On 2008-12-03 23:54:11 +0000, Tom Anderson said:

On Tue, 2 Dec 2008, Peter Masson wrote:

"Tom Anderson" wrote

No, Crossrail should stop at Slough, and concentrate on being an
affordable and effective suburban railway, and not a pie-in-the-sky all
things to all people scheme.

Crossrail will go to Maidenhead, Heathrow, Shenfield, and Abbey Wood.
Any strong pressure to change any of these destinations is more likely
to mean that Crossrail doesn't happen at all than that changes will be
made.

Yes. I'm not quite mad enough to argue for changes at this stage -
rather, i point out that the scheme is not optimal. It shouldn't really
be going to the GWML at all - the Waterloo lines would be a much better
destination, but for obscure reasons, they were dropped from
consideration a very long time ago.

Subsequent add-ons are possible - Reading is the obvious one, so that
diesel trains out of Paddington can be eliminated from the Relief
Lines, while the Main Lines can become a totally 125 mph railway.

By which everyone at Reading travels to London. Nobody at Reading is
going to get on a Crossrail stopper to London when they could get a
fast train. The only market is for local commuting into Reading, and
that market isn't big enough to justify the expense.

The market may not be big enough to justify electrification, but based
on /numbers/ of passengers, I understand that more people travel /to/
Reading (from all the different directions) in the mornings these days
as travel /from/ Reading to Paddington. So there are already quite
large flows from the Ascot and Guildford via Wokingham and Paddington -
Slough - Maidenhead directions at least to counterbalance the 'towards
London' flows.
Of course this effect makes the eastbound flows from points west and
south of Reading even fuller!


Gravesend is a long shot, but may be needed for (and financed by)
development in the Thames Gateway.

Ditto.

Another destination west of Paddington would be nice, but no-one has
come up with any convincing case.

Hampton Court! The SWML is crying out for Crossrail - a single-seat
ride along it into the City would relieve Waterloo, the W&C, and the
southern Circle. The trouble is that you'd need to bore quite a bit
more tunnel in central London - probably on a route something like the
1938 Northern line plan:

http://www.flickr.com/photos/twic/1591807010/sizes/o/

Perhaps diving into tunnel at Battersea, and running Victoria, perhaps
Green Park and then Oxford Street. Not at all cheap.

Richmond - Kingston did not attract universal support. Amersham -
Aylesbury would be nice, so that the Met line can concentrate on
Uxbridge and Watford, while the fast lines beyond Harrow-on-the-Hill
would become single use by Crossrail, and electrified at 25 kV OHLE.
But traffic density is insufficient to generate a business case. More
trains can't be pushed down the GWML - there's not teh demand, and
capacity is needed for freight west of Acton Yard. So I think we're
stuck with the Westbourne Park reversing sidings.

Realistically, yes.

tom


--
Robert