Are Our Cities Subitable For S-Bahn

[Samd22]

Some of those destinations are quite long runs - I was thinking of something more like Reading - Basingstoke - Alton - Guildford - Redhill/Gatwick - Tonbridge/Sevenoaks/Orpington - Dartford etc. - if you follow something more like that line around. I'm less sure of specific locations elsewhere, as the Southern area is the part I know best.

Yeah, I agree with that but it seems many stopping trains seem to reach those sort of distances.

Would be better off serving Reading, Aylesbury, High Wycombe, Hemel Hempstead, Luton, Stevenage, Colchester, Guildford, Alton, etc and leaving the further places to be covered by regional express trains.

I was also wondering about coordinating branchlines in more rural areas of Britain into S-Bahn systems. This has been done in Germany, with attempts to group local lines into networks, coordinated with local buses etc. - this is done by both DB and private companies. I was thinking of the 'Breisgauer S-Bahn' as an example, if anyone knows the system. Similar ideas include the Thuringen Waldbahn (TWB) which is more like an inter-urban tramway. Perhaps this should be the best approach for more regional operations in Britain.

Where abouts in Germany is the Breishauer S-Bahn?

[alexnick]

So, taking my own Guildofrd area as an example - seeing as I know it best, using these German classifications, train services would be as follows:

S-Bahn: Waterloo - Guildford (via Woking)
S-Bahn: Waterloo - Guildford (via Chobam)
S-Bahn: Waterloo - Guildford (via Epsom)

RB: Waterloo - Portsmouth/Haslemere (all stations)

RE: Waterloo - Portsmouth (fast)

Then Reading - Guildford - Gatwick trains, which aren't part of the plan, but for comparitive purposes would be REs and RBs.

The Breisgauer S-Bahn is based in Freiburg. It operates a few local brachlines that go through the Freiburg suburbs and out into the countryside between Freiburg and the Rhine. They also own some bus services, which serve purposes like connecting the German/French border to Colmar (they meet their trains at the border). I wonder whether simialr operations would be suitable in any British locations.

Nick

[Samd22]

Maybe mattvince could answer this but could a North East light rail network reasonably serve the Newcatsle-Carlisle and the Newcastle-Teeside distances well?

[Samd22]

So, taking my own Guildofrd area as an example - seeing as I know it best, using these German classifications, train services would be as follows:

S-Bahn: Waterloo - Guildford (via Woking)
S-Bahn: Waterloo - Guildford (via Chobam)
S-Bahn: Waterloo - Guildford (via Epsom)

RB: Waterloo - Portsmouth/Haslemere (all stations)

RE: Waterloo - Portsmouth (fast)

Then Reading - Guildford - Gatwick trains, which aren't part of the plan, but for comparitive purposes would be REs and RBs.

The Breisgauer S-Bahn is based in Freiburg. It operates a few local brachlines that go through the Freiburg suburbs and out into the countryside between Freiburg and the Rhine. They also own some bus services, which serve purposes like connecting the German/French border to Colmar (they meet their trains at the border). I wonder whether simialr operations would be suitable in any British locations.

Nick

Well thought out, can I presume RB is regiobahn using emu/dmu's?

And that RE is regioexpress that the Germans use to classify loco hauled regional trains?

I've heard of the Freiburg system - do they use diesel trains?

And where abouts in the UK would you like to see this type of network used?

[ianm42]

The way that the Munich S-bahn operates, where the S-bahn route is part of a longer distance route, the S-bahn trains stop at all stations, with a frequency up to every 10 minutes at peak times. Longer distance stopping trains make their first stop at the outermost S-bahn station.

So, imagine there was an S-bahn service from Waterloo to Woking, then the first stop for Waterloo-Portsmouth stopping trains would be Woking. This improves the timings from Waterloo to stations all the Woking-Portmouth stretch by not having to stop for the first leg of the journey, but the down side is that a journey from, say Godalming to Surbiton would require a change at Woking.

This could quite easily be achieved with the 4-tracks which are already in place. Hand the slow lines over to the S-bahn, and run all longer distance trains, non-stop Waterloo-Woking (or possibly Clapham Junction-Woking) on the fast lines.

[alexnick]

Yes, this is exactly my idea. I know it's similar to the current arrangement, but I'm imagining re-organising the service into German-style Stundentakt.

Carrying on with the SWT-region example...

REs (probably 444s) would run Waterloo - (Clapham) - Woking - Guildford, and on as fasts.
RBs (probably 450s) would run Waterloo - (Clapham) - Woking - Worplesdon - Guildford, and on as stopping services.
S-Bahn services (probably 455s) would run Waterloo - all stations - to Woking / Basingstoke / Alton / Guildford (possibly on all three routes).

Samd22, In Germany RBs are slow, whereas REs are semi-fast. Often, in practise, there is little difference between them. There is no significance on traction in these classifications. Therefore, in my vision, REs are the fast trains, only stopping at the larger stations - possibl overtaking RBs, which stop everywhere.

The Freiburg local lines are now operated by RegioSprinter 650s. I think they used to be either 795/6/8s or 211/2s on coaches with a driving trailer.

Such a regional network is my idea for South Wales, with the branches extending out from Cardiff and Newport. Exeter is another possible location - this whole idea is probably less useful in the South East, I should say. However, people with other ideas should please state them, as I don't know the British nework that well.

Nick

[Samd22]

Samd22, In Germany RBs are slow, whereas REs are semi-fast. Often, in practise, there is little difference between them. There is no significance on traction in these classifications. Therefore, in my vision, REs are the fast trains, only stopping at the larger stations - possibl overtaking RBs, which stop everywhere.

The Freiburg local lines are now operated by RegioSprinter 650s. I think they used to be either 795/6/8s or 211/2s on coaches with a driving trailer.

Such a regional network is my idea for South Wales, with the branches extending out from Cardiff and Newport. Exeter is another possible location - this whole idea is probably less useful in the South East, I should say. However, people with other ideas should please state them, as I don't know the British nework that well.

Nick

Nice, shame we don't have the loading gauge for them - that will forever hold us back

Could work developing these type of S-Bahn systems in less populated areas and breath new life into old rural routes.

[mattvince]

What's wrong with SWT's timetable at present? The service mix provides the kind of frequencies necessary to move the numbers into Waterloo - although even that is at a pinch. Apart from getting a few more Windsor Lines services in, there is little that can be done short of extending the platforms. The number of arrivals at Waterloo between 0800 and 0859 on the Fasts is 22 (out of a maximum of 25) and the Slows is 17 (of 20). 3tph are lost due to stopping patterns and performance differences, plus avoiding the odd conflict. Woking is a hell of a place to turnaround (Platform 3 is the east-end Bay, in the centre) - it's probably only wise to do it when Guildford line trains are crossing the junction, or any other suitable gap. Any increase in frequencies of 'terminating' services is best done by pushing them out to Aldershot, the flyover at Brookwood resolves this issue nicely - still no platforms for them at Waterloo, however. Class 455s - to Alton? - are you insane?!

S-Bahns can be applied with limited investment in stations, stock, traincrew and marketing. It's getting stakeholders involved to provide startup costs and operating subsidy which can sink a project. The trouble is that many stakeholders are either scrooges (DfT, HM-T) or blinkered into their own little schemes (Local Authorities). Some are just not interested.

Sam - we have an equivalent of DB's Class 650. My old boss invented the damn things - commonly known as a Class 153 or 'Dogbox'.

[Samd22]

Sam - we have an equivalent of DB's Class 650. My old boss invented the damn things - commonly known as a Class 153 or 'Dogbox'.

I just wish ours were as big, then again the old saying - "it's not the size that counts but what you do with it"

[alexnick]

The Guildofrd area really does need a Stundentakt style timetable. It may be alright for those people just going up to London - that's straightforward enough, but to get anywhere else in Surrey is really difficult. Here are a list of journeys I've had to make recently that were difficult owing to poor connections:

Milford - Oxshott
Milford - West Byfleet
Milford - Cheam
(all return journeys)

And it really is annoying that it's hard to make these connections - for those of us who spend time communting into Guildford rather than London, life is much much harder.

However, I know that SWT are completely re-writing the timetable as part of their new bid. Hopefully things will improve

I do know that Woking is impossible - if only Network Rail would put in that extra crossover that SWT keep asking for - terminating would be much easier then. I'm convinced that the problem in London is that we don't have enough station capacity in the London stations - they all seem really crowded. Perhaps we can rebuild WI when the CTRL is fully up and running into St. Pancras and terminate regular services there (I know, I know, they won't, they'll just sell the land!).

I realise that saying 455s was a mistake - I meant '450s and 455s'. Apologies.

Nick

[Samd22]

Forgive me but what exactly does a Stundentakt style timetable include again?

[alexnick]

Stundentakt is the principle of clock-face departures and trains meeting at major junctions to provide maximum connectivity. I think the principle was either invented in Switzerland or Germany, and now both countries use this system just about everywhere. Let's use an example of a junction in Switzerland, without being specific, which, say is on an SBB mainline, with an SBB branch line starting there, a narrow gauge line, and two bus routes at the statio, one of which goes to the town centre (A), the other one doing a more long-distance run to some nearby villages (B). Saying everything was designed to connect around the point of xx:00 (on the hour), the arrival/departure sequence would be as follows:

xx:-10 - bus A arrives
xx:-7 - SBB branch line EMU arrives
xx:-5 - NG train arrives (loco runs round, train is shunted - this will take just a few minutes in my experience of Swiss NG operations!)
xx:-3 - SBB stopping service on the mainline arrives
xx:-2 - bus B arrives
xx:-1 - SBB IC arrives
xx:00 - SBB IC departs
xx:02 - bus B leaves
xx:03 SBB branch line train departs
xx:04 SBB stopping train on the mainline departs/Bus A departs
xx:05 Narrow gauge train departs

Therefore, it is impossible to miss connections at these stations, and long waits are avoided - you will wait 10-15 minutes at a maximum - in my experience, 5 minutes is a long connection time, 1-2 is not untypical, but the shortest connections will always be arranged to be cross-platform.

I hope this is a good explanation, and that I have convinced others of its value!


Nick

[Samd22]

I like that system - only problem is we wouldn't get eveyrone together in this damn country to agree to such a system

Labour aren't serious about public transport - they only use it for vote grabbing headlings.

Basically we need a peoples revolution to over throw the government and scare the life out of other political groups by showing them that we won't accept rubbish like this.

If this was France there would be full scale riots!

DOWN WITH THE GOVERNMENT!!

[mattvince]

Nick - read the Route Utilisation Strategy. Any recast will unlikely be significantly different from the standard pattern of Dec04 - except some of the outer sections may be amended to allow for the quicker performance of Desiro stock - some of the Runing Times are a bit slow west of Woking. And then there is running to Exeter hourly, when the loops are added (Parsons-Brinckerhoff found there to be only one major problem, quoting a cost of £26m at 2004 prices). Southampton will also get a recast - the Romsey-Tottons are going to Salisbury instead (Romsey-Salisbury via Soton, with FGW all-shacks scrapped south of Westbury/Salisbury), and Brockenhurst-Wareham is being scrapped, replaced with services presently terminating at Southampton being extended. Waterloo International will be used - it's just that Network Rail don't believe that any more than 15tph can use the Windsors. I'd be tempted to disagree if Nine Elms Flyover can be partially removed, restoring 4-track Windsor lines, and using International to take up the enhanced Windsor Lines service - NR may think this could trigger resignalling. Instead they wish to extend all platforms into what is presently the concourse - I have a sneaking suspicion that Plats 1-4 can be extended to 10*20m without any significant layout changes and without impacting the concourse. The rebuild of Waterloo would be fairly major, and then would allow more trains to terminate by including Waterloo International in the end-game. Certainly NR have no permanent use for it between 2008 and when the rebuild would be finished, merely allowing other platforms to be closed to let the work be done. It's better than Railfuture's proposal - to route SouthEastern trains into International (confidently stating that Plats 13-18 could cope with the Windsors AND Airtrack...).

You don't mean a Taktfahrplan, do you?

[alexnick]

Well, I was going by reports of from the consultancy firm which is planning this new timetable - apparently it is nearly impossible to re-write anything for London-Woking, though they claim to have made some changes.

They are against re-developing WI because it will disrupt the existing services too much as new crossovers would need to be laid at the throat of the station.

Taktfahrplan is the same thing. The word is merely shortened from Stundentaktfahrplan. The linguistic concept of Stundentakt is also common - reading German railway magazines, you will often find phrases like Zuege verkehren im Stundentakt... trust me I'm a linguist!

Yes, let's overthrow the government!

Nick