The West Midlands Day Ranger Ticket
For my trip around Birmingham last week, I had decided to use a West Midlands Day Ranger Ticket.
I had hoped to purchase one in the Booking Office at Lichfield Trent Valley station, but it was closed and only with difficulty was I able to purchase one on the train into Birmingham.
But I didn’t get a map with the ticket, as I have had in Lancashire before, where Northern Rail have a leaflet detailing all their Day Ranger tickets. There’s one here on the National Rail web site.
On the Thursday, I walked to New Street and bought a ticket, but the only map they had was a photocopy.
The area covered by a West Midlands Day Ranger is large and covers the area bounded by Crewe, Shrewsbury, Hereford, Worcester, Stratford-on-Avon, Leamington Spa, Northampton, Rugby, Nuneaton, Lichfield and Stoke.
As trains are generally frequent between all stations, it was an ideal ticket for my purposes and I got good value on both days in Birmingham. Coming back to London on the Thursday, I used my Day Ranger Ticket to get to Northampton, where I bought a ticket for Watford Junction and travelled back on a virtually-empty London Midland train.
The Overground from Watford Junction wasn’t empty, as I caught the aftermath of the rush hour on the day of the Tube stroke.
The two possible disadvantages of the West Midlands Day Ranger Ticket, is that it must be used after 9:30 and isn’t valid on the Midlands Metro.
Next time, I want to visit several places in the West Midlands, I’ll go to Leamington Spa or Northampton and then use a West Midlands Day Ranger.
Young People Increasingly Turning To Trains
This was the headline on an article on the RailNews web site. This short extract is typical of the article.
One ‘dramatic finding’ is ‘a more utilitarian attitude to car ownership’ with greater weight being placed on alternatives.
Younger people are also ‘particularly concerned’ about the high cost of using a car – including insurance, parking and learning to drive.
I wonder if the study is mirrored in countries like Germany and France!
Manchester’s Ticketing In Disarray
According to this article on Global Rail News, Manchester’s plans for smart ticketing have gone down the pan.
Could the failure of this system be caused, by not using the same successful system as London?
After all the minimum requirements of any smart electronic ticketing must include :-
- A Smart card like Oyster
- The ability to use contactless bank cards from all over the world.
- The ability to use ApplePay and the future AndroidPay.
London isn’t quite there yet, but when AndroidPay arrives and they can accept any contactless bank card, they will have set the global standard, to which all transport ticketing systems must aspire.
Any city or region, that doesn’t have a system that matches London, will lose out on the independent visitors.
The biggest benefits of contactless ticketing on buses, trams and trains are.
- Cash money and its associated costs and problems are taken out of the system.
- Attacks on staff are reduced.
- Boarding is quicker, so services are faster.
- Ridership increases.
- I have a feeling that by analysing the enormous amounts of joirney data generated, prediction of where new and improved services should go is very much better.
- The book is open on fare evasion, but I think it has dropped.
So come on Manchester, join the twenty-first century!
All I Need In A Hotel
I’m only a man with simple tastes.
That’s all I need for a night.
These are my pet hates.
- Having to put your key into a holder to get electricity.
- Taps and showers that need glasses to work out how they work.
- Televisions without Freeview in the UK.
- Rooms that are too hot.
Good News For Blackpool
Blackpool hasn’t had much good news over the last few years, but could this news article in the Guardian, be the start of better times for the town.
The article describes how Great North Western Railway has been given permission to run six return trains a day between Queen’s Park in North London and Blackpool. This is an extract from the article.
GNWR has been granted firm rights to run services from Blackpool North to Queen’s Park in north-west London, calling at Crewe, Preston and Poulton-le-Fylde. GNWR intends to run its services beyond Queen’s Park into the mainline terminus at Euston, but this is contingent on Network Rail agreeing to grant the slots when the scale of disruption of work to construct the new HS2 line becomes clear.
It also intends to call at Milton Keynes, Nuneaton, Tamworth, Lichfield Trent Valley and Kirkham and Wesham, depending on the conclusion of other works by Network Rail.
The services will be run using new Class 390 Pendolino trains.
I think there are two possible outcomes.
The trains are delivered and six services a day are run between Blackpool and London.
But Virgin Trains already operate trains two services a day between Blackpool and London, so I would assume they will use every trick in the book to see that GNWR don’t get a successful service running on the route.
The only way to probably fight off the interloper, would be to run a comparable service.
So in either way it is good news for Blackpool.
To me, the interesting idea, is to use Queen’s Park as a London terminal, if Network Rail can’t find paths to get access to Euston.
It would appear that Queen’s Park station has plenty of space and platforms. Also because of the Bakerloo Line it has good connections to Central London.
So could it be a station that is used to take pressure from Euston during the building of HS2, by perhaps being the London terminus for some London Midland services, even if it is not used for GNWR’s services to Blackpool and other places.
It’s certainly not a problem, I would want to solve, as many won’t want there services moved from Euston.
On a personal note, the Queen’s Park to Blackpool services will be something I will use, as it is proposed they will stop at Milton Keynes, Nuneaton, Tamworth, Lichfield Trent Valley, Crewe, Preston, Poulton-le-Fylde and Kirkham and Wesham.
Also for me, Queen’s Park is not a difficult station to get to from where I live in Dalston.
I shall watch GNWR’s plans unfold with interest, as just as they will have a positive effect on Blackpool, they should benefit me too!
The New Northampton Station
Surely, a town trying to sell itself as a town to both develop and build cutting-edge products, needs a modrn gateway to the world.
Over the last couple of years, Northampton station has been rebuilt and it is now a superb gateway to the town.
When the platforms and stairs have been finished, it’ll be one of the best medium-sized stations in the country.
Redditch Station
Redditch station is a small station, at the end of the mainly single-track Redditch Branch of the Cross-City Line in Birmingham.
I had hoped to find a cafe close, but there was nothing obvious, so I got back on the Class 323 Train and returned to Birmingham.
Redditch doesn’t quite get the service of say West Croydon on the Overground of four five-car trains an hour, but it does get three three-car trains every hour, which is better than many places in the UK and the wider world.
I would think that service levels greater than this would need another platform and complete doubling of the branch to Barnt Green. This Google Map shows that there is little space for another platform.
Redditch Station
As the post about Bromsgrove station showed, the Cross-City Line is adding four much-needed platforms at Bromsrove, just a few miles away.
So could we be seeing three trains an hour to each destination?
But I just get the feeling that some four-car trains might be needed after one trip in the peak.
Alvechurch Station
The Redditch Branch of the Cross-City Line in Birmingham has recently been upgraded, with a major rebuild at Alvechurch station. Wikipedia says this about the upgrade.
The section of the Cross-City Line between Barnt Green and Redditch was single track. Network Rail planned to increase capacity by adding a passing loop and second platform at Alvechurch. This was also to include a footbridge and lifts to reach the new platform. This was to allow the service to be increased from two to three trains per hour.
These are a few pictures of the new station.
The improvements at Alvechurch very much show how one thing can lead to another.
But as I can testify, the result gives three trains an hour to Reddith and although I didn’t alight there a full step-free station at Alvechurch.
Bromsgrove Station
Bromsgrove station is unusual in that it is at the bottom of the historic Lickey Incline, which for in railway terms is a very steep hill. Wikipedia says this about the station.
Bromsgrove is only one of four stations in the UK which get annual usage of over half a million journeys with just an hourly service (Blackrod, Hartlepool and Inverurie being the other 3 stations).
So Network Rail are rebuilding the station and electrifying the Lickey Incline to add Bromsgrove to Birmingham’s Cross-City Line as described in this section in Wikipedia. These pictures show the current station and the works for the new one.
There will be four platforms and a large car-park, so obviously they are expecting an increase in passenger numbers. This Google Map shows the station and its relationship to the town.
Bromsgrove Station
I can’t visit Bromsgrove station without commenting on the Lickey Incline, which I talked about in Up And Down The Lickey Incline. The views are pretty good as you look out over the Worcestershire countryside.
Going down, I felt that the train was very quiet, as the driver was relying on Newton’s friend, but going back to Birmingham, the underfloor diesel engines on my fully-loaded Class 172 train, were working very hard.
My train had taken the Lickey Incline from a standing start at Bromsgrove station, unlike the trains going straight through, which seemed to use the extra momentum of higher speed to climb the slope as easily as possible.
Sadly, I wasn’t treated to a show, as a banking engine pushed a heavy freight train up the hill.
Along The Cross-City Line
The Cross-City Line stretches across Birmingham between Lichfield Trent Valley and Redditch stations, calling in the city centre at New Street. There pictures are from Wednesday’s trip from Lichfield into the centre.
And these are some images from between New Street and Redditch.
The line has the feel and in some cases look of the London Overground, except that a lot of the stations were obviously built using a kit of standard parts.
The Cross-City Line has an advantage that a lot of the London Overground would like – Space and platforms long enough for more than six carriages.
If I have a criticism of the Cross-City Line, it is that it doesn’t have enough stations in the city centre, with too much reliance on the busy New Street. As the line passes underneath Moor Street and through important areas east and west of the major station, surely a couple of extra stations would make the line much more customer-friendly. Especially, if it could link up better with the Midland Metro.
, The frequency is higher than the London Overground’s four trains an hour, which is becoming the accepted lower limit for a Metro service.
Camp Hill Line
There are aspirations to incorporate the Camp Hill Line into the system, to effectively give another East-West route, south of the city centre. With the West Midlands getting responsibility for transport in the next few years, this will happen. But if you look at Birmingham’s rail lines, history says, it might not be done in the obvious way, but in something much better.
According to Wikipedia, the Council is talking about a three trains per hour service between reopened platforms at Kings Norton and Moor Street.
Without doubt in Germany, this service would be operated by tram-trains, which on arriving at Moor Street would join the Midland Metro. This Google Map shows Moor Street station.
Could The Metro Squeeze Through Here?
It is a tight area, but then so it was at Snow Hill and they have got the Midland Metro through that concrete jungle.
Sutton Park Line
The Sutton Park Line is another aspiration of the authorities for opening as a passenger route between Rugeley and Water Orton. At its northern end, it will connect to the route between Rugeley and Walsall, which is currently being electrified and at the southern, it will connect to the route between New Street and Nuneaton.
The line also crosses the Cross-City Line at Sutton Coldfield. This map show the two-level crossing.
Sutton Park And Cross-City Lines
So is there scope for a new interchange station here. Only traffic statistics will know.
But above all the future for the Cross-City Line must be very bright, even if the direction of expansion has yet to be decided.
The Anonymous Widower 