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[email protected] · December 15th 15, 12:16 PM posted to uk.transport.london

In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

On Mon, 14 Dec 2015 17:00:20 +0000, Basil Jet
wrote:

I would not be surprised if TfL makes a land grab for the Thameslink
core and it becomes Crossrail 0, with very little penetration outside
the M25 apart from airports, so Tattenham would be in but Brighton would
be out. My sister lives in Brighton and works near Kings Cross and
changes at Victoria every morning because she says the Thameslink route
is slower, so I'm not sure how much Brighton would care about losing
Thameslink services.

To be fair, a large part of the largesse of the Thameslink programme is to
speed up the crawl from London Bridge/Blackfriars to St Pancras.

I've not seen TfL people express much enthusiasm for grabbing
Thameslink when they've been interviewed about rail devolution. I
think there is an acceptance that splitting operations on a very
complex route with an equally complex PFI contract for the rolling
stock is not going to be easy.

I also don't believe DfT would split services on Thameslink having
taken years to group services together. I suspect TfL would like to
get the inners run under the Southern brand name even though they
will, of course, have an overlap with Thameslink in places.

TfL Dft and City Hall are jointly launching a "rail vision" for London
and South East rail services at some point in January 2016. Mike Brown
said this to the Assembly Transport Committee last week. Had been due
this month but diary problems have prevented the joint launch being
scheduled.

Actually crowding will only be a problem in the peak, so maybe all
twelve branches would still have off-peak service. But the desire to
keep the branches down on the Crossrails, even turning half the trains
at Paddington or Wimbledon just so that they won't have too many
branches, is in marked contrast to the Thameslink Programme where every
train heads in a different direction until it hits buffers or the sea.
Does no-one else think that's odd?

I think the Thameslink service pattern will unravel over time. This is
purely on the basis that I think it will prove inoperable on a robust
and reliable basis. It is farcical that the Wimbledon loop timetable
constrains the Midland Main Line, the Brighton Main Line and the East
Coast Main Line all the way to Scotland. Network Rail have to
schedule the former first and slot everything else in around one
service. ECML fast services will be constrained by the Thameslink
services once the routes are connected together. I don't believe that
is a sustainable position for the TOCs, for passengers or Network
Rail. Can you imagine the announcement at Edinburgh Waverley "bing
bong we apologise for the delay to the 0900 service from London Kings
Cross. This was due to a points failure at Sutton."

We all know that the insane decision to include the Wimbledon loop services
in Thameslink was prompted by the then Sutton MPs. Will DfT now have the
balls to tell them (only 1 is new) to stop holding half the rest of the
country to ransom?

I think 10 Crossrail 2 trains will turn at Wimbledon. 30 are planned through
the core and 20 an hour to Raynes Park.

--
Colin Rosenstiel