The Anonymous Widower

Could High Speed Two Be A One-Nation Project?

As currently envisioned, High Speed Two is very much an English project, with the following routes

• London and Birmingham
• London and Liverpool via Birmingham
• London and Manchester Airport/Manchester via Birmingham and Crewe
• London and Sheffield via Birmingham and the East Midlands Hub
• London and Leeds via Birmingham and the East Midlands Hub

There are large numbers of mid-sized towns and cities that it won’t serve directly.

The West Coast Main Line

The West Coast Main Line serves the following routes.

• London and Birmingham
• London and Liverpool via Crewe
• London and Manchester via Crewe
• London and Glasgow via Crewe, Wigan, Preston and Carlisle
• London and Blackpool via Crewe, Wigan, Preston
• London and North Wales via Crewe and Chester.

It could probably be considered a two or two-and-a-half nation line, as it serves the Western half of Scotland and the Northern half of Wales.

Add the West Coast Main Line and High Speed Two together and you get a line, that serves a lot more places like Blackpool, Carlisle, Chester, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Preston, Stafford, Stoke and Wigan.

• The current plan for both routes envisage them both being run by Avanti West Coast, so it looks like High Speed Two is being designed to work with the West Coast Main Line.
• Destinations like Carlisle, Glasgow and Preston will be served using the West Coast Main Line.
• Compatible trains will be built that can be run on both lines.
• Some stations will be shared.

It does seem that there are advantages, if the two routes are considered as one system.

The East Coast Main Line

The East Coast Main Line serves the following routes.

• London and Bradford
• London and Cambridge
• London and Edinburgh via Doncaster, York and Newcastle
• London and Harrogate via Leeds
• London and Hull
• London and Kings Lynn via Cambridge
• London and Lincoln via Newark.
• London and Leeds via Doncaster
• London and Middlesbrough
• London and Skipton via Leeds
• London and Sunderland

The East Coast Main Line could become another high speed line.

Extra services could be added.

• London and Norwich via Cambridge
• London and Nottingham
• London and Grimsby and Cleethorpes via Lincoln.
• London and Sheffield via Retford.

Add the East Coast Main Line and High Speed Two together and there could be a wider range of towns and cities served.

• Peterborough and Doncaster could play the same role in the East as Birmingham and Crewe will play in the West.
• The East Coast Main Line between London and Doncaster will be upgraded to in-cab ERTMS signalling in a few years time, which will allow 140 mph running on several sections of the route.
• Improvements are either under way or being planned to reduce bottlenecks on the East Coast Main Line.
• If High Speed Two can handle eighteen trains per hour (tph), then surely the East Coast Main Line, which has a lot of quadruple track, can handle upwards of twelve 140 mph trains per hour between London and Doncaster, after the improvements to track and signalling.
• I estimate that 140 mph running between London and Doncaster could save as much as twenty minutes.
• I feel that Barnsley, Doncaster, Hull, Leeds, Sheffield and York could all be reached in under two hours from London using the existing Azuma trains.
• This morning the 0700 from Kings Cross is timetabled to reach York at 0852. Would it be possible for London and York to be around just ninety minutes?
• Savings would also apply to trains between London and Leeds, Middlesbrough, Newcastle, Scotland and Sunderland.
• Sub-four hour journeys between London and Edinburgh would be commonplace.

Note that the Internet gives a driving time of nearly three and a half hours between London and Leeds. Surely, two hours or less on High Speed Yorkshire would be much preferable.

I would add this infrastructure.

• There might be a good case to create electrified routes to Hull and Sheffield and between Sheffield and Leeds, but they wouldn’t be needed to start the service or obtain the time savings. But they would ease operation, cut carbon emissions and save a few more minutes.
• A station at Doncaster-Sheffield Airport.
• A parkway station at Barnsley on the Dearne Valley Line with direct services to Doncaster, Leeds, London and Sheffield.

The two latter improvements have been proposed in Sheffield Region’s transport plans.

High Speed Yorkshire should be finished as soon as possible. A completion date of 2024 is not unreasonable.

Northern Powerhouse Rail

Northern Powerhouse Rail is a plan to build an East-West high speed line or at least a much faster one, than the overcrowded joke, that presently exists.

I discussed the latest thinking in Changes Signalled For HS2 Route In North and the latest thinking and my views can best be summarised as follows.

• Northern Powerhouse Rail will be an improved line with some new sections, between Liverpool and Hull via Manchester Airport, Manchester and Leeds.
• Northern Powerhouse Rail and High Speed Two will connect at High Legh.
• Northern Powerhouse Rail and High Speed Two will share infrastructure.
• The High Speed Two route to Manchester would be via Birmingham, Crewe, High Legh and Manchester Airport.
• The High Speed Two route to Liverpool would be via Birmingham, Crewe, High Legh and Warrington
• Hull will get a London service from High Speed Two via Birmingham, Crewe, High Legh and Manchester Airport, Manchester and Leeds

The Oakervee review of High Speed Two is also underway and leaks are suggesting, that the report is recommending that High Speed Two be built in full, but differently.

One important thing, that is happening, is that Network Rail have started the procurement process to improve the current line between Leeds and Huddersfield, as I reported in Network Rail Reveals Detailed £2.9bn Upgrade Plans For TransPennine Route.

• Extra tracks will be built.
• There will be some extra electrification.

I very much feel, that this is one of the most difficult TransPennine sections to improve.

The other sections are summarised as follows.

• Liverpool and Manchester Airport via Warrington and High Legh is across the flat lands of North Cheshire and could follow the M56.
• Manchester Airport and Manchester will probably be a high speed tunnel.
• Manchester and Huddersfield section could possibly be improved in the short term
• Leeds and Hull and the required connections to the East Coast Main Line are in the flat lands of East Yorkshire.

It looks to me, that Network Rail have a plan in there to perhaps deliver improved services East of Huddersfield and radiating from Leeds in the next few years.

It certainly needs improvement, as the TransPennine route must be the worst main line in the UK.

A One-Nation Railway

I think these lines can be connected to create an integrated high speed network.

• High Speed Two
• West Coast Main Line
• East Coast Main Line
• Northern Powerhouse Rail

But.

• It doesn’t connect to the whole country and needs to be extended.
• It won’t be fully developed until at least 2035.
• Improvements are needed now!

So what could be substantially delivered of the core network, by say 2024, which is around the date of the next General Election?

• Faster and more frequent services on the East Coast Main Line.
• An electrified higher capacity and faster line between Leeds and Huddersfield and possibly between Leeds and Hull.
• New East Coast Main Line services from London to Barnsley Dearne Valley, Bradford, Cleethorpes, Doncaster Sheffield Airport, Grimsby, Harrogate, Huddersfield, Middlesbrough, Norwich, Nottingham, Scarborough and Sheffield and Sunderland.
• Sub-four hour services between London and Edinburgh.
• New local services to connect Blyth and Ashington to the East Coast Main Line at Newcastle.
• A Tees Valley Metro  connecting Bishop Auckland, Whitby and all in between to the East Coast Main Line at Darlington.
• Improved local services between York and Leeds via Harrogate, Sheffield and Leeds via the Dearne Valley and on other lines in Yorkshire.

Effectively, the recommendations of this report on the Transport for the North web site, which is entitled At A Glance – Northern Powerhouse Rail, which apply to Leeds and Sheffield would have been implemented to connect to high speed services at Doncaster, Leeds, Sheffield and York.

Technology used would include.

• Some more electrification using the power from the electrified East Coast Main Line.
• Conventional electric trains and compatible battery trains.
• Tram-trains feeding into the Sheffield Supertram.
• ERTMS digital signalling on the East Coast Main Line and the major branches to Hull, Leeds and Middlesbrough.

There would also need to be an increase in LNER’s Azuma fleet. But that is already rumoured as I wrote in More New Trains On LNER Wish List.

Could we see as many as twelve Axumas per hour between London and Doncaster? Yes!

Could it all be delivered by the 2024 General Election? Yes!

High Speed Scotland

The Scottish Nationalist Party is pushing for High Speed Two to be extended to Scotland.

I think that this will eventually be a feasible project, but it will be a very expensive and perhaps built around 2040.

These are my thoughts for the next few years up to 2024.

High Speed To Edinburgh

Consider.

• Edinburgh currently supports a half-hourly service to and from London.
• East Coast Trains are proposing to add five trains per day to this route.
• TransPennine Express will run an hourly service between Edinburgh and Liverpool, via Manchester, Leeds, York and Newcastle, which starts at the December 2019 timetable change..
• CrossCountry run an hourly service between Aberdeen and Plymouth.
• It looks like Edinburgh and Newcastle have a four tph service.

All services, except the CrossCountry  are planned to be run by Hitachi’s Class 800, 802 or 803 trains.

• Currently, services take ninety minutes for the 125 miles between Newcastle and Edinburgh.
• The Hitachi trains are all capable of 140 mph with digital signalling.
• The Hitachi trains have better acceleration.
• The route is fully electrified. Although, there are reports it needs enhancing to be able to handle the current number of trains.

How many minutes can be taken off thjs route, with a new timetable on a line running only Hitachi high speed trains?

Probably not that many, but it would ensure all London and Edinburgh trains were under four hours.

But it will all happen by 2024?

High Speed To Glasgow

So Edinburgh is alright, but what about Glasgow?

Consider.

• Glasgow currently supports an hourly service to and from London.
• TransPennine Express run an hourly service to and from Manchester Airport
• TransPennine Express will run a three trains per day service to and from Liverpool.

Glasgow has a much lower frequency service to and from England than Edinburgh.

Currently, London and Glasgow takes over four-and-a half hours and there is going to be no serious improvement, until High Speed Two opens to Crewe, when the time could drop to perhaps just over three-and-a half hours.

But that won’t happen until possibly 2030.

In Does One Of Baldrick’s Descendents Work For Avanti West Coast?, I detail a cunning plan, that might allow London and Glasgow in four hours.

This was my conclusion in the other article.

To improve services between London and Birmingham, Blackpool, Liverpool and Scotland, appears to need the following.

• Ten new Hitachi trains.
• Full digital signalling on the West Coast Main Line.
• Track improvements on the West Coast Main Line
• Upgrading of the Pendelinos to allow 140 mph running.

This should reduce London and Glasgow to around four hours and London and Liverpool to around two hours.

There may be advantages in replacing the Pendelinos with the Classic-compatible High Speed Two trains on the London and Glasgow service as early as possible.

• There would be a large increase of capacity between London and Glasgow.
• What would be the possible speed of the Classic-compatible trains on updated track North of Crewe? I will assume 140 mph, but it could be more! That’s called engineering!
• London and Glasgow timings would be improved, as soon as digital signalling is installed.
• The trains would get a thorough testing before the opening of High Speed Two to Birmingham.

At least one platform at Glasgow Central would need to be extended to take a four-hundred metre long train.

According to Wikipedia, the Classic-compatible trains will be introduced from 2026.

I think by the December 2026 timetable change Glasgow could see a four-hour service to and from London.

But could it be 2024, if the Pendelinos can pick up time North of Crewe with digital signalling?

The Borders Railway

If High Speed Two is going to be a One Nation project, the Borders Railway must be extended from Tweedbank to Carlisle via Hawick.

Could this be done by 2024?

It would be a close-run thing! But possible!

The Glasgow South Western Line

The Glasgow South Western Line, is a secondary route between Glasgow and Carlisle.

It should be electrified early, so that during the upgrading of the West Coast Main Line North of Carlisle it can be used as a diversionary route.

Scotland Could Have Two Four-Hour Fully-Electrified Routes To And From London

But it’s not just London that gets good connectivity to and from Scotland!

• Birmingham
• Bradford
• Carlisle
• Leeds
• Liverpool
• Manchester
• Newcastle
• Peterborough
• Preston
• Wolverhampton
• York

All these cities will have direct connections to Edinburgh and/or Glasgow.

High Speed Midlands

Almost unnoticed and with little fuss, the Midland Main Line is being upgraded to provide 125 mph services between London and Chesterfield, Derby, Leicester, Nottingham and Sheffield.

• New Hitachi bi-mode Class 804 trains will improve speeds and increase capacity
• Over the last decade or so, the track has been upgraded for 125 mph running.
• Electrification will reach between London and Market Harborough.
• Market Harborough station has been remodelled to remove a bottleneck.
• The Corby branch will be electrified with the trains running half-hourly.

I also think, that the Midland Main Line will link into all the improvements between Barnsley, Doncaster, Leeds and Sheffield and provide the following.

• A high speed route between Leeds and the East Midlands.
• A route for a Barnsley and London service.
• A second route for Leeds and London services..

It also seems that rail planners are getting innovative with the design of the Midland Main Line.

• It appears that the Midland Main Line and High Speed Two’s spur to Sheffield will be combined into an electrified line between Clay Cross North Junction and Sheffield via Chesterfield.
• An improved link to the East-West Rail link at Bedford could improve links between the North-East and the South of England.
• The disused rail line between Market Harborough and Northampton could be reopened.

The line is a lot more than a connection between London and the East Midlands.

The upgrade should be complete by 2024.

East West Rail

East West Rail is still in a long planning stage, but it now looks likely to provide more than a passenger link between Oxford and Cambridge.

• New freight routes for Felixstowe and Southampton.
• Extra passenger services between Oxford and Reading in the West and Cambridge, Ipswich and Norwich in the East.
• Connections to the Great Western Main Line, the Chiltern Line, West Coast Main Line, Midland Main Line, East Coast Main Line and the Great Eastern Main Line.

It has also been suggested that East West Rail should be connected to High Speed Two at a new station at Calvert. This could give Bristol, Cardiff and Southampton good links to and from High Speed Two.

Great Western Main Line

At the December 2019 timetable change, there has finally been some good news in the saga of the electrification of the Great Western Main Line.

• Services between London and Bristol have been improved.
• The timetable has been improved.

Whether it will stand up is another matter.

Certainly by 2024, it will be a much better main line.

It could have full digital in-can signalling, which could result in 140 mph running and journey time savings.

Who knows?

But what excites me is the possibility of a connection between High Speed Two and East West Rail at Calvert, which will allow trains to run between Bristol, Cardiff and Swansea, in Wales and the West and the North on a mainly electrified high speed railway.

High Speed North Wales

Avanti West Coast is purchasing thirteen new Hitachi bi-mode trains to run services to Chester and North Wales.

I can’t see much speed improvement in the services, although if the West Coast Main Line gets digital signalling, this could save a few minutes between London and Crewe.

High Speed Ireland

The technology is now available to build a rail bridge between Scotland and the island of Ireland.

I laid out the arguments in A Solution To The Northern Irish Problem!.

The Lincoln Solution

Lincoln is a city, that has been ignored by UK railways for decades.

But not any more as LNER now run six return trips a day to the city on Mondays to Saturdays and five on Sundays.

I wrote about the improvements in The Shape Of Train Services To Come.

How many other cities and large towns would benefit from a Lincoln solution?

LNER have already launched a similar service to Harrogate at the December 2019 timetable change and I’m sure that more will follow.

Disability And Access Issues

A true one-nation railway wouldn’t exclude anybody from using the trains.

Strides have been made to put up step-free bridges, but some of the access between platform and train is truly dreadful.

This picture shows what can be achieved by good design on a Class 755 train.

And this is the step on one of Hitachi’s new trains.

Note that all doors on these Hitachi trains are also far too narrow.

Some train manufacturers can do much better.

Recurring Themes

In this analysis, there are factors that keep cropping up.

Digital Signalling Or ERTMS

This is the key to squeezing more trains into our overcrowded railway.

Between London and Doncaster on the East Coast Main Line, should be operational in a few years and I believe the following lines should follow as soon as possible.

• East Coast Main Line between Doncaster and York and possibly Newcastle.
• East Coast Main Line North Of Newcastle
• West Coast Main Line North Of Crewe
• West Coast Main Line South Of Crewe
• Midland Main Line
• Great Western Main Line

As a time-expired Control Engineer, I believe that in-cab digital signalling is a major key to increasing capacity.

Faster Line Speeds

Some routes like TransPennine, have Victorian line speeds

Network Rail showed how it could improve line speed with the remodelling at Market Harborough station.

Bottlenecks, like the Trowse Swing Bridge at Norwich need immediate removal, no matter what the Heritage Taliban and other Luddites say.

New Hitachi Trains

There will be several more orders for the next generation of Hitachi’s high speed trains.

I have been critical of Hitachi’s manufacturing processes for these trains in the past, but they seem now to be running well in fleet service.

A standard UK train on 125 mph lines, that can also handle 140 mph with digital signalling must be a good thing for all sorts of reasons.

New Feeder Services

Several new feeder services have been indicated and there should be a lot more of these to bring the benefit of the high speed network to more of the UK population.

Delivering The Improvements

Geographically, the places where improvements are needed are spread thinly around the country and vary from projects with a cost of tens of millions to those with costs of tens of billions.

In the UK, we tend to go for the big hit, when perhaps several smaller ones might give a better short-term improvement.

We also duck projects, which would annoy the noisy local interests.

We need to have fundamental rethink about how we deliver and pay for rail improvements.

Conclusion

I am fairly pleased overall in that I think by 2024, many places in the UK, will have a much better train service than they do now!

Delivery of High Speed Two, East West Rail and Northern Powerhouse Rail as soon as possible after 2024, will be the icing on the cake.

Will It Be A One-Nation Project?

I think it can be!

December 16, 2019 Posted by AnonW | Transport/Travel | At A Glance – Northern Powerhouse Rail, Avanti West Coast, Azuma Train, Borders Railway, Class 802 Train, Clay Cross North Junction, Clay Cross North Junction And Sheffield Electrification, East Coast Main Line, East-West Rail, ERTMS, Glasgow South Western Line, Great Western Main Line, High Speed Two, High Speed Yorkshire, HS3/Northern Powerhouse Rail, Midland Main Line, West Coast Main Line | 6 Comments