furnessvale wrote:
On Apr 20, 7:24?am, Mwmbwls wrote:
Spelthorne Councillors seek to choose Airtrack electrification
voltage. It reminds me of the days when London had conduit trams
because overhead wires were considered unsightly - but then at least
they owned the streets and the trams - unlike Spelthorne. This is
surely a technical rather than a political question. Note also Mr
Livingstone's response.

I don't know the details of the scheme but if it is new build I doubt
thrird rail would be allowed. If it is allowed as an "infill" I hope
the councillors take on the job of delivering the death messages to
parents when the kiddywinkies get zapped.


It definitely ought to be allowed as infill of the third rail network - it
is only about 2 miles from the point the route leaves the Windsor line to
the buffer stops under T5, and they aren't going to add overheads all the
way to Reading, Guildford and Waterloo...

The recent report (we discussed it a few weeks ago) just reckons there are
'technical difficulties' in running on third rail all the way into T5 - so
what are these? The basic airtrack scheme has trains running into
terminating platforms which are separate from the existing HEx platforms.

Clearly there will be other voltage changeover issues if HEx is run all the
way to Staines as well (which IIRC is the only scenario that has OHLE into
Staines.

I think Livingstone is doing the status of the project down a bit - if
Spelthorne council are already dealing with consultation issues at commitee
level. The fact he hasn't had a personal presentation on the subject doesn't
mean the consultation (documents easily found on the www) isn't happening...

Paul S