The Updating Of Newcastle Station
Newcastle station is one of the most important stations on the East Coast Main Line. I took these pictures of the station redevelopment as I passed through.
My memories of the station usually involve how blustery it can be. The glazing of the front of the station, may not be as dramatic as that at Strasbourg, but it did seem to make the station entrance a lot more civilised. The position of the ticket machines and information screens under the portico, is an idea that could have been borrowed from the French station, with which it shares a lot of operational characteristics, like fast trains to the capital, an extensive regional network and a below-ground metro or tram.
Newcastle has now joined Kings Cross and Liverpool Lime Street, where you can walk straight outside the station and be in a partly-pedestrianised area, where you can get your bearings of the city, that might be unknown to you. As the pictures show work is still continuing in this area.
Newcastle is one of six operational stations in the UK, that is a Grade One Listed Building. The others are Bristol Temple Meads, Huddersfield, Kings Cross, Paddington and St. Pancras. I can see Manchester Victoria joining this elite group, when it is completed.
Why Wasn’t The Picc-Vic Tunnel Built?
The Picc-Vicc Tunnel, which would have been a rail bypass under Manchester. Having experienced the tunnel under Liverpool,earlier in the day, I was wondering, why a similar tunnel hadn’t been built in Manchester.
On the way back from Huddersfield to Manchester, I was discussing with several Huddersfield fans, how the Northern Hub would affect their journeys. All seemed to be welcoming the upgrade, so I asked why the Picc-Vicc tunnel wasn’t built.
One guy, said that he’d been to a lecture at the local historical society. He said that British Rail and the government were planning three tunnels in the 1970s; Liverpool, Manchester and the Tyneside Metro.
So because of cost, one had to be dropped, and Manchester was chosen.
As we’re getting much better with tunnels every year, I wouldn’t say that the Picc-Vicc tunnel is dead. Crossrail was on the back-burner for so long, no-one ever thought it would happen!
Could we for instance see a tunnel under part of Manchester for HS2?
Cats Will Be Cats
This story from the Metro on Tyneside is a good one.
The First Metric Railway In The UK
I just found this small piece of trivia on the Wikipedia entry for the Tyne and Wear Metro.
The Tyne and Wear Metro was the first railway in the UK to operate using the metric system; all its speeds and distances are stated in metric units only.
Do you think I should tell UKIP?
Where Next For The Emirates Air-Line?
I like predicting the future and in many cases, I have the knowledge to do my predictions based on fact rather than fantasy.
So now we have got the Emirates Air-Line up and running, where else could we use a similar system within the UK.
The Emirates Air-Line has been designed using the simple single cable, Monocable Detachable Gondola (MDG) technology, which uses a single cable for both support and propulsion. The simple concept probably explains, why the system went from project start to finish in undera year. It is not untried technology, as a similar system in Caracas, is twice the length and has twice the number of cabins. So if you are of a nervous disposition and find the Emirates Air-Line a bit scary, stay away from Caracas. Although looking at my pictures and some of the Caracas system, the gondolas appear to be very similar. Both might have been built by the Austrian company, Dopplemayr. The Emirates Air-Line certainly was.
But it does show the flexibility of the technology, as Caracas system is much larger than the London one. But the Emirates Air-Line is not small in terms of capacity, as its 34 cars can move 2,500 people in an hour, which is the equivalent of thirty buses. Cynics have complained about the cost of £60 million, but then crossing a river, either needs a tunnel, a ferry or a bridge.
Asa an aside here, London’s millennium footbridge cost around £20 million, but of course couldn’t have been used here, as it is not high enough for large ships to pass underneath.
I know England well and I think there are several places, where cable-cars could be a cost-effective alternative to other means of moving people.
Obviously, because I know Liverpool well, a cable-car could be an alternative way to cross the Mersey. Liverpool has a problem in that it has three ageing ferries, that will need replacing at some time. They also do other jobs, like run pleasure trips up the Mersey. As there is a proper railway under te river, Liverpool’s need for passenger movement is not so pressing. But a cable-car system, running all the way from Lime Street station to Birkenhead could be a spectacular attraction taking visitors over one of the best cityscapes in Europe.
Crossing the Tyne at Newcastle, would probably be one of the easiest from an engineering point of view.
Obviously, schemes will come together, when the economics of the Emirates Air-Line are fully understood in a couple of years.
But I think before the end of this decade we will be seeing other cable-car systems in the UK.
92 Clubs – Week 3 – 16 Clubs – 28 Trains, 3 Trams, 3 Metros
Week 1 Week 2 Week 3 Week 4 Week 5 Week 6 Week 7
Day 15 Day 16 Day 17 Day 18 Day 19 Day 20 Day 21
Perhaps not as many clubs, as I would have wanted, but there was a lot of public transport.
I also had a late train, but that actually helped me at Hereford on Day 12, by giving me some extra time.
As with Week 1 and Week 2, I’ll put in a few awards.
Heroes of the Week
Everything went fairly smoothly and no-one really stood out, except for some very cheery people who sent me on my way.
Most Surprising Stadium of the Week
This has to be Morecambe in possibly the town that surprised me most. The whole town deserves an award for going from being a place berated in various papers for benefit tourists, to a place, where you’d be pleased to go for a few days.
Best Stadium of the Week
Huddersfield was the first of the new stadia to be built. It has a grace and engineering-style beauty that so many modern stadia lack. Access from the train is pretty good too. And the staff at the stadium I met, were friendly too. If the club make it to the Championship, they will be a welcome addition to the League.
Best Signposted Stadium of the Week
There wasn’t really one, but Manchester United and Newcastle with their own tram and metro stops are the easiest to find from the station. Newcastle probably wins because of the station in team colours and the fact that it’s so near to the ground.
Worst Signposted Stadium of the Week
A pedant would say Leyton Orient, as I don’t think I saw a single signpost after the Underground station at Leyton. But then you pass umpteen bus stops, all with maps showing you where the ground is located.
They could also include Millwall, but as the ground effectively has its own station at South Bermondsey and soon will have another at Surrey Canal Road, it is rather irrelevant.
So it has to be Manchester City, where there is no information at Piccadilly station and you have to get a bus from Piccadilly Gardens a short walk away. And then the bus doesn’t give any indication you are arriving at the stadium.
Best Town of the Week
Only Morecambe deserves any award. Just as with Hartlepool last week, they have done their best with very limited resources. The Town really shows up Blackpool to be the real dump it is. It was a pity I had so little time there on a very busy Day 21.
Dump of the Week
It’s a toss-up here between three places, Manchester, Leeds and Milton Keynes. I think I’ll give it to Milton Keynes because of the fact that it would be an impossible place to live without a car and even then the signposting leaves a lot to be desired.
The problem with Leeds and Manchester, is that their buses are so badly organised and totally unusable by visitors except with a guide. But that also applies to Blackpool and Bristol.
I haven’t really caught up much, but I’m keeping going.
The Infrastructure’s The Star
On the one hand I watching athletics on the BBC in the centre of Newcastle amongst all of the bridges and the iconic buildings. It’s called the Great North City Games.
On the other hand, I’ve just had an e-mail describing the Sound Tracks Festival in East London, which is taking place at three main venues and you get between them on the East London line. Someone has remarked that it’s quicker to get between stages, using the train, that walking through the mud at Glastonbury. And of course there’ll be acoustic acts, including bands and a harpist on the connecting trains. I wonder what the Brunels would have said, if they’d known that their Thames Tunnel, would be transporting mobile concert halls between the two sides of the river.
We now have some fantastic pieces of infrastructure, both new and old and we should be imaginative about how we use them.
Manchester is a Top Place to Go
Who says this crap? It’s apparently in the New York Times list at number 20 of 41 places to go in 2011 ahead of Miami and Zanzibar.
Manchester is a poor city and is very much second class compared to Liverpool, Glasgow, Newcastle, Leeds and of course London. You could argue it does have two good football teams, but London has three. It’s got no iconic buildings and it is not a World Heritage Site like Liverpool. I suppose you could argue, that Manchester has a couple of good hotels and is well connected by train to Liverpool and Leeds for days out. It also has a real tennis club.
Doncaster to Edinburgh
I had a few minutes to change trains at Doncaster, before I got on the fast train towards the North. I’d known when I booked that the last part of the journey to Edinburgh would actually be a coach as they were doing substantial work in the Morpeth area. At least though when I got in the Scottish capital, I knew that it was perhaps a ten minute taxi to a comfortable bed in my friend’s house.
Doncaster is a station that has had a serious makeover with most of the facilities modern and up-to-date. But I don’t know, but it just lacks something.
Perhaps, stations should be destinations in their own right.
I know St. Pancras International is in a different league from every other station in the UK and possibly Europe, if you believe some of the statements of the head of SNCF, but I believe all stations should aspire to be a little bit like that station.
If say you are meeting someone in the station, it should be a pleasant place to wait, have a coffee, read the paper and perhaps watch the trains coming and going.
Moving a Train
The picture shows a Southern train from the routes south of London, probably being moved to the works at Doncaster or York for repair or refurbishment. There is a lot of movement at a station like Doncaster.
Stations should also be places for business meetings, so that say if you are based in london and want to meet your managers from say Hull and Newcastle, then perhaps a sensible and productive lunch in the middle would be an idea.
I didn’t venture outside of the station, so I don’t know whether their is a nice hotel or restaurant outside or not!
But why not create a sensible cafe/restaurant, shops and perhaps a hotel high up in the station? Many stations have beautifully structured roofs and the proper structure placed up there would compliment them. In some ways, the engineering involved would be similar to that in some of our art gsalleries and museums, where roofs and mezzanines have been created. Space should always be use to the maximum, and now that trains make a lot less pollution, the roof space might be ripe for development
It might not be practical, but so many of our stations are cluttered and there is nothing more than a Costa and a burger bar.
We can do so much better!
It’s just a small point, but to get it right, you must get all the details right. For instance they’d put in nice new toilets in Doncaster, but the toilet roll dispensers were all broken, as they were badly designed.
Coming up, I would have been able to just walk across the platform, but when going north, it meant I had to use the underpass. Perhaps, we should ensure that as many connections as possible are just a short walk on the level! Doncaster, Peterbough and York aren’t too bad. They would also be a lot better, if people didn’t travel with the kitchen sink on wheels trailing behind them.
I was travelling very light and all I had was just a shoulder bag, that carried a spare pair of knickers and socks for each day I was away and a shirt for every two. I didn’t bring a laptop, as I’ve now come to the conclusion that every gram is something else to carry and more strain on my decrepit body.
We arrived in Newastle on time and whilst others were dreading the bus, I was being philosophical. There was a bit of a scrum at the coaches, but I was on quickly and managed to get a double seat for the nearly three hour trip. I think it could have been better organised with perhaps a few coaches going direct to Edinburgh, rather than having to drop off perhaps one person at Berwick and Dunbar. Some American passengers were getting distinctly edgy, as they’d only got into Heathrow that morning. They’d have probably changed their plans, if they’d known about the coach, but then the information their agent got in the US seemed to be incomplete. Travel agents are to me the lowest of the low, as they always book you on the route that gives them the most commission, so possibly East Coast pays better than Virgin! We are lucky in that we have two equally fast routes to Scotland from London and you should use the one that is more convenient, not the one that is obvious.
Sir Christopher Achieves His Goal
In the Great North Run yesterday, Sir Christopher Chataway achieved his goal of a time of under one hour fifty-two minutes, to beat eighty percent of the other runners in the half-marathon. Here’s the report in The Independent. Apparently, he’s giving up competing.
“It will be my last half-marathon,” he announced afterwards. “In future I shall be concentrating on the only sport in which I’m improving – bridge.”
I suspect he might recind that statement. After all, he did nothing for many years and then came back a star!
The Anonymous Widower 