow better cross platform interchange for Eastbound trains ?
As already mentioned Stratford gained much improvement for 2012 including additional subways and lifts . However, their are still parts like where the DLR used to terminate that need to be tidied up .
Melvyn,
The extra Central Line platform was only built because modelling showed it was necessary for the Olympics. It got funded by the Olympic committee. Even if a similar platform could be built eastbound, the chances of it being funded by anyone would be very low indeed.
Melvyn/PoP
NO, in a word ….
To the south of the eastbound track of the Central @ Startford is a fence & then the Up Electic line.
No room for a platform, anywhere at all.
If this
http://binged.it/18bxP8Y
works … you can see the Central diving down topwards Leytonstone by the large intra-track bushes (!)
Reading from bottom to top
Central W platform both sides
Up Electric platform on S side
Central E platform N side
Down Electric platform S side
Up main – train in platform
Down main
Reversible loop
@Moving away from the delights of Stratford for a moment, I was pondering the implications for the CrossRail franchise launch of the shadow Transport minister’s comments about allowing the public sector to compete for franchises,if not to terminate the franchising process altogether. This has radical and perhaps unknowable consequences for CrossRail and LOROL (in the latter case, as soon as 2016). For example,who would be the public sector operator here? LU? Something new? And if not controlling the process via franchising, just what sort of control mechanism would there be?
@Graham,
I’m not sure that the shadow minister was talking about CrossRail / LOROL at all, which could be considered as ‘concessions’, rather than franchises, given that no revenue risk is transferred. While Labour’s policy re. franchises is not fully spelled out, it appears to be silent in the area of ‘concessions’.
@answer=42 – point taken, although whether the said shadow quite understands the difference is unclear. It will still seem odd if the rest of the network is operated directly (with the risk internalised) and the London concessions (where the same risk is retained by the concessioning body) are forcibly contracted out. [BTW,technically, LO and CR are still franchises: the legislation hasn’t been amended; and for some of the national rail “franchises”, the amount of revenue risk transferred is trivial to non-existent. The distinction in practice is a lot less than in theory].
Greg Tingey @ 1 March 2015 at 09:21
“Melvyn/PoP
No room for a platform, anywhere at all.
If this
http://binged.it/18bxP8Y”
“This” worked for me, but the other option is to spend half an hour or so walking around the station, including looking down on it from that huge footbridge.
works …
Melvyn
The track at Platform 5 was indeed in a pretty sorry state until recently with very worn wooden sleepers and plenty of vegetation but I’m sure it was relaid towards the end of last year with fresh ballast and concrete sleepers.
Stratford station and platformsrare generally in a reasonable state due to Olympics refurbishments as others have pointed out. One issue yet to be addressed is the paucity of passenger information on the Central Line platforms, especially platform 6 on the eastbound where TFL announcements in the event of delays or problems are rare.
Does anyone know if the fares on the Liverpool Street to Shenfield line will come into line with TfL zones when they take over in May? Currently from Zone 6-Zone 1 on the Liverpool Street line (Romford) is £5.10, compared with TfL lines(inc. C2C) which is £3.10. Children over 5 also have to pay at present. I was wondering if they might bring everything into line and fares would be standardised to the rest of the TfL network?
@Graham
…and for some of the national rail “franchises”, the amount of revenue risk transferred is trivial to non-existent.
Which observation is precisely what is driving Labour’s policy.
http://www.tfl.gov.uk/cdn/static/cms/documents/pay-as-you-go-tarrifs-national-rail.pdf
No indication here of either these or West Anglia (beyond the Victoria Line) changing any time soon. Maybe in May? maybe not until the next annual fares revision in January?
A Griffiths
I know Stratford well,,. but the picture was for other peoples ….
timbeau
There has been much palpitation that “Zonal-only” fares will come in upon “Overgroundisation”, particularly among season-ticket holders, who, in zone 3, if they have “Liverpoool St / London Terminals” ticket stand to be stung for approx £600 p.a. extra, for no return ….
[I will let this go but there has to be a limit on how many times you bring this up. PoP]
@Greg
That is a different question: Anon’s question was whether the zonal fares would be at the existing TOC rate or the lower TfL rate, not whether point-to-point seasons would still be available alongside the zonal fares, as at present.
That they are not mutually exclusive is apparent from the situation on the GWML, where TfL single fares have been charged for some years:
– Point to point Paddington to Ealing Bdy £936pa
– Z1-3 travelcard £1596pa
@PoP – why do you think they have used “TfL Rail” rather than “Overground”. The services into Liverpool St. will (initially) be very similar to those on the DC lines into Euston.
If (when?) TfL get hold of other suburban services, do you think they’ll go for “TfL Rail” rather than “Overground” ?
Richie,
I don’t really know why you are asking me. My guess is only as good as anyone elses.
I can’t really see the point of temporarily branding something as London Overground – even more so when it wont be up to London Overground standards. By calling it TfL rail people wont have a high expectation and then be disappointed.
Could be wrong, but I think I caught sight of a train set with a new slightly more tfl like colour scheme this AM at Shenfield. I suppose the transition is not far off now.
Slightly off topic, but Crossrail related.
Regular readers will know that Canary Wharf Group has built the station that’ll have their name, and constructed lots of public and retail space above the station site at the same time as building the station. The shops/restaurants/roof garden above the station complex will open next month.
@ IslandDweller
Diamond Geezer’s blogpost yesterday was all about that very topic: http://diamondgeezer.blogspot.co.uk/
THC
A train has running in/out of Liverpool Street in the temporary colour scheme for TfL Rail but without roundels.
The use of TfL Rail is because people will have high expectations of the Crossrail product. Initially there will only be deep cleaned trains & stations. TfL Rail is purely an interim brand that will disappear with the new trains.
@ IslandDweller Canary Wharf plan to open first part of their development above new Crossrail Station next Friday 1St May 2015.
the TFL-Rail branding has appeared at Stratford.
Here is two photos, a line diagram for platform 8 and the new Platform Finder diagram
https://plus.google.com/+BrianButterworth/posts/LZaFb6yakkv
I was at Canary Wharf Crossrail Place today and enjoyed looking at a photo exhibition that has been put on display showing various stages of work to build both the station and over site development . While a screen shows film of work to build development .
While there was no mention of Crossrail 2 in today’s Queens Speech a brief mention was made to HS2 and development of High Speed rail.
Melvyn: Can’t talk about HS2 here though.
[Thank you for pointing this out. You can talk about HS2 – but only in a context relevant to London. We do keep trying to point out to Melvyn we are not a receptacle for general news comment. PoP]
The new @TfLRail Twitter team is up and raring to go. Already answering questions on new stock and refurbishment.
@ConsultationAl: @TfLRail Welcome! Do you guys know when the stock refurbishment is due to complete?
@TfLRail: @ConsultationAl Hi, as far as I know trains will remain the same (but with re-branding) until May 17 when new trains will be introduced. ^AC
@TfLRail: @ConsultationAl Oh, also (just doing a little research).. Existing trains will now have seating, signage and panels replaced. ^AC
Here is the TfL-Rail outdoor sign at Stratford station Westfield end. https://plus.google.com/+BrianButterworth/posts/aWXWp5yuHyw
Here is a link to TFL site for map of TFL rail which also shows taking bikes on trains map updated to include lines transferred to TFL today.
I checked for Avoiding Stairs map but that still shows old map under tube maps.
https://tfl.gov.uk/maps/track/tfl-rail
One does wonder if Shenfield should have been shown as zone 10 ?
Afterall. Shenfield is just outside London but when Crossrail opens to the west Reading is a long way out of London and surely you can’t have ” special fares apply” for a large length of the line .?
@ Melvyn – yes you absolutely can have “special fares apply”. Read the Fares Advice Paper that is part of the Mayoral Decision about West Anglia / TfL Rail fares. TfL are locked into commitments to the DfT about fares levels. They cannot undercut fares on parallel services and must have DfT agreement to fares that apply on any devolved services including Crossrail. Shenfield isn’t in Zone 10 because Zone 10 doesn’t exist and because the DfT refused to transfer Shenfield. You need to think about the way NR fares are priced from particular pricing points – Shenfield is one, Watford Junction is another. If fares were pulled down to TfL levels then fares across the network would be pulled down and TfL would be required to compensate TOCs for loss of income against franchise projections. The DfT are not going to willingly allow fares cuts which then imperil the finances of rail franchises. I also would not support TfL being locked into ever bigger financial bail outs to franchises for services not controlled by TfL and serving areas well outside TfL’s control. That’s pouring money down the drain.
Anyone expecting bargain TfL fares to Reading is going to be disappointed. I fully expect FGW (or successor franchise) to be in charge of fares setting at Reading well after Crossrail arrives at Reading. TfL will have to charge the same fares.
There is a TfL Rail twitter session on 7/7/15 at 1900 for questions about the Liv St – Shenfield service for those who may have questions or queries about the service. I think I may need to restrict my questions for fear of causing “upset”. 😉
One small snippet from the Twitter Q&A that may calm tempers. Apparently the class 345s will have a mixed seating layout like the S8 stock – transverse and longitudinal. Much of the rest of the session was complaints about poor information, poor Twitter feedback, no increase in frequencies, trains missing out Harold Wood and Brentwood if running late, demands for faster services and demands for trains NOT to skip stop in the peak. The last two prove you can’t win no matter what you do. 😉 I was slightly surprised at the slowish pace of some improvements like new / extra ticket machines which won’t turn up until 2016. I’m surprised that sort of thing isn’t being done much quicker even recognising all the stations will be worked on over the next few years.