Don valley Railway

[Chekhov]

12 hours ago, Meltman said:

I don't think we are trying to compare a small local railway to the WCML for a start. I'm in favour of electrification but for places where it's not practical or the cost is prohibitive there are other possible solutions. I don't know if you remember but the line up the Don Valley was electrified with very 'old fashoned' OH  the modern stuff is far less obtrusive and not a blot on the landscape. 

Interesting point about the "old" 1.5kV DC system which BR said would cost a fortune to convert to the modern 25kV AC, and used that as one of the excuses to close Woodhead. When they converted the still extant section of the line from Dinting to Piccadilly to 25kV (in 1983) it was much easier and cheaper than they had predicted years previously.

 

I don't buy the argument we should only be electrifying very heavily used lines. In France there are lines far less well used than, say, Sheffield to Bedford (> London) which are electrified.

And in any case one would have thought that the Don Valley line - if used by tram trains - would surely have 2 (or hopefully 3) services per hour. That's busy surely ?

[Meltman]

The Don Valley line is ideally suited to electrification, as is the Hope Valley line and the Midland main line too. 

[Irene Swaine]

1 hour ago, Meltman said:

The Don Valley line is ideally suited to electrification, as is the Hope Valley line and the Midland main line too. 

The man hours to electrify Totley tunnel and structural implications would be off the scale. 

[RollingJ]

You a fully qualified surveyor/engineer as well, now?

In any  case, the 222's which run the Intercity routes on EMR are due to be replaced by Aurora bi-modals in the near future, so the tunnel will not  need to be electrified.

Edited October 29, 2023 by RollingJ

[Chekhov]

14 minutes ago, RollingJ said:

You a fully qualified surveyor/engineer as well, now?

In any  case, the 222's which run the Intercity routes on EMR are due to be replaced by Aurora bi-modals in the near future, so the tunnel will not  need to be electrified.

TBH I think Bi-Modes are a pathetic cheap excuse for a decent electrified rail system. If the government are going to ban everyone from having petrol cars (and warm houses.......) they are absolute hypocrites for not insisting that pretty much all lines with, say, more than 1

train per hour, are not electrified.

[RollingJ]

1 minute ago, Chekhov said:

TBH I think Bi-Modes are a pathetic cheap excuse for a decent electrified rail system. If the government are going to ban everyone from having petrol cars (and warm houses.......) they are absolute hypocrites for not insisting that pretty much all lines with, say, more than 1

train per hour, are not electrified.

Why? In the case of (specifically) Totley Tunnel,  it is almost  impossible to electrify, with current technology - bi-modals mean that they can still run off electricity for the rest of the route.

[Irene Swaine]

47 minutes ago, RollingJ said:

You a fully qualified surveyor/engineer as well, now?

In any  case, the 222's which run the Intercity routes on EMR are due to be replaced by Aurora bi-modals in the near future, so the tunnel will not  need to be electrified.

They will not be running through Totley tunnel in regular service! The Intercity route runs through Bradway Tunnel, towards Dronfield, not the Totley Tunnel. It is the Class 158s on the Connect route that run through Totley Tunnel.

 

[RollingJ]

3 minutes ago, Irene Swaine said:

They will not be running through Totley tunnel in regular service! The Intercity route runs through Bradway Tunnel, towards Dronfield, not the Totley Tunnel. It is the Class 158s on the Connect route that run through Totley Tunnel.

 

Ooops, my mistake - I obviously need more coffee! 😉

[Planner1]

19 hours ago, Chekhov said:

Change the emissions regulations then. There is too much of this extreme "keep us safe and well at any cost", the fact is the air in the UK has never been cleaner and a few diesel trams would not make any significant difference.

 

But, as it happens we do not want battery trams, they have limited power and range, we want electric ones. Modern OHL structures really aren't that unsightly anyway. 

I hardly think they are going to change international vehicle construction regulations just because you don’t like them.

 

If diesel trams were needed the promoter of the scheme would need to pay a manufacturer to design compliant vehicles. It would not be easy or quick and it would be damned expensive.

 

People in the industry disagree with you about battery trams. The market testing they did in West Yorkshire showed that the industry felt battery trams were a practical solution. You can charge them at stops while stationary, so range isn’t a particular issue. You’d probably still only use them in places where it was expensive or undesirable to put in catenary though.

 

I’d guess any project putting trams up the Stocksbridge line would use catenary.

Edited October 29, 2023 by Planner1

[Chekhov]

1 hour ago, RollingJ said:

Why? In the case of (specifically) Totley Tunnel,  it is almost  impossible to electrify, with current technology - bi-modals mean that they can still run off electricity for the rest of the route.

They have electrified countless tunnels across the network, why should Totley tunnel be any different ?

I accept it might be expensive when done, but once done it's done, for centuries.