Gw electrification - where can I get a summary of plans?

[whole diary]

[Ingleborough]

There is of course the practical common sense view of electrification, and then there is the entrenched 'Ivory Tower' view of people far away who work in the DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) and generally get the 1630 out of Waterloo on a railway which has enjoyed massive investment over the years.    Sorry, I get a bit jaundiced dealing with DfT decision making. The DfT civil servants carried out the assessment assuming no increase in passengers or services.  Sorry, but we've known for over 40 years about the 'Sparks Effect'. Put on electric trains, running frequently and passenger numbers soar.

Common sense would say that the wires should go to a major nodal point on the route, and that is neither Newbury or Bedwyn, it's Westbury. Just a few miles from the major National Grid feed in point near Melksham for the Chippenham to Bristol section. Whip the wires up through Trowbridge and Melksham and there is a major diversionary route fully wired. 

Using normal 110 mph class 387s Westbury and intermediate stations can be reached just as quickly as Bedwyn is today using 90 mph DMUs^▸ (Diesel Multiple Unit) which are nowhere near as fast accelerating from rest.   Claire Perry is the MP^▸ (Member of Parliament) for Devizes as well as a Transport Minister, but this does not give her any extra influence over this, but it certainly helps to have support for the idea in high places.

It's all down to the bean counters in the end and seeing as GWML^▸ (Great Western Main Line) electrification has already creeped over some red lines it will take some innovation to win through.

There is some hope. First Group run Hull Trains. As part of a conglomerate they have offered to finance the electrification of the line to Hull from the East Coast main Line. The latest information was that this offer was on the verge of being accepted, a UK^▸ (United Kingdom) precedent will be set. Given the size of the market in Wiltshire and from services connecting in from other areas, that could possibly work here.

As an aside, one of the major electricity suppliers in the late 1990s offered to electrify most of the old BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) Western Region in return for a 20 year supply contract.  Railtrack said no thanks.  I wonder how that could have worked out? 

There is a large market beyond Bedwyn, the few HSTs^▸ (High Speed Train) that serve those stops at places like Pewsey see plenty of use. Put on the trains and the passengers will come.
 

[TonyK]

"It should be noted that an efficient profiling workstream is considering all electrification projects and the outcome of this workstream may result in reprofiling the delivery dates of some electrification projects.".

I ran it through a little-known area of Google Translate, and it came up with this meaning:

Might be late.

As to the supplier of power:

As an aside, one of the major electricity suppliers in the late 1990s offered to electrify most of the old BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) Western Region in return for a 20 year supply contract.  Railtrack said no thanks.  I wonder how that could have worked out?   

That deal, if done now, would be in breach of European Commision directives, intended to promote the ability of any EU^» (European Union - about)-based company to to tender for any public service contract in any member state. I think the supply of electricity to a railway would fall under Directive 2004/17/EC[30] article 16(a), article 61, which states that any contract for utility supply and service with a value exceeding ^387,000 must be advertised in the Official Journal of the European Commission (OJEC) to enable tenders from across the EU. This directive was not in place in the late 1990s.

Some forummers may harrumph, and bemoan this interference in our day to day running of our own affairs - I make no comment. The stated intention behind the directives was to save around 0.5% of Europe's GNP by making big deals transparent, and eliminating cartels. This is done by opening contracts to more bidders, and having a single place to advertise invitations to tender. Other routes can still be used in addition, but a whole sub-industry has grown out of scrutiny of the OJEC for suitable tenders for clients, and the temptation to duplicate effort is low.

A deal to supply electricity is something I have trouble getting my head around. Let's assume only two tenders were received, both from household names in electricity supply. We'll call them by the first two letters of their names so they cannot be identified. ED* and nP* both have power plants in UK^▸ (United Kingdom), but the electricity they provide may not necessarily come from those plants. They are plugging their plug into the same 13 amp socket. Presumably, then, this becomes a supply contract to the railway, and a whole load of purchase contracts with everyone else behind the scenes, including National Grid. All those are likely to quote the same price to both ED* and nP*, making the difference in price to the railway the difference in profit they will make. With the latest accession of  states to the EU, there would be therefore nothing to prevent a coalition of Bulgarian and Maltese accountants, with absolutely no previous involvement in electricity supply, from tendering to broker the deal.

There's a lot of middle-men, and not a lot of logic, involved!

[John R]

That made me laugh. But seriously, can anyone else believe that the lines to Oxford and Newbury are going to be turned over to ac stock in Dec 16? 

[BerkshireBugsy]

"It should be noted that an efficient profiling workstream is considering all electrification projects and the outcome of this workstream may result in reprofiling the delivery dates of some electrification projects.".

I ran it through a little-known area of Google Translate, and it came up with this meaning:

Might be late.

Thank you FTN - that made me laugh !

[Rhydgaled]

That made me laugh. But seriously, can anyone else believe that the lines to Oxford and Newbury are going to be turned over to ac stock in Dec 16? 

Maybe one or the other, but not both?

[stuving]

As to the supplier of power:

As an aside, one of the major electricity suppliers in the late 1990s offered to electrify most of the old BR^▸ (British Rail(ways)) Western Region in return for a 20 year supply contract.  Railtrack said no thanks.  I wonder how that could have worked out?   

...
A deal to supply electricity is something I have trouble getting my head around. Let's assume only two tenders were received, both from household names in electricity supply. We'll call them by the first two letters of their names so they cannot be identified. ED* and nP* both have power plants in UK^▸ (United Kingdom), but the electricity they provide may not necessarily come from those plants. They are plugging their plug into the same 13 amp socket. Presumably, then, this becomes a supply contract to the railway, and a whole load of purchase contracts with everyone else behind the scenes, including National Grid. All those are likely to quote the same price to both ED* and nP*, making the difference in price to the railway the difference in profit they will make. With the latest accession of  states to the EU^» (European Union - about), there would be therefore nothing to prevent a coalition of Bulgarian and Maltese accountants, with absolutely no previous involvement in electricity supply, from tendering to broker the deal.

There's a lot of middle-men, and not a lot of logic, involved!

Why would the price be the same? A deal is whatever you agree; there's no single price label. And anyway, we may soon have separate deals for each TOC^▸ (Train Operating Company). With most electric trains having power meters on already, it would be quite feasible (though metering was introduced just to permit the split of TOCs from rail networks).

You only need to believe that competition gives a better deal than a single contract supplier, and that enough competition to justify that - not a perfect market - is possible in such a case. And as all recent UK governments, however labelled, did think that presumably the directives were not so important.

[ellendune]

Given the impact of the work on services can we summarise what the resignalling programme is?

Also when the mast work is being done in each section? (Biggest risk of making holes in signalling cables?)

[ChrisB]

That made me laugh. But seriously, can anyone else believe that the lines to Oxford and Newbury are going to be turned over to ac stock in Dec 16? 

Maybe one or the other, but not both?

No one has said electric stock from Dec16....

[IndustryInsider]

In terms of the Reading to Didcot section I'd estimate that over 95% of trenches have been dug, about 75% of steel support piles in the ground (some not in fully yet) and there's about 150 support masts now installed.

[stuving]

That made me laugh. But seriously, can anyone else believe that the lines to Oxford and Newbury are going to be turned over to ac stock in Dec 16? 

Maybe one or the other, but not both?

No one has said electric stock from Dec16....

There's this in the CP5^▸ (Control Period 5 - the five year period between 2014 and 2019) Enhancements Delivery Plan (March 2014):

Activities and milestones
The DfT^» (Department for Transport - about) target is for electrification to be completed for electric train operation Oxford,
Newbury, Chippenham (inclusive) and Bristol Parkway to deliver the December 2016
timetable; from Chippenham (exclusive) to Bristol Temple Meads; and Bristol Temple Meads
to Cardiff via Bristol Parkway to deliver the December 2017 timetable.

So yes, actually providing stock is a separate step, to be taken by different people from those doing the infrastructure. But it is meant to happen, if all the plans are still valid and the fancy kit does its stuff. Still to be proved, that.

[Tim]

As In understand it from a recent issue of Rail.  The wires are to go up first on part of the Didcot-Swindon section because that has been designated as a testing site for the IEP^▸ (Intercity Express Program / Project.) trains.  The first fully electrified sections for traffic will be airport junction to Newbury and Airport junction to Oxford.  The route will then be electrified from Didcot to Bristol Parkway.  Then through Chippenham and Bath to Temple Meads (this can only happen after track is lowered in Box tunnel which will require work that has yet to start).  Then up Filton Bank (which I assume will be 4 track by then??) to partway.  Then on into Wales.  It has yet to be decided if the relief lines in Wales will be done.

There may well be extensions after that but the kit is likely to move to the MML^» (Midland Main Line. - about) for a while first.

[eightf48544]

There's a rumour about (unsubstantiated unknown source) that Henley and Marlow electrifcation is likely to be deferred. Not sure about Windsor.

[stuving]

There's a rumour about (unsubstantiated unknow source) that Henley and Marlow electrifcation is likely to be deferred. Not sure about Windsor.

Doesn't that sound just like a case of "It should be noted that an efficient profiling workstream is considering all electrification projects and the outcome of this workstream may result in reprofiling the delivery dates of some electrification projects."?

In any case, the branch lines always did look likely to be "balancing items" - easy to put off until a bit later as that has no wider implications than keeping a couple of DMUs^▸ (Diesel Multiple Unit) in use when there is no longer a huge dearth of them.

[stuving]

Given the impact of the work on services can we summarise what the resignalling programme is?

Also when the mast work is being done in each section? (Biggest risk of making holes in signalling cables?)

Did you mean resignalling? That's a whole different kettle of fishplates.

If you look in the CP5^▸ (Control Period 5 - the five year period between 2014 and 2019) Enhancements Delivery Plan, it only mentions ETCS^▸ (European Train Control System) in cabs and ERTMS^▸ (European Rail Traffic Management System.) Infrastructure, and that's not part of the main funding. The milestones given are:
Great West Main Line
Paddington - Heathrow ETCS Level 2 Overlay commissioning completed April 2017
Paddington - Bristol South ETCS Level 2 commissioning completed        July 2019.

The section mentioned above says the ETCS/ERTMS is an overlay onto the existing signals, which is a bit misleading as most of that is also being renewed, and a little earlier. The reason it's not there is that resignalling is not enhancement - the signalling function stays the same. Basically every lamp becomes a peripheral controlled by a big computer at Didcot, connected by datacomms links.

There are some marked milestones in the Western Route Summary Route Plan (P62), and some words too, but the timing is a bit unclear. However, the principles have been stated (there may be a few exceptions, but only a few):

All signal heads are replaced with LEDs ASAP. That's nothing to do with the planned resignalling, but it frees up the effort that has to go round checking and replacing bulbs.
Hardly any signals or blocks change. Hence no new post holes to dig.
All track circuits get replaced with axle counters, needed for immunisation before electrification goes live.
All all signals get recontrolled from Didcot (for the core route as far as Bristol).

All that gets done on the renewals budget, and largely using renewals labour, by end 2016 - they are going to be busy! I have since seen some announcements of contracts for some of the work, but I don't know what or how much of it.

I also heard that in a lecture by Peter Martell, (Western) Route Asset Manager (Signalling) at Network Rail. I asked him what the impact would be of remaking every signal lamp connection in the field (and that's at least once) - he said it was bound to put the failure rate up, but he couldn't say how much. You have been warned!

[ChrisB]

Network Rail are working on the next Route Study. The next Stakeholder meeting is later this month on the latest progress