Modern Railways – April 2019

(Joyce) #1
Crowded corridor: Northern unit Nos 319367 (left)
and 156491 in the through platforms at Manchester
Piccadilly on 10 August 2018. Philip Sherratt

News Front


14 Modern Railways April 2019 http://www.modern-railways.com


THIRTY OPTIONS FOR CASTLEFIELD


Df T RULES OUT EXTRA PLATFORMS AT PICCADILLY
SOME 30 options for resolving
capacity problems through the
Castlefield corridor between
Deansgate and Manchester Piccadilly
are being assessed by Network Rail,
industry sources report.
The large number of proposals is
understood to have been developed
as a response to a decision by the
Department for Transport that the
originally proposed Northern Hub
‘Package C’ is unaffordable. This
programme of work, for which a
Transport and Works Act Order has
been submitted by Network Rail but
not approved by DfT, was to see the
remodelling of Manchester Oxford
Road with four, longer through
platforms in place of the existing
five, along with two additional
platforms at Manchester Piccadilly
which would have shortened
headways by allowing services
to alternate platforms, so a train
could be routed into one platform
whilst the other was occupied.
The view of operators is reportedly
that there is no alternative to
Package C to deliver the promised
service commitments in the
Northern and TransPennine Express
franchises. Indeed, locally the view
is that the work is needed just to

maintain the current service level,
which is significantly below the
number of services proposed. It is
understood that DfT now insists
Package C can only go ahead if
the industry can prove a case for it,
with the 30 alternative options now
part of the evaluation process.
According to one industry source,
whilst it is possible to construct a
compliant timetable the margins
are so tight that the system does
not work in practice. Recent
improvements in performance have
served merely to ‘paper over the
cracks’ that exist through capping
the number of trains at 12 per hour,
the number that previously existed
and far short of the 16 required
to meet operators’ aspirations.

CONSTRAINED


Current planning rules for the
section allow for a two-minute dwell
time at Oxford Road and Piccadilly
stations with two-minute platform
reoccupation times (the time
between a departing train starting
to move and the next train coming
to a stand). In reality this is rarely
achieved, and even if it is the 15 trains
per hour it permits is one train fewer
than the required capacity. The

situation will be further exacerbated
by the arrival of new rolling stock, in
particular the trains being introduced
by TransPennine Express, where
the end door arrangement of the
vehicles will extend dwell times and
the longer trains themselves will
increase the time taken to clear the
block sections before the next train
can enter. A likely future assumption
is that intervals between trains will
need to be at least five minutes,
locking the system into the previous
maximum of 12 trains per hour.
It is understood some of the
30 options are being examined
purely to discount them formally,
while others are described as existing
‘purely for the purposes of proving
that the only option is the full works
package’. These options include:
n turnback sidings to the
east of Manchester Victoria,
either at the bottom or top
of Miles Platting bank;
n an additional platform
at Salford Crescent;
n the relocation of Windsor Bridge
Junction further north;
n loops on the Cheshire
Lines Committee (CLC) and
Chat Moss lines to allow
overtaking of services;

n grade separation of Ordsall
Lane Junction; and
n a reduction in the number of
platforms at Oxford Road to
three and electrification to
Stalybridge (which is supposed
to be part of the Trans-Pennine
Route Upgrade anyway).

One final proposal is the
conversion of the line from
Manchester to Atherton to tram
operation, meaning services would
run onto the increasingly crowded
streets of Manchester rather than over
the congested heavy rail network.
Some of these options are reportedly
as expensive as the abandoned
Package C, while others would aid
service recovery but do little to
help capacity.
Readers of Modern Railways have
been quick to propose projects which
would see freight services from Trafford
Park diverted away from the centre
of Manchester (‘Forum’, this month).
It is understood that these or similar
proposals are amongst the 30 options
evaluated, but it has been decided that
ultimately they would probably not
solve anything as the West Coast main
line between Crewe and Acton Bridge
is full and a major resignalling scheme
on the CLC route would be required, as
well as the electrification of the line.

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