"Tom Anderson" wrote

There are flows from kent, from the Tunnel and from the oil terminal at
the Isle of Grain mostly. They're much smaller than the Essex flows.

Also container traffic from Thamesport at the Isle of Grain. There is a case
to be made for freight to use High Speed 1, both from the Channel Tunnel (it
is daft that the Ford parts train has to run all round London on congested
commuter lines when there is a convenient connection from HS1 in teh
Dagenham area. The Grain to Willesden container trainwould also have a
better route via the Thames Tunnel and the Barking to Gospel Oak line,
though unless a diesel is allowed through the Thames Tunnel both Grain to
Hoo Junction and Barking to Gospel Oak would need to be electrified.

The cross-country route doesn't do anything about traffic generated by the
ports nearer London, around Tilbury etc. One plan there is to use the
Gospel Oak - Barking line for a lot more freight, possibly even closing it
to passenger trains, i think, which would relieve the North London line
between Stratford and Gospel Oak. If you could send all through-London
freight that way, i think you could in theory run a tube-frequency service
between Stratford and Gospel Oak.

Barking to Gospel Oak is going to get a 4 tph passenger service, but this
still leaves 3 or 4 freight paths once the line is resignalled. It really
needs electrifying as well.

A long time ago, someone here proposed four-tracking the NLL all the way
from Stratford to Camden Road, and argued that it was a practical thing to
do. This would give you a route from the GEML and LTSR to the WCML, which
is where freight wants to go, that would be completely segregated from the
passenger tracks of the NLL. Skepticism about the possibility of the
scheme has also been expressed, though.

It is likely that 4 tracks will be reinstated the whole way from Dalston to
Camden Road, but the East London Line extension will be given exclusive use
of the southern pair between Dalston Junction and Highbury & Islington, so
freight will still have to run between passenger trains between Stratford
and Acton as well as between Barking and Gospel Oak.

Peter