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Wigan to Bolton electrification officially given go ahead

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swt_passenger

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Who does so much stuff need to be live? When clearances are tight, could they not use a non conductor for the catenary wire? When they first did Metrolink in Manchester, the span wires in the centre were polypropylene so they didnt need insulators.
And why dont they anchor the overhead to bridge soffits? It could save a mast and maybe allow lower clearances under the bridge, as the wires would move less.
I'm not an overhead engineer - I'm just designing overhead with crayons!
Sometimes under low bridges they bring the catenary level down gradually either side of the bridge to effectively the same level as the contact wire, and they can and do mount various fittings directly to the underside of bridges. If a specialised design can meet electrical clearance distance and insulation values it can be done. Sometimes catenary and contact are supported very close together in height by little more than twin fibreglass tubular brackets.

this view (2nd pic) of the Bletchley EWR viaduct shows the catenary and contact close together - but those tubular supports can be mounted much nearer the roof if needed:
 
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Nicholas Lewis

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It's quite possible that the NR design criteria have moved on in the 4-year gap since Grip 3, necessitating a new or updated survey.
There has been talk of reducing the strict standards enforced by ORR in previous schemes (reducing clearance work), and things like the improving the piling works (using a wider range of pile sizes).
All based on "lessons learned" from the CP5 schemes.
Hasn't helped with the cost on this line although without more transparency its impossible to know what unit rate the scheme has used for its estimate
 

td97

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Seems that bridge inspections were carried out last week at Church St and Manchester Rd in Westhoughton
 

plugwash

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They don't indicate exactly which tracks are already electrified (in particular the details of what if-any existing overrun provision is made for trains misrouted towards wallgate from the WCML) and I don't know how closely they represent the tracks on the ground, but from looking at the maps on tracksy it looks to me like the electrification will create new interfaces between electrified and non-electified tracks at "Wigan station junction" (where the cut across to north Western leaves the line from Bolton/Atherton to Wallgate) and "Crow Nest Junction" (where the line from Bolton to Wigan joins the line from Atherton to Wigan).

 
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Ianno87

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Take it no running off wires them just connect to the original ones either side of the lostock jct to Wigan north western line.

No, there is absolutely no overlap or run-off at North Western at all onto the Hindley lines.
 

WatcherZero

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Theres a sign on the platform at North Western warning drivers no electric access to Hindley lines.
 

plugwash

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Are there currently any overruns or warning signs for trains on the WCML heading towards wallgate?
 

LNW-GW Joint

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Don't know about signs, but there is no overrun towards Wallgate.
That phase of WCML electrification (1974) did not go in for overlaps, there was not one even towards Liverpool at Springs Branch.
I think the major one towards Manchester at Euxton Jn was the same.
The connections towards the L&Y route south of Wigan NW are only single track, and carried next to no traffic for many years.
 

plugwash

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Do we know if the interfaces from the new electrification towards the non-electrified lines to wallgate and atherton are likely to have overruns wired?
 

Mag_seven

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Just a reminder that the topic of this thread is Wigan to Bolton electrification.

If anyone wants to discuss anything else they are welcome to start a new thread.

thanks :)

 

scragend

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Just seen on a local residents' group that leaflets have gone out to people living near Hindley station about the electrification works. I don't live near the station so I don't have one but someone has posted this image. Hmmm...

1632570828122.png
 

ianhr

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Just seen on a local residents' group that leaflets have gone out to people living near Hindley station about the electrification works. I don't live near the station so I don't have one but someone has posted this image. Hmmm...

View attachment 103097
When I passed through just over a week ago Westhoughton and Hindley appeared to have attractive gardens, presumably looked after by local residents, and lots of mature trees. Presumably the trees at least will have to go. Interesting that the map shows Lostock even though there are no platforms on the Wigan lines.
 

Ianno87

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When I passed through just over a week ago Westhoughton and Hindley appeared to have attractive gardens, presumably looked after by local residents, and lots of mature trees. Presumably the trees at least will have to go. Interesting that the map shows Lostock even though there are no platforms on the Wigan lines.

It does have a "side platform" symbol for Lostock to denote the difference. Probably useful to include it on the map as reference for Lostock Jn.
 

Trackman

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When I passed through just over a week ago Westhoughton and Hindley appeared to have attractive gardens, presumably looked after by local residents, and lots of mature trees. Presumably the trees at least will have to go. Interesting that the map shows Lostock even though there are no platforms on the Wigan lines.
I went early last week, last time I went Crow Nest signal box was still there.
Hindley was nice, trees and plants and had a mock up of a coal pit and there was a wooden train or was that Westhoughton which was equally nice.
I suppose they will have signs at both Ince and Hindley for the 769's as my train didn't stop at Ince (from Wallgate). Sooner the better for the 769's with electrification, travelling to Bolton was hard work for the 769 even when it was going downhill.
 

WatcherZero

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Just seen on a local residents' group that leaflets have gone out to people living near Hindley station about the electrification works. I don't live near the station so I don't have one but someone has posted this image. Hmmm...

View attachment 103097

Ouch, when Network Rail messes up the order of stations on a line in its own handouts....

Hindley and Westhoughton are the wrong way round.
 

furnessvale

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It does have a "side platform" symbol for Lostock to denote the difference. Probably useful to include it on the map as reference for Lostock Jn.
Many will mistake that for the normal indication of a more minor station.
 

GRALISTAIR

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I apologize for being slightly OT but did not want to start a fresh thread for a now closed one. I was traveling in the Bolton area on the M61 yesterday and the hard shoulder was blocked off where the M61 crosses over the now electrified Manchester-Preston line. Large parapets (metal clad) were finally being installed as per requirement over an electrified railway.

At the quoted eye watering price tag for this section I would hope EVERYTHING has been taken into account though I don't think it is crossed by any motorways.
 

civ-eng-jim

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The M61 crosses the Wigan-Bolton line too but the parapet is already clad - Whether it meets requirements for OLE I don't know.

1633432489238.png


M61 overbridge before cladding on the line to Preston:

1633432576089.png
 

edwin_m

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A bit surprised the Wigan-Bolton bridge doesn't seem to have the enhanced crash barriers that I thought all motorway over rail bridges got after Great Heck (and which are just visible on the second bridge).
 

Elecman

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I apologize for being slightly OT but did not want to start a fresh thread for a now closed one. I was traveling in the Bolton area on the M61 yesterday and the hard shoulder was blocked off where the M61 crosses over the now electrified Manchester-Preston line. Large parapets (metal clad) were finally being installed as per requirement over an electrified railway.

At the quoted eye watering price tag for this section I would hope EVERYTHING has been taken into account though I don't think it is crossed by any motorways.

The M61 crosses the Wigan-Bolton line too but the parapet is already clad - Whether it meets requirements for OLE I don't know.

View attachment 103530


M61 overbridge before cladding on the line to Preston:

View attachment 103533
I reported the non compliance of the MVE M61 Bridge several times to both Highways England ( as was) and the ORR finally must have struck home . I actually wondered if they did the wrong bridge originally.
 

snowball

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Roger Ford has a page on this in the Nov Modern Railways (p. 32).
Subtitle "Business case trumps high costs". Haven't read it yet.

Edit: have now read it. He has no new info on this specific scheme that we didn't have before (though he avoids the mistake in some other reports of the decision, which misinterpreted the perhaps deliberately unclear press release as 13 route miles). His piece is mainly about electrification costs generally.
 
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plugwash

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Electrifying ANY route makes sense if you are serious about cleaning-up diesel emissions
But the focus should be on the routes where it will make the most difference and I don't think the CLC is one. It gets two northern DMUs per hour in each direction running local services, plus the EMR service to Norwich (which is unlikely to be electrified any time soon).

Wigan to Bolton makes sense because with a slight service rearrangement (joining the southport serices up to the Atherton services rather than the Bolton services) a short section of electrification allows a much longer service to be run by pure electrics.

(which are particularly nasty, try P12 at New St next to a ticking-over Voyager for 30 seconds).
No disagreement there, if I was running the show I'd be putting a high priority on working out how to get diesel out of new street, either by introducing bi-mode trains and/or by electrifying crosscountry routes.

Its also a rather handy diversion if you need to run Liverpool-Manchester services with EMU's
I still maintain that only in exceptional circumstances is it likely to be worth electrifying a line based primarily on it's utility as a diversion route.

Local trains are likely to be split with a RRB covering the gap rather than diverted. Otherwise you lose services to the local stations along the route. Even with Long distance services there is likely to be a limit to how much you can divert before the diversion line fills up.
 

Ianno87

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I still maintain that only in exceptional circumstances is it likely to be worth electrifying a line based primarily on it's utility as a diversion route.

In the CLC's case, the limited route capacity would mean you'd just cancel the Chat Moss services entirely, and tell punters to use the existing CLC services, even if EMUS could be diverted that way.
 

Bletchleyite

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But the focus should be on the routes where it will make the most difference and I don't think the CLC is one. It gets two northern DMUs per hour in each direction running local services, plus the EMR service to Norwich (which is unlikely to be electrified any time soon)

The thing that makes the CLC particularly suitable is the large number of local stations, for which a high acceleration modern EMU would be able to provide a considerable timetable improvement over a DMU.
 
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