Liverpool Lime Street to Euston

[YorkshireBear]

I was under the impresion liverpool would get a better service post HS2... taking som of the manchester paths.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

I was under the impresion liverpool would get a better service post HS2... taking som of the manchester paths.

I've no doubt Liverpool will get more services, just expect them to serve about 6 or 7 places on-route! Maybe Runcorn, Crewe, Stafford, Nuneaton, Rugby and Watford Jn... I seem to recall proposals to axe the direct service and just extend the Euston-Wolves train!

 

[ushawk]

My opinion that Liverpool should get a Cross Country service again so it can get better links with the rest of the country - 1tph with an 11 car pendo off-peak would be enough.

Though with Cross Country, will need a recast - maybe run them through to Brighton via Olympia - kind of gives a London link - but then i can dream

 

[tbtc]

I would expect it to take around 3 hours - journey planners will add on at least 20 minutes as the minimum connection times, when it's a 5-minute walk

Yes, but the minimum connection time at Wigan isn't stingy either (given that you need to walk between two stations that are also a fairly short walk - I think its a fair comparison (so the "minimum time" is the same issue either way).

I think, in practical terms, this is more than outweighed by the benefits of not changing at Wigan and being able to board at the terminus

I accept that boarding at the terminus is often handy, if you want to have a better chance of getting an unreserved seat (etc), but if the journey planners tell people that Southport - London is faster via Wigan than via Liverpool then I imagine that your average passenger will take that at face value and go via the fastest route.

Its not just Southport either. Kirkby - London is around twenty minutes faster via Wigan. St Helens (All Stations) is around half an hour faster via Warrington... Liverpool South Parkway takes the same time northbound by boarding a "Manchester" train and changing at Crewe as it does boarding a "Liverpool" train and changing at Runcorn.

Of course, it depends what you mean by 'decent part', but I would hazard a guess that is much less than 1/4 of the passengers.

See the examples above.

Once you start trying some examples on the NRES website its surprising just how much of Merseyside has faster London services than using the Lime Street service.

Whereas the Manchester services are being used by people from Bury/ Oldham/ Stockport/ Stoke/ Crewe - it all adds up

(I always said in Open Access threads that any additional WCML "fast" path should be used by a second Liverpool service, instead of a Barrow/ Bradford/ Blackpool etc speculative service - now I wonder whether a second "Preston" service would be more appropriate - as Crewe/Warrington/ Wigan would serve parts of Liverpool too)

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

I suppose that some trains that should go to Liverpool go to Holyhead, in the evening I think there's 2 in an hour out of Euston to Holyhead which probably connects with the same boat. Why one of those trains can't go into Liverpool is beyond me.

There's only ever 1tph to Chester (of which 5 go through to Holyhead), mostly 5-car 221s.
They don't really serve boats any more, it's nearly all local demand.
They also serve MK and Crewe which the Liverpool's don't any more.

Much of the reason is lack of Pendolinos.
More Liverpool trains when the 4 new ones go into service.

 

[phil8715]

I think VT are just making a token effort. If they didn't didn't have to run services in to Liverpool they probably wouldn't.


Sent from my iPad using Tapatalk HD

 

[Pumbaa]

You are also ignoring the number of seats needed on Manchester - London services for Crewe/ Stoke/ Macclesfield etc.

This.

Liverpool services only serve Runcorn, and that's only because there's no local service, I'm pretty sure Virgin would cut Runcorn given half the chance, and Stafford, which is lucky as its Trent Valley neighbours have no express service to speak of.

Mostly for Lampshade's benefit, I Posted this earlier:

The majority of travellers on the Liverpool service go only to/from Liverpool. Once you look at the loadings in a similar way for Manchester, ie removing the Stoke/Macclesfield/wilmslow/MK loadings, you often have a smaller end-end load off-peak for Manchester than you do Liverpool. In this way, Liverpool fares better as its the way the timetable worked out. TOC input during the development of the new WC timetable wanted calls at Crewe and Rugby/Nuneaton with the Stafford call transferred to another service, but for whatever reason this didn't work and instead ended up being Stafford only. So to this end the addition of the one extra stop at Stafford is the apologetic present from the timetable, rather than an intended hindrance to loadings!

And I disagree with the want to remove Runcorn. It adds less than 2 minutes to schedules thanks to the PSR over the Runcorn Bridge, and acts as a regulation point for Weaver Junction in the Up direction. And it also has 2tph on the Lime Street - New Street runs.

It is also a handy parkway station for Halton/Warrington/Runcorn etc. Virgin had implied previously any new services that served Liverpool would always call at Runcorn. To this extent, I never mentioned it in my earlier post, as the two go together without question, much like Manchester and Stockport.

 

[Nym]

Unless you run via St Helens Jcn of course...

 

[Pumbaa]

Quite. Running via Warrington BQ and St Helens allows the Glasgow to be sped up. And of course if you speed up the Up Glasgow enough, you could step up the diagrams too. Currently the Liverpools and Glasgow (most of the day) have ridiculous layovers at Euston.

 

[87015]

And of course if you speed up the Up Glasgow enough, you could step up the diagrams too. Currently the Liverpools and Glasgow (most of the day) have ridiculous layovers at Euston.

Isn't the whole idea of having a single fleet rather than one actually tailored to match demand that you just interwork services as you are not constrained by 'Glasgow sets' and 'Liverpool sets'?

If you are sticking them on the same route you could actually have a fleet that is suited to what it works, I don't know age old ideas like having certain sets with more FOs for peak Manchester and Birminghams and others with more TSOs for the Scotch services perhaps?

Seems incredibly lazy planning...

 

[ukrob]

Isn't the whole idea of having a single fleet rather than one actually tailored to match demand that you just interwork services as you are not constrained by 'Glasgow sets' and 'Liverpool sets'?

Seems incredibly lazy planning...

I don't know if it is currently the case or not but the Liverpool service had a 75 minute layover at Euston - and this set was then used for another service if a late inbound would cause a delayed outbound. That is smart - not lazy planning.

 

[Pumbaa]

I don't know if it is currently the case or not but the Liverpool service had a 75 minute layover at Euston - and this set was then used for another service if a late inbound would cause a delayed outbound. That is smart - not lazy planning.

I seem to remember there was already another set at Euston though as the 'standby'. And yes it still occurs. Arrives at xx56, departs x207.

 

[Robin GX]

One train an hour is not bad really, especially as there is the London Midland option as well. Manchester is a much bigger and more important city than Liverpool.

 

[MidnightFlyer]

One train an hour is not bad really, especially as there is the London Midland option as well. Manchester is a much bigger and more important city than Liverpool.

Liverpool is larger in population than Manchester...

 

[87015]

I seem to remember there was already another set at Euston though as the 'standby'. And yes it still occurs. Arrives at xx56, departs x207.

On second thought it is even more stupid as the Virgin traincrew are deemed too fancy to work more than one round trip on the same route (or similar terms) so you probably can't even diagram the same crew with the same unit in and out if the units are restricted to one destination. Thats going to make service recovery a complete faff regardless of what set you have as a nomiated 'step up' set, because you can't spin it straight back out if everything is a crew swap to get around the one trip rule!

 

[tbtc]

On second thought it is even more stupid as the Virgin traincrew are deemed too fancy to work more than one round trip on the same route (or similar terms) so you probably can't even diagram the same crew with the same unit in and out if the units are restricted to one destination. Thats going to make service recovery a complete faff regardless of what set you have as a nomiated 'step up' set, because you can't spin it straight back out if everything is a crew swap to get around the one trip rule!

I'd have hoped that things like electronic reservations would make it much simpler to "switch" trains at a terminus, so that there was no reason for a southbound Glasgow to wait to work the next northbound Glasgow... similarly, no reason for the same (southbound) staff to work the same unit north...

 

[RichW1]

I think everyone in the world needs to be careful over defining sizes of cities and what constitutes a city or metropolis. How you serve them by rail is a very interesting and complex topic and as the size of our cities in the 21st century is a new phenomenon in terms of how busy and how complex they are, it will take a lot of work.

Just one example.... did you know that British city population statistics cannot be used when comparing them to other cities in the world? Why? Because the British have a very 'unique' view on what a metropolis is. We have a very odd view of boundaries and of living in towns or villages when we no longer do, as these are very often part of, economically and otherwise, somewhere else. Our populations of our cities are therefor smaller compared to other world cities as they all class cities differently.

Take London...you may say the population is 7.8million or so BUT when international bodies from the US or Europe study cities, their figure for London is 13-14million. Quite different.

So how we run trains and where the main central business districts are deemed to be is a tough one and it is all predicated on the proven human science of this.....that cities which have a concentration of people, thus creating a 'critical mass' effect, tend to keep on growing more successfully (in GDP terms only) than those which are smaller polycentric seperate identity driven towns joined together with no dominent centre. So, if you're wondering where such policy comes from, it might be worth reflecting on that point. The main focus being the fact that information exchange is larger and thus creates a rolling effect like London where success breeds more success and it is a natural phenomenon across the globe.

Of course this means some places are ceded to others and become 'suburbs' to the larger central business district and this creates order and functionality. It is these social sciences that maybe being applied in government by analysts when looking at the long term picture some maybe wanting to build for the UK. Train services are becoming ever more complex given travelling patterns and this is a large problem in a densely populated country where cities are merely becoming a reference to a place within a coninuous built up area. Effectively, we are becoming a city State in the southern half of Britain and train services will be ever more complex.

 

[xtradj]

when is the 2nd hourly service due to start

 

[Pumbaa]

On second thought it is even more stupid as the Virgin traincrew are deemed too fancy to work more than one round trip on the same route (or similar terms) so you probably can't even diagram the same crew with the same unit in and out if the units are restricted to one destination. Thats going to make service recovery a complete faff regardless of what set you have as a nomiated 'step up' set, because you can't spin it straight back out if everything is a crew swap to get around the one trip rule!

I would have hoped that the crews would be understanding during disruption and agree to go wherever they needed a driver going. And also hopefully plenty of crew sitting around waiting to go, even it's just as far as Stafford or Stoke to get things moving.

 

[tbtc]

Maybe we should be glad that Liverpool wasn't closed down thirty years ago:

Margaret Thatcher's closest ministers came close to writing off Liverpool in the aftermath of the 1981 inner-city riots and even raised the prospect of its partial evacuation, according to secret cabinet papers released on Friday.

The cabinet papers released by the National Archives under the 30-year rule reveal Thatcher's closest advisers told her that the "concentration of hopelessness" on Merseyside was very largely self-inflicted with its record of industrial strife.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/dec/30/thatcher-government-liverpool-riots-1981?intcmp=122