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Various consultations on the May 2022 East Coast Mainline timetable

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swt_passenger

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A few things from scanning through the various pdfs...

* - The evening Chathill service won't stop at Cramlington, meaning quite a bit gap in the peaks for Newcastle - Cramington passengers (who will significantly outnumber the Chathill man and his dog!) - will the expectation be that the Ashington service covers this instead?
That can’t be it, because Ashington trains won’t get as far up the mainline as Cramlington, they’ll already be off the mainline at Benton Junction, its about 5 miles further south.
 
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yorksrob

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A few things from scanning through the various pdfs...

* - The evening Chathill service won't stop at Cramlington, meaning quite a bit gap in the peaks for Newcastle - Cramington passengers (who will significantly outnumber the Chathill man and his dog!) - will the expectation be that the Ashington service covers this instead?

* -Still two short DMUs into Leeds in the morning peak from Skipton (rather than combining the Lancaster and Carlisle services to allow a path to be used by a four coach EMU) - I wasn't expecting anything to change, but it's still annoying

* -Seems a bit odd to be removing the token "put the place on the map" LNER service that Sunderland has to London at the same time as giving Middlesbrough/ Cleethorpes a token "put the place on the map" LNER service to London (I appreciate the reasons for both changes, but the timing of doing one at the same time as the other seems worth pointing out)

* -I thought Reston was a daft idea for a station when it was proposed, I thought it was a daft idea when they started building it, I think it's a daft idea now that we see just how poor the service is going to be / how we'll have to allocate stock to a stand alone service just to provide enough services to justify opening it - it's going to be a white elephant

* -Saltburn gets an hourly Manchester service - great - more people should visit Saltburn - the other east coast seaside towns are over-rated!

* - In all of the rationalisations (and complaints about insufficient paths through Garforth for the current XC service at tea time!), I'm surprised that the Blackpool North service still runs fairly fast to York (okay, it picks up Garforth in lieu of TPE, but there's still the stand along Leeds - York stopper - given all of the other reductions/ simplifications, I half expected the stops to be giving back to the Blackpool service, as used to be the case)

I still like the overall changes, don't get me wrong - there's a lot of good in there - obviously there'll be something in there that everyone dislikes



I don't think there's talk of scrapping them, but if TPE can manage the vast majority of their current services without them then they can become someone else's problem (which may allow us to take these modern coaches out of service for a few months so that money can be spent on reconfiguring them)



Sure, I was just trying to see if there was any quantifiable benefit of it, that's all - going via Leeds is enough of a delay on Sheffield - York journeys but even more so with (London) Doncaster - York (Newcastle) journeys



Fair call - I'm more biased in favour of Donny for obvious reasons, but there's obviously a lot of connections at Peterborough too

Indeed. I would say that if TPE can manage their services with five annd six carriage trains, then I would say fine.

If getting rid ofcthem means a return of 3 carriage services on the main routes then no, absolutely not.
 

Watershed

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how we'll have to allocate stock to a stand alone service just to provide enough services to justify opening it
Fortunately it's very unlikely to end up served that way. The service will still be pretty infrequent though!

* -Saltburn gets an hourly Manchester service - great - more people should visit Saltburn - the other east coast seaside towns are over-rated!
Whilst Saltburn is far more of a destination than Redcar could ever hope to be (sorry @ainsworth74!), it's still a matter of operational convenience and reliability to extend the services through to there. Terminating at Redcar is causing no end of difficulties.

If getting rid ofcthem means a return of 3 carriage services on the main routes then no, absolutely not.
With the extension to Saltburn and various other projects due to soak up 185s, that is exactly what would happen if the Mk5s were ditched. In fact, even under today's heavily reduced diagrams they 'cover' for more than 10% of the 185 fleet.
 

CAF397

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Summary for those who can't read the pdf for any reason.

1tph LNER fast to Edinburgh, calling York and Newcastle
1tph LNER semi-fast, calling at most intermediate stops
1tph LNER Newcastle semi-fast

TPE to Edinburgh withdrawn back to Newcastle
TPE Manchester Airport to Newcastle trimmed back to York to Man Vic
But a return to a full Liverpool - Scarborough timetable, which when added to the Manchester Victoria - York reinstates the 5 'fast' services over the Pennines (when including the Hull from Manchester Piccadilly).

I do have concerns over Manchester Airport connectivity from the east, though. Only the Redcar/Saltburn train from Huddersfield/Leeds/York, compared to trains from Chester, Liverpool, Blackpool, Lancaster, Preston & Crewe.

Airport numbers will recover, and how are they going to manage the numbers flying from Manchester who are travelling from Darlington, Durham and Newcastle? Change at Manchester Victoria?

The York-Manchester Victoria service should be diverted into Manchester Piccadilly via Guide Bridge, if just to allow journey connections.
 

Ianno87

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The York-Manchester Victoria service should be diverted into Manchester Piccadilly via Guide Bridge, if just to allow journey connections.

To where? Victoria is more convenient for the likes of Bolton, whereas any passengers from Yorkshire to the Midlands would travel directly via XC.
 

JonathanH

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Airport numbers will recover, and how are they going to manage the numbers flying from Manchester who are travelling from Darlington, Durham and Newcastle? Change at Manchester Victoria?
Or York, or Leeds, or Huddersfield.
 

yorksrob

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Fortunately it's very unlikely to end up served that way. The service will still be pretty infrequent though!


Whilst Saltburn is far more of a destination than Redcar could ever hope to be (sorry @ainsworth74!), it's still a matter of operational convenience and reliability to extend the services through to there. Terminating at Redcar is causing no end of difficulties.


With the extension to Saltburn and various other projects due to soak up 185s, that is exactly what would happen if the Mk5s were ditched. In fact, even under today's heavily reduced diagrams they 'cover' for more than 10% of the 185 fleet.

If anything is to be maintained from the whole pandemic fiasco, it should be the prevelance of 5-6 carriage TPE services.
 

Ianno87

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Indeed. Onto an already busy 1tph service to Manchester Airport.

Of which a decent chuck of people would be alighting at Victoria anyway. So people from Newcastle can have a seat to Victoria, then alight and walk across the platform to join an Airport service.
 

tommy2215

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I hope the DfT have a serious plan to increase capacity on their voyager routes, especially since there will be extra stops now. I know all the speculation about the Avanti voyagers and EMR Meridians that there's been on this forum, but I don't think the DfT have confirmed anything.
 

Watershed

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The York-Manchester Victoria service should be diverted into Manchester Piccadilly via Guide Bridge, if just to allow journey connections.
Unfortunately there would be little point in that. In both directions it runs right behind the Hull service, which picks up all the local stations between Huddersfield and Manchester.

The only connection you'd be gaining would be York-Manchester Piccadilly but that is already served by the Redcar (to become Saltburn) service.
 

CAF397

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To where? Victoria is more convenient for the likes of Bolton, whereas any passengers from Yorkshire to the Midlands would travel directly via XC.
Warrington (3 tph from Picc v 1tph from Vic), Manchester Airport & various South Manchester destinations.

Manchester Victoria will be served by 3tph from York, whereas Manchester Piccadilly will only be served by 1tph from York.
 

Ianno87

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Warrington (3 tph from Picc v 1tph from Vic), Manchester Airport & various South Manchester destinations.

Manchester Victoria will be served by 3tph from York, whereas Manchester Piccadilly will only be served by 1tph from York.

You'll be able to change at Victoria for 1tph to each of Manchester Airport and Warrington. So hardly unserved.
 

tbtc

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That can’t be it, because Ashington trains won’t get as far up the mainline as Cramlington, they’ll already be off the mainline at Benton Junction, its about 5 miles further south.

Cheers for confirming - that's quite a gap in that case

(I don't have any connection to Cramlington but I do bang the drum for the place since it's a town that feels like it's not getting the service it deserves because it's on a fast main line, and therefore there's not much scope for stopping trains there)

Whilst Saltburn is far more of a destination than Redcar could ever hope to be (sorry @ainsworth74!), it's still a matter of operational convenience and reliability to extend the services through to there. Terminating at Redcar is causing no end of difficulties

I appreciate it's not because of any significant demand for Mancunains heading to Saltburn but I'd always recommend the town (and, re Redcar, it's a lovely walk along the beach between the two places and then had hourly train back - recommended

Why sit on a train for an hour and a half to get from Middlesbrough to the crowded beach at Whitby when you could be sampling the wide unspoilt beach between Redcar and Saltburn?

XC Plymouth – Edinburgh trains will mostly call at Northallerton.

And so continues XC's history of being a dumping ground for stations that other TOCs don't want to/ can't serve properly (Dronfield, Chester le Street etc)

I do have concerns over Manchester Airport connectivity from the east, though. Only the Redcar/Saltburn train from Huddersfield/Leeds/York, compared to trains from Chester, Liverpool, Blackpool, Lancaster, Preston & Crewe.

Airport numbers will recover, and how are they going to manage the numbers flying from Manchester who are travelling from Darlington, Durham and Newcastle? Change at Manchester Victoria?

Lots of places don't have a direct train to Manchester Airport (and a number of places are proposed to lose their existing links - Sheffield/ Doncaster/ Llandudno/ Chester etc)

Crewe is about twenty minutes away from the Airport, so it's much more important that it has a regular service (that Durham/ Darlington)

The Manchester Airport branch is far too congested - nine trains per hour (pre Covid) but only thirtysomething passengers per train - a complete waste of resources

I hope the DfT have a serious plan to increase capacity on their voyager routes, especially since there will be extra stops now. I know all the speculation about the Avanti voyagers and EMR Meridians that there's been on this forum, but I don't think the DfT have confirmed anything.

Sadly, I don't think they do - just dump additional calls on XC with no additional trains

(hmm, the reference in the documents is to Newcastle - Reading - does that mean that the bi-hourly Southampton extensions won't come back? I may have missed this in all of the other bumf)
 

tommy2215

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Sadly, I don't think they do - just dump additional calls on XC with no additional trains

(hmm, the reference in the documents is to Newcastle - Reading - does that mean that the bi-hourly Southampton extensions won't come back? I may have missed this in all of the other bumf)
The timetable does show the bi-hourly Southampton extensions, plus the one a day to/from Guildford. The 13:46 Southampton - Edinburgh is curtailed at Newcastle but everything else will run as before. It doesn't show the early morning Nottingham-Bournemouth but that might be because its not relevant to the consultation.

Whatever the long term hit to rail usage is, it most certainly won't prevent the 4/5 car voyagers from being full and standing. With the Northallerton, Reston and extra Berwick stops they'll go from very crowded to incredibly crowded.
 
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No impressed with LNERS changes to the Aberdeen services. The end to end journey time gets longer and the addition of extra stops in southern England will just mean getting decent fares for stations north of edinburgh on weekends and summer will be impossible cause they will be filled up with even more more edinburgh visitors than they get now. A massive step backwards.
 

JonathanH

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No impressed with LNERS changes to the Aberdeen services. The end to end journey time gets longer and the addition of extra stops in southern England will just mean getting decent fares for stations north of edinburgh on weekends and summer will be impossible cause they will be filled up with even more more edinburgh visitors than they get now. A massive step backwards.
How does this follow? Surely Edinburgh passengers are going to aim for the fastest services. LNER can manage advance purchase quotas to get the loadings to work as they determine makes sense. Is connectivity from East Anglia etc to Dundee / Aberdeen potentially more important than through journeys from London?

Is there some practical reason why the Aberdeen / Inverness services are linked to slower services (eg 800/1s don't have the same performance on electric as the 801/2s) or is it just a matter of timetabling?
 

Failed Unit

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How does this follow? Surely Edinburgh passengers are going to aim for the fastest services. LNER can manage advance purchase quotas to get the loadings to work as they determine makes sense. Is connectivity from East Anglia etc to Dundee / Aberdeen potentially more important than through journeys from London?

Is there some practical reason why the Aberdeen / Inverness services are linked to slower services (eg 800/1s don't have the same performance on electric as the 801/2s) or is it just a matter of timetabling?
Suspect it is timetables. I don’t think they can change the path north of Edinburgh. With the speed up that will be a long wait at Edinburgh. However it appears the fast services are leaving kings cross at x30. So they would need to recast Scotland.

The extra stops may generate more business but we will see.
 

TheBigD

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No impressed with LNERS changes to the Aberdeen services. The end to end journey time gets longer and the addition of extra stops in southern England will just mean getting decent fares for stations north of edinburgh on weekends and summer will be impossible cause they will be filled up with even more more edinburgh visitors than they get now. A massive step backwards.
Same journey time northbound, around 10 minutes slower southbound for those travelling north of edinburgh.
 

JonathanH

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Same journey time northbound, around 10 minutes slower southbound for those travelling north of edinburgh.
Yes, it could be the Scottish paths which dictate the fast going from Kings Cross at xx30 instead of at the top of the hour as they would have to wait from about 20 minutes at Edinburgh if the xx00 path was used and ran through.
 

Failed Unit

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Yes, it could be the Scottish paths which dictate the fast going from Kings Cross at xx30 instead of at the top of the hour as they would have to wait from about 20 minutes at Edinburgh if the xx00 path was used and ran through.
Just managed to download the timetable. 1203 London - Inverness is faster with the extra stops. Same path north of Edinburgh. But the speed up South of Edinburgh is making it 3 mins faster.
 

TheAlbanach_

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No impressed with LNERS changes to the Aberdeen services. The end to end journey time gets longer and the addition of extra stops in southern England will just mean getting decent fares for stations north of edinburgh on weekends and summer will be impossible cause they will be filled up with even more more edinburgh visitors than they get now. A massive step backwards.
Makes more sense (to me) to have the ABD/INV services stopping at more stations down the route. Gives people more options for direct journeys to the north of Scotland.
 

InOban

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On the contrary the linking of the Aberdeen / Inverness services into the stoppers makes perfect sense. Anyone with a time sensitive end to end journey (indeed anyone travelling the full distance ) is almost certainly going to fly (probably cheaper as well). These trains serve the people going to and from Aberdeen for their two weeks on the oil rigs, and their homes are distributed along the route, certainly not in London

Personally I don't see why XC continues to operate North of Edinburgh especially since the sets spend the night in Edinburgh and have to travel north essentially ecs in the morning and south in the evening. The time was when scotrail didn't have enough trains to maintain an hourly service without these XC services but that will no longer be the case. The Voyagers would be much better utilised in the central core of the XC network.

I totally agree with earlier poster about Reston. Always a political station. I saw a pic of a visit by the local MSP to the works site today. She obviously hadn't seen the proposed timetable! With the suggested services it won't need any car park.... Mind you, the XC consultation does suggest the possibility that a TOC could be funded to provide a regular semifast service between Edinburgh and Berwick-upon-Tweed (which is nearer Edinburgh than Newcastle )
 
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JonathanH

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Personally I don't see why XC continues to operate North of Edinburgh especially since the sets spend the night in Edinburgh and have to travel north essentially ecs in the morning and south in the evening. The time was when scotrail didn't have enough trains to maintain an hourly service without these XC services but that will no longer be the case. The Voyagers would be much better utilised in the central core of the XC network.
XC consulted on changing the time of its Aberdeen trains once before - moving it to the middle of the day (with the unit effectively strengthening a peak service into Leeds from the south and south from Edinburgh in the evening) but no changes were actually made.

They remain in the role they have had for some time of strengthening the Edinburgh peak which, as you note, Scotrail could probably do itself.

This is the quote from the previous consultation.
The current CrossCountry service provision for Aberdeen is primarily aimed at providing additional capacity between Aberdeen and Edinburgh. One impact of providing this service is that high capacity five car Voyagers are therefore dedicated to serving the extremities of the network at times when their optimum location should be in the core of the network at that time. The December 2017 proposal seeks to rebalance this by serving Aberdeen during the daytime, offering a more attractive service for through journeys from the Midlands, Yorkshire and the North, arriving Aberdeen in the early afternoon. The parts currently used by CrossCountry services would then be available to other operators.
 
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TheBigD

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The proposed LNER timetable seems a very mixed bag.

Pros...

The hourly fast Edinburgh service with a journey time of around 4hr05m/4hr10m
The extra hourly semi-fast service to Newcastle
Earlier arrival in to Edinburgh from London and later departure from Edinburgh to London and London to Edinburgh
Direct Middlesborough to London service
(I suspect that in time the other 5 London-York semi-fast will be extended through to Middlesborough if more bimodes are procured)
Extension of one of the Lincoln services to/from Cleethorpes
A new 0920 Lincoln-London service filling the current 4 hour gap in the morning
Improved connectivity from the extra stops in the Aberdeen and Inverness services
Slight improvement in Leeds journey times by around 5 minutes
For some reason Retford sees 4 services to London between 0547 and 0650 compared to the normal off peak service of 1 train per 2 hours

Cons...

The loss of some intermediate journey opportunities
(Virtually nil Stevenage to Peterborough services meaning a 55 minute Thameslink journey as opposed to 30 minutes on LNER today)
(Virtually nil Newark-Retford journey opportunities)
Darlington loses 1 train per 2 hours and the quickest now taking around 5-10 minutes longer
The southbound Lincoln service appears to have a poor path after Peterborough taking around 60 minutes to do what could be 50 minutes
A reduction of 1 in morning peak hour Peterborough-London stops and a 40 minute gap
Increased gap in the evening Lincoln service, was 1606/1906 and is now 1610/1943
(The 1943 has a 9 minute stop at Newark, presumably to detach a unit?)
Leeds services have just 20 minute turnarounds at Leeds
No sign of the promised 2 hourly extensions through to Bradford
A reduction of in Sunday Services from Edinburgh to London from 26 to 22.
The early morning 0540 4 hour service to London now takes 10 minutes longer.
A couple of the morning peak trains from Newcastle to London take around 10 minutes longer

Connections are also a mixed bag, for example, an hour wait for at Peterborough for a Cambridge-Edinburgh journey yet just a 10 minute wait in the southbound direction


It will be interesting to see where the Hull Trains/Grand Central/East Toast Trains fit in to the timetable and what their paths are like.
 
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AverageTD

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Looking up the thread, I'm starting to understand why TPE are receiving such cuts north of Manchester but I have a few obligations.
- Terminating the York service at Manchester Victoria seems daft, although the Airport doesn't really need another service right now, Piccadilly losing a service round the curve doesn't seem great either, especially for those coming from destinations south of Manchester that don't get a through train out the other side.
- I'm hoping that the Manchester to York service will get the 68s now, while 802s will operate Saltburn services. Would make better use of the wires and 125mph running as I can't see them trundling down the ECML slow lines from York to Northallerton.
- Could a 2 hourly TPE extension north of Newcastle provide some sort of regular service to both Reston and Dunbar as well as 1 or 2 other station on the ECML. I'd hope this means that Cross Country could abandon their stops at Dunbar.
- TPE also propose an additional hourly service between York and Scarborough. It seems logical that the Manchester to York service should be extended to Scarborough.

Final question from me, although the demand may not necessitate it, could both TPE services to Newcastle still run along with the new LNER service or is it a one or the other situation?
 

gledhill56

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Why is it as soon as people read the TPE consultation they automatically assume it’s a way of getting rid of the Mk5 coaches, there always seems to be a constant witch hunt against them on these forums.
 
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