Could High Speed Two Serve Chester And North Wales?
This diagram shows High Speed Two services, as they were originally envisaged before Phase 2 was discontinued.
Note.
- Trains to the left of the vertical black line are Phase 1 and those to the right are Phase 2.
- Full-Size trains are shown in blue.
- Classic-Compatible trains are shown in yellow.
- Blue circles are shown, where trains stop.
- The dotted circles are where trains split and join.
- In the red boxes routes alternate every hour.
Click on the diagram to enlarge it.
If I look at the trains counting from the left of the diagram, I see the following.
- Train 4 is a pair of Classic-Compatible trains, that split and join at Crewe, with one train going to Lancaster and the other to Liverpool Lime Street.
- Train 5 is a single Classic-Compatible train going to Liverpool Lime Street.
This gives Liverpool Lime Street two trains per hour (tph) and Lancaster one tph
Could train 5 be a a pair of Classic-Compatible trains, that split and join at Crewe, with one train going to Holyhead via Chester and the other to Liverpool Lime Street?
Consider.
- Yesterday, a pair of Class 805 trains, ran between Euston and Holyhead. Each Class 805 train is 130 metres long, so a pair of Class 805 trains is sixty metres longer than a High Speed Two Classic-Compatible train.
- I am certain, that a single High Speed Two Classic-Compatible train will fit the platforms between Crewe and Holyhead.
- Crewe and Holyhead is 105.5 miles and the route is not electrified.
- Crewe and Holyhead is double-track all the way except for the Britannia Bridge over the Menai Strait.
- With the exception of perhaps 2 to 3 miles, half the route between Crewe and Holyhead has a line speed of 90 mph. with the other half being 75 mph.
- Given the countryside and the number of important historic sites, electrification might be difficult, as the heritage Taliban will say no!
- It was promised by the last government that Crewe and Holyhead would be electrified, but I will assume it won’t be!
- Hitachi, who are part of the consortium building the High Speed Two Classic-Compatible trains have developed battery-electric high speed train technology, which is likely to be applied to the Current Class 805 trains, that work the route.
- Hitachi’s battery-electric high speed train technology can propel the trains at up to 125 mph, provided the track allows it.
I feel that Crewe and Holyhead can be developed into one of the most iconic high speed railways in the world, by using battery-electric high-speed trains. Tourists would come from all over the world, to experience mouse-quiet battery-electric trains.
High Speed Two should go for it!
These are some thoughts.
It Would Be A Green Route To Ireland
Consider.
The fastest direct Avanti service to Holyhead is scheduled to take three hours and forty-two minutes, with one hour and 46 minutes between Euston and Crewe, and one hour and fifty-seven minutes between Crewe and Holyhead.
- High Speed Two will knock thirty-four minutes off the time between Euston and Crewe, when the core route between Euston and Crewe is complete, which will reduce the time to three hours eight minutes, with with one hour and 12 minutes between Euston and Crewe, and one hour and fifty-seven minutes between Crewe and Holyhead.
- The Crewe and Holyhead section of the route would still take one hours and fifty-seven minutes, which is an average speed of just 54 mph, along the North Wales Coast.
- An overall time of three hours between Euston and Holyhead, would require an average speed along the North Wales coast, which would be an average speed of just 62 mph.
- The operating speed is an average of around 80 mph between Crewe and Holyhead, and would run the section of the route in 79 minutes, which would mean a Euston and Holyhead time of two hours and 31 minutes.
- A 100 mph average between Crewe and Holyhead, would run the section of the route in 63 minutes, which would mean a Euston and Holyhead time of of two hours and 15 minutes.
I believe that with track improvements, a more efficient stopping pattern and using Hitachi’s battery technology, that battery-electric High Speed Two Classic-Compatible trains could run between Euston and Holyhead in under two hours.
A fast ferry would complete the route between Holyhead and Dun Laoghaire.
Could More Than One Train Per Hour Be Sent To Chester And North Wales?
Consider.
- Because of the cancellation of Phase 2 of High Speed 2, there are spare paths on High Speed Two between London and the West Midlands.
- If the core section of High Speed Two is extended Northwards to Crewe, as advocated by Dyan Perry of the High Speed Rail Group, that I wrote about in The Future Of HS2 Could Lie In Its Original Vision, this would create extra paths to Crewe.
- If the West Midlands and Crewe section of the High Speed Two route has the same capacity as London Euston and the West Midlands it could handle seventeen tph.
- At present it looks like with the cancellation of Phase 2, the West Midlands and Crewe section will handle just ten tph.
, So there will be seven spare paths between Euston and Crewe!
In fact it will be better than that, as each train could be a pair of Classic-Compatible trains, that split and joined to serve two destinations.
Could A North Wales Service Call At Hawarden Airport?
Hawarden Airport is where Airbus build wings for their aircraft in the UK.This Google Map shows Hawarden Airport.
Note.
- The large runway.
- The various factory buildings.
- The North Wales Coast Line between Chester and Holyhead, runs along the North side of the Airport.
I doubt if Airbus wanted a station, it would be difficult to arrange.
Conclusion
Because of the vacant paths, it would appear that extra services to North Wales and North West England can be fitted in.
The Lack Of Information At Edinburgh Waverley Cost Me £55.10
The ongoing works at Edinburgh Waverley ruined my day. I had intended to come up to the city to take some photographs for this blog and see an old friend, who like me is widowed.
I also wanted to take a train to Leven to see the new stations.
I have a very unusual skin and on some days I can’t use ticket machines, so I need to use a human in a ticket office.
Today was one of those days and to complicate matters, I couldn’t find the ticket office.
I also wasted more time finding platform 17 for Leven.
Going back to London, where I live, my friend advised me to take the escalators from Princes Street to get into the station, which I have used many times before.
But they were shut and I missed the 16:13 Lumo to London by about a minute.
To get home, I had to buy another ticket on LNER for £55.10.
If there had been more information, perhaps in leaflets or from real people around the station, I would have had a much better day.
Exceptionally Low River Levels Raise Fears Over Water Supplies
The title of this post is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
This is the sub-heading.
Many of the UK’s rivers have hit exceptionally low levels and that could worsen in the next three months, according to the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology (CEH), raising questions over supplies to households, farmers and businesses.
These three introductory paragraphs add more details.
The warning comes after the driest spring in England since 1961, with northern regions experiencing the driest start to the year in nearly a century.
Almost all of the UK is expected to have below normal or low river levels in May, apart from the south-west of England.
The Environment Agency has said that the UK is at medium risk of drought and warned households of the risk of water restrictions.
In the 1970s, I was involved in a marginal way, in the planning of the water supply network in the UK, by the then Water Resources Board. My software called SPEED was used to solve the hundreds of differential equations involved.
Since the 1970s, I have felt, that as water supply in the UK has been fairly good, that the engineers, planners and mathematicians of the Water Resources Board didn’t do a bad job.
I don’t think, I can remember a period as long as this without rain.
I am drinking heavily to keep hydrated and I’m already today on my second bottle of Adnams Ghost Ship 0.5 % Beer.
But it just seems to go straight out through my skin, which I talked about in My Strange Skin.
I am Jewish in my father’s male line and Huguenot in my mother’s, so I have lots of ancestors, who lived in poor living conditions. So did Darwinian selection produce my leaky skin, that also heals itself quickly, in the harsh living conditions.
But on the other hand does it make me dehydrated all the time? And also create lots of red spots all over my body?
It’s not something new, as I can remember feeling this this as a child and helping my mother to count all the spots.
I hope that I will be fine, when we get some rain.
An Alternative Lift At Caledonian Road and Barnsbury Station
I went to look at something this morning, that might have made a post for this blog.
But as it wasn’t worth photographing, I decided to come home and decided to take a train home from Caledonian Road and Barnsbury station.
The station is of a slightly unusual design, which is described in Is Caledonian Road And Barnsbury An Ideal Four-Track Station?.
There is a wide island platform, where the Overground trains call on either side, which is connected to the station exit, by a half-bridge with lifts.
It was an affordable way to make the station accessible for all.
But today the lift on the island platform had failed.
- As I approached the bridge on entering the station, a London Overground station-man was waving at me from the island platform.
- He shouted at me, that the lift on the island platform had failed.
- So I took the working lift and then walked across to the central lift tower, with its failed lift.
- He met me at the top of the stairs and offered to escort me down.
- But I said, that if I could go down the right hand side, with my good arm on the rail, I’d be OK.
- He said that would be fine and he watched me descend, which I did safely.
- Whilst I was there, two mothers with young children in buggies arrived on a train. So after a quick chat, the mothers carried their children up the stairs and he carried the buggies.
London Overground had certainly setup an alternative approach, that should work well until the lift is repaired.
Getting Home From Caledonian Road and Barnsbury Station
The Balls Pond Road of Round The Horne and Beyond Our Ken fame in the 1950s and 1960s, runs between Highbury and Islington and Dalston Junction stations.
- I live about half way between the two stations and as, what would have been my nearest station; Mildmay Park closed in 1934, I have to get a bus from Dalston Junction to get home.
- Today, though, I took a slightly longer route, but one with minimal walking.
- I took a train four stops to Hackney Central station.
- I used the bridge with lifts to cross the tracks at Hackney Central station.
- I exited Hackney Central station through the second exit on Graham Road, that was opened in 2022.
- After crossing Graham Road on a light-controlled crossing, I was able to catch a 38 bus to within a hundred metres of my house.
There would be no case for reopening Mildmay Park station, but as I get older this route is the easiest.
Haventus, Sarens PSG Unveil ‘On-Land to Launch’ Floating Wind Solution
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on offshoreWIND.biz.
This is the sub-heading.
UK companies Haventus and Sarens PSG have developed a low-cost solution for the integration and launch of floating offshore wind turbines.
These two introductory paragraphs add more details.
Haventus said that it is working to enable offshore wind project developers to acquire fully assembled floating bases and turbines at Ardersier, Scotland, as well as providing dry storage which does not require complex licensing.
A heavy-lift solution will enable safe on-land integration and launch to the harbour of fully integrated floating offshore wind turbines.
Note.
- Haventus introduce themselves on their web site, as an energy transition facilities provider, offering pivotal infrastructure for the offshore wind industry. The first facility, they are developing is the Port of Ardesier in the North of Scotland, to the North-East of Inverness.
- Sarens PSG introduce themselves on their web site, as specialists in turnkey heavy lifting and transportation solutions for offshore wind component load-in, marshalling, assembly, deployment, and integration.
It looks to me that the two companies are ideal partners to put together flotillas of large floating wind turbines.
These two paragraphs seem to describe the objectives of the partnership.
This should shorten supply chains through single-site sourcing of key components and remove the operational, safety, logistical, and engineering complexity that comes with storage and integration activities in the marine environment.
The companies also said that the solution can also drive down the costs and accelerate floating offshore wind deployment by simplifying transport and installation requirements and remove the obstacles of weather and design life variables that must be considered with ‘wet’ storage and integration.
I was always told as a young engineer to define your objectives first, as you might find this helps with the design and costs of the project.
I do wonder sometimes, if the objectives of High Speed Two smelt too much of a project designed by lots of parties, who all had different objectives.
The Location Of The Port Of Ardesier
This Google Map shows the location of the Port of Ardesier in relation to Inverness, the Orkneys and Shetlands, and Norway.
The Port of Ardesier would appear to be ideally placed to bring in business for the partnership.
Government Approval For Large Solar Farm
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
This is the sub-heading.
A large solar farm in East Yorkshire has been given the go ahead by the government.
These two introductory paragraphs add more detail.
The 3,155 acre (1,277 hectares) site will be built on land around Gribthorpe, Spaldington and Wressle and Howden.
Its developers said it would produce 400 megawatts of electricity – enough to power 100,000 homes.
Note.
- This solar farm is five square miles or a 2.2 mile square.
- Due to the size of the scheme the planning application was handled by the Planning Inspectorate as it was classed as national infrastructure.
- Ed Miliband may have been involved in the final decision.
- The solar farm would connect to the National Grid at the Drax substation in North Yorkshire.
But the solar farm is not without opposition, as these last three paragraphs indicate.
George McManus, spokesman for East Riding Against Solar Expansion (ERASE), said the approval “brings us a step closer to enormous swathes of agricultural land being blanketed in a million, Chinese manufactured, solar panels.”
He added: “Other projects in the pipeline will see another 20,000 acres disappear under glass.
“The East Riding is being industrialised and people need to wake up to that.”
Nothing is said about where Reform UK’s Mayor for Hull and East Yorkshire sits.
Silvertown Tunnel: Has Sadiq Khan’s £2.2billion Scheme Ended Rush-Hour Jams?
This video from The Standard shows the Silvertown Tunnel in the Peak.
It also shows traffic in the Rotherhithe Tunnel.
Name Your Poison!
The weather is hot and my cardiologist, GP and physiotherapist are advising me to keep hydrated.
This picture shows what I’m drinking.
Note.
- The 500 ml. bottle of beer costs £1.25 or £0.0025 per ml.
- The 330 ml. can of Diet Coke costs £4.75 for 8 or £0.0018 per ml.
The prices are from Ocado.
Tapwater is not much cheaper.
Could High Speed Two Serve Blackpool North?
Consider.
- Blackpool North station is electrified and will have an electrified route to London Euston HS2 and Birmingham Curzon Street stations, when High Speed Two opens.
- Yesterday, both 11-car and 9-car Class 390 trains, which are longer than single High Speed Two classic-compatible trains, used Blackpool North station.
- Blackpool is noted for fresh air and fun.
- Blackpool needs leveling-up. Surely High Speed Two will help with this?
- Blackpool has a unique Modern and Ancient tramway to bring residents and visitors to High Speed Two.
I am fairly sure, that single High Speed Two class-compatible trains could use Blackpool North station.
But could another High Speed Two service have a path between London and Preston to serve Blackpool?
Because of the cancellation of Phase 2 of High Speed 2, there are spare paths on High Speed Two between London and the West Midlands.
If the core section of High Speed Two is extended Northwards to Crewe, as advocated by Dyan Perry of the High Speed Rail Group, that I wrote about in The Future Of HS2 Could Lie In Its Original Vision, this would create extra paths to Crewe.
It looks to me, that the tricky part of the route is between Crewe and Preston.
This diagram shows High Speed Two services, as they were originally envisaged before Phase 2 was discontinued.
Note.
- Trains to the left of the vertical black line are Phase 1 and those to the right are Phase 2.
- Full-Size trains are shown in blue.
- Classic-Compatible trains are shown in yellow.
- Blue circles are shown, where trains stop.
- The dotted circles are where trains split and join.
- In the red boxes routes alternate every hour.
Click on the diagram to enlarge it.
Note that if Phase 1 were to be completed to Crewe, there would be five full-size and five classic-compatible trains using the West Midlands and Crewe section of the High Speed Two route, of which five trains would terminate at Manchester Piccadilly HS2 station and two classic-compatible trains would terminate at Liverpool Lime Street.
So just three Scottish trains and one to Lancaster would go North of Warrington Bank Quay station, which would be an average of one train every fifteen minutes.
High Speed Two will be fully digitally signalled and I’m sure that trains could run as flights of two or more trains, a couple of minutes apart.
This would mean that a London and Blackpool North service could run say two minutes behind one of the London and Scotland services to Preston
- Between London and the West Midlands, there would be twelve trains per hour (tph).
- Between the West Midlands and Crewe, there would be also be twelve tph.
- Between Crewe and Preston, there would be five tph.
I believe it would be possible for High Speed Two to run a London and Blackpool North service, provided that the London Euston to Crewe core of High Speed Two is completed soon after Phase 1 is completed.
It should also be noted, that I believe the second Scottish service from London could also have a flight with another service. So could Barrow or Blackburn have a High Speed Two service from London?
Surgeon Invents Plastic-Reducing Urine Collection Pot
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on the BBC.
This is the sub-heading.
A hospital specialist has invented a new product that manages to reduce plastic and simplify the process of testing urine.
These three introductory paragraphs, add more detail.
Consultant urologist Dr Nick Burns-Cox has been working on his own innovation, the Pee-In-Pot (PiP) for 10 years.
Made from bamboo and sugar cane, it removes four items from the current urine collection process, three of them plastic.
Mr Burns-Cox, who works at Musgrove Park Hospital in Taunton, said he hoped it would cut down the use of single-use plastic in the NHS and reduce the chance of errors.
I like the design of this simple device.
But, personally, I hope it becomes universal, as I have trouble giving urine samples.
I had my stroke in Hong Kong and the Chinese nurses, were so aggressive, when it came to taking urine samples, they have given me an aversion to them.
In my view the device could help the patient psychologically, at what could be a difficult time.
The Anonymous Widower 