Platform view of curved high wall of Boston's Porter T subway station

Friday Reads – 28 April 2023

Euston, we have a problem (RailwayNews)

Île de France new tramway accomplishments & developments (FabriqueDeParis)

The incredible 1950s flywheel powered Gyrobus: Video (Megaprojects)

The Transit Tour Guide of Boston (TrainsBusesPeople)

Why you can’t go directly to the Amtrak platform to wait, not explained (Vox)

Parking lots across North America are being turned into housing (FastCompany)

The Canadian – luxury sleeper train trip Toronto to Vancouver: Video (TrekTrendy)

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5 comments

  1. Killer phrase in that Railway News article:
    ” Harper is strikingly pro-car;” – whilst similar noises are emerging on the pages of “Modern Railways”
    Oh dear … I do hope that we are not going to get an attempt at Serpell Mk II in the next 2 years?

  2. Tentative & hopefully careful follow-up …
    A vast rail project, in London has been put on hold & may easily be cancelled – HS2 to Euston, with the aforementioned Harper in charge.
    It’s also been publicly admitted that slowing down HS2 saves no money at all.
    So – why are they doing it, other than a deliberate wrecking operation?
    May I suggest that people go back & read the L-R article on Marylebone & the desperate partisan & ideology-driven attempts to close that.
    LINK: https://www.londonreconnections.com/2014/near-terminal-case-saving-marylebone-rail-road-conversion/
    It both looks & sounds awfully familiar to me

  3. @Greg T

    It’s more likely to be a short term cash flow reduction – save spending on Old Oak Common to Euston now, even though it’ll cost more later, and likely under a different government.

  4. The Birmingham spur of HS2 is a red herring – anyone for elsewhere in the West Midlands will have to change stations. The real purpose of HS2 is to plug into the WCML near Lichfield and speed up trains from NW England and Scotland. (Compare the M54, which stops at Telford, but nevertheless benefits the whole of Shropshire and North Wales)

    Birmingham to London has alternatives, unlike places further north. I travelled that journey yesterday, in a lovely spacious Mark 3 coach with proper tables, curtains and everything, for less than £25 return. And the only time I saw the WCML was a couple of glimpses near Wembley Central and South Hampstead.
    And the scenery is nicer in the Chilterns too.

  5. @timbeau

    A good point. If only the Southeastern trains map wasn’t so incomprehensible the usefulness of the trains that travel down HS1 to Ashford International and then over limited-speed Southeastern third-rail network would be more obvious.

    I can get, for example, from Stratford to Margate (115km) in just 83 minutes compared to Brighton (91km) which takes 103 even with the Liz Line.

    The HS2 connections will provide for much faster WCML OHLE trains that can then travel down to Euston from (as you say Lichfield) making the bottom 191km of a trip from the Midlands at 300 km/h take just 38 minutes.

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