In message , at 10:16:04 on Mon, 12 Dec
2016, Basil Jet remarked:
I share your doubts about building the new Sandy-Shepreth line and would
probably have chosen a Hitchin north chord instead.

With no ECML interchange?

That would be at a new Sandy station on the same site as the proposed
one. Just the exit for E/W trains would be south on the ECML rather than
across-country via Bassingbourne.

IME the interchanges with other lines have to be at major stations
where most trains already stop, or the interchange possibilities will
never work out that well.

We appear to be living in a post-StAlbanisation world. Where new
stations mean more stops. See Edinburgh Gateway and Cambridge North.
--
Roland Perry