Glasgow Crossrail - a disfunctional and negative loss

[rjhowie]

Many years ago - well over two decades at least there was a proposal to have a more positive connection between the South of the river suburban electric system and that on the Northside. This would have meant a re-siting of Aryle Street Station and using the line that still is there across the Clyde not far from the Central Station bridge. This originally took trains into the former St Enich Stn with a junction taking the other line via Glasgow Cross to the northside lines. A short distance of re-connection would be needed on the other side of the river. Years ago it would have been a fraction of the present day but funding has always been blocked. The Crossrail Project would have revolutionised the suburban systems in and around Greater Glasgow's network. It would also allow trains to the West Coast direct and so on. Don't wish to open a hornet's nest but other places seem to get such without so much bother including London. Okay, I know London is huge and much travelling but this city is the largest in Scotland and the existing suburban system is a bit disjointed not being properly linked.

It is physically possible to take a train between the 2 systems but not in a practical passenger way and because this has been danced around for years by politicians negated by the tremendous cost estimates. Many don't realise that there is anothe rail bridge across the Clyde in the city centre because nothing is seen happening! It is a neat, turreted structure and not so long agon I watched a short You Tube video of a rail enthusiasts train going over it. Sometimes you want to wish that politicians didn't run things as this would be a complete boost to what is presently here in Glasgow.

 

[Paulsw2]

Just to give a bit of a poke to the 'hornets nest' - have you noticed how major rail infrastructure projects in UK in last 20 years have been tied-in to benefit the City of London? Consider:
Jubilee Line extension - re-routed to Canary Wharf to bail out what was, at the time in the early 90s, a tenant-free white elephant on the Isle of Dogs;
High Speed One / Channel Tunnel Rail Link - re-routed from Waterloo and south London to go in from the east via Stratford (in close proximity to the City's station, Liverpool Street);
Cross-Rail - a purpose built tunnel direct to Liverpool Street under the centre of London to connect bankers to their mansions in Buckinghamshire to the west.

I reckon that's about £20 billion of investment at current prices - not bad for one square mile out of the 94,000 in the UK!

Paul

 

[amigacooke]

I reckon that's about £20 billion of investment at current prices - not bad for one square mile out of the 94,000 in the UK!

Paul

That would be the sector that raised 63 billion in taxation for the Treasury last year alone. Not bad for one square mile out of the 94,000 in the UK!

 

[Wessex_Electric_Nutter]

Jubilee Line extension - re-routed to Canary Wharf to bail out what was, at the time in the early 90s, a tenant-free white elephant on the Isle of Dogs;
High Speed One / Channel Tunnel Rail Link - re-routed from Waterloo and south London to go in from the east via Stratford (in close proximity to the City's station, Liverpool Street);
Cross-Rail - a purpose built tunnel direct to Liverpool Street under the centre of London to connect bankers to their mansions in Buckinghamshire to the west.

Ahem!

Bathgate to Airdale - Scotland
Ebbw Vale - Wales.
Reading Station inprovements (yes, thats a fair few million including a new freight chord, and platforms.)
Corby Station
Other station improvements outside London

Those don't affect London. And in fact, I think you will find that improvements are based on passenger demand. London in particular gets congested more and more each day (added to the fact that crossrail has been in planning since 1993.)

 

[pfx]

Stirling to Alloa - Scotland?

Going back to the OPs point, or part of it at least, the Glasgow suburban network is, surprisingly, the largest outside of London. Sadly, it is poorly connected north and south of the river which effectively means very few interfaces between the two. I can understand how more connections may lead to more 'straight through' connections.

 

[Wessex_Electric_Nutter]

Edinbrough to Newcraignall - Scotland again and isn't that being extended as well?

 

[rjhowie]

Actually we have had 4 local lines re-opened in my memory. Glasgow-Edinburgh via Bathgate, Alloa Line (you got the name wrong Wessex!), Maryhill Line (short run), Larkhall Line and now initial work started on the Galashiels one. The Glasgow-to airport Line was droppped by the present government in Edinburgh. Interestingly this was after Central Station organised a ndew platform!

However we are talking about city suburban travel here. I can understand London needing the extensions due to size, business and the roads couldn't cope without rail and espeically the Tube. However the Greater Glasgow area is important to Scotland. The city is the hub for the whole of West Scotland and has a good suburban railway mostly electric. The Glasgow Crossrail has been lying about and kicked about and nothing done. There are no tunnels to be built or long stretches of new track beds apart from a couple of hundred yards. The bridge over the Clyde is still extant and considering that if it had gone ahead 20 years ago, it would have been at a fraction of the cost now. It is ridiculous than in an area the size of Greater Glasgow that the 2 electric suburban systems are not connected when they could be. It is just as important relatively to us up here as the stuff in London is.

A a very young boy I can still remember going from the now defunct line through Whiteinch along the north bank of the Clyde then we got over the river to Queen's Park for a giant Boys' Brigade Review at Queen's Park Rec Ground. No changing. It was a bit cicrumventus but that hired train did it. Kind of ridiculous that Scotland's biggest city has this divide when track beds and bridge are stil there!

 

[amigacooke]

Take heart, the Snow Hill Tunnel beneath London had its track lifted in 1971, but it was back in 1988 as part of Thameslink. Now an upgrade to Thameslink is reusing the massive supports of the old Blackfriars Railway Bridge to support a new station across the river.

 

[wholbr]

Hi Everybody.
Having been up to Glasgow and Edinburgh a few times in recent months I would agree that improvements to the public transport infrastructure is badly needed. Anything which would relieve the traffic congestion on the roads has to be a good thing especially rail which has the capacity to move hundreds of people in one go. Having said that unless the Scottish government are prepared to pay for the rail improvements from within the Scottish budget, I cannot see the Westminster government becoming involved until after the independence referendum in 2014.

I would think it would be suicidal for the coalition government in London to be seen financing or even just contributing to large-scale infrastructure improvements in Scotland when in two years the Scottish people may decide they do not wish to be part of the United Kingdom any longer. Don't get me wrong, if Scotland decides to go its own way I would be the first to wish them well. But until that decision is made one way or the other it would seem that as far as the UK as a whole is concerned everything has to be on hold with regard to Scotland.

Bill

 

[Paulsw2]

That would be the sector that raised 63 billion in taxation for the Treasury last year alone. Not bad for one square mile out of the 94,000 in the UK!

Well that'll go as a down payment for the hundreds of billions they took from the taxpayer for the bailout in 2008. Not to mention the £350 billion pounds of free money they'be been given by the Bank of England via 'quantitative easing' (or 'stuffing bankers pockets' as it's known to us proles). I won't even mention how much tax they've avoided paying through the usual scams/offshore accounting etc. that City types routinely employ.

Paul (in a Bolshevik mood)

 

[rjhowie]

Yes you do have a point there wholbr about the UK government walking on broken glass (unfortunately) and in passing I suspect there will be no change up here anyway! As a convinced last Tsarist Paulsw2 and no prole leaning person I will be watching you.....(!)

Rail is never-the-less still important here. We did lose a big chunk during the time the State was involved for some decades after 1948 but I have to say that even as a rail fan, big cutter Beeching was sadly right that there were lines that could no longer be justified. Trams then buses and cars seen to that. There were others where they could have kept the railbed intact for a potential future. Thankfully that is the case in the 5 re-instatements here north of the Border. To be fair maybe no-one could imagine the tremendous movements in populations and the growing of some small towns so policies were forumated for the times. The only part of GB where another agenda was at work was in N. Ireland. There when nationalised the then new undertaking State company was heavily run by the bus people and immeidately they just went into over-drive mode and the Province lost over 70% of it's rail. The side impact to that was that cross Border rural lines effected the then nationalised CIE in the South which suddenly had lines going nowhere.

 

[JCitron]

When I read this, I think of what's happened and is happening over here!

Up in Boston we have North Station and South Station which are about a 20 minute walk between each other, or a 15-20 minute subway ride (We call our underground trains subways too), with one or two changes in between depending upon which line you take. On some days it's actually faster to walk then to take the T.

Well during the late 1980s through the 2000s the Big Dig project was started and finished. The NAARP proposed to build a North-South tunnel connecting North Station to South Station. The rail tunnel could easily have been built under the then proposed route of the Central Artery which was taken down and tunneled under the city. This tunnel would have included an inbetween station for commuter trains and subways to stop at and ease the already overcrowded T and highways.

What came of this? A whole lot of nothing more than a few long drawn out talks along with a lot of money spent on "studies". The road tunnels are now open and working and there is space set aside for a future rail tunnel, but I'm not waiting for a future rail tunnel since this won't happen in my lifetime.

John

 

[amigacooke]

Well that'll go as a down payment for the hundreds of billions they took from the taxpayer for the bailout in 2008.

I think the money was borrowed not taken. There is a difference.

As to avoiding paying tax, I'm sure all the 'proles' who take cash in hand for a job diligently declare that income at the end of the financial year.

 

[wholbr]

Hi Everybody.

I think the money was borrowed not taken. There is a difference.

I take it amigacooke from your statement that you believe the enormous financial debt the banks owe to all the other private businesses and people who are taxpayers in Britain will at sometime in the dim distant future be repaid.

However, how will they repay the one and a half million who have lost their jobs, the thousands who have lost their homes and the untold number of businesses that have gone under because of their "totally inept gambling" in products even they did not understand leading to the financial collapse four years ago.

As an owner of a small business who has not had a full week's holiday in two years (like many) I have no doubt that if I ran my business the way the bankers run theirs I would be out of business with our employees on the dole. But not the foregoing for the city of London Mafia. They still sit there on a lunchtime in their exclusive bars drinking their champagne paid for by the taxes of businesses like mine and their employees.

The activities of the bankers also means that infrastructure improvements such as the rail development rj is referring to in this thread have far less chance of actually coming about because councils, local government and national government no longer have the financial ability to fund such projects. It is true that some national prestige rail projects will go ahead. The Cardiff and Bristol to London electrification of the line is one such project but unfortunately in the West of England many other projects are either cancelled or on indefinite hold.

The above are rail projects that would have undoubtedly created better employment prospects for many in this part of Britain but are now just the dashed dreams of the many thousands brought about by the activities of the privileged few. Another example of the 1% acting against the 99% in Britain (Posh boys looking after posh boys again).

Bill
Managing to scrounge two days off from the business (oh joy)

 

[mity22]

I am thinking of doing the Glasgow subway as its pretty small so will not be to hard to make

 

[rjhowie]

I came across the Glasgow uibway on another sim several years back when i briefly footered with it before moving to Trainz. You couldnn't get out the cab which made it a bit too restrictive. So I do hope you get round to that possible build mity27.

Going back to my thread start on the Crossrail project it has been shelved after years of pushing to et it. Had this been done 20 years ago it would have been a fraction of the present day estimates. Bridges and pathways are still intact in places and would only take a very short piece of extra track and junctions for it to be in place. Transport Scotland got sniffy about this age old plan claiming nthat there would be great cost and no assurance car journies would be reduced. So what are they going to do - keep building motoraways and move the population ointo man made islands off the coast??

The Authorities are well aware of the transport problems in Glasgow and regarding the suburban rail part (which has been pointed out is the largest outside London) why shouldn't it have extensions or Beeching cuts brought back? The Greater Glasgow area covers a big population and there are parts of the railway reaching saturation point. North of the River Clyde for example trains going through Partick interchange which is Scotlands' busiest local station are getting near the limit for time spacing. With so much of the potential route of "Crossrail" in place and only a very short additional section it would make sense for the North and South electrics re the Clyde be connected as sensible progress.

On the matter of re-opened lines here so what? They were needed and they are well down the cost of the extensions on London for example. They just ask and get whereas here to took years of effort to get lines re-opened. Maybe if we had a more sensible lot in Holyrood we might have more progress than exists in Transport Scotland quango. After all the start of the putting back Larkhall, Bathgate, Aloa, Maryhill, Galashiels all came before the pr4sent admin so they needn't take any credit. There plunge into rail matters was to shut down the Glasgow Airport planned link.

With an extensive suburban railway much of it electric it is badly disjointed due the lack of a passenger link-up between North and Soth systems in the city. London got it's crossrail so the largest city up here with so much transport pressure should get it'sas it reaches nigh on 40% of the population.

 

[Paulsw2]

I think the money was borrowed not taken. There is a difference.

As to avoiding paying tax, I'm sure all the 'proles' who take cash in hand for a job diligently declare that income at the end of the financial year.

You wouldn't happen to be a Libor trader by any chance would you? :hehe:

Paul

 

[amigacooke]

You wouldn't happen to be a Libor trader by any chance would you? :hehe:

Paul

You're joking! Where I work we don't even get money for a Christmas knees up.

 

[37040]

Can I point out that the North Clyde and South Clyde suburban systems are joined. It's called the Argyle line.

The line you describe was NEVER intended to join the Argyle line, irrespective of wither you move Argyle st station. The intention was to move High street station on the Queen st to Airdrie, (now Edinburgh) line via a new chord between the Current station site and the City & Union line, which crosses the Clyde as you describe, then connects to the Ayr line at Shields junction. This would allow theoretical through running between Ayr and Helensburgh via Queen st low level.

Except Queen Street Low level is full. There is no spare capacity to run extra trains, especiallly once you get further west and the Argyle lines join at Partick.

Next. The Glasgow Airport link. The best thing that could have been done was to stop this, as it was designed completly wrong. The plan was to build a seperate branch from Paisley St James to the airport. This involved ripping up playing fields, building an expensive bridge over the M8 and then building a new station at the Airport. Exactly where the Airport Fuel farm currently is.

The sensible thing to do was drop off the existing Paisley main line at Wallneuk Jn, follow the abandoned trackbed of the Renfrew line, crossing under the M8 motorway on a pre existing bridge and then crossing the White Cart River. giving you a direct, surface run to Glasgow airport Terminal Two. This is what happens when you let either Senior "Transport" planners and Politicians design things, instead of Railwaymen

 

[rjhowie]

The main argument 37040 by Transport For Scotland was that there wouldn't be enough traffic passenger-wise and that not enough cars would be taken off roads to justify. I dare say that is an arguable point. Targets set for the re-openings of Alloa and Larkall for example were exceeded. The matter of you saying that the lines converge is that they do so not at a reasonable point in the city centre which is the main thrust of the Crossrail. It could be argued that the slightly added time could put some would-be travellers off but again an open-ended matter. I do agree that the situation at Partick is on the saturation level.

As for the dumped airport link, yes what yous said on that would make sense. It is also my understanding that some have though of the matter of tram-trains (now considered south of the Border) on an air link but through Gilmour Street Station.