Mr Thant wrote:
On 23 Jul, 00:10, 1506 wrote:
How will this work? I thought that the Crossrail platforms were to be
on the south side of Paddington under the old cab road?

Yes they are. They're going to build a long thin two storey high
"spine of light" (by which they mean skylight) between the cab road
and Eastbourne Terrace, which will be directly above the island
platform.

I suspect something like a linear 'sunpipe' would be quite effective
see:
http://www.sunpipe.co.uk

With the cost of enegy reducing the need for artificial light and
air-con can be very cost effective (as can regen braking)

As an aside I was suprised that the crossrail tunnels don't appear
'switchback' into the stations.
I'd like to be proved wrong as 'rising' into a station, and 'falling'
away is clearly the most efficient way of coverting kinetic energy into
potential energy and back again. Must be far more efficient than regen
braking.

Jim Chisholm
U

--
http://londonconnections.blogspot.com/
A blog about transport projects in London

On 23 Jul, 11:08, "J. Chisholm" wrote:
I suspect something like a linear 'sunpipe' would be quite effective
see:http://www.sunpipe.co.uk

Like that, but on a much much larger scale. The bottom of the sunpipe
will look like this:

http://www.crossrail.co.uk/pages/pad...alisation.html

That opening at the top of the picture will run the length of the
platforms and extend all the way up to ground level. Presumably
they've done the modeling to prove this will actually work.

U

--
http://londonconnections.blogspot.com/
A blog about transport projects in London

On Jul 22, 8:23 pm, Mr Thant
wrote:
An hour or two ago the Crossrail Bill became the Crossrail Act, which
means as soon as the funding agreement is signed (due in September)

Given the governments record level of borrowing and deficit its
building I wouldn't get too excited just yet. Just because its
approved doesn't mean it'll happen.

B2003

On 23 Jul, 12:28, wrote:
An hour or two ago the Crossrail Bill became the Crossrail Act, which
means as soon as the funding agreement is signed (due in September)

Given the governments record level of borrowing and deficit its
building I wouldn't get too excited just yet. Just because its
approved doesn't mean it'll happen.

The national debt since 1970 has averaged about 50% - currently it's
39% (including PFI but not public sector pensions, since the former's
new and the latter hasn't changed). So the government has a decent
amount of room for manouevre.

(see: http://www.ifs.org.uk/bns/bn26.pdf )

I can't see the government delaying or axing Crossrail - even if the
economy turns to absolute disaster, rather than the more likely 0-1%
growth for a couple of years, the most sensible political decision
would still be to pledge the funding, begin work, and let the Tories
either continue it or leave it half-built, waste huge amounts of
money, and lose large amounts of London support.

[and the best bit for Labour is that if it is built to time, its
opening date in 2019ish would roughly coincide with their next chance
of getting back in: "see what we did? see how the Tories have invested
nothing in new transport routes over the last 10 years?"]

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org

On Wed, 23 Jul 2008 03:27:10 -0700 (PDT), Mr Thant wrote:

I suspect something like a linear 'sunpipe' would be quite effective
see:http://www.sunpipe.co.uk

Like that, but on a much much larger scale. The bottom of the sunpipe
will look like this:

http://www.crossrail.co.uk/pages/pad...alisation.html

That opening at the top of the picture will run the length of the
platforms and extend all the way up to ground level.

So will it extend up to 2 storeys above ground level?

On 23 Jul, 12:28, wrote:
On Jul 22, 8:23 pm, Mr Thant
wrote:

An hour or two ago the Crossrail Bill became the Crossrail Act, which
means as soon as the funding agreement is signed (due in September)

Given the governments record level of borrowing and deficit its
building I wouldn't get too excited just yet. Just because its
approved doesn't mean it'll happen.

B2003

Quite. The history of the railways (and indeed, London Transport
itself) is littered with Acts that never got built. *Sigh* The Watford
& Edgware is my personal poster child for that scenario.

On 23 Jul, 13:00, asdf wrote:
So will it extend up to 2 storeys above ground level?

The above ground bit acts as as a skylight. See the cross section on
page 27 he

http://tinyurl.com/5jslyx

U

--
http://londonconnections.blogspot.com/
A blog about transport projects in London

The national debt since 1970 has averaged about 50% - currently it's
39% (including PFI but not public sector pensions, since the former's
new and the latter hasn't changed). So the government has a decent
amount of room for manouevre.


I would contend that we won't actually know what level of debt this
Government has built up and is continuing to build up (Quote Dianne
Abbott on This Week when asked whether the Government will cut back on
spending or borrow, "Oh borrow, of course, we are a deeply unpopular
Government with only two years to go before an election, course we'll
borrow.") until either they're forced to go to the IMF or the other
lot get in (and they’ll probably lie as well).

On Jul 23, 1:37*am, Mr Thant
wrote:
On 23 Jul, 00:10, 1506 wrote:

How will this work? *I thought that the Crossrail platforms were to be
on the south side of Paddington under the old cab road?

Yes they are. They're going to build a long thin two storey high
"spine of light" (by which they mean skylight) between the cab road
and Eastbourne Terrace, which will be directly above the island
platform.

Thank you for responding.

This is an interesting concept. I wonder how it will work in
practice. Will the top be glass? Will it be elevated? One has a
certain concern about antisocial behaviors. Will it become a super
sized-trash receptacle, or a magnet for graffiti?

On Jul 23, 3:08*am, "J. Chisholm" wrote:
Mr Thant wrote:
On 23 Jul, 00:10, 1506 wrote:
How will this work? *I thought that the Crossrail platforms were to be
on the south side of Paddington under the old cab road?

Yes they are. They're going to build a long thin two storey high
"spine of light" (by which they mean skylight) between the cab road
and Eastbourne Terrace, which will be directly above the island
platform.

I suspect something like a linear 'sunpipe' would be quite effective
see:http://www.sunpipe.co.uk

With the cost of enegy reducing the need for artificial light and
air-con can be very cost effective (as can regen braking)

As an aside I was suprised that the crossrail tunnels don't appear
'switchback' into the stations.
I'd like to be proved wrong as 'rising' into a station, and 'falling'
away is clearly the most efficient way of coverting kinetic energy into
potential energy and back again. Must be far more efficient than regen
braking.

'switchbacking' into, and out of, the stations is a great concept. It
is utilized on the Central Line. However, I believe that Crossrail
has to avoid so many exist facilities like deep foundations and other
subway lines, that switchbacking is impractical.