Double Track Heritage Railways

?? I'm not aware of any caring-sharing strategy towards the heritage railway movement! The fact that the struggling Pottlesford and Turnover Railway can't afford to instal signalling has little or no bearing on whether the much wealthier Grand Moneybags Trunk Railway decides to double its track or not!

 

Care to enlighten me on which railways have the money bags ?

Most of em are hand to mouth, apart from the well known, well established lines, which got there by... well by being careful with money... which means staying single track and concentrating on the appearence of the whole rather than the wants of the few.

 

the churnet valley was a double line but it would be a very expensive task to do.many lines now are now across the two original ones. the man hours alone would be hard to come by. extra signaling equipment, then more line walks for the p way. unless it was a welthy person paying for it to be done much i expect will stay single. shame tho. i would love the glou/war to be double.

 

Gav, There is one place on the CVR where we could not put in double track. Its the overbridge in Station Rd. It was singled due to lorries that kept hitting it, if you look at the bridge now it has chunks out of it. So I doubt that permission would ever be given to reinstate the missing half.

 

I was talking about a hypothetical railway, for the purpose of comparision. The 'moneybags' bit was relative - meaning better funded than the struggling fictitious Pottlesford and Turnover Railway - but not necessarily awash with money as such.

 

The amount of money a railway has is irrelevant, because it just means they can spend more on their priorities - for example, there arent many railways can keep both their carriages and out-of-service loco's undercover, something of much more importance long term.

Double track is an attraction pretty much only to enthusiasts, and unless a substantial length is doubled it doesnt really have much of an effect on the number of trains that can be run anyway. While we may see 'dynamic loops' in the medium-term, i think the GCR will remain the sole authentic double track mainline experience for a very long term.

Chris

 

Yes, the northern section will need to be double track too, otherwise it will be an operational nightmare with the double track south of Loughborough. The section from Loughborough to Rushcliffe Halt is over 5 miles; to Hotchley Hill 'box it is over 6 miles.

Going a bit off topic, but the priority now for bridging the gap must be to develop the GCR(N) further. The track is actually relatively easy to put down, if you can obtain it from a suitable second hand source. The cost is the signalling, and so it may be that the GCR(N) put down a significant chunk of double track -- but I think Loughborough High Level station is a greater priority. There is one physical issue in that one of the embankments wasn't constructed properly and is falling down (probably the only point on the London Extension that was done that way). If the GCR(N) do get double track as well then they should be able to go a good diesel gala.

 

'Need to be' and 'will be' are two completely different things! A single track northern extension wouldn't be vastly different to the current state of operations over the Rothley - Leicester section - for every train running through onto the single line on a busy weekend, a couple turn back at Rothley. Obviously double track northwards would be vastly preferable, but it's not an absolute necessity if much of the service turns back at Loughborough as it does now.

 

No. I definitely meant and said "need to be".

The section from Rothley to Leicester north is 2.5 miles at the end of the line. The section from Loughborough to Hotchley Hill box is 6 miles and will be in the middle of the core section of the line. The planning for the gap is that it will be double track, and the planning for the GCR(N) is that it too will be double track. It is really a no-brainer.

Quite in what order that happens is still to be seen, but my guess is that GCR(N) will have double track, once Loughborough High Level station has been built and the GCR have finished the signalling at Swithland.

 

The GCR(N) can currently operate an hourly service from Ruddington to Loughborough (East) using the passing loop at Rushcliffe Halt, so it should be possible to extend the existing hourly GCR passenger service through to Ruddington. Obviously (hopefully!) full double-tracking is the ultimate ambition, but presumably funding won't be available immediately for both the 'gap' and double-tracking northwards - a relatively simple signalling installation should be sufficient in the meantime to allow us to run at least something!

Incidentally, I've never seen anything to suggest that the initial route across the gap will be double-track, but rather that provision will be made to allow double-tracking in the future.

 

Not really. There's not much point in for various reasons.

I don't know really what plans you've seen but everything that I have seen says it will be double track.

Firstly, there's not much point in spending 10-15 million quid on a new stretch of line, and then not spending a few hundred thousand in order to make that reach its potential. It's poor economics, so it must be all or nothing.

Secondly, the ruling principle is that you don't want to put in place work (costing resources) that you then have to undo in a few years. So there's no point in signalling Loughborough Central-Rushcliffe Halt as single track using single line token because you then have to rip all that out when you double it.

Thirdly, there is going to be an interface with the signalling for the Midland Main Line, and Network Rail will want a professional job doing and don't want to be messed around, so it's important that the interface is put in place and not then fiddled because otherwise that will cost additional resources.

 

The big problem as I see it is that the full, final signalling scheme that would be required to run a full service over a double-track railway will take some years to install with (very hard-working!) S&T volunteers. I'm sure an interim scheme, probably not necessarily more than a couple of ground frames, to allow - first and foremost - any commercial traffic to operate, along with a basic hourly service, could be put to work relatively quickly (at the most basic, look to the GCR(N) with staff and ticket, and Handsignalmen at the intermediate loop!). Hopefully that won't be too much to undo in the long term - some sort of phased works would be necessary anyway. Funding-wise, I agree that it might be wise to look to fund double-track northwards at the same time as the 'gap' - realistically, though, that funding might not be available immediately!

 

The video I saw on YouTube by the the GCR about their proposals for bridging the gap at Loughborough gave the impression that they wanted the gap to be double track if possible. Don't the two GCR's, between them, also have tentative plans to extend the route at both ends in the long term - a short distance south from Leicester North and at the other end to Wilford in Nottingham? If this ever happens, that is likely to increase the potential use of the GCR as a genuine public transport route as well as heritage railway. Maybe the GCR will be the first heritage railway to run preserved Sprinters or similar!

 

I suspect that the northern extension beyond Ruddington would be more viable than the southern extension beyond Leicester North - the latter requires the replacement of at least one significant structure. The recent feasabilty report considered both short extensions though; I don't know for sure what the conclusions for either were. I don't think the potential for 'commercial' passenger services was considered, but I suppose it'd be a definite possibility, especially if there was to be a connection to the (extended!) tram network at the Nottingham end. It'd bring problems of regularly providing sufficient staffing for early morning trains though.

 

The problem with re-opening Ruddington would be parking, while north of Ruddington the cutting at Wilwell Cutting is an SSSI so a new alignment would have to be constructed if the plan is to link up with NET line 2 if/when that is built (which will probably on a similar timescale to bridging the gap). Also, how do you organise trains into the Heritage Centre from the main line?

 

I'll be honest, I'm not too familiar with the northern section beyond the existing infrastructure itself. I didn't think the presence of an SSSI was sufficient to require a complete realignment, though I stand to be corrected if someone knows otherwise. As for connections into the heritage centre, various options have been discussed informally and unofficially (!), from a railcar shuttle to a South curve. Personally, I think running 'mainline' trains into the heritage centre via an additional run-round at Ruddington is a no-brainer, and running them straight in via a South curve would deprive Ruddington of its service.

 

The northern extension proposal was for a new alignment and a short walk to the tram stop, rather than the old alignment and a shared station or connection. Not what I'd have preferred, personally, but that was the proposal anyway.

The SSSI occupies a large area and the trackbed skirts along one edge of it, personally I'd have thought there would be a case for re-opening the original alignment and adjusting the SSSI boundaries slightly to suit, but what the legalities would be I have no idea. The new alignment proposal avoided the problem.

Incidentally there is another SSSI right alongside the line, so putting a steam railway next to an SSSI clearly isn't a problem. It's the big meadow at Loughborough, next to the Brush works.

Phil

 

SSSIs don't prevent steam railway operation - almost the entire NYMR trackbed is a SSSI!

Steven

 

The SSSI boundaries define the extent of the special scientific interest. So they can't be "adjusted" without destroying part of the very thing that makes it special. Having said that, there have been exceptions (eg the M3 through Twyford Down) where Government decided other considerations (usually something to do with commerce) outweighed the special interest. I'm not at all convinced there is a strong national interest in relaying a heritage railway over land that is of special scientific interest in the case of the GCR(N) at Wilwell Cutting SSSI (which is also a Local Nature Reserve, which introduces yet more considerations/restrictions) where the trackbed sits smack in the centre of the SSSI.

A different situation further north, where the NYMR is, of course, adjacent to or wholly included in several SSSIs, but the Railway was there, intact, before the SSSI notification, thus the designation description and requirements already include the NYMR.

Steve

 

The Fairbourne Railway is another one with a substantial foot in an SSSI, in ths case the northern half of the railway beyond the passing loop. It was designated about 8-9 years ago and there wasn't much consultation involved!