Manchester United Regeneration Scheme

[HaxbyFur]

Manchester United have gone forward with plans to build a new 100,000 seater stadium, before demolishing the old one and regenerating the surrounding area into new houses, commercial opportunities and fan experiences.

One part of this project which hasn't been mentioned much is that there has been many mentions of a brand new rail station, which has been described by architects as being here in their plans:



This would remove the currently closed and unused Manchester United Rail Station and relocate it to the location shown below:


I'm interested to hear people's input from the railway side of things. They're really trying to encourage public transport as the main method of travel though I can immediately see some issues with the proposal:
* These services will need to go through the Castlefield Corridor, how are they going to allocate that capacity?
* There'll be a lot of passengers in single bursts during match days. Are they assuming 3/4 car Northern Rail services are going to be sufficient? If not, is the proposal for these to only stop at Piccadilly 13/14?
* Has Network Rail been consulted about this yet? Is there an official Rail plan for the scheme?

 

[Flying Claret]

Never mind building a new station. How are they going to move Trafford park freight terminal...?

 

[HaxbyFur]

Never mind building a new station. How are they going to move Trafford park freight terminal...?

I actually think this is one of the only parts which has been addressed. I'm sure people will hop in to correct me if I'm wrong, but there's a plan already in motion to build a new freight terminal near Newton-le-Willows which will replace this one.

 

[tumbledown]

Being discussed:

Old Trafford freight relocation

Apparently Freightliner are looking to relocate the Old Trafford terminal to St Helens to release land for regeneration. The St Helens site is near the Newton le Willows triangle. If successful, the deal would see Freightliner relocate its rail terminal from Old Trafford to Parkside East in...

www.railforums.co.uk

 

[Baxenden Bank]

Never mind building a new station. How are they going to move Trafford park freight terminal...?

I actually think this is one of the only parts which has been addressed. I'm sure people will hop in to correct me if I'm wrong, but there's a plan already in motion to build a new freight terminal near Newton-le-Willows which will replace this one.

Freight terminal aspects are being discussed in this thread.

Is it me or is there an echo in here!

 

[Tomos y Tanc]

Freight terminal aspects are being discussed in this thread.

Is it me or is there an echo in here!

Actually, given the whole thing is pie in the sky. maybe it should be in the 'Speculative Ideas' section!

 

[HaxbyFur]

Actually, given the whole thing is pie in the sky. maybe it should be in the 'Speculative Ideas' section!

I think it's one small level over speculative. The stadium will definitely be rebuilt, or even worse case scenario from this point have it's capacity increased.

The train station will definitely be investigated as part of that extra capacity.

 

[Flying Claret]

Freight terminal aspects are being discussed in this thread.

Is it me or is there an echo in here!

Cheers everyone. I hadn't seen that other discussion.

@Baxenden Bank as in Accy?

 

[Baxenden Bank]

@Baxenden Bank as in Accy?

Yes.

 

[Flying Claret]

Yes.

Nice. I'm at the opposite side of the 'lines' in green Haworth.

 

[furnessvale]

Manchester United have gone forward with plans to build a new 100,000 seater stadium, before demolishing the old one and regenerating the surrounding area into new houses, commercial opportunities and fan experiences.

One part of this project which hasn't been mentioned much is that there has been many mentions of a brand new rail station, which has been described by architects as being here in their plans:
View attachment 176760


This would remove the currently closed and unused Manchester United Rail Station and relocate it to the location shown below:
View attachment 176761

I'm interested to hear people's input from the railway side of things. They're really trying to encourage public transport as the main method of travel though I can immediately see some issues with the proposal:
* These services will need to go through the Castlefield Corridor, how are they going to allocate that capacity?
* There'll be a lot of passengers in single bursts during match days. Are they assuming 3/4 car Northern Rail services are going to be sufficient? If not, is the proposal for these to only stop at Piccadilly 13/14?
* Has Network Rail been consulted about this yet? Is there an official Rail plan for the scheme?

If the proposed new station is the open red box, they appear to have selected a location as far away from the new stadium and other developments as possible.

Thus they are following a long standing tradition of maximising inconvenience to public transport users. Nothing new there!

 

[JamesT]

If the proposed new station is the open red box, they appear to have selected a location as far away from the new stadium and other developments as possible.

Thus they are following a long standing tradition of maximising inconvenience to public transport users. Nothing new there!

That's normally considered a good thing, a measure of separation allows for queueing etc. to be set up. One of the problems with the existing station that caused it to be closed is that the stadium is right on top of it, so people queuing for the train got in the way of crowds trying to disperse. Consider Olympic Way at Wembley Stadium, that provides a convenient place for the crowds to be controlled waiting to get into the station.

 

[childwallblues]

Will the WCML and the Liverpool to Manchester Chat Moss route require power increases to cope with the electric freights generated in the Newton-le-Willows area?

 

[The Planner]

Will the WCML and the Liverpool to Manchester Chat Moss route require power increases to cope with the electric freights generated in the Newton-le-Willows area?

Depends how many run on electric, its not a huge amount now. I expect power modelling is being done on a set of assumptions.

 

[furnessvale]

Depends how many run on electric, its not a huge amount now. I expect power modelling is being done on a set of assumptions.

Interesting thought. Presumably power modelling could spill over into timetabling, e.g. only one electric freight allowed in a certain section at a time.

If so, that could affect future expansion of freight in general, or expansion of electric haulage in particular. Or does it already happen?

 

[The Planner]

Interesting thought. Presumably power modelling could spill over into timetabling, e.g. only one electric freight allowed in a certain section at a time.

If so, that could affect future expansion of freight in general, or expansion of electric haulage in particular. Or does it already happen?

I expect congested infrastructure will get used, so capping capacity as you note. Declaring that requires a solution though, so its not done lightly.

 

[Elecman]

Will the WCML and the Liverpool to Manchester Chat Moss route require power increases to cope with the electric freights generated in the Newton-le-Willows area?

The existing grid feeder is the old Parkside 132kV feeder at that location.

 

[Chester1]

Manchester United have gone forward with plans to build a new 100,000 seater stadium, before demolishing the old one and regenerating the surrounding area into new houses, commercial opportunities and fan experiences.

One part of this project which hasn't been mentioned much is that there has been many mentions of a brand new rail station, which has been described by architects as being here in their plans:
View attachment 176760


This would remove the currently closed and unused Manchester United Rail Station and relocate it to the location shown below:
View attachment 176761

I'm interested to hear people's input from the railway side of things. They're really trying to encourage public transport as the main method of travel though I can immediately see some issues with the proposal:
* These services will need to go through the Castlefield Corridor, how are they going to allocate that capacity?
* There'll be a lot of passengers in single bursts during match days. Are they assuming 3/4 car Northern Rail services are going to be sufficient? If not, is the proposal for these to only stop at Piccadilly 13/14?
* Has Network Rail been consulted about this yet? Is there an official Rail plan for the scheme?

I would be surprised if it is used for scheduled services around match times. The new stadium would have 10,000 seats more than Wembley and be in a location more tricky to provide services for. I can't see how Northern could guarantee sufficient capacity on a match day to avoid dangerous overcrowding. Maybe the occasional match charter could use it.

 

[slipdigby]

I would be surprised if it is used for scheduled services around match times. The new stadium would have 10,000 seats more than Wembley and be in a location more tricky to provide services for. I can't see how Northern could guarantee sufficient capacity on a match day to avoid dangerous overcrowding. Maybe the occasional match charter could use it.

Correct. The very vast majority of demand pre and post game or event will be to/from or via the City Centre. There isn't capacity to run anything additional via Castlefield, therefore the primary public transport mix will remain as at present, i.e. tram and bus.

 

[Class 170101]

Correct. The very vast majority of demand pre and post game or event will be to/from or via the City Centre. There isn't capacity to run anything additional via Castlefield, therefore the primary public transport mix will remain as at present, i.e. tram and bus.

But perhaps longer trains instead?

 

[Pyewipecarshed]

These services will need to go through the Castlefield Corridor, how are they going to allocate that capacity?

This will be the major stumbling block. The removal of the freight terminal should free up the freight paths (1 or 2 per hour) which could be used for match shuttles, but you'd need a very long train to move everyone at such a low frequency.

 

[nwales58]

But perhaps longer trains instead?

Piccadilly platforms 13/14 are nearly 400m long so 2500-3000 passengers/train ... the next bottleneck is that it would take 10 minutes or more to unload and clear the platform unless seriously rebuilt (a full 400m TGV unloading via the platform shows the problem nicely) so it does not fit into the rest of the network without massive investment elsewhere.

The capacity needed is rapid transit territory, but only needed for match days so why spend the money.

Unless it's a station on an east-west route tunnelling under Manchester bypassing all the nasty capacity constraints all around the existing network. Unfortunately we seem to be locked in to that route approaching from the south via the airport (because it started with the now-defunct HS2 alignment).

 

[slipdigby]

Piccadilly platforms 13/14 are nearly 400m long so 2500-3000 passengers/train ... the next bottleneck is that it would take 10 minutes or more to unload and clear the platform unless seriously rebuilt (a full 400m TGV unloading via the platform shows the problem nicely) so it does not fit into the rest of the network without massive investment elsewhere.

The capacity needed is rapid transit territory, but only needed for match days so why spend the money.

Spot on, especially the latter point.

Given there's already three tram stops with 25 trams per hour into the city centre within 10 mins walking distance, surely better to enhance Metrolink capacity rather than trying to solve Manchester's rail network issues?

Aside from rail based solutions, it has been observed that 15 year old double deckers arriving or departing every 30-45 seconds make a decent dent in the match day crowds at both the Etihad and Old Trafford. Indeed, I suspect that bus based park and ride to intercept traffic coming off the motorway network, e.g. close to the Trafford Centre may form part of the proposed solution to the double whammy of loss of surface parking at Old Trafford plus 25,000 extra spectators.