Kensal Rise Station
Kensal Rise Station is being updated with a lift on the Eastbound platform.
If you compare the state of this station with that of Prittlewell, it illustrates how it was right for London Overground to takeover the Lea Valley Lines from Abellio Greater Anglia.
Bruce Grove Station – 11th July 2015
When I visited Bruce Grove station in September 2014, I wasn’t impressed and gave the station a score of 1/10.
These pictures were taken today.
It may be cleaner, but I don’t think it’s much better, although I’d now give it 2/10.
South Tottenham Station – 6th July 2015
The rebuilding of South Tottenham station with lifts is coming on.
I was changing to the Victoria Line by walking to Seven Sisters station.
Travelling In Style Between Liverpool Street And Hackney Downs Stations
There are some Class 317 trains, with First Class seats, that work the Lea Valley Lines into Liverpool Street.
Obviously, when the new Class 378 trains arrive, these will go somewhere more suited to this luxury.
The Site Of The Hall Farm Curve
I was travelling north on the Lea Valley Line and just before arrival at Tottenham Hale station, I took these pictures of the site of the Hall Farm Curve.
The Class 315 or 317 train in the last picture is a Chingford Branch train on its way to Hackney Downs and Liverpool Street stations.
This Google Map shows the Lea Valley Line from where the Chingford Branch crosses over the top to Lea Bridge station.
Hall Farm Curve And Lea Bridge Station
The scar of the old Hall Farm Curve connecting the two lines clearly shows.
Note the new Lea Bridge station will be built, where the Lea Valley Line crosses Lea Bridge Road.
The Next Phase Of The Overground
An article in City AM talks about the choosing the new operator of the London Overground.
Quite frankly, I don’t care who runs the Overground, provided they do a good job. I also know that if they don’t perform, they’ll feel the fullforce of the Mayor’s boot or stilettos.
But what is interesting is these paragraphs, which detail changes to the system in the next few years.
And Liverpool Street revellers will be pleased to hear the contract will include “options” to introduce all-night services at weekends from 2017.
TfL said frequency on the northern section of the line will be increased by 25 per cent next year, from eight to 10 trains.
For me, late night services on the Overground are to be welcomed, as for example, it will make getting home after a late evening arrival into London easier. An increase in frequency on trains through Dalston Kingsland and West Hampstead will benefit everybody.
Long may the Overground spread its orange tentacles through the city, to enrich and ease the lives of Londoners and visitors alike.
How’s The Overground To Enfield Town Doing?
In Transport for London Do The Sensible Thing, I said this.
Various news items on the Overground like this story in the Enfield Independent, have been reporting that the Class 315 and Class 317 Trains on the Lea Valley Lines are not very reliable. I’ve read somewhere that they are spending up to two million pounds to get them running better.
So I thought I had better go and check to see how the lines to Enfield were doing, by taking the train to Enfield Town from Hackney Downs and then walking to Enfield Chase to get a Class 313 train back home.
The pictures show the following.
1. An eight-car Class 315 train was working one of the last of the rush-hour services into Liverpool Street. So hopefully, London Overground have now got all services back up to their correct length.
2. Most trains I saw seemed to have a London Overground roundel on the side, even if they weren’t repainted.
3. I travelled out to Enfield Town in a very clean eight-car Class 317 train, that had been upgraded for the Stansted Express with tables, luggage racks and First Class. When was Enfield Town last served by a train so luxurious? In some ways it’s a waste, as surely there are other places, where as soon as the replacement Class 378 trains arrive, these old Stansted Expresses could be more gainfully employed.
Perhaps, they could serve Glasgow Airport? But then the Scots would complain, that they were getting London’s clapped-out second-hand trains. I noticed as I left that the train had had a full service in September last year. Old they may be, but they are far from scrapyard-ready! I suppose an old Mark 3-based train, is still a Mark 3-based train, with all the strength and ride quality that means.
4. In the meantime, this Class 317 train, is probably doing a good job in pacifying the natives of Enfield.
5. After my walk through Enfield Town centre, I got on a Class 313 train to get back to London. Now that is a clapped-out train and I wonder how many passengers for London from Enfield are thinking about changing their point of departure for London. If you commute and have a Freedom Pass, this is now unrestricted from Enfield Town, so this must have an effect on commuting pstterns.
6. I took the picture of the pantograph on the Class 313 train, as this is a special job, so that the trains can run in the restricted tunnels to Moorgate. It only needs to fold away very snuggly, as that section of line uses third rail for its electricity.
I will ask this question, about what I saw.
London Overground have put an option for 249 extra vehicles in the order for the Class 378 trains, as I reported in Have Transport for London Other Plans For The Overground?
So will some of these optional vehicles in the Class 378 order end up working the Great Northern lines into Moorgate and Kings Cross?
They have a lot going for them.
1. They are certified for working in tunnels, as on the East London Line, they run sixteen times each hour both ways through the Thames Tunnel.
2. There is a dual-voltage variant of the Class 378 train.
3. There would be the problem of designing a new pantograph well and certifying them for the Great Northern tunnel, but that is not as great a task as designing a whole new class of train.
It would probably be a special variant of the Class 378 train, but it hopefully, it would not be a difficult design to create.
We can do a little calculation on where the 249 extra vehicles might go.
Various documents show that by 2030, London Overground wants to be running six-car trains on the North and East London Lines. So if the existing fleet was all made six car, that would probably need 63 vehicles, as there are 57 trains on the system currently and another six are on order.
If we assume that Transport for London’s other target, the Dartford Lines, comes with some fairly new trains, this may or may not use up some of those options.
Taking the 63 off the 249 gives us 186 vehicles, which leaves 186, which can be 62 three-car trains or 46 four-car ones, with a few vehicles left over. Intriguingly, they could also be configured as 31 six-car trains.
So how many trains would be needed? At present the line is worked by 44 3-car trains. So if it was deemed that under London Overground, the service would be as now, there would be plenty of vehicles.
But as I pointed out, 186 vehicles gives us 31 six-car trains. Wikipedia states that the tunnels to Moorgate will accept trains of this length, so would it be a simple decision to make all the Great Northern trains six-car to turn the service into a higher-capacity, seven days a week, Metro service? As this would be a distinct variant, they might even be given a bit more performance to ease them along the East Coast Main Line to Hitchin. After all other members of the family to which a Class 378 belongs are 100 mph as opposed to 75 mph trains.
Running six-car walk-through trains into Morgate, rather than two three-car ones coupled together, gets rid of one of the restrictions of running in tunnels, which insists that passengers can walk through the train to get out in case of trouble.
So the more I look at this, the more I think, that Transport for London has an option on trains to work the Great Northern services.
As Transport for London have said, they might like to take over some of the inner Thameslink services, I suspect that the flies on the wall in meetings between Govia Thameslink Railway and Transport for London will have interesting tales to tell.
Have Transport for London Other Plans For The Overground?
It is now widely-publicised that Transport for London have started the process to get Class 378 trains delivered for the Lea Valley and Gospel Oak to Barking Lines. This article in Rail News gives full details.
But the History section in the Wikipedia entry for the Class 378 trains has this paragraph.
On 19 June 2015 it was announced that Bombardier had won a contract to supply a further 45 units, with an option for a possible 249 additional vehicles. The 45 units would comprise of 30 sets to replace class 315 and 317 units on the recently taken-over former Greater Anglia routes, one unit for use between Romford and Upminster, six to strengthen the existing London Overground fleet and eight units to replace the class 172 diesel units on Gospel Oak to Barking services.
So what are TfL proposing to do with the optional 249 vehicles, if it eventually is part of the order?
If they are four-car trains that would be over sixty sets, which as they need thirty sets for the current Lea Valley operation, would mean they could support two similar services of the same size.
It is an open secret,that Transport for London wants to be responsible for Dartford services from London, so that would probably require thirty to forty sets, which still leaves enough to takeover another service or perhaps add an extra car to all the five-car sets on the North and East London Lines.
Or could they be looking at the Great Northern services out of Moorgate and Kings Cross? These currently use forty-four rather clapped-out Class 313 trains, comprising 132 vehicles.
It just seems that we’re going to get a Big Orange!
The First Repainted Class 317 Train
This morning, I did two trips on this repainted Class 317 train, that was built in the early 1980s.
It would appear to have been running between Liverpool Street and Chingford.
The inside has not been touched other than by a team of people like Aggie MacKenie who have applied some no small amount of elbow grease. I did think it might be a relaid carpet, but it might just have been good cleaning. The tables at which I sat, were also clean enough to eat your lunch off.
I travelled one way with an American tourist, and she couldn’t believe the age of this train.
But as Wikipedia details, this train was refurbished to run the Stansted Express in 2000. So does that mean they’re really only fifteen years old?
The Anonymous Widower 