In our previous post on the shape of the London rail network, we looked back at two key decision points which established our infrastructure legacy: the ring of termini that gave rise to the pattern of services which concentrates demand onto the city core, and the narrow 12′ standard for cross-city tube lines.
It’s been hard to break free from this legacy, and to find ways to reshape the London rail network and expand the city core. While the core has largely remained the same as it was in the 1860s, London’s population and travel to work area have grown enormously. As a result, the challenge is to establish new travel patterns that take the pressure off this core.
There are number of infrastructure options:
- New and improved orbital services that avoid the need to travel via the core – which may also encourage commercial expansion from the centre and create new travel hubs.
- Cross-city mainline services, such as Crossrail and Thameslink. These are inherently more efficient to run, release invaluable capacity at the termini, and offer multiple interchange and destination options. They are, however, very expensive – particularly the stations – and there is a practical limit to how many new lines we can (or would want to) burrow through the city core. This is a subject we’ll return to in a future post.
- New capacity on the Underground tube and sub-surface lines ? this is already being implemented through the upgrade plan and, although it is bolstering the network as a whole, it is not altering its shape. Currently, there is no real discernable pattern to the proposed tube extensions: arguably they are simply developer-led (Northern to Battersea) or opportunistic (“Hakerloo“).
So what should be the role of the tube lines in a strategy to reshape the rail network? The limitations of the narrow (12′ diameter) tube lines are now well-recognised. Developing our previous discussion on tube extensions, as the tubes fill to capacity in the centre there may even be a case for ‘over-extended’ tube lines to be cut back, and for some outposts to again be served by mainline services. The tubes could then focus on providing an effective service through the centre, with key interchanges in the inner suburbs.
But we are jumping ahead, so let’s look first at the infrastructure investments that are being outlined in the London and SE Rail Utilisation Strategy (RUS) and how that might help reshape the network.
Into the Land of Railway Acronyms
Over the last few months we have looked at the RUS on line by line basis, and have explored the challenges of providing for growth on the radial routes where there is generally little or no capacity to spare. Type “RUS” into the search box under Archive and up they will come, although some of these discussions may now need updating following the final draft of the RUS released in July.
To those unfamiliar with acronym-laden and seemingly tortuous governance arrangements, the RUS are the building blocks of the rail Industry Initial Plan (published on 29 Sept), which informs the DfT’s High Level Output Specification (HLOS) process. The HLOS defines what the government requires from Network Rail’s infrastructure in its next control period (Control Period 5, or CP5, 2014 – 2019) and what is expected of the train service operators. HLOS2 will be published as a government White Paper in summer 2012. It may seem a cumbersome way of developing a strategic rail policy, but at present it’s all we’ve got. Intrigued LR readers with a penchant for evaluation and review may care to peruse the current HLOS (for CP4, 2009-2014) which was published as the 2007 government White Paper Delivering a Sustainable Railway.
So, with the expectation that recommendations in the London and South East RUS will be bundled up into investment bids in the HLOS, it is useful to look at TfL’s own bid, summarised in its July 2011 recommendations for HLOS2. As TfL states, the document has two purposes:
(a) to influence the Initial Industry Plan, such that it contains TfL’s recommended schemes or near equivalents; and
(b) to provide material which TfL and stakeholders can use to lobby government over the investment needed in London’s railways in the HLOS itself.
The document summarises many of the recommendations in the London and SE RUS, and talks about a “rail strategy for London for 2014 to 2019″.
Tfl’s Take
But the real point of difference is how TfL views the network as a whole, and then embeds this in a broader transport framework across London. This overview may be what gives rise to the new pattern (below) of “strategic interchanges”, and the hint that travel through London may not actually need to involve London at all. This is all very encouraging, although it does spark hazy recollections of London rail plans in the dim and distant past.
Strategic Interchange Locations
As we’ve already discussed, TfL’s role in running the Overground is rapidly evolving and, unsurprisingly, they are seeking to develop more diverse travel patterns using the orbital lines:
7.2.2. The Mayor’s Transport Strategy emphasises the role of strategic interchanges to assist orbital movement that not only improves accessibility locally but also relieves pressure in central area. The nature of this covers:
- Improving currently inadequate interchange in terms of quality
- Calling more trains on radial routes to make the interchange more effective
- Increasing frequency on orbital routes
- Physical changes to reduce the time it takes to change from one platform to another and thus to make the interchange
- New stations to allow interchange where none is possible currently
So how will TfL achieve this? Aside from the potential new governance arrangements, what does TfL’s vision of strategic interchanges look like in terms of infrastructure and service patterns?
Both the RUS and TfL identify the orbital routes as a key focus for new investment, with increased service frequency and longer trains to meet what is expected to be a rapidly growing demand. However, this could be characterised as a ‘bit more of the same’ rather than a quantum leap in service pattern.
Orbital Peak Traffic
They are significant improvements nonetheless, and edge closer to the service frequency we expect from the Underground. Yet as we highlighted in our Overground series, they barely keep up with projected demand. Even with the proposed investment, the projections show that there will still be overcrowding on the orbital lines, and no other options are offered.
AM Peak Traffic
TfL also recognise that a number of these interchanges (and the lines from them) are already overcrowded. At the very least, significant investment will be required at Finsbury Park, Barking, Bromley South, Herne Hill, Tulse Hill, Clapham Jn and Wimbledon, and these are included in the £68m improvements package identified by TfL.
Station Schemes 2014 – 2019
Modest investments can certainly improve passenger capacity and the quality of the interchange experience, and they present an attractive business case for the HLOS.
Neither TfL nor the RUS, however, offer anything specific on changing the radial service patterns so that more services call at these new strategic interchanges. Clearly the value of spreading the load through the orbital routes is largely negated if the radial services don’t actually stop there, but increasing stops at these interchanges will slow journey times and reduce capacity overall on the radial routes, and this will exacerbate the very problems that the RUS and TfL are trying to resolve.
Getting Strategic with our Interchanges
This begs the question: what exactly is a “strategic interchange”? Are they just points on a map where lines cross and there happens to be a station? Or are they expected to become hubs in their own right, engines of local economic growth, for which TfL’s new interchange stations become the pride of the network?
Given the Mayor’s purview in terms of planning and development, should “strategic interchanges” be created at places where there is greatest potential for growth, combined with the need to support new travel patterns that take the pressure off the city core?
Let’s look at some examples. The Mayor’s Transport Strategy highlights Woolwich Arsenal as an exemplar, offering interchange between a radial route and DLR, plus integration with buses. But there is no talk of broader development themes, other than mentioning that the “strategic interchange will be further enhanced when the planned Crossrail station opens in 2017.” The Crossrail station will, however, lie 200m north which stretches the interchange definition somewhat. Woolwich Arsenal is also a two-track station with all trains stopping, so no changes were required to the service pattern. It does not have any of the challenges of interchanges on the mainlines.
Conversely, Ealing Broadway, Willesden Jn and Queens Park are on mainlines through which expresses thunder. West Hampstead has always been the interchange that never was, and many trains actually by-pass the station at Lewisham. Although Balham, Elephant & Castle and Vauxhall have Underground connections, so do Brixton and Kentish Town, but TfL has not identified these as strategic interchanges – and what of New Cross and New Cross Gate on the new ELL?
Stratford may offer a better example of what we might assume a strategic interchange would be: at the heart of the monumental redevelopment for the Olympics, orbital lines north and south, tube connection, and the advantage that many mainline trains stop here. The RUS is proposing track layout changes that can provide an additional platform, and also explores the potential for more Lea Valley services.
Looking west and into the future, perhaps Old Oak Common could become a new “super-hub”, with a new HS2 station at which GWML expresses trains would stop, linked to a resurgent Willesden which would become the WCML equivalent. To the plethora of connections on offer could be added a Bakerloo extension, or even blowing the dust off the curtailed District Olympia line and pushing it north.
Hammersmith & Fulham’s Park Royal International
OOC has emerged blinking in the bright lights of both HS2 and Crossrail, driven by a local authority with economic development high on the agenda, and fêted by masterplanners seeing commercial opportunity. Is this likely to be a model that can be replicated in other parts of London?
Ones eyes are naturally drawn to places like Peckham Rye, Brixton and Tottenham Hale, where economic development programs could focus investment on smaller-scale developments built around new transport hubs.
This could then prompt a rethink on the purpose of tube extensions. For instance, should the Northern go to Brixton rather than the developer-led extension to Battersea? And should Hakerloo be ditched in preference to a more modest extension to Peckham Rye?
In terms of service provision, perhaps there is also an opportunity to rethink this pattern of hubs linked by metro services, and think of these hubs as destinations in their own right which could be linked by fast limited-stop services. This could, for instance, allow rapid cross-London travel that avoided the city core. The closest we have come to this was Anglia Railways’ London Crosslink services, which died a death in 2002 but could form the basis of a wider pattern of new services also using the West London and South London lines.
Crosslink
Options and Limitations
But back to the nuts and bolts of the RUS and TfL’s recommendations for HLOS2. It is clear that delivering a coherent program of strategic interchanges is going to require major investment in areas outside London’s core, and particularly on the orbital routes.
We will explore each of the orbital lines in more detail in future posts, but suffice to say now that the potential to provide more capacity is limited by a number of factors:
- Platform lengths – especially on the ELL, which is limited to 4-carriages; the original ELL line had 6-car platforms but Canada Water, is only 4-car length
- Signalling, junctions and track speeds – historically the orbital lines have been a low priority for investment; therefore, aside from the new ELL, capacity is generally restricted by signalling and low line speeds
- Freight – the WLL and NLL are important strategic freight routes and metro services have to be interleaved with freight movements, but these two traffic patterns have very different characteristics and do not mix well. Or, to put it another way, TfL’s Overground aspirations will depend on its success in relocating cross-London freight flows to new routes outside London
- Inter-operability between networks – railway operators invariably shy away from passenger services that cross between regions, as they are prone to delay and disruptions can easily transfer across the network. Hence the radial routes into London have largely remained compartmentalised, and the orbital routes are largely segregated.
Although the proposed investments in the RUS are to be welcomed, it is perhaps no surprise that the plans for the orbital routes are conspicuously modest. It suggests that the investment value-add of these routes is hard to quantify, and therefore they remain the poor cousins trapped between the dominant radials, which then helps perpetuate the “ring of deprivation” around the city core.
It is also clear that London’s rail network is coming up against some real capacity limits that require some outside the box thinking. On most radial routes there are very few options to create new capacity, particularly with the growth in longer distance commuting services. Here TfL is demonstrating some leadership, but it is likely to need a more visionary investment case to bring their strategic interchanges to life, and start to change the shape of the rail network.
The Outer London Commission described four super-hubs: Stratford, Croydon, Brent Cross (RIP) and “Heathrow” (whose meaning was never very clear to the OLC members).
But its always best to follow the money – and Park Royal City – Old Oak Common seems to have emerged, blinking into the light, and a developer’s dream.
An interchange station is needed there, but actual development around the stations can be at the speed which the private sector deems profitable; no extra public subsidy is be needed.
OOC’s bright lights are blinking obvious
I imagine one day when they merge the 2 Catford stations a pretty penny could be made with the enormous retail space they will inevitably build on it.
The idea of 4 ‘super’ hubs in the major London compass sections of N, S, E and W (what is the northern one?) makes a lot of sense but hugely beefing up smaller local centres I am less sure about. A few are no brainers in the long run (e.g. West Hampstead) but all come with difficulties. North Action on the central line sums up the weakness of the overground network and it would be very costly to effectively rebuild a dozen or so stations without actually increasing capacity as such, just spreading the load.
The real answer lies in a network of 4/5 crossrail lines (no more than that so just 2/3 more than planned) not just because they bring an enormous amount of extra capacity but they offer the potential for extending, splitting, etc tube and rail lines. Suddely, a VL extension comes back into play as does splitting the jubilee. Crossrail in the West makes the Ealing branch redundant and long term that offers the opportunity for branching after SB either up Uxbridge road or down SW and helping out Waterloo.
“North” is a tricky one. The various National Rail routes (MML, ECML/Hertford Loop and possibly the two Lea Valley/West Anglia routes?) are quite divergent, and the orbital route passes very close to the centre (North london Line) or is low capacity/currently quite quiet (GOBLIN)- and interchanges between both the NLL and GOBLIN and the radial National Rail and Tube lines are mainly pretty poor. There’s Finsbury Park, but that just has the Great Northern stopping trains and two radial tube lines. The divergence makes a “hub” unlikely surely? There’s nowhere quite with the incredibal coming together of lines that OOC offers, there’s not even an equivalent to Stratford.
The Outer London Commission described four super-hubs: Stratford, Croydon, Brent Cross (RIP) and “Heathrow” (whose meaning was never very clear to the OLC members).
Stratford, East Croydon (or Norwood Junction?), OOC and Clapham Junction at the 4 diagonal compass points, seems more reasonable to me.
I presume Boris will promise Crossrail 2 in his manifesto next year(?)
There are still a few corridors free under London for new tube or crossrail lines and they will always win out to any serious new orbital lines. They will be doing well to build new interchanges on the existing overground routes.
To reiterate the only sector of London to have a healthy office market outside the core is West London towards Heathrow.
Old oak common could have real potential for growth, but most interchanges have prospects for large scale redevelopment. As for the other ideas, it will take new crossrail lines for them to be able to cut back any tube lines (wasn’t that what the old chelsea-hackney line was in the first place?).
Bakerloo will only receive funds if it can relieve the main network, so forget it just going to Peckham rye. Also they are busy taking developer levies in Batersea and Vauxhall, so the Northern line is going there.
An advantage of orbital line improvements is that all the benefits are felt in London. In contrast, improving radial mainlines, e.g. London-Cambridge, mainly has the affect of making it easier to commute from Cambridge, and thereby accelerates the middle-class flight from London.
As for the southern superhub, would Wimbledon be better then Clapham Junction (I’m not sure, just suggesting!)? It has a wide radial route across southern London in Tramlink, it has Thameslink to south central and northern London (and beyond!), and also will be the terminus of the Chelney line when constructed. Most suburban trains stop there, and the range of trains stopping there could probably be improved.
Tramlink is surely orbital?
There is also the beginnings of an orbital route using the Kingston Loop, St Helier line, and Sutton – Croydon route.
Ooops, I did mean Tramlink is orbital. Moment of mishap there!
Bakerloo extension yes – but not too far out.
I’ve bben watching the Hayes trains this past week, and they’re rammed now.
Victoria from Brixton to either Herne hill or Tulse hill, with loop at end….
OOC PROVIDED it is a proper interchange.
Where do the electrified GOBLIN trains go, West of GO? I assume they run East to either Grays or Pitsea via either Ockendon or Dagenham Dock, or alternate ….
W. Hampsted needs travolators (!)
Tott Hale ONLY if a third platform is built on the up side [ There IS room if the overbridge just to the South is rebuilt, AND said third track inserted all the way to Broxbourne.]
More TRAMS – we’ve already had this spat about that.
Croydon extension is a must, and I am of the opinion that X-river could still be a good idea – and, um, er, extend North to Camden Town and Kentish Town?
The roads there are narrow, though, in some places, so you might get the Ealing/Southall problems that screwed Uxbridge-Shep Bush.
Re-instate Point Pleasant flyover, and extend NLL to Wimbledon? Capacity problem?
Re-install Hall Farm – Lea Bridge ( a favourite of mine for obvious reasons), and split the newly 10-minute Chingfords to alternate to LS and Startford.
@Drew
Unlike anywhere else in London, Clapham Junction already IS a superhub. Just one without proper investment.
I’ve been banging the drum for orbital services for so very long.
The four super hubs, as I see them, are Clapham Junction, Willesden Junction/OOC, Stratford, and London Bridge.
The problem is with that last one as it’s actually a terminal, not a hub, and is nowhere near the LO orbital route. The solution I propose is a new super-hub station at “Surrey Canal Junction”, on the site of the incinerator. This station would have platforms on all of the South Eastern lines, all of the Brighton lines, the LO route, and any future Crossrail-style routes that might still be underground at this point. I think it would relieve London Bridge immensely.
The problem with these studies is that they only seem to consider the orbitals as a way of removing congestion from the absolute central areas…so only do the minimum required to relieve the current congestion there. It’s not just freight that can bypass London…a significant chunk of passenger traffic can as well….and I mean Greater London, not just Central London.
I’ve long advocated not only East-West Rail, but a series of orbital routes that remove the need to go via London, as well as providing valuable freight and diversionary routes. I cringe when public figures describe the LO system as a rail M25. No, THIS is a rail M25.
Likewise, the short-sighted notions of routing every easy service possible down a single (admittedly expensive) tunnel rather than planning for multiple routes that interchange. Case in point: The Chiltern Line is a perfect candidate for Crossrail’s apparent spare capacity in the west (though I still feel improving the GWML infrastructure out to Heathrow with 6 tracks could absorb most of that fine). It has an existing rail route to the Crossrail core and is crying out for investment (quad tracking, electrification, and 10-12 car trains). Instead, we get cheapskates trying to penny-pinch the rebuild of Euston and route the WCML suburban services down there instead of giving them their own route down to new underground suburban platforms at Waterloo from new underground suburban platforms at Euston (interchanging with Crossrail at TCR), and leaving the Chiltern line to fend for itself trying to make the most of the hugely capacity-constrained terminus of Marylebone.
Likewise…the ECML services could justify a 24tph tunnel on their own through to London Bridge to remove the need for any to terminate at Kings Cross as well as increase frequency…but instead, the current service levels (or at best, a slight increase) is getting funnelled down Thameslink. The MML is already hugely overcrowded…and when they upgrade the core to 24tph, they’re planning on using a chunk of that capacity for ECML services instead or increasing the frequencies on the MML to the required levels.
..and finally, just for seeding some ideas of your own, here’s a few of the overground orbital routes we could have had…
Delivering any improvement in orbital services will depend as much on fixing the stations as providing the capacity. More and more people seem to travel with all their possessions (judging by the size of the wheeled bags being used) and whilst they cope OK on the flat, they really struggle when changing levels. Moreover, many of these stations suffer from lack of investment. Try moving from low level to high level at Willesdan Junction with a 23kg case, and try waiting on the High Level platforms on a cold winter day!!!
So, capacity and quality stations with escalators and lifts for level changes is needed.
In that first map, what on earth is that long wiggly line coming off the south of the GWML right up at the western border? Staines West?
Wimbledon is shown as having an MTS Strategic Interchange Scheme on the books. Fair enough, it is one of the busiest stations in the UK. However, it mysteriously doesn’t have any long or medium distance trains stopping there (except for tennis!)
An Old Oak Common strategic interchange is so blinking obvious that I just hope that they don’t wait forever to get the details ‘just so’ before starting anything at all. New stations have been bravely created in the past, the usage has grown and grown, so no-one subsequently needs to pay consultants vast sums to wipe off their crystal balls and spend centuries ‘consulting’ before acting.
However, having said that, I cannot help but think that the developers’ Park Royal International looks like a multilayered dog’s breakfast. It seriously looks in danger of losing its strategic function and only really satisfying the local development need. For instance: does Crossrail really need two (or is it three/four?) extra stations?
Commenters here have again and again stressed the need for a Clapham Junction to Heathrow link. OOC could provide that but the developer plan shows folk from CJ having to change at Willesden, then again at one of the uncountable new Crossrail stations (but not the one serving HS2, so bad luck if you want to go North in a hurry!). Let’s get this amazing opportunity right, for London and the UK, not just make it a convenient way to get to a shopping centre!
Forgive me if this has already been said against the previous article, bit I couldn’t face looking at a load of architects’ Brave New World visions.
swirlythingy – I think yout mysterious line is too far east to be Staines West – it looks like the Heathrow branch to me, but for some reason shows T4 but not T5.
The mysteries of maps that our betters create! Swirlythingy has got us going on the strange branch off the GWML heading south for some distance on the Strategic Interchange Locations Map produced by TfL. I too think it’s a dreamer’s recreation of the Staines West branch line. A sad loss to the network that could have been a lot more useful than just providing a logistics railhead for T5 construction. (Curses on the M25 designers). Anyway, that map reminds me of the oft printed excuse in Rail magazine ‘ some lines and stations have been omitted for clarity’ ie: if you are totally confused, it’s your fault not ours.
I think that the TfL map has omitted the Windsor branch from Staines. That doesn’t totally explain the difficulties as Staines West station was a lot closer to the Waterloo-Reading line than that little orange line indicates.
Now, I’ll bang my usual drum. I’m hoping for, but failing to see some real vision in TfL’s proposals. We have all been so grateful for just a modicum of investment in London’s railways, that we dare not hope for a real connected-up network that will take people out of cars and ensure London’s future prosperity. The Overground has been a resounding success. We should build on that. Without some serious forward-looking vision we will never get the best out of what we have already got. It might appear to be OTT to look immediately for a one-stop shop at Old Oak Common that incorporates slick interchanges between GWML, HS2, Crossrail, HeX & WLL (&NLL) (with the line diversions to make it happen) but unless we really say now that that is what we have to aim for, then it will never happen. We will have a West Hampstead all over again, where some lines stop, others don’t, and for those that do, the passenger has to confidently negotiate the wild streets of the metrop.
If you are not a local, it’s quite intimidating trying to get from one ‘adjacent’ station to another. I have bewildered my way around between Paris Gard du Nord and Gard de L’Est (easy according to Seat 61), between Shoreditch High Street and Liverpool Street, from Bakerloo to Thameslink at Elephant & Castle and I daren’t try Walthamstow Queens Road to Central – I might never be heard of again. Westfield at Shepherds Bush paid for station upgrades and new stations, but left them all isolated from each other. Don’t let’s have Terry Farrell’s redevelopment dream without spending real money on the rail infrastructure so that everyone (not just commuters and locals) can confidently interchange there without hassle.
Whoops! Excuse my francais (O-Level 1964). It should have been Gare du Nord and Gare de l’Est above.
I note that on the “orbitals peak” diagram that Denmark Hill is shown to the east of Peckham Rye! Somehow I don’t think entire suburb movement is part of future rail strategy.
@Fandroid
I don’t think that can be the Staines West branch – Staines is well outside the GL boundary (and on the Thames). Why would it not be the Heathrow branch? (It looks odd because LU lines are not shown (although Tramlink, DLR and LO lines are) – an odd omission in a map illustrating integrated transport proposals!
@timbeau
You are spot-on with your geography. The squiggly blue line showing the Thames gives it away. As you rightly point out, omitting tube lines leaves out some vital connections, and makes some surface lines look disconnected (eg the Greenford branch).
Actually, Fandroid, you’d be much more likely to vanish somewhere in the “Elephant” complex than at Walthamstow.
But, you do all realise that there USED to be a set of steps down from the WC car-park to W Midland (It’s nowhere NEAR Queen’s Road) …
When pat of the land was sold off for development, a condition was that the link was preserved/updated.
Needless to say, the developer did nothing of the sort.
Last year (I think) London Borough of Waht the F***k (LBWF) finalyy won a court action against said developer and their succesor(s) … but, of course, nothing has been done, and it is still a ridiculous journey from one station to the other.
Not quite as insane as Hackney CentralH Downs, but almost as bad!
The Walthamstow link is about to commence construction (next week I think!) as part of a redevelopment of the station lands.
Target opening date is, you guessed it, summer 2012.
Hello,
This is my first post on London Reconnections, which is looking very fine in its new livery.
Big vision about super hubs is indeed needed, and welcome. But I hope it’s not at the expense of obvious improvements that could be made to existing connections, such as:
- reopening the high level platforms (formerly Brockley Lane Station) at Brockley to interchange between Southeastern, Southern and London Overground
- including stations on the ‘new’ London Overground south London line at Brixton and Camberwell
- converting Bromley North to light rail use, possibly linking to both Tramlink and DLR extensions; the former is close by at Beckenham and the latter, if extended to Catford, would be just a couple of miles away
- tying together stations in close proximity better, eg. West Hampstead, Catford/Catford Bridge, to make them obvious interchanges and centres of development
- creating a Central Line interchange with the London Overground east London line at Shoreditch High Street
And with the Chelsney proposals, why not bring (some of?) its lines to Victoria to allow Southeastern/Southern services to extend on to it, as per Thameslink/Southeastern beyond Blackfriars, thus creating space at Victoria and new connection possibilities?
Regarding general topic of gauge restrictions and restricted platform lengths does anyone with greater engineering knowledge than myself have any views on LR55 track covered in the current edition of “the rail engineer” (page 44-45) and accessible from http://www.rail.co/location/united-kingdom ?
Whilst the article refers to benefits that might be applicable in Crossrail construction I can’t but wonder if other London schemes might benefit or even become financially viable utilising this technology.
Dan – thanks
I WONDERED what they were doing @ W Central!
No signs or indication, of course, just a slightly-restricted entrance to the original station on the up side.
Long overdue.
Addendum
Dan – where did you get that information?
Googling for it got me nothing, and there were no signs up at the station yesterday – just a lot of portakabins…..
Repeat question
Where can one find information regarding the works beingundertaken at Walthamstow Central.
I think we’d all like to see that?
Looking at the aerial photos and to ensure good connectivity between hs2, crossrail, London overground and the underground, I would propose the following:
Transfer central line Ealing broadway branch to bakerloo line then from north acton build a cut and cover link to willesden junction via the old oak common site with interchange station
Build new central line branch from east acton or white city interchanging with above bakerloo line route, hs2 and crossrail in the old oak common site and then taking over the Dudden hill route with new interchange stations at harlesden, neasden and cricklewood/ Brent cross.
I can’t imagine anyone using the Ealing branch of the Central would take kindly to the long and mazy route via Queens Park! Is there actually much need to keep the Ealing branch at all post Crossrail? Ealing will have a much faster service to Paddington and many existing Central Line destinations. Connection at OOC/North Acton for destinations nearer at hand. If West Acton still needs a service, running a North Acton – Ealing Broadway shuttle might suffice
I expect the best bet for the Dudding Hill Line is an Overground branch of some sort.
But the northwest London light railway has proposed a DLR system on it, then taking over the Central line branch to Ealing Broadway, and even somehow on to West Ealing and the Greenford branch (soon to become a dead-end, with HS2).
Transport for London objects to light-rail stopping freight traffic on the Dudding Hill line, but they might co-exist somehow, since both Old Oak Common and Brent Cross architects have at some stage proposed light rail.
Apparently TfL canvassing local council transport officials on the potential for a Hounslow-Hendon service. This would use the Dudding Hill line, it would be interesting to know more…
The Ealing stub on the central line will probably become redundant long-term, especially if Crossrail offers 16tph at Eailing Broadway. All those Bakerloo services terminating at QP does seem a waste, and a short connection to take over this branch would give quicker services to some parts of NW London which are actually slow and quite difficult to do (try using the 83 bus to get to Ealing from Wembley, takes over an hours in rush-hour). It seems a pretty easy and cheap connection to do.
Where the central line then goes is the big question. Don’t think NW London needs any more tube lines, certainly not radial anyway. I would prefer it follow Uxbridge road and essentially do what the West London tram was meant to but far better and without road issues. The other option is going SW and helping out Waterloo by taking a load of trains off the Windsor line. The Hounslow loop would be obvious, but would quite like the Piccdilly line to go there if they can get rid of the Uxbridge branch since it would be a shorter and cheaper connection (which prob requires the District to take over and thus loosing its own branch somewhere).
Re TfL’s concerns about the Dudding Hill line, freight trains and light rail can happily co-exist on the same tracks when the latter service is operated by tram-trains, as the networks in Karlsruhe and Kassel show.
For an informed UK perspective on tram-trains, see Prof. Andrew McNaughton’s article “The Regional Railway Revolution” in Rail 687 (January 11-24, 2012).