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| Re: London Overground (307630) | |||
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Re: London Overground |
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Posted by Rail Blue on Thu Sep 7 08:22:10 2006, in response to Re: London Overground, posted by David Fairthorne on Wed Sep 6 23:23:26 2006. For historical reasons there's already too much choice of rail routes in south London generally, resulting in infrequent services; that London Bridge local line is an exception, having a reasonably good service.Much of which is easily solveable if you apply some simple rules. 1) Look at each station's sensible routes to London Bridge and Victoria. Remember the Northern Line exists. 2) At the Croydon tangle, compare the journey times of the various routes to London Bridge and Victoria. Victoria has two sensible routes (via Norbury and via Crystal Palace*), whilst London Bridge has one sensible (via Forest Hill) and one necessary silly route (via Norbury). There is an obvious service pattern here: both Croydons get a service from London Bridge via Forest Hill, one Croydon gets Victoria via Norbury, whilst the other gets Victoria via Crystal Palace and acts as the terminus for London Bridge via Norbury. * this necessitates that the two routes from London Bridge to Crystal Palace should loop. What this gets you to is: VICTORIA (Main Line) 4tph via Hackbridge 4tph via Norbury [and West Croydon] 4tph via Crystal Palace [and East Croydon] VICTORIA (Chatham/Atlantic Lines [incomplete]) 4tph London Bridge 4tph [via Streatham] LONDON BRIDGE (South London) 4tph Victoria 4tph Crystal Palace Loop 4tph via Norbury [and East Croydon] 4tph via Hackbridge LONDON BRIDGE (Main Line) 4tph Crystal Palace Loop 4tph [via West Croydon] 4tph [via East Croydon] All that's then left is to distribute outer termini. There is a slight problem here in that there is insufficient terminal capacity at Sutton, as potentially the following services have got out that far: 4tph Victoria via Hackbridge and Balham 4tph Victoria via Hackbridge and Herne Hill 4tph London Bridge via Hackbridge 4tph Victoria via Norbury 4tph London Bridge via Forest Hill The way this can be sorted without any new construction is definitely a fudge: 4tph Victoria - Balham - Hackbridge - Sutton - Epsom 4tph Victoria - Herne Hill - Tooting - Wimbledon 4tph London Bridge - Hackbridge - Sutton - Wimbledon 4tph Victoria - Norbury - West Croydon 4tph London Bridge - Forest Hill - West Croydon - Sutton (- Epsom Downs 1-2tph) With some reconfiguration allowed, namely a bay platform for the Loop at Sutton, conversion of the Tooting Line (which unsurprisingly has virtually no passengers) to Tramlink, provision of the missing centre platform at Cheam, and a reconfiguration of Belmont station to provide double track with a small yard beyond, you get this massive improvement to services: 4tph Victoria - Balham - Hackbridge - Sutton - Cheam - Epsom 4tph Victoria - Herne Hill - Hackbridge - Sutton - Cheam 4tph London Bridge - Hackbridge - Sutton - Cheam (maybe - Epsom) 4tph Victoria - Norbury - West Croydon - Sutton - Belmont 4tph London Bridge - Forest Hill - West Croydon - Sutton - Belmont (- Epsom Downs 1-2tph) [4tph Wimbledon - Sutton shuttle, ready to be attached to the Chelney Line] The only other outer termini to allot are the East Croydon services. This is simple: 2tph London Bridge - Tattenham Corner via Forest Hill 2tph London Bridge - Caterham via Forest Hill 4tph Victoria - Purley via Crystal Palace 4tph London Bridge - East Croydon via Norbury If you've been observant, you'll notice I have nothing serving Crystal Palace - Beckenham Junction. This is entirely intentional - it's getting Tramlinked anyway, and in the mean time it could be a 2tph shuttle Streatham Hill - Beckenham Junction (which would annoyingly only just require two trains - better make them 456s). What I've achieved here is to maintain the sensible choices, to remove some silly ones, and to create an increase in service frequency. Although for best results some reconfiguration is needed in the Sutton area, something better can be achieved with existing infrastructure. Whilst on infrastructure, there are four new stations I'd like to see built: 1) Crofton Park - on the Brighton Main Line (replacing the station on the Catford Loop). 2) Bellingham - on the Mid Kent Line (replacing the station on the Catford Loop). 3) Giant Arches - a two level station between North Dulwich and Tulse Hill, or between Herne Hill and West Dulwich, depending on how you look at it. I suppose it could also be called Giant Lifts. 4) Eastfields - north of Mitcham Junction. These would help with Part II: the Chatham Lines... |
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