On Thu, 3 Mar 2005, Dave Arquati wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:
On 2 Mar 2005, James wrote:

Clive Coleman wrote in message ...

In message , James
writes

Worse still, I've been on trains which have sat around for a minute
and a half at Earlsfield. Not long ago, half the trains wouldn't
even have stopped there.

The dynamics of an urban railway are very different to that of running
a transport service in the boondocks. The problem is that SWT are
forced to try and operate like a country railway within the urban
section.

They should be allowed, like LUL, to run a metro service with 15-20
second stops and simply getting on with it.

I agree entirely - including providing trains with lots more doors, every
5 minutes or less.

Surely the only solution that would allow such a service would be
isolation of the metro tracks from the "country" tracks - much like
Crossrail hopes to do

Bingo.

(although the current setup of the GW and GE makes their plan relatively
easy).

Also bingo, sadly. Are there any separable bits in the SWT area? The
Hounslow loop isn't needed by country trains, since they can go via
Richmond, but it will be needed by goods trains until there's a freight
crossing across the Thames in the east. How about the slow lines on the
LSW mainline? Are those used by country trains, or does everything run
fast when it gets to Surbiton? Is there any scope for more tracks round
here?

The alternative is just to scrap the country service. Not sure i like the
idea of all these bumpkins getting into London anyway. It's bad enough
just with people from south of the river.

tom

--
GOLDIE LOOKIN' CHAIN [...] will ultimately make all other forms of music both redundant and unnecessary -- ntk