Around Loughborough Junction Station
I took these pictures close to Loughborough Junction station.
They show the triangle of lines that make up the junction and some of the buildings in the area. In An Overground Station For Camberwell, For pictures from the station see this post.
I quoted the 2050 Transport Plan as saying this.
e.g. at Camberwell, that can plug connectivity gaps and act as development nodes.
Surely there is a connectivity gap between the London Overground and Thameslink, but the Luftwaffe didn’t do anything creative to help with clearing the site for the development node, the area needs.
An Overground Station For Camberwell?
In Transport for London’s Transport Plan for 2050, there is this paragraph.
Some examples of the type of scheme to help address these issues are an upgrade to the London Overground network to provide 6 car trains and new stations on existing lines, e.g. at Camberwell, that can plug connectivity gaps and act as development nodes.
By Camberwell, I suspect they mean at Loughborough Junction, where the London Overground passes over Thameslink. A couple of years ago, I visited the site and created a post with some pictures.
I said this about creating a Camberwell Beauty out of Loughborough Junction.
It is one of these problems that needs imagination. A good architect might be able to produce an elegant connection between the two lines and then link it to the ground on the other side of Coldharbour Lane to the current station entrance. Looking at the local bus map, shows that the area is well served by bus routes, so perhaps we could make Loughborough Junction a true interchange in the east of Brixton.
I shall go again to see if a development node can be used to bridge a significant connectivity gap in London’s train system.
On a personal note, it would really improve the ease of my getting onto Thameslink routes to the South.
Improving The Overground
Transport for London’s Transport Plan for 2050 says this about improving the Overground, with particular reference to creating a circular railway by extending the Goblin.
An option for doing this, could be an extension of the Overground in stages, creating new links initially where most feasible.
It does also say that new stations might be added to existing lines, giving a particular mention for Camberwell.
As I found on my trips Tracing the Goblin Extension, most of the infrastructure is already there and in many places, all it needs is innovative timetabling of the extra trains.
Buried in the report are possible plans on improving my local Overground service on the East London Line.
- Better late night and overnight services on the Overground.
- Automatic Train Operation on the core of the line from Dalston Junction to Surrey Quays to increase service frequency from 16 tph to possibly as high as 24 tph.
- Six car trains on the Overground.
At the moment the East London Line has 16 four-car trains an hour in the core route, so 24 six-car trains will mean an increase of capacity of 2.25.
It will be needed, as who knows how many passengers will use the line to get to Crossrail at Whitechapel?
Once Crossrail opens, so many regular journeys I do, like to Ipswich, Oxford Street, Paddington and Heathrow could involve going to Whitechapel and then using the new line.
It should also be said as regards the East London Line, that the report says nothing about extending the line to Willesden in the west or Stratford in the east, by reopening the Eastern Curve at Dalston. This was talked about when the East London Line was created, but I think that passenger numbers might have increased more than they thought they would, so five and possibly six car trains have had a priority.
I shall be adding a bit of speculation about what might happen to the Overground in the next few days. I’ll put links here for ease of reading a post with more jumps than a whole bunch of frogs.
An Overground Station For Camberwell?
Are There Any Sensible Places For New Stations On The Overground?
But whatever happens, it looks like it’s all go on the Overground. In some ways, this disparate collection of lines in and around London, shows how the new breed of railway managers and engineers in the UK are very sensible and cost conscious , and have the needs of the passengers very much to the fore.
A Vision Of Old Oak Common In The Future
Transport for London’s Transport Plan for 2050 is particularly forceful about what will happen at Old Oak Common.
A key aim beyond this is to integrate Old Oak Common as a Canary Wharf of the future, with around 90,000 jobs and 19,000 homes
They also have a detailed map, showing lines reaching out in all directions, from the junction of Crossrail, HS2 and the Overground. In addition to the links through the Goblin Extension, I’ve traced earlier, there are a possible extension of the West London Line to Balham and a service northwards on the Midland Main Line to somewhere like St. Albans.
So London is getting another hub to complement Stratford and Canary Wharf in the East and Clapham Junction in the South.
It’s Amazing What You Can Do With Meccano, Lego And Sheets Of Glass
I happened to go through New Cross Gate station and just had to take some pictures.
Let’s hope that Network Rail and Transport for London, are going to use the system to create a few more modern stations. There certainly seem to be decision makers in these organisations, who are not afraid to do the unconventional.
Let’s face it, London Underground in the 1930s created some of the finest stations of the era, anywhere in the world. When our descendants look at stations like this one at New Cross Gate in a hundred years time, they might just say that we got something right.
Just because it’s only a station, it doesn’t mean the architecture or construction must be second rate.
Summary And Conclusions On The Goblin Extension
I’ve now traced all the new sections of the Goblin Extension from Upper Holloway, all the way round to Abbey Wood.
Tracing The Route
I’ll start by listing the sections of the line, where most of the infrastructure is already built.
Norwood Junction To Peckham Rye
Peckham Rye To Bexleyheath And Abbey Wood
The Alternative Route From Wimbledon To Peckham Rye
The Barking To Abbey Wood Tunnel
I’ve said very little about this, except muse about its use.
Infrastructure Needed
There is only one major piece of infrastructure that needs to be built and that is the Barking to Abbey Wood Tunnel.
One other thing that will to be done is to electrify the only part of the route that has not been so equipped; the main Gospel Oak to Barking section of the line.
There will I suspect be some track and signalling work, but probably nothing in addition to what will be done anyway.
Remember that signals will be under the remit of ERTMS and in the cabs, which might help in some places.
Trains Needed
Trains for the Gospel Oak to Barking Line will be ordered soon and will probably be Class 378 trains or something very similar.
The only modification needed will be that they must be dual voltage to work all of the line, which of course they are on the North London Line.
Reports say four trains will be needed to work the current Gospel Oak to Barking Line, so as the new line is probably four times as long, something like twenty trains would probably be needed.
How Many Trains Per Hour?
What surprised me on my trip round the Goblin Extension, was how few trains per hour run on some parts of the route.
In many places, there are just two trains an hour, which definitely isn’t good enough for a turn up and go service.
So it shouldn’t be too difficult to accommodate at least another two trains an hour, all the way round the route.
Did The Goblin Extension Start As A South London Project?
Across North London, the current Goblin probably needs bigger trains and electrification, more than it needs more stations and more trains per hour. Although the latter would be nice.
But having travelled across South London a lot during the day, there often seems to be gaps between services and even short journeys need a change of train. I don’t know what it is like in the peak periods, but then extra services are always welcomed.
Connectivity from East to West and all points in between would definitely be improved, especially as from 2018, this line has good links to Crossrail and Thameslink.
Remember too, that driving in South London is much more difficult than in the North and the Underground is not as extensive as it is in the North.
The old South London Circular route from London Bridge to Victoria used to partly fulfil this East-West need and when it was discontinued to allow the East London Line to reach Clapham Junction, there was a lot of complaints that passengers in South London had lost their link to Victoria.
The only people, who know the traffic on the trains are Transport for London, who probably have access to all the statistics of where people enter and leave the network.
So did Transport for London invent the Hounslow to Abbey Wood service in response to a perceived need shown by the traffic statistics. Especially, as they knew there were plenty of train paths across South London and only small infrastructure changes would be required.
But they hit a snag, in that Abbey Wood and Hounslow are not stations, where you can turn a train around. Trains would have to come into the station and then go out the way they came in. I know nothing of operating trains, but surely you don’t want one of your two platforms blocked several times an hour. Especially, where you have high-frequency services wanting to use your platforms.
So someone looked at the places where these services could terminate. At Hounslow, they came up with the plan to go up the North London Line and the Dudding Hill Line to the Gospel Oak to Barking Line. At Abbey Wood, they came up with a plan to build a tunnel to the other end of the line at Barking Riverside, thus completing the circle.
Circular lines are always good for politicians, as they can understand them and sell their perceived benefits to the public.
Tracing The Goblin Extension – Norwood Junction To Peckham Rye
As Brockley was an error on my part, I got the A to Z out and looked for another route to get on the Nunhead to Lewisham Link. The less direct route with a change of trains at Crystal Palace seemed to be a way to go.
This was another section, where I got two or more trains.
Norwood Junction to Crystal Palace
Crystal Palace to Peckham Rye
It was trouble free and passed through many stations that I’d never heard of before.
The only problem was that I had to wait twenty minutes for both trains. Is this a problem on this route, when perhaps you need to get from Gypsy Hill to North Dulwich, which might be solved by a four trains per hour Goblin Extension service?
I took these pictures along the route.
Note that you can also interchange with Thasmeslink at Tulse Hill and the East London Line at Crystal Palace and Peckham Rye. There are also good connections to Victoria and London Bridge at various stations in this section.
Tracing The Goblin Extension – A Detour To Brockley
When I first saw the route it in TfL’s Transport Plan for 2050, it looked like they had found some way to connect the Brighton Main Line to the Nunhead to Lewisham link at Brockley.
But as the pictures of the Nunhead to Lewisham Link going across at Brockley show it is an impossible connection.
Unless of course TfL are going to demolish half of the area or develop flying trains.
The only improvement needed here is to paint the bridge, as they have done at Hackney Downs.
Brockley incidentally, is a very good coffee stop.
Tracing The Goblin Extension – Wimbledon To Norwood Junction
This part of the route was fairly straightforward even though in this exercise it was three separate trains.
- Wimbledon to Sutton
- Sutton to West Croydon
- West Croydon to Norwood Junction
Obviously, the Goblin Extension will do it without changes, by a direct route.
As an exercise, I tried to see what National Rail Train Enquiries said about how you get from Wimbledon to Norwood Junction. Some routes it gives are of the if-you-want-to-go-there-I-wouldnt-start-from-here variety, with up to two changes in a forty minute journey.
So perhaps one of Transport for London’s objectives is to simplify the rail routes in South London.
Tracing The Goblin Extension – Hounslow To Wimbledon
I started this by taking a train direct to Hounslow from Waterloo, which is something I’ve never done before. This train runs on the Hounslow Loop Line, which is joined by the North London Line between Kew Bridge and Brentford stations. The trains running from Upper Holloway in the section of the line described previously join at this point.
After running through several stations, the trains will arrive at Hounslow.
Hounslow Station
This is a simple two platform station, that is on a fairly small site, so it would be unlikely to have any space for any terminal platforms.
But this doesn’t really matter as all trains at present just continue round the Hounslow Loop Line and that’s what I think trains on the Goblin Extension will do.
One interesting point is that the off peak typical frequency on this line is four trains per hour with perhaps a few extra in the peaks. So fitting in extra trains on the four trains per hour frequency of the Goblin might not be difficult.
Continuing round the loop, you come to Whitton and Twickenham stations, the latter of which is being refurbished for the 2015 Rugby World Cup.
Refurbishing Twickenham Station
Note the orange rails! Is this a clue, just coincidence or are they using a Dutch contractor and they used what the Dutch always have handy?
At Twickenham the route turns south onto the Kingston Loop Line and I had wondered if there would be space to put a curve in so that trains could go direct.
No Space For A Connection At Twickenham
There is little space, so trains would go into Twickenham station, the driver would move to the other end of the train and then after unloading and loading passengers, get the train on its way again. There may be a small amount of track and platform work, but I suspect all the substantial work being done for the Rugby World Cup will probably be enough to accommodate the Goblin Extension.
I did think looking at the work being done, that Network Rail may have incorporated a bay platform, where trains could terminate or as in the Goblin Extension’s case reverse direction.
I had to change trains at Twickenham to get a train to continue my journey and this one was on its way to Wimbledon, by way of Kingston, New Malden and Raynes Park, which I think is the proposed route of the Goblin Extension. At Wimbledon it’s another turn south onto the Sutton Loop of Thasmeslink.
No Space For A Connection At Wimbledon
Again as the picture shows there is no space for a curve to turn direct onto the Sutton Loop, so it will have to be another reverse in Wimbledon station to continue the journey.
Wimbledon is a busy station, but there still seems to be plenty of space around the station, so that just as at Twickenham, the reversing of the train could probably be achieved without causing too much disruption to other services.
I did have one thought about the double reverse the trains will probably have to make at Twickenham and Wimbledon and that is will some clever methods of working, eliminate the need for the driver to move cabs twice and perhaps allow them to drive from the other end using some trusted modern technology.
The Anonymous Widower 