wrote:
Peter Goodland,

Actually, I did not know that the present arrangements are temporary -
indeed the staff seem not to know that either since, when I asked one
of them, he agreed that this was a lamentable change and mentioned
nothing about it being temporary either!


snip

Seven minutes is hardly something to boast about! Why should domestic
passengers have to be so inconvenienced (to say nothing of being denied
the use of one of London's finest Gothic buildings) at all?


snip

The Midland Mainline platforms will be moving to the other side
(western) of the station and will still be a long way from the Euston
Road.
I think that the time taken to get to the tube will be substantially
shortened when the King's Cross northern ticket hall opens in 2009.
This will have extra access to most of the underground lines and will
also have access to the domestic platforms.
I can't immediately find an on-line plan showing this, but I think
there was a map in Modern Railways a few months ago though. Although,
there are some pictures showing the location of the new ticket hall
above ground on the tfl website.

Paul Corfield wrote:
On Thu, 16 Mar 2006 12:05:51 +0000, Dave Arquati wrote:


Well yes but I fear there are going to be huge issues to deal with -
most notably the willingness of Network Rail to co-operate at a price
that is affordable. The reliance placed on these lines for the Olympics
(and London's transport needs) gives a number of parties massive
leverage against TfL. You can detect where the issues may arise in this
very recent London Assembly report

http://www.london.gov.uk/assembly/re...ondon-line.pdf

Interesting to see cross-party consensus about the development of these
lines emanating from this report. There are lots of big service issues
proposed (Barking-Clapham Junction with no wires?), even some that
align with the Cross-London RUS, but I'm going to pick on a small one.
Why does the report just endorse the Stratford-Queens Park service
proposals (once the Bakerloo runs back out to Watford Jn) and not
insist that these are extended to Willesden Junction LL bay platform?
Surely that would provide more "synergy" and easier integration with
ELL phase II services to Highbury?

THC

On 17 Mar 2006 10:12:04 -0800, "
wrote:

So, let there be no doubt, (if St. George are to be believed), the
money for the railway station is already in place, and also (if St.
George are to be believed) the ONLY reason for the delay in the
building of that station is Railtrack (or their successor's) reluctance
- which they have expressed right from the beginning - to do anything
that increases use of that line on which, so they say, they have severe
capacity problems.

If only they'd also insisted they pay for the voltage changeover being
moved to Shepherd's Bush, saying it was required to free up capacity
for their new station...

In message . com,
" writes

Paul Terry,

You are getting your developers confused!

I don't believe so.

The developers of the Imperial Wharf scheme are St. George.

Yes.

That has nothing to do with Circadian, who are the Lots Road Power
Station developers.

Yes.

So, let there be no doubt, (if St. George are to be believed), the
money for the railway station is already in place

So why does the West London Line Group say the following on ...

http://www.westlondonlinegroup.org.uk/latest_news.htm

There is a funding shortfall of £1.3 million for the proposed
station at Imperial Wharf whose estimated cost is £3 million.
The developer of the Lot's Road Power station site, St George,
had pledged a capped contribution of £1.7 million. The remaining
£1.3 will only be paid the house-builder Circadian if the 800
apartment project gets the go-ahead following the recent Public
Inquiry.

And why does Circadian's own publicity say the following on ...

http://www.circadian-uk.com/ld_pdf_2/transport.pdf

What are you doing to support the proposed West London Line in
your current scheme? We have now allocated £1 million of the
total £5 million package of transport measures to the new
passenger service. If the proposed station doesn't go ahead by
2010 the money will go towards other transport measures such as
more local bus or river bus services.

And why might http://www.twocapitals.co.uk/CTG/June05.pdf say ...

The cost of a station at Imperial Wharf would be £3 million and
developer St George is offering a maximum of £1.7 million. House
builder Circadian has offered to contribute subject to planning
permission for tower blocks at Lots Road.

So, sorry, but I think Circadian are very closely involved in the
funding package.

Lastly, according to today's local newspapers, Kensington & Chelsea
have abandoned any plans to judicially challenge Prescott's total
denial of local wishes. Perhaps, rather than that expensive route, they
should offer Prescott an IQ test and, just so as not to make things too
difficult for him, allow him to keep his job if he can scrape double
figures!

Well, I'd agree with that bit
--
Paul Terry

On 17 Mar 2006 11:18:46 -0800, "THC"
wrote:

Why does the report just endorse the Stratford-Queens Park service
proposals (once the Bakerloo runs back out to Watford Jn) and not
insist that these are extended to Willesden Junction LL bay platform?

At a guess, it's because that would involve the trains sharing tracks
with Bakerloo services, causing performance pollution. Also, the bay
at Willesden Jn is only just long enough for a 3-car train (the island
platform narrows considerably at the north end, so a fair bit of
rearranging might be needed to extend it to 6 cars, or even change the
layout to one like Arnos Grove).

Paul,

Thanks for your detailed and interesting reply.

Two things emerge.

Firstly, although St. George in all of their rhetoric of the mid-1990s
about "funding a new station" did not, as far as I can recall, mention
anything about a cap. In any event, it was, I suppose, naive of me to
believe anything they said. I remember standing up at a public meeting
and predicting that the station would NEVER be built and, even if it
was, it would hardly have any effect on the extra car traffic that
would be generated, being on a line with a (then) twice-hourly service
between two stations that were hardly likely to be greatly used by City
commuter traffic.

Secondly, presumably, the "capped" £1.7 million from St. George would
have been sufficient to build the station had they done so 7 or 8 years
ago when that figure first arose. It is hardly surprising that the
costs have increased significantly since then. I am not for one moment
defending St. George (I opposed their scheme then and still think it is
an appalling blot on the landscape - far too many houses crammed into a
small and inaccessible area) but to be fair to them, I think they
genuinely wanted to have a railway station there, and I cannot see how
the long delay has benefited them at all. Which leads me to conclude
that there must be some truth in their protestations at the time that
Railtrack were dragging their heels in allowing the station to be
built.

As revealed in the material you have quoted, it now seems that the
costs have so escalated that Circadian are now involved. Which really
is a scandalous dereliction of duty by Hammersmith & Fulham Council
whose planning consent was given on condition that the railway station
was built BEFORE phase 2 of the Imperial Wharf scheme was started!

With years like 2010 now being quoted, not only will Imperial Wharf be
complete but the Circadian nightmare will probably be complete long
before the railway station is built.

So, come on Adam Gray and others if you are reading this: do you
remember me predicting that there would never be a railway station at
Imperial Wharf. I'd say the jury was still very much out on that one
wouldn't you?!

Marc.

In article .com,
() wrote:

Paul,

Thanks for your detailed and interesting reply.

Two things emerge.

Firstly, although St. George in all of their rhetoric of the mid-1990s
about "funding a new station" did not, as far as I can recall, mention
anything about a cap. In any event, it was, I suppose, naive of me to
believe anything they said. I remember standing up at a public meeting
and predicting that the station would NEVER be built and, even if it
was, it would hardly have any effect on the extra car traffic that
would be generated, being on a line with a (then) twice-hourly service
between two stations that were hardly likely to be greatly used by
City
commuter traffic.

Secondly, presumably, the "capped"

I wonder what the originally estimated costs of the station was? I
suspect it was somewhat below £1.7M and when the estimates rose above
that St George said "enough is enough" and imposed a cap.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

THC wrote:
(Barking-Clapham Junction with no wires?)

I've always wondered about this too - it seems like a good fill-in
scheme that would be rather inexpensive. It would have the dual benefit
of releasing 150s from GoBLin duties and allowing through services as
listed from Barking, providing an alternate route for c2c users who
take the first train and change at West Ham for central London
destinations.

You might not even have to immunise the LU signalling either, which can
only help save money.

In article .com,
(TheOneKEA) wrote:

THC wrote:
(Barking-Clapham Junction with no wires?)

I've always wondered about this too - it seems like a good fill-in
scheme that would be rather inexpensive. It would have the dual
benefit of releasing 150s from GoBLin duties and allowing through
services as listed from Barking, providing an alternate route for c2c
users who take the first train and change at West Ham for central
London destinations.

You might not even have to immunise the LU signalling either, which
can only help save money.

The snag is shortage of 313 units, isn't it? They are using some 508s on
Euston-Watford because of it.

--
Colin Rosenstiel

Colin Rosenstiel wrote:
GOBLIN electrification
I've always wondered about this too - it seems like a good fill-in
scheme that would be rather inexpensive. It would have the dual
benefit of releasing 150s from GoBLin duties and allowing through
services as listed from Barking, providing an alternate route for c2c
users who take the first train and change at West Ham for central
London destinations.

You might not even have to immunise the LU signalling either, which
can only help save money.

The snag is shortage of 313 units, isn't it? They are using some 508s on
Euston-Watford because of it.


One would hope that by the time any GOBLIN electrification happens, the
313s will have been replaced. Even if not, the LUL-ification of the DC
Lines ought to free up a few units.

--
John Band
john at johnband dot org
www.johnband.org