MML Electrification: progress updates

[snowball]

Press release

Significant investment in southern end of Midland Main Line this Christmas

Network Rail engineers will be working hard delivering presents to passengers on – and above – the railway.

www.networkrailmediacentre.co.uk

Two major projects will take significant steps forward this Christmas; to upgrade signalling at West Hampstead and to strengthen a railway bridge in Kentish Town, while a myriad of maintenance work take place throughout the route.

The signalling work will “recontrol” the system used by signallers to control the traffic lights of the railway onto a more modern, computer-based system. At the same time, control of trains at the southern end of the Midland Main Line into St Pancras will be transferred back to West Hampstead from Three Bridges Rail Operating Centre. This will allow operations teams in the East Midlands to directly manage train movements for the length of the line, improving decision making for passengers.

Meanwhile, in Kentish Town, work will continue to strengthen the railway bridge which runs over the Midland Main Line. Kentish Town Road at its junction with Leighton Road will be closed from 20.00 on Christmas Eve to 23.59 on Wednesday 27 December as engineers complete repairs to concrete and steel elements of the bridge, use high-pressure water to clean existing steel components, and apply a protective coating system to various parts of the steel structure.

On the top of the bridge, two 25 tonne excavators will demolish the parapet wall and a 350-tonne crane will lift out the old girders and in the new girders and precast concrete brick faced parapets.

Buses and pedestrians will still be able to cross during the road closure.

Disruptive work on both projects alongside dozens of routine maintenance activities, will take place during Christmas Day and Boxing Day, when passenger trains do not operate, reducing impact upon passengers.

Gary Walsh, Route Director for Network Rail’s East Midlands route, said: “Our teams will be working incredibly hard over Christmas to carry out vital upgrades and maintenance that will mean more reliable journeys for our passengers.

“The work at West Hampstead will allow our signallers to make better decisions for passengers and the strengthening of the bridge in Kentish Town will make it safe for all users for years to come.

“I’m sorry for the inconvenience that will be caused to road users in Kentish Town but want to thank them for their patience and understanding while we carry out this necessary strengthening work.”

Mark Pavlides, Chief Customer Officer for Govia Thameslink Railway, said: “We’re also very grateful to our customers for their patience during this vital work that Network Rail have planned to carry out at the quietest possible time on the route. These major projects will improve our customers’ experience through better reliability and maintain safety for passengers for many years to come.”

Engineers will also be working on other projects further north in the East Midlands route with teams carrying out improvement work to existing overhead line equipment to allow new trains to run at 125mph and will be continuing to work to electrify the line between Kettering and Leicester meaning faster, more reliable, and greener future journeys for passengers.

 

[Brissle Girl]

“Traffic lights…”. Ugh!

 

[Jamesrob637]

“Traffic lights…”. Ugh!

Was it written by somebody whose mother tongue isn't English?!

 

[snowball]

Was it written by somebody whose mother tongue isn't English?!

It was written by someone whose mother tongue is not rail nerd.

 

[swt_passenger]

Was it written by somebody whose mother tongue isn't English?!

Network Rail standard infant school level PR, from the same idiots who a few months ago referred to sidings as “laybys for trains”…

 

[takno]

“Traffic lights…”. Ugh!

Unfortunately press releases are no longer rewritten by journalists before publication, so you have to have the language ready to be copied and pasted in for literally the lowest level of knowledge of any possible reader in the target audience.

Personally I think describing signals as "traffic lights" in every single press release is pretty unhelpful because apart from being lights which give directions to drivers the two things have very little in common. Typically if a set of traffic lights is out drivers will just look at the second set across the junction, or if the whole junction is out they will just drive cautiously and merge in turn, confident that they will be able to stop within line-of-sight. None of that applies to signals, and so the metaphor really tends to give people misleading ideas and probably makes them question why lines need to be completely closed to do upgrades. There's no telling PR teams though.

 

[QSK19]

Kettering and Leicester… clearly they’ve found a way to electrify under the London Road bridge and have secretly approved the work

 

[Merle Haggard]

“Traffic lights…”. Ugh!

Bit like the Derby remodelling of a few years ago when the Network Rail posters illustrated that the new signals would be three-aspect with red at the top. To be fair, they didn't have red/green man though

 

[Killingworth]

Kettering and Leicester… clearly they’ve found a way to electrify under the London Road bridge and have secretly approved the work

Those words chosen with more care. "Between Kettering and Leicester" could mean any bit of track between the places but doesn't necessarily include both of them, and it doesn't.

Saying between Kettering and Sheffield would have been equally true but that might have stretched credulity a bit too far.

 

[43066]

Unfortunately press releases are no longer rewritten by journalists before publication, so you have to have the language ready to be copied and pasted in for literally the lowest level of knowledge of any possible reader in the target audience.

Personally I think describing signals as "traffic lights" in every single press release is pretty unhelpful because apart from being lights which give directions to drivers the two things have very little in common. Typically if a set of traffic lights is out drivers will just look at the second set across the junction, or if the whole junction is out they will just drive cautiously and merge in turn, confident that they will be able to stop within line-of-sight. None of that applies to signals, and so the metaphor really tends to give people misleading ideas and probably makes them question why lines need to be completely closed to do upgrades. There's no telling PR teams though.

Agreed - unhelpful and misleading. Typical dumbing down which occurs all over the place these days.

Kettering and Leicester… clearly they’ve found a way to electrify under the London Road bridge and have secretly approved the work

Those words chosen with more care. "Between Kettering and Leicester" could mean any bit of track between the places but doesn't necessarily include both of them, and it doesn't.

To be pedantic Wigston is part of the wider Leicester urban area, so it wouldn’t be incorrect to state that the electrification reaches Leicester, just not the part of Leicester we tend to think of in railway terms!

 

[londonmidland]

I do hope that once electrification is complete to Wigston, that the ‘pause’ in further electrification of the MML isn’t too long after.

Ideally, there really needs to be a rolling program of electrification, otherwise it’s going to take forever to complete.

 

[QSK19]

Those words chosen with more care. "Between Kettering and Leicester" could mean any bit of track between the places but doesn't necessarily include both of them, and it doesn't.

Saying between Kettering and Sheffield would have been equally true but that might have stretched credulity a bit too far.

Yes, I get all that, but I’m being pedantic given that we RF users know exactly what I meant. I appreciate that Joe Public might not get it; so describing it as such would be acceptable in that context.

Ideally, there really needs to be a rolling program of electrification, otherwise it’s going to take forever to complete.

If at all - although I think other users have said that a good amount of investigative work on RS3 is being done.

 

[Killingworth]

I do hope that once electrification is complete to Wigston, that the ‘pause’ in further electrification of the MML isn’t too long after.

Ideally, there really needs to be a rolling program of electrification, otherwise it’s going to take forever to complete.

It's certainly planned in detail now, if not ready to go. I've heard recently from 3 independent sources that Dore -Sheffield will be 3 tracked and Sheffield reconfigured. But has a Business case been signed off yet for what we might consider an adequate, let alone good, scheme at acceptable price? Supposedly to be completed by 2030 and possibly still could be, although 2035 may be nearer the mark.

 

[londonmidland]

It's certainly planned in detail now, if not ready to go. I've heard recently from 3 independent sources that Dore -Sheffield will be 3 tracked and Sheffield reconfigured. But has a Business case been signed off yet for what we might consider an adequate, let alone good, scheme at acceptable price? Supposedly to be completed by 2030 and possibly still could be, although 2035 may be nearer the mark.

I haven't been keeping track so I'm not really up to date with the latest developments and proposals. Do we know what is coming 'next' aka where and when the next set of OLE piles will be installed?

 

[Jamesrob637]

I do hope that once electrification is complete to Wigston, that the ‘pause’ in further electrification of the MML isn’t too long after.

Ideally, there really needs to be a rolling program of electrification, otherwise it’s going to take forever to complete.

Use (some of) the money saved from truncating HS2. Simple.

 

[Peter Sarf]

Use (some of) the money saved from truncating HS2. Simple.

Needs to be done quickly, before the electrification teams start being disbanded.

I feel a missed opportunity slipping by.

 

[JustPassingBy]

Re (from the press release above):
At the same time, control of trains at the southern end of the Midland Main Line into St Pancras will be transferred back to West Hampstead from Three Bridges Rail Operating Centre.

My signalling knowledge is probably out of date, but I know at one point Leicester PSB (now gone) handed over to West Hampstead PSB. I thought both were going/gone, e.g. Leicester now covered by Derby ROC. So I am confused about the above - why is signaling being moved back to West Hampstead? Or is the "control of trains" referred to in the press release not signalling?

 

[38Cto15E]

We have always known that the GCR and MML would always be the bridesmaid and never the bride, given our closeness to the WCML and ECML, but at least I am going to be polite, and say "Happy Diamond (60th) Anniversary to the West Coast Main Line, you were in power 60 years ago whilst I'm still waiting for sparks to appear at Leicester.
You can tell can't you that I have become disillusioned with the MML/ St Pancras snatch etc etc, so much so that a couple of weeks ago I drove to Nuneaton, parked free, very close to the station and boarded a 60 mnute Pendolino to Euston only to be greeted on board with a complimentary full British Brekkie.

 

[takno]

Re (from the press release above):
At the same time, control of trains at the southern end of the Midland Main Line into St Pancras will be transferred back to West Hampstead from Three Bridges Rail Operating Centre.

My signalling knowledge is probably out of date, but I know at one point Leicester PSB (now gone) handed over to West Hampstead PSB. I thought both were going/gone, e.g. Leicester now covered by Derby ROC. So I am confused about the above - why is signaling being moved back to West Hampstead? Or is the "control of trains" referred to in the press release not signalling?

West Hampstead PSB is being replaced by (a/some) digital workstations. I can't see anything which say they won't remain at West Hampstead for the moment. Generally speaking Network Rail is taking a slightly more relaxed approach to moving everything into a small number of giant ROCs, and is allowing smaller centres to carry on in some places. In any case, once the signalling is on workstations it isn't such a technically huge task to shift control to the ROC later.

The signalling which is moving back into West Hampstead is presumably the route into the main-line platforms at St Pancras. Again there was a strong presumption at the time of the Thameslink core project that Thameslink needed control of everything in one place, and also that you wanted the approaches to the core to be fully digitally-controlled. Now that West Hampstead will be digitally controlled it probably makes sense to move the interface closer to the Thameslink core itself. In particular it doesn't make a whole lot of sense anymore for Three Bridges to control the main line platforms at St Pancras.

 

[QSK19]

We have always known that the GCR and MML would always be the bridesmaid and never the bride, given our closeness to the WCML and ECML, but at least I am going to be polite, and say "Happy Diamond (60th) Anniversary to the West Coast Main Line, you were in power 60 years ago whilst I'm still waiting for sparks to appear at Leicester.
You can tell can't you that I have become disillusioned with the MML/ St Pancras snatch etc etc, so much so that a couple of weeks ago I drove to Nuneaton, parked free, very close to the station and boarded a 60 mnute Pendolino to Euston only to be greeted on board with a complimentary full British Brekkie.

The excuse will be that the MML isn’t important and the maximum journey time is only a couple of hours; so it’s not high up the priority list. EMR’s offerings compared to Avanti and LNER reflect its second-rate status, an example being hot drinks in first class: “community centre” over-stewed tea/coffee in paper cups on EMR; porcelain cups on Avanti with metal teapots and milk pots.

Point taken that the WCML and ECML go up to Scotland and hence have longer journey times (so stuff like good catering is extremely important); but that is no excuse to neglect a busy mainline, especially when the Government keeps mentioning the good old levelling up line.

Surely it is finally time for the MML to be the bride after the other lines are already on their 5th spouse? Hopefully, the 810s prove to be a decent product which respect the MML’s intercity passengers and not simply a sop to appease a half-arsed electrification job.

 

[John Webb]

.....Generally speaking Network Rail is taking a slightly more relaxed approach to moving everything into a small number of giant ROCs, and is allowing smaller centres to carry on in some places. In any case, once the signalling is on workstations it isn't such a technically huge task to shift control to the ROC later......

At St Albans South Box, we understand that Covid was a significant factor in deciding to retain West Hampstead as a signalling centre rather than splitting it between the ROCs at Three Bridges and East Midlands. There may have other factors as well, of course.

West Hampstead PSB is being replaced by (a/some) digital workstations. I can't see anything which say they won't remain at West Hampstead for the moment.....

.....The signalling which is moving back into West Hampstead is presumably the route into the main-line platforms at St Pancras. Again there was a strong presumption at the time of the Thameslink core project that Thameslink needed control of everything in one place, and also that you wanted the approaches to the core to be fully digitally-controlled. Now that West Hampstead will be digitally controlled it probably makes sense to move the interface closer to the Thameslink core itself. In particular it doesn't make a whole lot of sense anymore for Three Bridges to control the main line platforms at St Pancras.

I understand that over the coming Christmas holiday, 4 workstations will be introduced at West Hampstead in the former Maintainers’ Mess & Locker Room as a temporary measure. These will replace the present "eNtrance-eXit" (N-X) panel that was installed in the late 1970s when West Hampstead was built. This will free up the current room with the N-X panel to allow said panel to be removed. (Regrettably we don't have the room at St Albans South to preserve it!) The control of the 4 MML platforms will be moved back to West Hampstead from Three Bridges ROC.
The present N-X panel room will be refurbished and the workstations eventually moved there from their temporary location.
There are no alterations to the signals themselves.

 

[JustPassingBy]

At St Albans South Box, we understand that Covid was a significant factor in deciding to retain West Hampstead as a signalling centre rather than splitting it between the ROCs at Three Bridges and East Midlands. There may have other factors as well, of course.

I understand that over the coming Christmas holiday, 4 workstations will be introduced at West Hampstead in the former Maintainers’ Mess & Locker Room as a temporary measure. These will replace the present "eNtrance-eXit" (N-X) panel that was installed in the late 1970s when West Hampstead was built. This will free up the current room with the N-X panel to allow said panel to be removed. (Regrettably we don't have the room at St Albans South to preserve it!) The control of the 4 MML platforms will be moved back to West Hampstead from Three Bridges ROC.
The present N-X panel room will be refurbished and the workstations eventually moved there from their temporary location.
There are no alterations to the signals themselves.

Thank you - fascinating to hear these details and the apparent unwinding of some of the ROC centralisation.

 

[Geogregor]

Interesting details regarding signaling.

I still don't understand reversal of policy of moving everything into big ROCs. I thought that was clear direction of travel, so to speak.

Is it so staff are not concentrated in one place? Some sort of policy to increae resilience?

I know it is slightly off topic but I'm really curious.

 

[43066]

The signalling which is moving back into West Hampstead is presumably the route into the main-line platforms at St Pancras. Again there was a strong presumption at the time of the Thameslink core project that Thameslink needed control of everything in one place, and also that you wanted the approaches to the core to be fully digitally-controlled. Now that West Hampstead will be digitally controlled it probably makes sense to move the interface closer to the Thameslink core itself. In particular it doesn't make a whole lot of sense anymore for Three Bridges to control the main line platforms at St Pancras.

This makes a lot of sense, as it often feels like the TBROC controlled part, which is really just St. Pancras platforms and perhaps half a dozen signals, is somewhat of a poor relation. The person operating workstation looking after it presumably has a lot more to do besides, so isn’t able to fully focus on it.

Another issue is that the GSMR invariably patches you through to the Ashford HS1 workstation if used in or close to St Pancras - although that may well continue post migration to West Hampstead. It can be absolutely infuriating!

Interesting details regarding signaling.

I still don't understand reversal of policy of moving everything into big ROCs. I thought that was clear direction of travel, so to speak.

Is it so staff are not concentrated in one place? Some sort of policy to increae resilience?

I know it is slightly off topic but I'm really curious.

AIUI a lot of it comes down to cost, and there’s now no real pressure to do it as the scheme to role out ETCS has been indefinitely delayed/kicked into the long grass in most locations.

 

[LowLevel]

Interesting details regarding signaling.

I still don't understand reversal of policy of moving everything into big ROCs. I thought that was clear direction of travel, so to speak.

Is it so staff are not concentrated in one place? Some sort of policy to increae resilience?

I know it is slightly off topic but I'm really curious.

For some of the longer distance moves it was being suggested that there was a lot of talent with thorough knowledge of the area potentially being lost with long distance moves. Some ROCs are pretty solid - see EMCC where pretty much all of it's control area is local. "Let the computer work the job and forget the rest, if it goes wrong it doesnt matter" York ROC on the other hand has an awful reputation.

 

[Spartacus]

For some of the longer distance moves it was being suggested that there was a lot of talent with thorough knowledge of the area potentially being lost with long distance moves. Some ROCs are pretty solid - see EMCC where pretty much all of it's control area is local. "Let the computer work the job and forget the rest, if it goes wrong it doesn't matter" York ROC on the other hand has an awful reputation.

EMCC has a lot controlled by one form of ARS or another now, it's problems are at least known and predicable. There's one particular signaller there who had a rather bad reputation for not just letting the computer do it's thing, and invariably screwing up rather badly, and then denying he's the issue. Now many be he did know what he was doing before Derby was rebuilt, but if he did he needed to realise it's not the same now as it was, and not signal it like it was with old margins & restrictions.

 

[paulcleaver]

BBC News reporting that Leicester City Council have approved plans for the demolition of buildings to allow the redesign of the station entrance, albeit that planning permission has yet to be approved for that yet.

 

[Yindee8191]

BBC News reporting that Leicester City Council have approved plans for the demolition of buildings to allow the redesign of the station entrance, albeit that planning permission has yet to be approved for that yet.

Not really electrification related (maybe needs a new thread?) but good news anyway. Shame to lose quite a nice building but the station desperately needs a revamp and the plans look great.

 

[TT-ONR-NRN]

I wonder if I’ve suddenly realised why the 810 carriage numbers seem a little short for “most will be in pairs,” and why they have 21x 360s for 12 to be diagrammed daily - I hope they’re not hoping to send off peak 360 turns to the Midlands the way GWR do with 387s to Cardiff…

 

[londonmidland]

Today’s view of Cooks Lane footbridge, Kilby Bridge, showing the extent of the latest electrification works.

(Picture grabbed off Facebook. Not mine)