Is Minories operationally satisfying?

[Flying Pig]

1 hour ago, Blackvault said:

Maybe this is more of a timetabling question and I'm happy to start a new thread but how quickly would a train be dispatched after arriving? Assuming the correct operation of uncoupling the lead loco, backing a new one, brake test, loading and unloading of passengers. What about when the stock needs drawn out, and the loco released?

 

I'm attempting to build a proposed timetable for a layout that I might build in the future and would like it to be as realistic as possible. The layout only has three 3 platforms and is a standard minories layout set in an alternative King's Cross, whereby all the traffic is suburban. So plenty of ex LNER stock. The station is a few streets/blocks away from the mainlane terminus.  

 

 So far, and for no real reason this is the frequency of departures I've invented for peak and off peak times. Do these even look realistic? 

Peak time departures

HH:00

HH:15

HH:25

HH:38

HH:45

 

Off peak departure 

HH:00

HH:25

HH:38

If these are my departures what would the arrivals look like?

 

Additional how soon before departure would ECS arrive before the first departure of the day? 

 

Maybe I'm going about it the wrong way so any guidance is appreciated. 

 

I think it will be more interesting if you know where the trains are going before you try to write the timetable.  As you have decided on a location for your imaginary station you already have a start - look at the routes taken by various suburban services from Kings Cross.  If you want more variety of stock and locos, imagine a connection to the LMR, or the Southern.

[Blackvault]

On 30/06/2024 at 20:32, Flying Pig said:

 

I think it will be more interesting if you know where the trains are going before you try to write the timetable.  As you have decided on a location for your imaginary station you already have a start - look at the routes taken by various suburban services from Kings Cross.  If you want more variety of stock and locos, imagine a connection to the LMR, or the Southern.

I had actually. Maybe I should have put that in my post. The timings were similar to KX to Cambridge and Hitchin for 61 WTT. I thought that it's timings would be too intensive for minorities. 

 

I'd thought of the following rakes built up. 

 

Suburban Working 1 4 BR 57 Sub Carriages + 1 extra carriage for rush hour 

Suburban Working 2 4 BR 57 Sub Carriages +1

Suburban Working 4 BR 57 Sub Carriages + 1

Good Working 1 9 16 Ton Wagons + BV

Goods working 2 9 16 Ton Wagons + BV

Parcels working 1 2 vans + PTO

Parcels working 2 3 MK1 GUVs

Regional working 1 5 BR Mk1

Regional working 2 4 BR Mk1 + 1 LNER 

Edited September 16 by Blackvault

[Matloughe]

When it comes to turnaround of stock it depends entirely on its makeup. Suburban stock with a door to each compartment will load faster as you have a higher proportion of doors to seats 1 door to 10 seats, compared to 'mainline' stock which has 3 doors to 64 sets (1 door to 21.33333 seats).

 

A double decker bus takes approximately 3-4 minutes to load full from empty which is around 60 seats + standees; admittedly this includes buying tickets but I would say thats are reasonable time to either empty or load a 'Mainline' Coach, and approximately 2 minutes to empty or load a suburban coach sounds like a reasonable time. Will any cleaners be litter picking during the turn around - or a pilot moving coaches from one platform to another or is it a case of 'turnover operation' where a new locomotive takes the train out and the original locomotive becomes the new 'turnover' locomotive.

So a Suburban Train arrives and unloads (2 Mins), Cleaners hop on and work from coach to coach removing litter and sweeping out which adds another 4 minutes (1 min per coach), departure platform announced and train begins to load (2 Mins), turnover locomotive arrives, couples on, brake test (2 Mins), Guard and platform staff make sure doors are closed & give the signal (1-2 Mins) so from arriving to departing its taken approximately 12 minutes - being rather tight with timings, I'd probably say 15 minutes is the closest for a train to be turned around in - longer if mainline stock, and longer if its being shunted from platform to another.

Multiple Units are easier as they're often gangwayed between coaches and the driver can just change ends. Also this doesn't factor in conflicting movements where your train is ready to leave but an incoming service is blocking its path, or in the case of turnover operation waiting for the locomotive to arrive as its blocked by other traffic. Coupling or Uncoupling all add time and this is assuming our model passengers and staff are on 'peak' game.

Kind Regards,
Gary

[KeithMacdonald]

On 03/02/2019 at 14:54, Harlequin said:

So the current idea is this:

 

I really didn't intend to spend all day drawing layout designs but it's so satisfying

 

I'd like to compliment @Harlequin on one of the most elegant Minories-style layouts I've ever seen.

 

And to add a sad warning to others - on no account should you get sad and obsessive (like me) and design a "Double-Minories" which had two hypothetical double-track  lines from two different companies sharing a single terminus. With as many sidings as I could cram in every inch of spare space. Just don't do it! That way lies madness.

 

[KeithMacdonald]

On 07/02/2019 at 20:33, Nearholmer said:

Windsor and Eton Riverside?

 

On 07/02/2019 at 20:43, RJS1977 said:

Though would make a very impressive model if modelled with the river facing the viewer and the castle behind the station!

 

With Her Majesty trainspotting with a pair of Corgis?

[KeithMacdonald]

On 09/02/2019 at 01:39, Pacific231G said:

I'm intrigued by what appears to be a disconnected length of track along the side of the Thames behind the turntable. It appears on the 1910 edition but not any of the others.

 

Which map?

Several times, using the old OS maps on NLS, I've similarly been puzzled by what looked like a disconnected length of track. Only to eventually realise it was a drainage ditch or diverted stream.

Sorry for the thread drift.

[Pacific231G]

1 hour ago, KeithMacdonald said:

 

Which map?

Several times, using the old OS maps on NLS, I've similarly been puzzled by what looked like a disconnected length of track. Only to eventually realise it was a drainage ditch or diverted stream.

Sorry for the thread drift.

Hi Keith, Delving back four years it was the 1910 25 inch map from NLS

It doesn't appear in the 1897 or the 1933 equivalent maps. I did wonder if it had been a kick back siding from the road coming off the turntable with the points having been missed (or a temporary siding for dumping stone for river bank strengthening works (or something like that) which by 1910 been disconnected but not yet lifted. The obvious alternative would be a travelling crane track again laid for some kind of Thames Conservancy "works" but there doesn't appear to be enough space for any kind of wharf.

 

Thread drift but Windsor Riverside IS interesting. It was a three platform terminus (only two now) on a narrow restricted site so quite Minories like but with more interesting traffic possibilities (royal trains, visiting heads of state's Pullman trains, horse boxes, peacetime military movements (guards regiments etc.) as well as a busy commuter service to Waterloo. 

 

Edited June 30 by Pacific231G

[Pacific231G]

18 hours ago, Blackvault said:

Maybe this is more of a timetabling question and I'm happy to start a new thread but how quickly would a train be dispatched after arriving? Assuming the correct operation of uncoupling the lead loco, backing a new one, brake test, loading and unloading of passengers. What about when the stock needs drawn out, and the loco released?

 

 

For a busy rush hour operation it could be pretty quick. 

This is the platform occupation diagram for Paris-Bastille's evening rush hour in 1925 and the normal time a set of carriages spent in the platform before departing was ten minutes. (this chart is at the bottom of the graphical timetable)

These would be mainly arriving as ECS then departing with a load of homebound commuters. The trains that spent longer on the platform notably 210/229 on platform V, were probably those that arrived as service trains so had to be unloaded as well as loaded.

This is the track and signalling plan in diagrammatic form and the whole thing was controlled from a single Saxby mechanical box with 33 levers .

 

In the 1920s this was an intensely busy terminus serving a single commuter line that couldn't be expanded (knocking down the Bastille memorial column wouldn't have gone down too well !) To get more rush hour trains in and out, the Cf de l' Est's traffic engineers, carried out a very sophisticated rationalisation exercise and came up with an extremely efficient operating pattern where a set of trains departed in reverse platform order 5 to 1 to be almost immediately replaced by arriving (mainly ECS) trains without arrivals and departures having to cross each other . When all five platforms had been filled with trains and new locos coupled to them, the next set of departures began  

There were three traversers to release incoming locos (similar to those at Birmingham Moor Street) but with this highly rationalised pattern I don't think they were used during the rush hour as the adjoining platform would also be occupied. To save time there were water cranes near the terminal end of each platform so an arriving loco could uncouple then take on water while waiting for the platform to clear before following the train out and moving over to its next train - there was no hanging around in loco spurs. The chart shows which outbound train an incoming loco subsequently took out. 

You can see that train 191 left platform five at 18.30 hauled by the loco that had brought train 172 into platform four at 18.02. That train had departed at  about 18.14 giving the loco that had brought it in about 15 minutes to get from platform four to five, couple up and do its brake test before departing at 18.30 . 

Edited July 1 by Pacific231G

[Blackvault]

10 hours ago, Matloughe said:

When it comes to turnaround of stock it depends entirely on its makeup. Suburban stock with a door to each compartment will load faster as you have a higher proportion of doors to seats 1 door to 10 seats, compared to 'mainline' stock which has 3 doors to 64 sets (1 door to 21.33333 seats)....

....
Kind Regards,
Gary

 

Thanks for taking the time to reply Gary. That information and assumption cleaning time etc, is rather useful. In short 15-20 mins is the expected turnaround time for a train that had been carriying passengers. I honsetly thought it would have been far shorter!

 

6 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

For a busy rush hour operation it could be pretty quick. 

These would be mainly arriving as ECS then departing with a load of homebound commuters. The trains that spent longer on the platform notably 210/229 on platform V, were probably those that arrived as service trains so had to be unloaded as well as loaded. The chart shows which outbound train an incoming loco subsequently took out. 

 

You can see that train 191 left platform five at 18.30 hauled by the loco that had brought train 172 into platform four at 18.02. That train had departed at  about 18.14 giving the loco that had brought it in about 15 minutes to get from platform four to five, couple up and do its brake test before departing at 18.30 . 

 

Wow! That visual representation really has helped make things clearer in my mind, thanks Pacific/David.  You say that the loco that brought in 172 in P4 at 18.02 is the same loco that departed at 18:30 with train 181 on P5, howver I can seem to work out, how that graph shows that.  Am I missing something? 

 

Is the number 172 listed in Avec Machine du train, with the dotted line down to Train 191, indicated that loco that hauled in train 172? What does the HP signify? 

 

Thanks

[kevinlms]

8 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Hi Keith, Delving back four years it was the 1910 25 inch map from NLS

It doesn't appear in the 1897 or the 1933 equivalent maps. I did wonder if it had been a kick back siding from the road coming off the turntable with the points having been missed (or a temporary siding for dumping stone for river bank strengthening works (or something like that) which by 1910 been disconnected but not yet lifted. The obvious alternative would be a travelling crane track again laid for some kind of Thames Conservancy "works" but there doesn't appear to be enough space for any kind of wharf.

 

Thread drift but Windsor Riverside IS interesting. It was a three platform terminus (only two now) on a narrow restricted site so quite Minories like but with more interesting traffic possibilities (royal trains, visiting heads of state's Pullman trains, horse boxes, peacetime military movements (guards regiments etc.) as well as a busy commuter service to Waterloo. 

 

So how long did the then King spend waiting for the train in his waiting room? More likely he arrived and walked straight through the station and boarded the waiting train, which then almost immediately left!

[Jeremy Cumberland]

59 minutes ago, Blackvault said:

 

Thanks for taking the time to reply Gary. That information and assumption cleaning time etc, is rather useful. In short 15-20 mins is the expected turnaround time for a train that had been carriying passengers. I honsetly thought it would have been far shorter!

 

It could be. I don't have any timetables to hand right now, but as I recall, turnarounds at Liverpool Street Metropolitan were 8 minutes or less. Moorgate Widened Lines (either the two or three platform version) would also be worth looking at. At both stations, the turnaround locomotive movements didn't conflict with anything else (train departs; loco goes to spur as soon as points reset; incoming train arrives; loco in headshunt backs onto train). If loco movements need to be slotted in between trains arriving and departing at other platforms then turnaround times could quickly increase. The answer to this might be to add more platforms, so you could still have the same frequency of service.

 

It is worth noting that "a train that had been carrying passengers" probably won't have been carrying very many of them (in the afternoon/evening), or wouldn't be taking many of them away (in the morning). Moorgate's double-faced platform roads might have been a means of separating arriving and departing passengers, but Liverpool Street was only ever single-faced, and most trains were booked for passengers in both directions.

 

In short, I would ignore platform dwell times. After a train arrives, you need to get a new locomotive on the front, of course, and you should allow a minute or so for coupling on and doing a brake test, but you also doubtless want another train to arrive or depart at a different platform, and this will probably give you all the dwell time you need for the first train.

[Blackvault]

1 hour ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

In short, I would ignore platform dwell times. After a train arrives, you need to get a new locomotive on the front, of course, and you should allow a minute or so for coupling on and doing a brake test, but you also doubtless want another train to arrive or depart at a different platform, and this will probably give you all the dwell time you need for the first train.

 

Thanks, Jeremy.

 

Following that advice, I've built a rush hour suburban timetable, based on the work-in-progress three-platform minorities layout.   I don't think there will be any conflicts with inbound and outbound trains. 

[St Enodoc]

30 minutes ago, Blackvault said:

 

Thanks, Jeremy.

 

Following that advice, I've built a rush hour suburban timetable, based on the work-in-progress three-platform minorities layout.   I don't think there will be any conflicts with inbound and outbound trains. 

Assuming left-hand running, you can't arrive in Platform 3 and depart from Platform 1 at the same time.

[Pacific231G]

4 hours ago, Blackvault said:

 

Thanks for taking the time to reply Gary. That information and assumption cleaning time etc, is rather useful. In short 15-20 mins is the expected turnaround time for a train that had been carriying passengers. I honsetly thought it would have been far shorter!

 

 

Wow! That visual representation really has helped make things clearer in my mind, thanks Pacific/David.  You say that the loco that brought in 172 in P4 at 18.02 is the same loco that departed at 18:30 with train 181 on P5, howver I can seem to work out, how that graph shows that.  Am I missing something? 

 

Is the number 172 listed in Avec Machine du train, with the dotted line down to Train 191, indicated that loco that hauled in train 172? What does the HP signify? 

 

Thanks

Yes that's right. The loco that brought in train 172 (in France "up" trains have even "pair" numbers and "down" trains odd impair numbers) is the loco that will take out train 191 so it only has to move to  the first set of points behind the departing the departing train (now 183) then cross over and back onto the train on platform 4. HP is a light engine (more often written as HLP short for Haut le Pied an originally equestrian term meaning an unburdened horse)  

 

This is the complete graphique  for weekdays between 18:00 and 20:00. On weekdays, outside the rush hours,  the terminus was fairly quiet.

 

Because of its very cramped location with a long viaduct immediately beyond its throat, there were no carriage sidings at Bastille (apart  from 1bis when it wasn't being a loco release for platform 1) though there was a small three road sub-shed and coaling stage. So, every departing train had to arrive either as a service train or as ECS from down the line. You can see that a coach set might make two departures from the terminus during the evening rush hour  and the rhythmic pattern with trains going further in each "flight" departing first. Instead of fast, semi fast and all-stopping trains, most trains would run non-stop to somewhere down the line then stop at every station to the point where they terminated. The Est's traffic department was very proud of this rationalisaton of a "quart in a pint-pot" service that had been very prone to delays so these diagrams come from a paper "The rational organisation of suburban services on the Est's network" presented at a conference in 1931.

 

It's worth noting that shunting signal weren't used, French signalling is restrictive rather than permissive so a driver could carry out the planned movement between platforms without needing a specific signal to do so.

This may seem off-topic for Minories but Bastille is similar being a very busy terminus crammed into a very tight location - exactly what CJF was offering. Though Bastille had five platform faces, the same principles could be applied to a three platform terminus like Minories handling a busy flow of commuter trains. At Bastille, parallel arrivals and departures are possible with any pair of platforms and that wasn't the case before the rationalisation. You could do that with Minories by adding a line between platform three and the inbound main or you could plan your movements without it.

 

Edited July 1 by Pacific231G

[Jeremy Cumberland]

What are the loco movements? I'm assuming all trains are loco-hauled (and not push-pull).

 

At the start, there has to be loco on the train in platform 3 and I assume there is one on the train in platform 2, with a third loco in the loco spur. This can go onto the train in platform 1 before the platform 2 train departs, but will you then be able to get the loco from platform 3 to the spur before the platform 2 train departs? This looks to be essential, even if you aren't particularly bothered about prototypically-correct signalling. If you leave it till after the platform 2, then things look to be very tight indeed to get a locomotive out of platform 3 and another train into platform 3 in less than five minutes.

 

I haven't traced through what might happen next, but I suggest you do, to see whether you can fit in all the movements you want. You might also need to decide on your signalling policy, since this could have a dramatic impact on how you handle incoming trains.

 

 

1 minute ago, St Enodoc said:

Assuming left-hand running, you can't arrive in Platform 3 and depart from Platform 1 at the same time.

But you can have an 18:10 timed arrival in platform 3 and an 18:10 departure from platform 1. The P1 train departs when the P3 train has arrived.

[Blackvault]

29 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

Assuming left-hand running, you can't arrive at Platform 3 and depart from Platform 1 at the same time.

It is indeed normal left-hand British running. I thought the design was classic Minories, but maybe not. Should P3 be accessible when P1 is accepting or departing? How would I fix the issue in the track plan? 

 

I'm happy to take this to the correct thread if needed. Thanks 

Edited July 1 by Blackvault

[Blackvault]

6 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

What are the loco movements? I'm assuming all trains are loco-hauled (and not push-pull).

 

At the start, there has to be a loco on the train in platform 3 and I assume there is one on the train in platform 2, with a third loco in the loco spur. This can go onto the train in Platform 1 before the Platform 2 train departs, but will you then be able to get the loco from Platform 3 to the spur before the Platform 2 train departs? This looks to be essential, even if you aren't particularly bothered about prototypically-correct signalling. If you leave it till after platform 2, then things look to be very tight indeed to get a locomotive out of platform 3 and another train into platform 3 in less than five minutes.

 

I haven't traced through what might happen next, but I suggest you do, to see whether you can fit in all the movements you want. You might also need to decide on your signalling policy since this could have a dramatic impact on how you handle incoming trains.

 

 

But you can have an 18:10 timed arrival in Platform 3 and an 18:10 departure from Platform 1. The P1 train departs when the P3 train has arrived.

This would be BR Steam, the late 50s, early 60s and mostly if not exclusively steam hauled trains. 

 

I would like to try and be as prototypical in movements and signalling. As St Enodoc pointed out, P1 and P3 have a conflict. Are most of your comments streaming from an issue with the track plan? 

[Harlequin]

20 minutes ago, Blackvault said:

It is indeed normal left-hand British running. I thought the design was classic Minories, but maybe not. Should P3 be accessible when P1 is accepting or departing? How would I fix the issue in the track plan? 

 

I'm happy to take this to the correct thread if needed. Thanks 

 

If you mirror Minories, which is what you've done, then the running characteristics all change (unless you change the handedness of the running lines at the same time). In fact, it's not technically Minories any more.

 

[St Enodoc]

26 minutes ago, Blackvault said:

It is indeed normal left-hand British running. I thought the design was classic Minories, but maybe not. Should P3 be accessible when P1 is accepting or departing? How would I fix the issue in the track plan? 

 

I'm happy to take this to the correct thread if needed. Thanks 

 

15 minutes ago, Blackvault said:

This would be BR Steam, the late 50s, early 60s and mostly if not exclusively steam hauled trains. 

 

I would like to try and be as prototypical in movements and signalling. As St Enodoc pointed out, P1 and P3 have a conflict. Are most of your comments streaming from an issue with the track plan? 

Your track plan doesn't have enough parallel routes for the full suite of simultaneous arrivals and departures. As you can't fit those in, the only way I can see to do this is to have a short gap between the P1 departure and the P3 arrival, to allow the departing train to clear the points and the signalman to reset the route.

[Pacific231G]

25 minutes ago, Harlequin said:

 

If you mirror Minories, which is what you've done, then the running characteristics all change (unless you change the handedness of the running lines at the same time). In fact, it's not technically Minories any more.

 

I've heard this said before Harlequin but never understood why it would significantly change the station's operation. You surely have three platform faces all able to handle both arrivals and departures and all directly connected, by a pair of crossovers, to both sides of a double track main line. Unless you're operating with separate arrival and departure platforms I see no reason why the handedness would affect that unless there is a convention that the final crossover outbound should be  a trailing one. The double crossover could just as easily be a scissors crossover in which case it would be symmetrical but operationally equivalent. 

 

 

Edited July 1 by Pacific231G

[Blackvault]

16 minutes ago, Harlequin said:

 

If you mirror Minories, which is what you've done, then the running characteristics all change (unless you change the handedness of the running lines at the same time). In fact, it's not technically Minories any more.

 

I wasn't aware of that and didn't think through the logic.

 

I've changed the layout/track plan's orientation, which is correct for Minories. Although this doesn't solve my timetabling issues?

 

A big thanks to you guys for helping me here. This is my first time back at modelling since I was a kid and it is an eye-opener when you want the outcome to be more prototypical. 

[Pacific231G]

15 minutes ago, St Enodoc said:

 

Your track plan doesn't have enough parallel routes for the full suite of simultaneous arrivals and departures. As you can't fit those in, the only way I can see to do this is to have a short gap between the P1 departure and the P3 arrival, to allow the departing train to clear the points and the signalman to reset the route.

That's also true of Minories but plenty of people have operated that with an intensive turnover suburban service.

You can get the full suite of parallel moves with Minories by adding a connection between platform three and the inbound main but, though that doesn't lengthen the layout, it does shorten platform three's available length by a bit less than the length of a point and I've not actually seen any version of Minories where that's been done. 

 

Looking at Blackvault's plan again it does seem to give a slightly longer throat than Minories (the difference between a simple turnout and a double slip) with no obvious benefit apart from tucking the loco spur into an area that's often wasted. 

Edited July 1 by Pacific231G

[Dr Gerbil-Fritters]

I've never been able to get past three elements of Minories; the reverse curves (that weird dog-leg, entirely unnecessary on a straight site); the conflicting moves, and the fact that it is entirely straight.  However 'short' it is, you'll need at least the same length again for staging the trains.  I think you either have to build Minories as it was originally planned, as a sort of CJF tribute, or if you're going to try and embiggen* it or improve it, you have to get rid of its quirks.  If you do, then you end up with a nice straightforward terminus like the one I built a few years ago (page 13 of this thread) 

 

If you're looking to build a multi-platform intensive service station, you really can't improve on what the French did at GdB, and all without having to resort to bespoke 'tricky track'.  Here it is in Peco medium turnouts.  I reversed the orientation, just to match Blackvault's plans...

 

 

This is 9' 6" x 9' 6".  If you substitute curved for straight turnouts on the outermost track, you can do it in 7' 6" x 7' 6".  Ask me how I know 😄

 

*lol

 

Edited July 1 by Dr Gerbil-Fritters

[Jeremy Cumberland]

Buried deep within the Theory of General Minories thread is an excellent discussion about why the reverse curves and the sequence of crossovers work better that way round, but this discussion only really makes sense if you are keeping the loco spur the same (or not having a loco spur at all). As soon as you move the loco spur, or add other features such as a goods yard or carriage sidings, then things change. @Blackvault's plan in the same post as the timetable looks fine to me, keeping the loco spur on the departure side. It might not be Minories, but at first glance at least it looks workable, and the curves, apart from platform 1 departures through the double slip, appear to be reasonable. The only change I'd tentatively propose is to replace the double slip with a set of points and move the loco spur further to the right.

 

18 minutes ago, Blackvault said:

I wasn't aware of that and didn't think through the logic.

 

I've changed the layout/track plan's orientation, which is correct for Minories. Although this doesn't solve my timetabling issues?

 

A big thanks to you guys for helping me here. This is my first time back at modelling since I was a kid and it is an eye-opener when you want the outcome to be more prototypical. 

Don't move the loco spur to the arrivals side. Try to have as little as possible on the arrivals side. In simple terms, for an intensive service to work, incoming trains need to be able to approach at speed, but for this to happen the track needs to be unoccupied - and remain unoccupied - during their approach. On the other hand, you can shunt in front of a train about to depart to your heart's content up to the time the train actually has to leave, and you can then shunt behind it as soon as it is clear of the track you wish to use (with a few caveats).

 

1 hour ago, Blackvault said:

Should P3 be accessible when P1 is accepting or departing? How would I fix the issue in the track plan? 

You never can. A train arriving in the furthest right hand platform will prevent all other movements in or out of other platforms. Your plan allows a simultaneous platform 1 arrival with a platform 2 or 3 departure, and that is probably all you want. With a different track plan, you might also be able to have a simultaneous platform 2 arrival and platform 3 departure, but even Minories only allowed simultaneous arrivals and departures from two pairs of platforms, not three.

[Blackvault]

19 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

Buried deep within the Theory of General Minories thread is an excellent discussion about why the reverse curves and the sequence of crossovers work better that way round, but this discussion only really makes sense if you are keeping the loco spur the same (or not having a loco spur at all). As soon as you move the loco spur, or add other features such as a goods yard or carriage sidings, then things change. @Blackvault's plan in the same post as the timetable looks fine to me, keeping the loco spur on the departure side. It might not be Minories, but at first glance at least it looks workable, and the curves, apart from platform 1 departures through the double slip, appear to be reasonable. The only change I'd tentatively propose is to replace the double slip with a set of points and move the loco spur further to the right.

 

Don't move the loco spur to the arrivals side. Try to have as little as possible on the arrivals side. In simple terms, for an intensive service to work, incoming trains need to be able to approach at speed, but for this to happen the track needs to be unoccupied - and remain unoccupied - during their approach. On the other hand, you can shunt in front of a train about to depart to your heart's content up to the time the train actually has to leave, and you can then shunt behind it as soon as it is clear of the track you wish to use (with a few caveats).

 

You never can. A train arriving in the furthest right hand platform will prevent all other movements in or out of other platforms. Your plan allows a simultaneous platform 1 arrival with a platform 2 or 3 departure, and that is probably all you want. With a different track plan, you might also be able to have a simultaneous platform 2 arrival and platform 3 departure, but even Minories only allowed simultaneous arrivals and departures from two pairs of platforms, not three.

 

I've taken your suggestion of moving the loco spur to a more traditional place on the outbound tracks close to Platform 1.  I assume that a replacement loco, would travel as far as the last point before the outbound curve, and back down through the ladder to either Platforms 2 or 3, thus blocking arrivals, but at least allowing a departure from P1. 

 

Thanks for setting me straight, for some unknown reason thought that Minories allowed simultaneous arrival and departures on all platforms, rather than just 1 and 2. It does beg the question what does platform 3 offer?  I will most likely have a goods arrival line below P3 and fan out the sidings into the space in front of the curve.