In article ,
(Paul Corfield) wrote:

On Thu, 11 Feb 2010 20:11:22 +0000, Tom Anderson
wrote:

On Thu, 11 Feb 2010, Andy wrote:

Upminster is where the new signaling will be controlled from.

On trains towards Dalston, anyway. Trains heading the other way will
obviously be controlled from Downminster.

See this gun Mr Anderson? Well I'm about to kill you with it for your
appalling taste in jokes.

bangbang

You're dead (or bloody well deserve to be!) -- Downminster. I ask you.
;-)

Dunno. Isn't it in the same league as extreme cases of madness - at least
Dagenham if not the full Upminster. Well beyond Barking, anyway.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Paul Corfield wrote on 09 February 2010 19:39:47 ...
On Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:05:58 GMT, "Richard J."
wrote:

I heard tonight at a meeting in Acton between local residents and
Network Rail/Tfl/LOROL representatives that Ian Brown (MD, London Rail,
TfL) had announced in his report to the Mayor at the TfL Board meeting
last week that the North London Line resignalling was to be postponed
until after the Olympics. This was reported by someone in the audience
tonight, and was clearly a complete bombshell to the people on the
platform. They had previously claimed that the resignalling was the
main reason for the continuing lack of Sunday services on the NLL.

I've now found the relevant part of the webcast of the TfL Board meeting
and have transcribed it (see below).

I don't think Ian Brown has been "very clear", despite what he claimed.
He makes it sound as if TfL are doing the "physical stuff", and then
Network Rail will do the new signalling later. But surely all the
4-tracking work, new crossovers etc. will be done by Network Rail or
their contractors? What about the signalling for the new or changed
track? Will that be cobbled together à la Jubilee Line and then
replaced post 2012 or what?

Network Rail's agreement to this change of plan would be crucial, yet he
makes no mention of that. Extraordinary.

And can the 8tph timetable for 2012 be supported reliably by the
existing signalling ?

Can anyone throw any light on this "decision"?

Transcript of Ian Brown's statement:
"Bit of a dilemma on the North London Line infrastructure. I just want
to be very clear on what we've done. This is a Network Rail 4-tracking
scheme for our Overground, also for freight trains and for all the other
stuff that runs on that line. Big scheme, £300+ million, and we've got
all sorts of problems with signalling design with Network Rail. It's a
general problem with Network Rail, as people know round the table, and
the dilemma for me is to have that service running, and to make sure
they guarantee to have the service well in time for the Olympics, of 8
trains an hour. What we're going ahead with [is] the blockade in
February - 3 months' blockade from Gospel Oak to Stratford. We're going
to do all the physical stuff, but we're going to keep the old signalling
going, so we've actually done the work, then Network Rail have got to
come back and do the signalling later. So we have actually secured our
frequency, we've secured the Olympic frequency, we've not secured the
corporate railway, and there's also some issues about freight trains, so
the scheme's got to be done, but we've secured our bit by that decision,
which was quite a difficult one."

Source: TfL Board meeting, 3 Feb 2010
Webcast at http://www.london.gov.uk/webcast/feb...ard_030210.asx
Excerpt above runs from 01:15:15 to 01:16:15

I have to say that it is all rather confusing. There are no clear
statements in the TfL Board papers or in the new papers for the Rail and
Underground Panel that was held today (see TfL website for the papers).
The only statement that has not changed in several months is that the
NLL possession plan has been out for "industry consultation". Given
that it starts in under 2 weeks one might have hoped that the
consultation process would have stopped by now.

I can't really understand the gist of what Ian Brown is actually saying
in his statement.

TfL London Rail are now saying that the resignalling has NOT been
postponed until after the Olympics. It will be done later this year and
in 2011, according to them. I've pointed out the inconsistencies
between that and what Ian Brown said and have asked them to explain
further. It seems to me that it's nonsense to say that the Olympic
frequency is "secured" if Network Rail still have to do the resignalling
pre-2012 and are known to be short of signalling design resources.

--
Richard J.
(to email me, swap 'uk' and 'yon' in address)

On 15/02/2010 17:53, Richard J. wrote:
Paul Corfield wrote on 09 February 2010 19:39:47 ...
On Tue, 09 Feb 2010 00:05:58 GMT, "Richard J."
wrote:

I heard tonight at a meeting in Acton between local residents and
Network Rail/Tfl/LOROL representatives that Ian Brown (MD, London
Rail, TfL) had announced in his report to the Mayor at the TfL Board
meeting last week that the North London Line resignalling was to be
postponed until after the Olympics. This was reported by someone in
the audience tonight, and was clearly a complete bombshell to the
people on the platform. They had previously claimed that the
resignalling was the main reason for the continuing lack of Sunday
services on the NLL.

I've now found the relevant part of the webcast of the TfL Board
meeting and have transcribed it (see below).

I don't think Ian Brown has been "very clear", despite what he
claimed. He makes it sound as if TfL are doing the "physical stuff",
and then Network Rail will do the new signalling later. But surely
all the 4-tracking work, new crossovers etc. will be done by Network
Rail or their contractors? What about the signalling for the new or
changed track? Will that be cobbled together à la Jubilee Line and
then replaced post 2012 or what?

Network Rail's agreement to this change of plan would be crucial, yet
he makes no mention of that. Extraordinary.

And can the 8tph timetable for 2012 be supported reliably by the
existing signalling ?

Can anyone throw any light on this "decision"?

Transcript of Ian Brown's statement:
"Bit of a dilemma on the North London Line infrastructure. I just
want to be very clear on what we've done. This is a Network Rail
4-tracking scheme for our Overground, also for freight trains and for
all the other stuff that runs on that line. Big scheme, £300+
million, and we've got all sorts of problems with signalling design
with Network Rail. It's a general problem with Network Rail, as
people know round the table, and the dilemma for me is to have that
service running, and to make sure they guarantee to have the service
well in time for the Olympics, of 8 trains an hour. What we're going
ahead with [is] the blockade in February - 3 months' blockade from
Gospel Oak to Stratford. We're going to do all the physical stuff,
but we're going to keep the old signalling going, so we've actually
done the work, then Network Rail have got to come back and do the
signalling later. So we have actually secured our frequency, we've
secured the Olympic frequency, we've not secured the corporate
railway, and there's also some issues about freight trains, so the
scheme's got to be done, but we've secured our bit by that decision,
which was quite a difficult one."

Source: TfL Board meeting, 3 Feb 2010
Webcast at http://www.london.gov.uk/webcast/feb...ard_030210.asx
Excerpt above runs from 01:15:15 to 01:16:15

I have to say that it is all rather confusing. There are no clear
statements in the TfL Board papers or in the new papers for the Rail and
Underground Panel that was held today (see TfL website for the papers).
The only statement that has not changed in several months is that the
NLL possession plan has been out for "industry consultation". Given
that it starts in under 2 weeks one might have hoped that the
consultation process would have stopped by now.

I can't really understand the gist of what Ian Brown is actually saying
in his statement.

TfL London Rail are now saying that the resignalling has NOT been
postponed until after the Olympics. It will be done later this year and
in 2011, according to them. I've pointed out the inconsistencies between
that and what Ian Brown said and have asked them to explain further. It
seems to me that it's nonsense to say that the Olympic frequency is
"secured" if Network Rail still have to do the resignalling pre-2012 and
are known to be short of signalling design resources.

On a "talking to a friend of a friend down the pub" level, I've been
told in the past by someone involved that the NR re-signalling has been
going quite horribly wrong and something will have to give sooner or later.

Could be rubbish, of course.

--
Arthur Figgis Surrey, UK

On Feb 18, 7:20*pm, Arthur Figgis wrote:

On 15/02/2010 17:53, Richard J. wrote:

TfL London Rail are now saying that the resignalling has NOT been
postponed until after the Olympics. It will be done later this year and
in 2011, according to them. I've pointed out the inconsistencies between
that and what Ian Brown said and have asked them to explain further. It
seems to me that it's nonsense to say that the Olympic frequency is
"secured" if Network Rail still have to do the resignalling pre-2012 and
are known to be short of signalling design resources.

On a "talking to a friend of a friend down the pub" level, I've been
told in the past by someone involved that the NR re-signalling has been
going quite horribly wrong and something will have to give sooner or later.

I wonder if they considered new types of signalling on the NLL, such as
cab signals. Did they consider that at all on the ELLX?

Cab signalling would not work for NLL at the current time because the
route is used by so many trains which are not fitted. The costs of
fitment would be very high.

ELLX would have been a good route to try it on with all new trains, but
I think they decided the technology was not mature enough when they had
to let the contracts.

In article ,
writes
I wonder if they considered new types of signalling on the NLL, such as
cab signals. Did they consider that at all on the ELLX?


--
John Alexander,

Remove NOSPAM if replying by e-mail

John wrote:
Cab signalling would not work for NLL at the current time because the
route is used by so many trains which are not fitted. The costs of
fitment would be very high.

ELLX would have been a good route to try it on with all new trains,
but I think they decided the technology was not mature enough when
they had to let the contracts.

That could apply to the core route, but the extensions over NR routes would
have then required dual fitted trains, for the same reasons as you point out
for the NLL.

Paul S

In article , Paul Scott
writes
John wrote:
Cab signalling would not work for NLL at the current time because the
route is used by so many trains which are not fitted. The costs of
fitment would be very high.

ELLX would have been a good route to try it on with all new trains,
but I think they decided the technology was not mature enough when
they had to let the contracts.

That could apply to the core route, but the extensions over NR routes would
have then required dual fitted trains, for the same reasons as you point out
for the NLL.

Paul S


But a cab equipped train can run over non cab equipped lines (look at
Eurostar for an example).


--
John Alexander,

Remove NOSPAM if replying by e-mail

On 20.02.10 21:28, John wrote:
Cab signalling would not work for NLL at the current time because the
route is used by so many trains which are not fitted. The costs of
fitment would be very high.

ELLX would have been a good route to try it on with all new trains, but
I think they decided the technology was not mature enough when they had
to let the contracts.

In ,
writes
I wonder if they considered new types of signalling on the NLL, such as
cab signals. Did they consider that at all on the ELLX?


That technology has been around since the 1920s and is widely used in
other nations.

They could have started with the ELLX, since it won't really interact
with the NLL.

If it works out, then perhaps they could start considering the NLL in
phases. I know that they plan to be rid of goods trains on the line, but
trains can also be fitted with cab signals. They don't have to be built
in when the units are being constructed.

On Feb 21, 8:47*am, "
wrote:

[snip comments re in-cab signalling]
That technology has been around since the 1920s and is widely used in
other nations.

They could have started with the ELLX, since it won't really interact
with the NLL.

If it works out, then perhaps they could start considering the NLL in
phases. I know that they plan to be rid of goods trains on the line, but
trains can also be fitted with cab signals. They don't have to be*built
in when the units are being constructed.

Woah, there's no plan to get rid of goods trains on the NLL - there is
however a plan/ aspiration to shift goods traffic onto the GOBLIN
(Gospel Oak to Barking line) and off the busiest section of the NLL.If
the GOBLIN was electrified, this would help matters somewhat.