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Coal has use in other industries - such as cement; in recent years coal trains have run to the cement works at Oxwellmains, Hope and Penyfford, and I may have missed others.

Of course we need to level up, but if you want to level up quickly and redistribute wealth from London then the fact remains that a better way of doing that is by concentrating on the North - for starters. I am sure you can see that there has to be a degree of priority - Plymouth for example...

I understand this but the truth is that the North is simply more populated and economically important. These are statistics that you dismiss, and I can understand that - they weaken your argument - but in terms of investment prioritisation the focus on HS2 to the North is understandable. To get...

All of your arguments are something of a race to the bottom - why isn’t there enough spent on the south west? Why does Yorkshire get a good service? What is the need for HS2? The thought process isn’t exactly comprehensive or network-wide, it’s pitting different areas against each other . I’m...

I suppose this says quite a lot about your arguments.

If HS2 was going to Paddington you might have a point. It isn’t, it’s going to Euston. There will be a better dispersal of passengers and the opportunity for improved access to e.g. Heathrow with OOC than airport it. If your only gripe is over the GWR fasts then this debate has been done to...

It does however miss the point in that bypassing Lancaster is theoretically intended to speed up services to/from London - not extending them by around two hours.

How are you getting trains from London to Settle?

I think it was refurbishment of a couple of platforms for use as stabling points. No idea what the platforms are used for now, if anything.

They also need to complete four-tracking at some point between Leeds and Church Fenton, to allow stoppers to be looped. A Leeds Council document I saw the other week seemed to suggest this loop would start at Cross Gates and end somewhere before Garforth.

The new Merseyrail stock is almost identical to the new Tyne and Wear Metro stock - I am not convinced there is a huge difference between the systems even if Merseyrail does remain part of the national network.

In fairness Darlington is a railhead for Catterick Garrison so military traffic may be playing a part there

IIRC those steel trains run from Margam - so the flow from Trostre is additional, although it may also be a beneficiary of the new warehouse at Dawsons.

I’m not entirely sure, but it runs from Trostre so possibly tinplate. It’s been running for a few months now, there are some pictures on Flickr if you search Middlesbrough Trostre. :)

Further to the discussion above about covered vans I was trying to put together a list of what flows still use these - - Metals traffic (both within South Wales and from South Wales to Tilbury, Burton, and Middlesbrough) - Bottled water (Dollands Moor to Daventry) - Aluminium ingots (Ditton to...

Fair enough - I wasn’t reading RTT right and hadn’t realised the Freightliner trains ran on different days to the DB ones. Cheers

It isn’t quite. The limited stop trains take about that long but whether a stop at Skipton and passage through to Colne could be pathed in 24 minutes is doubtful - you’re not going to get a continuous 60mph line speed for the whole journey

Including loco moves etc it does add up to more - I agree it’s not a massive freight operation but it is something that needs to be planned around if a passenger service were to be introduced. Of course such an obstacle is not insurmountable (see for example oil trains to Jarrow via the Tyne and...

I am very much on board with the rest of your argument but there are several daily trains to the glassworks at Ince and Elton (not that these couldn't be pathed around).

Whilst I agree with the general sentiment this is a poor argument. If it is so easy to train workers then what is so ‘special’ about the workforces at Derby, Newton Aycliffe etc? Are they somehow magically easier to train than the thousands of workers expected to be laid off at Port Talbot? Or...