asdf wrote:
On 16 Jun 2006 02:33:25 -0700, Bob wrote:

alwaystouchout.com reports two developments under
development/consideration.
1: The takeover of the Queens Park - Watford Junction section by LUL
Bakerloo line trains will free up capacity for the Willesden - Primrose
Hill - Points East Service.

I'm not sure this is really true any more. The new service via
Primrose Hill is now planned to start from Queens Park, so will only
use the section of the DC lines between Queens Park and Camden
Junction, which currently only sees 3tph anyway (compared to something
like 18tph north of Queens Park), so there's already plenty of
capacity there.


There is currently no physical connection having served South Hampstead
and Kilburn High Road. If trains were going to continue further than
Queen's Park after Primrose Hill, they'd have to cross immediately to
the AC lines and bypass the stations.

As has been mentioned elsewhere, reopening Primrose Hill as an
interchange with Chalk Farm would at least allow people to change to
the Northern, but basically Kilburn High Road and South Hampstead are
being abandoned. I think there will be a lot of complaints. Being
able to travel to Camden Road is not really equivalent to getting to
Euston in a couple of minutes if you work in central London.

A cheaper option, as I've suggested before, would be to build a new
crossover between Kilburn High Road and Queen's Park and allow
semi-fast trains to run from Euston to serve those two stations, then
cross tracks and stop at the currently unused Queen's Park platorms,
then Harrow and Watford or whatever. They'd have to be dual voltage,
but that's no problem really.



Besides, it strikes me that the new service is more a case of "we've
got this bit of railway and might as well do something with it",
rather than something which demands curtailment of other services to
create capacity for it.

This seems sensible if combined with the building of the Croxley link -
allowing Watford semifasts via Baker Street to reach Euston Square in
the same or less time as the existing DC service. Is this feasible?

Not really relevant - no one (in their right mind) travels all the way
from Watford to Euston on the DC lines anyway.

Or
will Watford-Euston passengers be allowed to join any Euston bound
train in a similar manner to the commuters from Wolverhampton to
Birmingham New Street?

I can't see why they'd make that change. In practical terms the
withdrawl of the Watford-Euston DC service would not decrease the
overall Watford Junction - Euston service level, as that's provided by
Silverlink County (which takes 15 mins instead of 45).

What will happen to to the spare platform
capacity created at Euston?

Probably more important would be the capacity freed on the Slow Lines
between Camden Junction and Euston, which might allow a small increase
in Silverlink County services (which could then use the "DC" platform
at Euston).