HS2 with a twist

[s55shh]

If we tax payers are paying billions for a new railway, why don't they build it with a road on top (like the Bridge between Norway & Denmark) and either only allow trucks on it or only allow cars on it. Surely it wouldn't cost much more and would get some freight off the M1 and M6 or give us car drivers an alternative.

[kiethton]

Brilliant idea until you hit a tunnel, also would need some work to link with the existing road infrastructure?

However the greens would have a field day with countryside emissions - look what happened with the M1 speed limit reduction...

Reckon this would work better for logistics IMO - freeing up additional capacity for private transport.

[montyjohn]

s55shh said:

If we tax payers are paying billions for a new railway, why don't they build it with a road on top (like the Bridge between Norway & Denmark) and either only allow trucks on it or only allow cars on it. Surely it wouldn't cost much more and would get some freight off the M1 and M6 or give us car drivers an alternative.

It's never too late for a response.

Here is what a typical cross section HS2 might look like. There are dozens of variations but I'm not going to sketch all of them out.
Generally the cutting is as deep as possible for noise and visual reasons.
Where it's not deep enough you have bunds for further noise and visual screening.
This obviously takes up more land, but it does provide a green corridor bringing ecology diversity benefits.



Imagine now you want to put a roof on the tracks.
Not only are you adding a huge structure, in order to achieve the same visual and noise mitigation you would need to double the land take.
From an engineering perspective, adding a structure is much more expensive that a simple slab track. Orders of magnitude more.
The amount of concrete and steel you would need to achieve this is mind boggling.



I think it would triple the cost of HS2.

In terms of benefit to road users, part of the business plan for HS2 is that the west coast main line would have spare capacity after HS2 is built meaning that trucks can be taken off the motorways and freight put onto rails.
Currently the WCML accepts very little freight as it's running at capacity.

[Magnum 475]

montyjohn said:

In terms of benefit to road users, part of the business plan for HS2 is that the west coast main line would have spare capacity after HS2 is built meaning that trucks can be taken off the motorways and freight put onto rails.
Currently the WCML accepts very little freight as it's running at capacity.

And one day the UK will work out, like the rest of Europe did decades ago, that trying to mix local services, express services, and freight on the same tracks is a really, really, bad idea. Freight needs its own track so that it doesn't hold up express trains, ditto local. But not in the UK, oh no. "We apologise for the delay to today's service, we're following a slower train".

HS2 is the first step in the right direction on this.

[montyjohn]

Magnum 475 said:

Freight needs its own track so that it doesn't hold up express trains, ditto local.

The WCML should cope with local and freight as it has slow and fast rails.
Mixing express, local and freight is just madness however.

[P5BNij]

montyjohn said:

Magnum 475 said:

Freight needs its own track so that it doesn't hold up express trains, ditto local.

The WCML should cope with local and freight as it has slow and fast rails.
Mixing express, local and freight is just madness however.

It should but it doesn't, I spend most of my working days on the slow lines working freights, following stopping passenger trains with another one usually right up my jacksie. Some passenger workings are booked to use the fasts and slows for pathing reasons too. Part of the problem is that the customer often wants longer and heavier freight trains which is a recipe for even more delays and pathing issues.

[montyjohn]

P5BNij said:

with another one usually right up my jacksie

Yikes, It's bad enough when it's a van at a busy traffic junction.

P5BNij said:

Some passenger workings are booked to use the fasts and slows for pathing reasons too.

I guess this is a symptom of running a railway at capacity which further exacerbates the problem.

[48k]

Magnum 475 said:

montyjohn said:

In terms of benefit to road users, part of the business plan for HS2 is that the west coast main line would have spare capacity after HS2 is built meaning that trucks can be taken off the motorways and freight put onto rails.
Currently the WCML accepts very little freight as it's running at capacity.

And one day the UK will work out, like the rest of Europe did decades ago, that trying to mix local services, express services, and freight on the same tracks is a really, really, bad idea. Freight needs its own track so that it doesn't hold up express trains, ditto local. But not in the UK, oh no. "We apologise for the delay to today's service, we're following a slower train".

HS2 is the first step in the right direction on this.

This is the big HS2 benefit that they have wholly failed in promoting. The sound bite that the anti HS2 brigade jumps on is "getting to London 5 minutes quicker" or whatever it is. The real benefit is opening up capacity so that express services can have a dedicated express line without interference from freight and local services, and in return the freight and local services can be programmed on lines without having to dance around express services.

[Magnum 475]

montyjohn said:

Magnum 475 said:

Freight needs its own track so that it doesn't hold up express trains, ditto local.

The WCML should cope with local and freight as it has slow and fast rails.
Mixing express, local and freight is just madness however.

Except where it doesn’t…..

Coventry to New Street is one track each way. Similarly up North it narrows to one track each way (can’t recall exactly where, but somewhere north of Preston up to Carstairs. These are the sections where it all goes wrong, and connections get missed.