Paul Corfield wrote on 09 February 2010 19:39:47 ...
On Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:05:58 GMT, "Richard J."
wrote:

I heard tonight at a meeting in Acton between local residents and
Network Rail/Tfl/LOROL representatives that Ian Brown (MD, London Rail,
TfL) had announced in his report to the Mayor at the TfL Board meeting
last week that the North London Line resignalling was to be postponed
until after the Olympics. This was reported by someone in the audience
tonight, and was clearly a complete bombshell to the people on the
platform. They had previously claimed that the resignalling was the
main reason for the continuing lack of Sunday services on the NLL.

I've now found the relevant part of the webcast of the TfL Board meeting
and have transcribed it (see below).

I don't think Ian Brown has been "very clear", despite what he claimed.
He makes it sound as if TfL are doing the "physical stuff", and then
Network Rail will do the new signalling later. But surely all the
4-tracking work, new crossovers etc. will be done by Network Rail or
their contractors? What about the signalling for the new or changed
track? Will that be cobbled together à la Jubilee Line and then
replaced post 2012 or what?

Network Rail's agreement to this change of plan would be crucial, yet he
makes no mention of that. Extraordinary.

And can the 8tph timetable for 2012 be supported reliably by the
existing signalling ?

Can anyone throw any light on this "decision"?

Transcript of Ian Brown's statement:
"Bit of a dilemma on the North London Line infrastructure. I just want
to be very clear on what we've done. This is a Network Rail 4-tracking
scheme for our Overground, also for freight trains and for all the other
stuff that runs on that line. Big scheme, £300+ million, and we've got
all sorts of problems with signalling design with Network Rail. It's a
general problem with Network Rail, as people know round the table, and
the dilemma for me is to have that service running, and to make sure
they guarantee to have the service well in time for the Olympics, of 8
trains an hour. What we're going ahead with [is] the blockade in
February - 3 months' blockade from Gospel Oak to Stratford. We're going
to do all the physical stuff, but we're going to keep the old signalling
going, so we've actually done the work, then Network Rail have got to
come back and do the signalling later. So we have actually secured our
frequency, we've secured the Olympic frequency, we've not secured the
corporate railway, and there's also some issues about freight trains, so
the scheme's got to be done, but we've secured our bit by that decision,
which was quite a difficult one."

Source: TfL Board meeting, 3 Feb 2010
Webcast at http://www.london.gov.uk/webcast/feb...ard_030210.asx
Excerpt above runs from 01:15:15 to 01:16:15

I have to say that it is all rather confusing. There are no clear
statements in the TfL Board papers or in the new papers for the Rail and
Underground Panel that was held today (see TfL website for the papers).
The only statement that has not changed in several months is that the
NLL possession plan has been out for "industry consultation". Given
that it starts in under 2 weeks one might have hoped that the
consultation process would have stopped by now.

I can't really understand the gist of what Ian Brown is actually saying
in his statement.

TfL London Rail are now saying that the resignalling has NOT been
postponed until after the Olympics. It will be done later this year and
in 2011, according to them. I've pointed out the inconsistencies
between that and what Ian Brown said and have asked them to explain
further. It seems to me that it's nonsense to say that the Olympic
frequency is "secured" if Network Rail still have to do the resignalling
pre-2012 and are known to be short of signalling design resources.

--
Richard J.
(to email me, swap 'uk' and 'yon' in address)