Heathrow: Where Was The Redundancy?
In the early 1970s, I was involved in a small way, in the design of chemical plants for ICI.
When designing a chemical plant, you obviously want a plant that will have a high availability, so output is maximised, even if some parts have to be shut down.
With chemical plants, you might duplicate some reaction vessels, pipework or pumps for example.
But surely, when you are designing large infrastructure, it should be designed to keep going.
This document from Network Rail is entitled £140m Transformation Of Liverpool Lime Street Completed On Time.
These bullet points serve as sub-headings.
- Track, platform and signalling improvements
- Paving the way for bigger, better trains with more seats for more customers in future
- Part of the wider Great North Rail Project
- Part of #StationsDay – celebrating the £5.2billion investment to regenerate Britain’s rail stations
But I also believe two other important sub-projects were carried out during the work.
The Station Has Been Substantially Prepared For High Speed Two
Consider.
- Platforms were lengthened so they can accept 265.3-metre long eleven-car Class 390 trains.
- Platforms were widened, so they could handle the 607 passengers, that can be carried in an eleven-car train.
- There appears to be five full-size platforms numbered 6-10.
- Is there the possibility of a sixth platform, which is currently numbered E (for Emergency (?))?
- The approaches to the station have been remodeled, so trains can enter the station very efficiently.
- The Class 390 trains are going between Crewe and Liverpool Lime Street stations, in times that are not far off those expected from High Speed Two trains.
As Liverpool Lime Street will only need to handle half-length 200-metre long classic compatible High Speed Two trains, Liverpool Lime Street station is now ready for High Speed Two.
Liverpool Lime Street Station Is Now Effectively Two Five Platform Stations
This OpenRailwayMap shows the platform layout at Liverpool Lime Street station.
Note.
- The platforms indicated by blue dots with numbers are the ten platforms of the station.
- The platforms in the Northern-half of the station are numbered 1-5.
- The platforms in the Southern-half of the station are numbered 6-10.
- All platforms; 1-10 are electrified.
- The white line running diagonally across the map, shows the route of the loop of the Wirral Line.
Click the map to show it to a larger scale.
These are some of my pictures of the station.
It is without doubt, one of the best stations aesthetically and operationally in the world.
Wrightbus Hydrogen Buses Trial Begins At Sizewell C
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Route One.
This is the sub-heading.
An order of 150 more StreetDeck Hydroliners, plus battery-electrics, could follow, says the manufacturer
These three paragraphs give more details.
A trial of four Wrightbus StreetDeck Hydroliner hydrogen fuel cell-electric buses at Sizewell C nuclear power plant in Suffolk was launched this week.
The three double-deckers and one single-decker are transporting workers at the under-construction site to test operational performance of the clean technology.
Wrightbus says a successful pilot scheme could lead to an order of 150 hydrogen buses from Sizewell, which would represent the UK largest fleet using that technology.
These zero-carbon buses are to ensure that transporting workers to the site for the project, has the lowest possible carbon footprint.
The Anonymous Widower 