Campaign grows to switch the building of HS2 station to Sheffield city

[alchresearch]

Yes.

And this is the Sunday Times article:

 

Britain’s £55bn high-speed rail project is in crisis as officials consider axeing stations, rail links and platforms amid fears costs will run out of control.

 

Two proposed stations — at Manchester airport and Sheffield’s Meadowhall shopping centre — could be ditched from the HS2 scheme under plans to save money, well-placed sources say.

 

Am I missing something, but wouldn't fewer stations be better? The more stations you have, you have to slow down to get to them, wait while passengers get on and off.

 

Better to have fewer stations so the train can run faster between them. I'd be pretty peeved to get on in Manchester, only for it to stop ten minutes later at the airport.

[foxy lady]

I wouldn't be the least bit surprised if all the fuss and noise created by SCC causes the HS2 planners to drop any station for Sheffield/South Yorkshire from the plans entirely.

 

Birmingham straight to Leeds no stops.

 

It does make you wonder. They say if the line came into Sheffield it would add 7 minutes to the journey time to Leeds.

If you consider we are not talking 2016 journey times here. We are 30 years down the line. In 30 years just standard upgrades will probably make the regular service from London to Leeds as quick as HS2 passing through Sheffield. So just what is the point.

I'd rather them spend half the money on upgrades to trains, lines and stations on the existing routes and not screw up the landscape and the journeys of folk who suddenly find a new HS2 line stuck across their regular commute.

[Cyclone]

What "standard improvements" are you imagining?

[smiggs]

It does make you wonder. They say if the line came into Sheffield it would add 7 minutes to the journey time to Leeds.

If you consider we are not talking 2016 journey times here. We are 30 years down the line. In 30 years just standard upgrades will probably make the regular service from London to Leeds as quick as HS2 passing through Sheffield. So just what is the point.

I'd rather them spend half the money on upgrades to trains, lines and stations on the existing routes and not screw up the landscape and the journeys of folk who suddenly find a new HS2 line stuck across their regular commute.

 

Do we have to go round in this circle again? The additional upgrades required to the existing mainline to get anywhere near the extra capacity provided by HS2 would take years, possible be more expensive and be hugely disruptive.

 

As an aside the journey time since HS2 is not really about journey time for Leeds to London is 2 hours for one train per day and 2 hours 20 minutes the rest. On a standard journey HS2 is 1 hour 28 minutes saving nearly an hour on a standard mainline journey, losing 7 minutes to get to Sheffield centre is basically nothing.

[Guest busdriver1]

So how else would you expand our rail infrastructure, which is at the moment almost running to capacity, without a comprehensive building program of more rail infrastructure?

 

There are a great many ways the rail system can be improved to increase capacity without trying to dress it up as a fantastic ultra fast system and telling us we need it. For example, many rail lines currently are two tracks where they were previously 4. Thats a bit obvious. Smaller, cheaper avoiding lines can be built to avoid some of the major bottlenecks, some even exist but are just not used. Drop the obsession with faster and faster trains.

I for one dont care if my train journey takes 2 1/2 hours when spending billions it could be 2 hours. I can spare that 30 minutes of my life.

[geared]

It does make you wonder. They say if the line came into Sheffield it would add 7 minutes to the journey time to Leeds.

 

Who is 'they' though??

 

Last time I looked the main campaign to move the station didn't actually include details on the diversion needed for the track move.

The best they could manage was some childs drawing of the track disappearing off into the distance.

 

You can't even begin to estimate the impact on journey time from such a bad plan.

It was one of the main mistakes of the whole campaign.

[foxy lady]

What "standard improvements" are you imagining?

 

Don't you imagine that our railways will improve over the next 30 years? 30 years ago they had only just replaced steam engines on the railways and had manned signal boxes where men had to pull leavers to operat manual signals.

[Annie Bynnol]

There are a great many ways the rail system can be improved to increase capacity without trying to dress it up as a fantastic ultra fast system and telling us we need it. For example, many rail lines currently are two tracks where they were previously 4. Thats a bit obvious. Smaller, cheaper avoiding lines can be built to avoid some of the major bottlenecks, some even exist but are just not used. Drop the obsession with faster and faster trains.

I for one dont care if my train journey takes 2 1/2 hours when spending billions it could be 2 hours. I can spare that 30 minutes of my life.

 

A lesson from recent history is the billions that have been spent on the WCML.

Massive construction delays.

Massive disruption.

Massive cost overruns because of old infrastructure.

Massive increase in demand still not being met.

No improvement in local services.

Rebuilding and modernizing parallel routes are costing £100s of millions and taking decades eg Bicester LM.

 

Most of the MML is double track and always was.

Huge sections of the ECML is double track and always was.

The capacity problems are at the London end where nearly all the tracks are 4 or more tracks, piling in more trains from the north on 4 tracks/bypasses would absolutely pointless.

 

Reconstructing stations and infrastructure to accommodate longer or double decker trains again is not viable for exactly the same reasons.

 

I wonder what the A6 would look like now if the great many ways the that roads can be improved to increase capacity had been adopted instead of building the M1/M6. Clue- A1/A1(M).

 

---------- Post added 11-05-2016 at 14:24 ----------

 

Don't you imagine that our railways will improve over the next 30 years? 30 years ago they had only just replaced steam engines on the railways and had manned signal boxes where men had to pull leavers to operat manual signals.

 

Make that 50 years ago and we still have signal boxes and single track sections between here and Manchester.

[foxy lady]

 

Make that 50 years ago and we still have signal boxes and single track sections between here and Manchester.

 

So plenty of scope for improvement. It seems only a few years ago improvements cut 7 minutes off the time from Sheffield to London without any HS2.

 

https://www.eastmidlandstrains.co.uk/information/media/news/New-Faster-Train-Journeys-from-Sheffield-to-London-Launched-Today/

 

09.12.2013

New Faster Train Journeys from Sheffield to London Launched Today

 

Fastest journey time of two hours to London, a reduction of six minutes

Average journey time reduced by seven minutes

£70million investment in track upgrade to enable trains to run at 125 mph

New timetable launched by East Midlands Trains

 

"These latest improvements to our timetable highlight just how much service levels have improved since we launched our franchise in 2007. The launch of our December 2008 timetable was the first stage in delivering faster journey times, then through a successful partnership with SYPTE, we brought two trains an hour to the Sheffield-London route in 2009. The launch of today’s timetable will see a further seven minutes knocked off the average journey time to London, which is a great step forward for our passengers.

Edited May 11, 2016 by foxy lady

[Annie Bynnol]

So plenty of scope for improvement. It seems only a few years ago improvements cut 7 minutes off the time from Sheffield to London without any HS2.

 

https://www.eastmidlandstrains.co.uk/information/media/news/New-Faster-Train-Journeys-from-Sheffield-to-London-Launched-Today/

 

09.12.2013

New Faster Train Journeys from Sheffield to London Launched Today

 

Fastest journey time of two hours to London, a reduction of six minutes

Average journey time reduced by seven minutes

£70million investment in track upgrade to enable trains to run at 125 mph

New timetable launched by East Midlands Trains

 

"These latest improvements to our timetable highlight just how much service levels have improved since we launched our franchise in 2007. The launch of our December 2008 timetable was the first stage in delivering faster journey times, then through a successful partnership with SYPTE, we brought two trains an hour to the Sheffield-London route in 2009. The launch of today’s timetable will see a further seven minutes knocked off the average journey time to London, which is a great step forward for our passengers.

 

Faster Sheffield London times are possible now.

Current re signalling, new track, track realignment and electrification will allow higher speeds.

But capacity will not increase because the track is full south of Bedford because of slower stopping commuter trains and too few platforms at St Pancras.

Journey times will not be allowed to be reduced for the same reasons.

Punctuality will improve as trains can make time up more easily.

Vanity will push more journeys to the 2hr mark.

An example of how HS2 will improve Leicester and London commuters journeys