Westminster Council To Trial Diesel Parking Charge
The title of this post is the title of an article on the BBC web site.
There will be a lot of complaints, but just as the Congestion Charge was accepted, this charge will be too!
And if it works for Westminster, how long before other Boroughs in London introduce it?
I do think though, that cities that cut pollution will benefit from the good publicity, that could generate extra visitors and increased business activity.
Are The Trains In Ely Finally To Be Sorted?
Railways in Ely must be a bit of a problem as they have their own section in Wikipedia.
This map shows the lines in the area.
Ely Lines
This is a Google Map of the area.
The current Ely station is towards the South-West corner, with the iconic cathedral to the North. The main line goes South-West to North-East across the map with Ely North Junction alongside the white chalky area in the North-East corner.
What suggested that I write this post was this article in the Eastern Daily Press, which is entitled Talks in Downham Market hear work to end East Anglia’s rail bottleneck at Ely could begin in three years’ time.
Reading the title, is a good summary of the article.
So what are the problems at Ely?
Ely Station
Ely station was not designed for efficient operation.
The following services call at the station.
- Ipswich and Peterborough.
- Cambridge and Norwich.
- London, Cambridge and King Lynn.
- Stansted Airport and Birmingham.
- Norwich and Liverpool.
To make matters worse. the Norwich-Liverpool service has to reverse in the station.
Connectivity between services can be bad and I have read that passengers between Kings Lynn and Ipswich may have to wait up to nearly an hour for a connection.
Because the station has only three platforms, organising the trains into a sensible pattern, for train operators and passengers. must be a difficult process.
The station is not step-free and relies on long ramps to cross the lines.
The Low Road Bridge On The A142 At Ely Station
This is said in Wikipedia about the low bridge just to the North of the station.
The height available for road traffic passing beneath the bridge is only 9.0 feet (2.7 m) which is unusually low for a bridge over an A-road. Despite the various warnings, the limited headroom is a frequent cause of accidents.[12] High vehicles must use a level crossing next to the bridge.
East Anglia’s legendary bad drivers, who seem to find new ways to cause chaos on the railways, must have real fun with this crossing.
According to this article on the BBC web site, the bridge was hit twelve times in 2015/16.
This Google Map shows Ely station.
Note that the level crossing is closed.
The Large Number Of Freight Trains Between Felixstowe And Peterborough
In Along The Felixstowe Branch, I said that the number of trains on the Felixstowe Branch could rise to 47. Not all will come through Ely station, but there could be a couple of long container trains in both direction every hour.
Note.
- The number of freight trains will increase.
- These freight trains can be up to 775 metres long and the average length will grow.
- Hawk Bridge over the Great Ouse on the Ipswich-Ely Line is only single-track, as is several miles of the line to Kennett station, where the Cambridge and Peterborough branches join.
All of these trains have to pass over the low bridge and through the level crossing.
Ely North Junction
Ely North Junction is a busy junction, where services to Kings Lynn, Norwich and Peterborough split.
This Google Map shows the junction.
Note the tracks come from Ely station to the South-West and split into three separate lines.
- Ely-Peterborough Line
- Fen Line to Kings Lynn.
- Breckland Line to Norwich.
There is also.
- A single-track loop line called the West Curve, that allows traius to go between Peterborough and Norwich.
- A distribution depot by the junction.
One of the problems is that freight trains between Peterborough and Felixstowe pass on the Southern side of Ely station and need to cross the lines to connect to Peterborough.
Footpaths
Footpaths and where they cross the railway are a sensitive issue in the Ely area. This document on the Network Rail web site, illustrates some of the problems.
This is said in the document.
The railway at this level crossing carries passenger and freight trains with a line speed of 60 mph. There are generally 194 trains passing throughthis level crossing per day.
That sounds like a recipe for a serious accident to me.
The Opening Of Cambridge North Station
The new Cambridge North station is scheduled to open on the 21st May, 2017 and will initially be just a stop on all services passing through.
The Cambridge Effect
Cambridge is successful and overflowing.
Towns and cities like Bury St. Edmunds, Ely, Haverhill, Huntington, Newmarket and Peterborough will increasingly find that they become satellites of the East Anglian Mega-Powerhouse.
These towns and cities will need good transport links to Cambridge.
Rail links to both Cambridge and Cambridge North stations will be important.
The New Greater Anglia Franchise
Greater Anglia have published plans that will affect Ely.
- They will run an hourly service between Peterborough and Colchester via Bury St. Edmunds and Ipswich to replace the current less frequent service between Peterborough and Ipswich.
- They will run an hourly service between Norwich and Stansted Airport to replace the current less frequent service between Norwich and Cambridge.
- I have also read somewhere, that Greater Anglia would like to run a direct service between Cambridge North and Ipswich via Bury St. Edmunds.
- Fordham and Soham stations could be reopened.
Some of these changes will put more pressure on Ely, but they will have two very beneficial effects.
- A North-facing bay platform will be released at Cambridge station.
- There will be two trains per hour (tph) between Kennett and Ipswich via Bury St. Edmunds.
I suspect that Greater Anglia will bring in other changes.
The Reopening Of March To Spalding Via Wisbech
Network Rail has spent £330million on upgrading the Great Northern Great Eastern Joint Railway into a freight link between Peterborough and Doncaster, which I wrote about in Project Managers Having Fun In The East.
It might never happen, but why shouldn’t the route be extended from Spalding to March on the Peterbough-Ely Line via Wisbech?
This would open up two main possibilities.
- Freight trains between Felixstowe and Doncaster would avoid the East Coast Main Line to the South of Doncaster.
- A passenger service from Cambridge to Wisbech could be opened.
Other longer distance passenger services might be viable.
The East West Rail Link
The East West Rail Link will provide a new route from Cambridge to the West, via a new Cambridge South station.
It will add to the numbers of passenger trains through Ely, as services will probably go from Oxford to Norwich and Ipswich via all three Cambridge stations.
But will the East West Rail Link be used to route freight trains between Felixstowe and Wales and the West?
A Proposed Ely North Station
I have found this article on the Ely Standard web site, which is entitled Could railway revolution see new station built at Ely North?.
The article says a new four-platform station would allow.
- Two tph on the Fen Line
- Connections reduced to no more than eight minutes.
- The introduction of a Kings Cross to Norwich service.
The new station would probably have the following.
- More passenger-friendly features.
- A lot more car parking.
- Good walking access to the City Centre.
- Trains between Norwich and Liverpool would stop in the station and would use the West Curve to avoid reversing in the station.
With all the water in the area, there must be scope for an architecturally excellent station.
From a project management view, this station is a good idea.
- It could probably be built fairly easily without causing too much interruption to current services, as Cambridge North station seems to have been.
- Once open, the current Ely station could be demolished or simplified.
- The low bridge and the level crossing could then be replaced with a modern traffic underpass capable of handling trucks.
- Ely Dock Junction and the lines South of the City could be remodelled to speed the freight trains through the area.
There might even be a dive-under to simplify operations.
I have no idea if the good people of Ely will like the idea of a new station.
Conclusion
The extra freight traffic and the published plans of the Greater Anglia franchise will mean, that substantial work will have to be done at Ely.
- Network Rail have a long term ambition of dualling the whole route between Ely and Kennett including Hawk Bridge over the Great Ouse, which would certainly ease the problems of the freight trains.
- A new Ely North station may be created.
- Closing the level crossing and creating an underpass for traffic at Ely station, would be an obvious thing to do, but could this be done without closing the railway for several months? Construction companies could always use the technique they did at Silver Street station in the 1990s, to get the North Circular Road under that station.
- Eventually, there will be a need for a chord at Ely Dock Junction, so that trains can go direct from Cambridge to the Ipswich to Ely Line without a reverse in Ely station.
I’ll be interested to see what Network Rail propose.
Ban Lorries From Using Car Sat-Navs, Say Councils
This is the title of an article on the BBC web site.
After a number of high-profile incidents where lorries have got stuck and caused hundreds of thousands of pounds of damage, something needs to be done.
Perhaps driving a truck, through an area it is banned, should be considered dangerous driving!
After The Robin Hood Line Will Nottingham See The Maid Marian Line?
This article in the Nottingham Post is entitled Hopes HS2 could see ‘Maid Marian Line’ opened to passengers.
There is a freight only line between Kirkby-in-Ashfield station on the Robin Hood Line and Pye Bridge on the Erewash Valley Line.
The proposal would allow trains to go between Kirkby-in-Ashfield via Pinxton and Selston to Langley Mill and Ilkeston and then on to Nottingham.
I’ve been here before in September 2015 in a post called Expanding The Robin Hood Line.
But the new baby elephant in the room is the new Ilkeston station, which hopefully opens on the 2nd of April 2017.
Given Chris Grayling’s thoughts, that I wrote about in Government Focuses On New Stations And Trains, could it be that if extra trains can be found, that to provide a second train per hour between Nottingham and Ilkeston, a second route to Kirkby-in-Ashfield and on to to Mansfield and Worksop, is opened up the Erewash Valley Line.
The route could even terminate on the proposed extension of the Robin Hood Line to Ollerton.
The route from Nottingham to Ollerton would be.
- Nottingham
- Toton for HS2
- Ilkeston
- Langley Mill
- Selston – New station
- Pinxton- New station
- Kirkby-in-Ashfield
- Sutton Parkway
- Mansfield
- Mansfield Woodhouse
- Shirebrook
- Warsop- New station
- Edwinstowe – New station
- Ollerton – New station
I think it is likely that this route could be developed.
- The track is all there and is used by freight trains and/or for driver training.
- An hourly service on this route would mean additional services for many of the stations on the route.
- The only problem would be finding some suitable diesel trains for the route.
- It could probably be trialled to Mansfield or with a simple station at Ollerton.
- The track from Ollerton appears to be intact all the way to Lincoln.
But the clincher is that it would provide connectivity for HS2 all the way from Worksop and Mansfield to Lincoln and Grimsby.
HS2 is needed, but we must make sure that the benefits of the line are spread to all parts of the country.
If this route to Lincoln could be developed as a 100 mph line, the time from Lincoln to London with a change to HS2 at Toton could be likely to be under two hours.
In Government Focuses On New Stations And Trains, Chris Grayling mentioned the route from Grimsby to Sheffield. Surely creating this route from Lincoln to Toton via Ollerton for HS2, is what really improves train transport in North Lincolnshire.
Building Railways In The UK Is Easy
I have just read this article on Global Rail News, which is entitled French Senate approves Lyon-Turin rail link.
That sounds easy until you read this from the Wikipedia entry.
Test drilling found some internally stressed coal-bearing schists that are poorly suited for a tunnel boring machine, and old-fashion Drilling and blasting will be used for the short corresponding sections.
It is not going to be a simple tunnelling job. It is more akin to some of the eighteenth and nineteenth century tunnels through the Pennines. Except that the tunnel will be 57 kilometres long and modern explosives are better.
It will carry a lot of freight, in addition to passengers from Paris and Lyon to Northern Italy.
But I doubt, I’ll ever be able to take a High Speed Train from London to Milan, as I’ll be long gone before everything is completed.
The Anonymous Widower 