SWR Applies To Build New London Maintenance Depot
The title of this post is the same as that of an article in Edition 865 of Rail Magazine.
This is the first paragraph.
Hounslow Borough Council is considering an application by South Western Railway to build a new depot on the site of Feltham’s former marshalling yard in South West London.
This Google Map shows the site.
It appears to be remarkably clear and the only clue to its former use must be Feltham Railway Club.
- The depot will lie between Feltham and Whitton stations on the Southern side of the Waterloo-Reading Line.
- The depot will have ten roads and will be able to accommodate ten car trains.
- Construction will start in February 2019 and the depot will open in 2020.
There houldn’t appear to be too many construction problems.
I do have a few questions.
Would The Opportunity Be Taken To Upgrade The Waterloo-Reading Line?
Waterloo to Reading and Windsor services might be increased in frequency.
Could an extra track be added alongside the depot or other works be performed to add capacity to services Reading and Windsor?
What Will Be The Affects Of The Proposed Heathrow Southern Railway?
The Heathrow Southern Railway is a proposal for a new route between Waterloo and Heathrow Airport via Clapham Junction and Staines.
Should Level Crossings In The Area Be Closed?
There are level crossings at Barnes, Feltham, Isleworth, Mortlake and North Sheen.
Would The Land Be Better Used For Housing?
This could be the major objection from the Council.
They could always build a depot with housing on top.
Could A Bigger Feltham Station Be built At The Same Time?
This could be a possibility, with perhaps a turnback platform for the proposed West London Orbital Railway.
Conclusion
Building the depot seems a good and fairly simple plan, but willit cover all possibilities?
Putin’s Only Aircraft Carrier Out Of Action
The title of this post is the same as that of an article in today’s copy of The Times.
This is the first two paragraphs.
Russia could lose its only aircraft carrier after an accident left a five-metre hole in the flight deck.
Admiral Kuznetsov was in the Arctic for repairs when the floating dock underneath it sank, causing a 70-tonne crane to crash on to the carrier killing one person and injuring two.
Enough said!
Could There Be A Tram-Train Connection At Reeve’s Corner?
A few day’s ago I took the tram from Croydon to IKEA. Coming back, I got off the tram at the Reeve’s Corner stop and took these pictures.
Note how close the trams are to the rail lines just to the West of West Croydon station.
This Google Map shows the area.
Note.
- The road bridge appears in several of the pictures.
- The rail lines appear to have plenty of space to accomodate an updated layout.
- The Reeve’s Corner tram stop is only used by trams going to Croydon.
- The trams share a single-track section between Reeve’s Corner and Wandle Park tram stop.
The single-track layout must be a restriction on the number of trams that can run between Croydon and Wimbledon.
This map from carto.metro.free.fr, shows the layout of the tracks in the area.
This map shows why there is plenty of space, as there are the dotted-lines of the West Croydon to Wimbledon Line, which was closed in 1997 to be converted into the London Tramlink.
This Google Map shows the route between Wandle Park and Revve’s Corner and how it crosses the rail lines.
Note that Reeve’s Corner is just beyond the North-East corner of this map.
Third-Rail Tram-Trains And The London Tramlink
The London Tramlink was designed twenty years ago, well before we had modern tram-trains, like those that are running all over Karlsruhe and have just started services between Sheffield and Rotherham.
I believe that third-rail tram-trains, as I proposed in The Third-Rail Tram-Train, are a viable concept, if they only use third-rail electrification, when running as a train.
Why Create A Tram-Train Connection At Reeve’s Corner?
The obvious reason, is that it would allow tram-trains to run between Wimbledon and West Croydon stations.
To the East of West Croydon, they could go to places like the proposed Steatham Interchange or the existing Crystal Palace, Beckenham Junction or Bromley stations.
Conclusion
Creating a tram-train connection at Reeve’s Corner is one of a number of places, where the trams and South London’s third-rail network can be connected.
I believe that developing these connections could enable several useful routes.
- Extra train and tram services to Beckenham Junction station.
- Tram-trains to Bromley South station.
- Extending the Bromley North Branch using tram-trains to Bromley South station, by street running through Bromley Town Centre.
Tram-trains could even serve Gatwick Airport and provide services around the wider Airport site.
Is Philip Green Going To Suffer The Same Fate As Gerald Ratner?
Gerald Ratner‘s misdemeanour was that he described some of his company’s product as crap, in a rather elaborate way, in a speech to the Institute of Directors.
The company’s share value dropped and he eventually left the company.
But he obviously has a lot of good qualities as he has been successful since.
Philip Green on the other hand, hasn’t had the best of publicity in recent years and especially in the last few months.
How long will it be before he suffers an enforced retirement?
Cost Of Widening The Last Section Of The A465 Will Be More Than The Entire South Wales Metro
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Wales Online.
The article is a good example of comparing costs between road and rail and is well worth a read.
Ludgate Circus And Blackfriars Station
This morning, I had an excellent full English breakfast with a large mug of tea in Leon at Ludgate Circus.
It is unusual for a fast-food restaurant, in that it has acres of space, alcohol, including gluten-free beer, for those who want it, five or six large tables that seat ten and an outdoor area for a sunny and warm day.
So at ten in the morning, I can always find a place to lay out my copy of The Times and read it at leisure.
Others seemed to be having breakfast meetings or encounters.
The Wikipedia entry for Ludgate Circus has a section on Stations, which says this.
Had the Fleet line of the London Underground been built, it would have had a station at Ludgate Circus. However, the Fleet line’s proposed route evolved into what is now the Jubilee line, which went south of the River Thames before reaching Ludgate Circus. In 1990 however, St. Paul’s Thameslink (later renamed City Thameslink) was opened on the site of the proposed Ludgate Circus station.
North-South Thameslink services through the double-ended City Thameslink station, with its numerous escalators and lifts, will reach twenty-four trains per hour (tph), from the current sixteen tph by the end of next year.
I could have taken Thameslink to Blackfriars station, but I walked and took these pictures on the way.
It is not a pleasant walk with all the traffic.
Next time, I’ll take Thameslink!
The reason, I went to Blackfriars, was to catch a Circle or District Line train to Tower Hill station.
Where is the Fleet Line, when you need it?
Phase one of the line ran to Charing Cross station, where it was extended to become the Jubilee Line, we have today.
The original plan for the Fleet Line as given by Wikipedia was.
Phase 2: would have extended the line along Fleet Street to stations at Aldwych, Ludgate Circus, Cannon Street and Fenchurch Street. Parliamentary approval for this phase was granted on 27 July 1971.
Phase 3: would have seen the line continue under the river to Surrey Docks (now Surrey Quays) station on the East London Line, taking over both of the ELL’s branches to New Cross Gate and New Cross stations, with an extension to Lewisham.
Parliamentary approval for this phase as far as New Cross was granted on 5 August 1971 and the final section to Lewisham was granted approval on 9 August 1972.
Phase 2 would have whisked me to Fenchurch Street station and Phase 3 sounds a lot like the current proposal for the Bakerloo Line Extension.
I very much feel that there is a need for a line across London on the route of the Fleet Line and Transport for London have a plan to extend the Docklands Light Railway, that I wrote about in A Connection Between City Thameslink Station And The Docklands Light Railway.
This map from Transport for London, shows the possible Western extension of the DLR.
With all the problems of the funding of Crossrail 2, that I wrote about in Crossrail 2 Review Prompts Fresh Delays, could this extension of the DLR, be a good idea?
It would certainly provide an East-West route at City Thameslink station.
Crystal Balls For Brexit
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on Rail Technology Magazine.
This is the first paragraph.
Have you noticed how it is almost impossible to have a sensible debate on the impacts of Brexit? The rules seem to be: take a firm, preferably dogmatic, position; talk about how history supports that position; refuse to entertain dissent; retreat to meet likeminded people; remain strangely bemused by the question, ‘what will happen next?
The article then goes on to give the author’s view on what Brexit will mean for the rail industry.
He comes to the following conclusion.
Brexit will bring costs, uncertainty, and a one-off opportunity to refresh our industry, reaching further into the communities that rail serves. Let’s grab it.
The article is well worth a detailed read.
Would You Want To Buy Part Of A Used Insurance Company From This Man?
There is an article in today’s Times, which is entitled Arron Banks Wants To Sell £4million Stake In Firm.
My answer would be a big no!
The City Of London Reaches For The Sky And Keeps More Feet On The Ground
This article on Construction News is entitled City of London To ‘Encourage’ New Skyscrapers.
This is the first two paragraphs.
The City of London Corporation has opened the door to a new wave of towers and an overhaul of one of its main routes as part of draft new local and transport plans.
The local authority wants to encourage the development of new towers able to provide an “iconic image of the City” that will enhance its global standing in the finance, professional services and commerce sectors.
The main route to be upgraded will be Bishopsgate between Liverpool Street station and London Bridge.
- Pedestrians will have more priority.
- Cycling and walking will be improved.
- The public realm will be upgraded.
It the Peak hours, it could become one the busiest walking and cycling routes in the world.
- At the Northern End, there is Liverpool Street station and Crossrail.
- At the Southern End, there is London Bridge, London Bridge station, Southwark Cathedral and the River Thames.
- Just to the West, is the massive Bank station complex.
- Just to the East, is the soon-to-be-redeveloped Fenchurch Street station.
In addition, the road is fringed on either side with alleys, side streets and the impressive Leadenhall Market, many of which are full of restaurants, cafes, pubs and retail outlets.
Conclusion
In the article, Brexit wasn’t mentioned once, but a large increase in employment wasn’t.
Has the City of London, just put several handfuls of fingers up to the selfish plans of others?
Drilling Starts For ‘Hot Rocks’ Power In Cornwall
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
For as long as I can remember, there have been plans to tap the ‘hot rocks’ under Cornwall for heat and convert it into electricity.
Geothermal power is used in many places around the world.
The Wikipedia entry is worth a read and the Utility-Grade Stations section has this paragraph.
The largest group of geothermal power plants in the world is located at The Geysers, a geothermal field in California, United States. As of 2004, five countries (El Salvador, Kenya, the Philippines, Iceland, and Costa Rica) generate more than 15% of their electricity from geothermal sources.
This is also said.
Enhanced geothermal systems that are several kilometres in depth are operational in France and Germany and are being developed or evaluated in at least four other countries.
As the Cornish project appears to have a degree of EU funding, it looks like Cornwall is one of the four other countries.
The BBC also had a report on the Cornish drilling this morning. They made a point to say that this project has nothing to do with fracking.
Fracking is an emotive project, but we seem to forget that a lot of the engineering and drilling techniques used in the process are also used in other applications, like obtaining fresh water and drilling very deep holes, as is proposed in Cornwall.
It is also enlightening to look at this Wikipedia entry, which describes geothermal power in Germany.
This is said about the sustainability of the power source in Germany.
n the same year (2003) the TAB (bureau for technological impact assessment of the German Bundestag) concluded that Germany’s geothermal resources could be used to supply the entire base load of the country. This conclusion has regard to the fact that geothermal sources have to be developed sustainably because they can cool out if overused.
Based on this, I can understand the enthusiasm for using the technique in Cornwall.
On the BBC this morning, it was said that the Cornish borehole could produce enough electricity for 3,000 homes.
A page on the OVO Energy website, says this.
Household electricity use in the UK dropped under 4,000kWh for the first time in decades in 2014. At an average of 3,940kWh per home, this was about 20% higher than the global average for electrified homes of 3,370kWh.
At 4,000 kWh a year, a home would use an average of 0.46 kW per hour.
This means that to run 3,000 houses needs 1.4 MW per hour.
A typical price of a kWh of electricity is thirteen pence excluding VAT, which means that this plant could earn around £178 per hour or £1.6million a year.
A Project Video
Access the project video here.
Conclusion
I feel that geothermal power could have a promising future in Cornwall.
The Anonymous Widower 