Grand northern plans to reopen woodhead

[black and decker boy]

Would the 1954 tunnel have “grandfather rights” so can still be used and brought up to spec with some work albeit lowering floor

 

Brian

Grandfather rights for what? If OHLE then no, there are no grandfather rights, the new BS:EN minimum clearances apply as NR have found at considerable cost in their current electrification programmes. You need to lower the track considerably to accommodate UK full height HGVs on rail wagons plus current OHLE clearances.

 

As BR found at Penmanshiel, lowering tunnel floors is fraught with danger and the deeper you need to go, the harder it gets.

 

This is the tunnel currently home to the National Grid HV power cables.

[Joseph_Pestell]

 

 

(8 axle wagons? do they mean 8 wheels? ).

 

I think they probably do mean axles. They should anyway.

 

To be able to load lorries quickly onto wagons and still have wagons that are within gauge, they will have to have very small wheels - rather like the narrow-gauge transporter wagons in Austria. Unless run at very low speeds, smaller wheels would need more axles/wheels to lighten the load and give adequate braking capacity.

[black and decker boy]

There are already several ‘low liner’ intermodal wagon designs in use in the UK including the DRS operated IDA lowliner fleet

 

https://www.railexpress.co.uk/going-low-with-the-ida-flats/

 

These feature an ultra low floor @720mm high and use very small wheels @577mm diameter. They still only use 4 axles per wagon. Headstocks and buffers are at a higher level so no ability to run at one level along a rake. The max length of normal HGVs is 18.75m and max weight 45T so your ro-ro wagon is going to be very bespoke.

 

The general recommended max height for HGVs is 4.95m so if you can find a ro-ro wagon with a 720mm floor, I would think you need a track to tunnel clearance of close to 7m (RSSB show approx 1.2m from top of train to the structure). I’d imagine that is pretty close to what Eurotunnel have and not what BR built at Woodhead in the 1950s.

Edited December 23, 2017 by black and decker boy

[Joseph_Pestell]

There are already several ‘low liner’ intermodal wagon designs in use in the UK including the DRS operated IDA lowliner fleet

 

https://www.railexpress.co.uk/going-low-with-the-ida-flats/

 

These feature an ultra low floor @720mm high and use very small wheels @577mm diameter. They still only use 4 axles per wagon. Headstocks and buffers are at a higher level so no ability to run at one level along a rake. The max length of normal HGVs is 18.75m and max weight 45T so your ro-ro wagon is going to be very bespoke.

 

The general recommended max height for HGVs is 4.95m so if you can find a ro-ro wagon with a 720mm floor, I would think you need a track to tunnel clearance of close to 7m (RSSB show approx 1.2m from top of train to the structure). I’d imagine that is pretty close to what Eurotunnel have and not what BR built at Woodhead in the 1950s.

 

Take out that 1.2m for OHE and you would need perhaps 6m from track to ceiling. If you take a tunnel built for double-track and lay a single track through it at lower level, you are probably just about there.

 

Agree with you though about the very bespoke nature of the wagons needed (in complete rakes).

[Orion]

I appreciate, as most people agree, that this project is unrealistic. I bet the Victorians wouldn't have seen it that way though. Oh for the spirit of Brunel and Stephenson!  

[black and decker boy]

I appreciate, as most people agree, that this project is unrealistic. I bet the Victorians wouldn't have seen it that way though. Oh for the spirit of Brunel and Stephenson!

The Victorians may well have ripped up even more Railways and laid tarmac on them just as they filled in canals to lay Railways. They didn’t do sentimentality and just moved onto the next better mode. You can’t argue the fact that road is more efficient in the modern world of just in time deliveries, door to door.

 

Whilst this ideology of this scheme has its merits, you just can’t see the numbers adding up. The government is pro-road, our whole economy is pro-Road and there are several viable road options and there is capacity across the 3 current rail routes for more freight. DfT are spending millions on 2 more options, HS3 and a new motorway tunnel.

 

Without political will (and regulation) HGVs will continue to run across the Pennines.

[TheSignalEngineer]

I found a reference to the previous incarnation of this proposal, then called 'Translink', dating from 2006. Other than a change of name and website address it doesn't look as if Julian Newton has made much progress with it since. Another group called High Speed UK has also proposed a Woodhead route for HS2 which included filling and reboring the original 1840s tunnels to Channel Tunnel standard. Given the problems encountered in 1951 during the boring of the third tunnel that should prove entertaining. 'Nuff said about that proposal, don't want to get the site into trouble.

 

Regerding clearances, from when I did some calculations on this proposal 12 years ago, the height of an HGV on a low-level wagon came out approximately the same as the height of the 25KV contact wire at a level crossing, which is about as high as it gets. The 3rd tunnel was just about big enough to fit a single track diesel hauled line. The centre of the roof of the 3rd tunnel was 6.34 metres above rail level with the 1500volt contact wire at 4.57 metres. The tunnel is roughly circular but IIRC doesn't have a 'floor', the sides sit on the rock. 

 

At a fraction over three miles long, if the trains ran at 60mph and allowing for the time taken to cross the single to double junction at each end it would take about 5 minutes to pass through on green signal headways.

[The Stationmaster]

Would the 1954 tunnel have “grandfather rights” so can still be used and brought up to spec with some work albeit lowering floor

 

Brian

 

As it was a tunnel it wouldn't have grandfather rights even if it had still been open to rail traffic in 1994 (it closed in 1981).  Grandfather rights only apply to traction units and rolling stock and then only to such items/designs which would have had access to the rail network at the time of privatisation legislation.  

[Joseph_Pestell]

 

Without political will (and regulation) HGVs will continue to run across the Pennines.

 

BBC reporting today that Govt thinking of charging HGVs on a mileage basis instead of VED.

[woodenhead]

"Thinking"

 

It's not a piece of proposed legislation or policy yet and the road lobby will get their hands on it to push it into the long grass

 

If it did become policy then other freight companies would be in like a shot with port to terminal ro-ro trains and Woodhead would be stuck in the middle of a no mans land

[MarkC]

BBC reporting today that Govt thinking of charging HGVs on a mileage basis instead of VED.

How would they bill all the foreign plate HGVs then?

[pete_mcfarlane]

I think they probably do mean axles. They should anyway.

 

To be able to load lorries quickly onto wagons and still have wagons that are within gauge, they will have to have very small wheels - rather like the narrow-gauge transporter wagons in Austria. Unless run at very low speeds, smaller wheels would need more axles/wheels to lighten the load and give adequate braking capacity.

But then some of the other figures don't make sense (and I'm wondering what  4 axle bogie coal wagons were used on the route before closure). The whole section just seems like technobabble.

 

In any case, their electric locos will have an axle load of at least 20t, so the bridges will need to be able to take that regardless of the wagon axle loading.  

[TheSignalEngineer]

I Asked the question of what would it cost

A response from Julian Newton regarding a question that was asked about the cost of the project:

 

We have spent considerable time and expense in surveying the line and formulating our bid. This is a privately funded venture with no intention of using public money so the cost is not something we wish to disclose at the present time. However, all will be revealed in the fullness of time. Regards Julian

 

Brian

When he announced the project in March 2006 under the name of Translink UK the cost quoted was £159 million.

[Boris]

[Edwin_m]

I live in the countryside but I am still a firm advocate of increasing fuel duty and abolishing VED. In the countryside, we get more miles per gallon than urban drivers.

With a large scale conversion to electric vehicles on the horizon the government is looking at a big loss of revenue if it relies on fuel duty.   A road network for EVs will still cost about the same, and EVs are less damaging but by no means benign (congestion is the same, noise can still be significant, they even create particulates from tyre wear).  So, along with a fuel duty to encorage people to switch to electric, there really should be moves towards a road user charging system.  This could charge less for rural roads to reflect the relative lack of congestion and the need for a car in those areas.  Unlike VED, taxes and charges should be levied on vehicle use not vehicle ownership, to make it more likely that paople will choose alternatives when appropriate even if they have to have a car available for some journeys. 

 

However this probably makes little difference for HGVs, which are used intensively and for which road user charges will doubtless be offset by a reduction/rebate on fuel so the cost per mile remains about the same.  Thus there is no extra financial incentive to transfer freight onto rail, and most of the rail network has no capacity for extra freight anyway.  A new rail link might be supported by HGV bans or prohibitive useage charges on parallel roads, but even if allowed by state aid rules this might just encourage HGVs to take longer and more environmentally damaging routes such as Sheffield-Manchester via M1, A50, M6. 

[Joseph_Pestell]

How would they bill all the foreign plate HGVs then?

ANPR.

[JDW]

I genuinely don't understand why people throw their money at promoting such things.  The only real advantage would be that drivers can take their 45 minute daily rest break on board, but in every other respect, it just doesn't stack up.  Besides the gauge and infrastructure issues, no operator is going to pay £135 to save less than an hour of driving, its cheaper to pay the driver an extra hour.  Even then, you're only really saving the delay time at Mottram, as the train will still take time to wind its way over the hills.  Lets optimistically say the journey takes 30 mins, check in 15 mins, thats 45 mins, you could probably drive the journey in an hour in average traffic, so £135 to save 15 minutes (or 60 if you take the drivers rest into account).  

Even with trains every 15 minutes, the reality is that you could probably be half way up Woodhead in the time it takes to drive off the M1, into the terminal, even if you're the first to load your lorry you'd have to wait for everyone else to board, will check in, boarding and departure really take less than 15 minutes??  I doubt it.  And as bad as Mottram is, it isn't all day every day, many off peak journeys I've made on the route have been free flowing, which takes away any speed advantage.  

Sorry, but it's utter pie in the sky...

[phil-b259]

ANPR.

That doesn't answer the question.

 

In any case unlike the U.K. most of the rest of Europe keep their vehicle regestration bodies confidential and refuse to allow access to the database by anyone other than law enforcement agencies.

 

As such ANPR is pretty useless in recovering monies from forgiven vehicles - you pretty much need to actually stop the vehicle and fine the driver there and then because the private sector balifs the DfT use will be denied access to vehicle regestration details.

 

(The DVLA in the U.K. will quite happily supply owners details to pretty much anyone in exchange for cash)

Edited December 24, 2017 by phil-b259

[MarkC]

ANPR.

 

That doesn't answer the question.

 

In any case unlike the U.K. most of the rest of Europe keep their vehicle regestration bodies confidential and refuse to allow access to the database by anyone other than law enforcement agencies.

 

As such ANPR is pretty useless in removing monies from forgiven vehicles - you pretty much need to actually stop the vehicle and find the driver there and then.

 

(The DVLA in the U.K. will quite happily supply owners details to pretty much anyone in exchange for cash)

Exactly so. That was the point I was trying to make.

 

Stopping vehicles with outstanding dues, be it tolls, speeding penalties or congestion charges, at the Chunnel or ferry terminals would be the only way to do it - and there is no reason why this isn't being done now, other than political will. Certainly the infrastructure and IT data are there.

[rockershovel]

How would they bill all the foreign plate HGVs then?

Same as the lost duty on the full tanks of fuel on incoming vehicles, and the unpaid fines I expect.... the EU does actually provide mechanisms for this sort of thing, the Poles have enthusiastically embraced using other countries’ administrations to collect unpaid fines from Poles living outside Poland, but “business as usual” here...

[pete_mcfarlane]

The only real advantage would be that drivers can take their 45 minute daily rest break on board, but in every other respect, it just doesn't stack up. 

 

And even that won't be an advantage in a decade or two, as driverless lorries aren't that far off becoming a viable technology. 

[TheSignalEngineer]

And even that won't be an advantage in a decade or two, as driverless lorries aren't that far off becoming a viable technology. 

Then we can couple a rake together, need a name for the new system. Train perhaps?

[Trog]

Bit of info I’ve seen on a faceache post

 

To deal with height resrictions using the 1954 tunnel

He wants to lower the track bed by 700mm

And use 3 rail in the tunnel

 

 

I wonder if he knows what a tunnel invert is?

[MarkC]

Bit of info I’ve seen on a faceache post

 

To deal with height resrictions using the 1954 tunnel

He wants to lower the track bed by 700mm

And use 3 rail in the tunnel

 

Brian

Can of worms there too - it's not a 'fill in' of surrounding 3rd rail installations, so it's unlikely to be approved.

 

It's all fantasy anyway...

[D854_Tiger]

I genuinely don't understand why people throw their money at promoting such things.  The only real advantage would be that drivers can take their 45 minute daily rest break on board, but in every other respect, it just doesn't stack up.  Besides the gauge and infrastructure issues, no operator is going to pay £135 to save less than an hour of driving, its cheaper to pay the driver an extra hour.  Even then, you're only really saving the delay time at Mottram, as the train will still take time to wind its way over the hills.  Lets optimistically say the journey takes 30 mins, check in 15 mins, thats 45 mins, you could probably drive the journey in an hour in average traffic, so £135 to save 15 minutes (or 60 if you take the drivers rest into account).  

Even with trains every 15 minutes, the reality is that you could probably be half way up Woodhead in the time it takes to drive off the M1, into the terminal, even if you're the first to load your lorry you'd have to wait for everyone else to board, will check in, boarding and departure really take less than 15 minutes??  I doubt it.  And as bad as Mottram is, it isn't all day every day, many off peak journeys I've made on the route have been free flowing, which takes away any speed advantage.  

Sorry, but it's utter pie in the sky...

 

 

The Woodhead route was a magnificent engineering achievement, so good it would seem to be a shame to waste it and plenty despair that it is so.

 

Trouble is, Woodhead was built to solve a problem that no longer exists and, despite extensive searches, no one really seems to have found another problem to which it could be the solution.