Metrowest Status

[whole diary]

[TonyK]

Correct, but they are talking about a Light Rail vehicle using that route. Can you imagine a Light Rail vehicle alone interspersed with heavy rail traffic on the busy Bristol to Bath main line, I can't.

I'm no electrical expert but I would have thought that to install a transformer to supply the required power to propel a light rail vehicle in that light rail vehicle from 'a future 25Kv OHL^▸ (Over-Head Line) supply' would be so heavy as to make it a, err, heavy rail vehicle anyway. I wish people like Marv and Tim would engage their brains before taking the brakes off their mouths.

Unless they have seen the Siemens S70 Avanto in service in Mulhouse. That runs on 25 KV AC on the mainline railway, and 750V DC^▸ (Direct Current) in town on the ordinary tram tracks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZwcsJyZ9Z8

[johnneyw]

A element of the Joint Spatial Plan seems to already have some doubts being raised about it's future. BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) reports that MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament) are questioning the safety of "smart motorways" with calls for their abandonment. The JSP includes smart motorways as part of the mix.
Here's the article:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-46553654

[Red Squirrel]

A element of the Joint Spatial Plan seems to already have some doubts being raised about it's future. BBC^» (British Broadcasting Corporation - home page) reports that MPs^▸ (Member of Parliament) are questioning the safety of "smart motorways" with calls for their abandonment. The JSP includes smart motorways as part of the mix.
Here's the article:
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-46553654

Maybe this belongs under WECA^» (West of England Combined Authority - about) Alphabet Soup, which covers JLTP, JSP and related issues?

MetroWest refers to half-hourly heavy rail services, whilst MetroBus covers mostly ordinary buses whose route numbers start with 'm'. I presume that if a rail-based rapid transit scheme ever gets as far as having a name, it will be called MetroMetro (MetroMetro: a tram-like experience using tram-like trams running on tram-track-like tram tracks! Who knows, it could work!)                   

[johnneyw]

Yep, mods may wish to move this one.
Only stuck it on this thread as where I found a JSP link on it.

[stuving]

Correct, but they are talking about a Light Rail vehicle using that route. Can you imagine a Light Rail vehicle alone interspersed with heavy rail traffic on the busy Bristol to Bath main line, I can't.

I'm no electrical expert but I would have thought that to install a transformer to supply the required power to propel a light rail vehicle in that light rail vehicle from 'a future 25Kv OHL^▸ (Over-Head Line) supply' would be so heavy as to make it a, err, heavy rail vehicle anyway. I wish people like Marv and Tim would engage their brains before taking the brakes off their mouths.

Unless they have seen the Siemens S70 Avanto in service in Mulhouse. That runs on 25 KV AC on the mainline railway, and 750V DC^▸ (Direct Current) in town on the ordinary tram tracks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZwcsJyZ9Z8

That's near enough the current definition of tram-train - being able to run on existing or standard street tram tracks or segregated rail tracks. Of course some people (naming no noms) find this too hard, and run theirs only on railway lines, or on their own tracks at 25kV, or using 750V only to cross proper trams' tracks. Chacun a son tram-train...

[johnneyw]

Bristol Live reports on possible progress with Charfield Station along with road based schemes. The surprise for me though was mention of a "road to nowhere" in Yate which I had never heard of. Apparently a dual carriageway built and abandoned in the 1970 which has occasional film location uses but that is about all. Anyway, here's the link:
https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/could-two-new-bypasses-railway-2575767

[grahame]

Bristol Live reports on possible progress with Charfield Station along with road based schemes. The surprise for me though was mention of a "road to nowhere" in Yate which I had never heard of. Apparently a dual carriageway built and abandoned in the 1970 which has occasional film location uses but that is about all. Anyway, here's the link:
https://www.bristolpost.co.uk/news/bristol-news/could-two-new-bypasses-railway-2575767

Here is the "blurb" if you want it as a film set:

http://www.southglos.gov.uk/documents/Road-to-Nowhere-Website-Document.pdf

[martyjon]

I live about 400 metres, as the crow flies, from the Road To Nowhere. As part of the planning permission for the housing development of which my home is part, the developer was required to make a contribution towards a relief road to avoid the A432 through Chipping Sodbury and Yate. The developer constructed the Road To Nowhere from a roundabout to a point where the road would rise to a bridge over the main Bristol to the North rail line and made a cash contribution to the then Gloucestershire County Council towards the cost of the bridge with the developer of the trading estate the other side of the rail line similarly making a contribution. Under the 1974 Local Government Act, Avon came into being to replace Gloucestershire and Northavon was formed by the merger of a number of 2nd tier councils, my local and rating authority being the 2nd tier authority was Sodbury Rural District Council. The above contributions made went to Gloucestershire and the sheer incompetence of Avon and Northavon ensured those monies remained in Gloucestershire's coffers. I probably will be providing food for the worms before regular traffic traverses the Road To Nowhere and judging by the current state of this stretch of 'highway' will require it to be re-constructed before it can be opened as part of the local everyday road network, after all its seen no regular traffic for 45 years so far.

[Bmblbzzz]

http://streetmap.co.uk/map.srf?X=370050&Y=181583&A=Y&Z=120

[Bmblbzzz]

Charfield station's been talked about for at least as long as Portishead, hasn't it?

[stuving]

I probably will be providing food for the worms before regular traffic traverses the Road To Nowhere and judging by the current state of this stretch of 'highway' will require it to be re-constructed before it can be opened as part of the local everyday road network, after all its seen no regular traffic for 45 years so far.

If you visit by Google Earth (51.532443°   -2.434346°) you will see that about a year ago a bit in the middle was done up - presumably for a film - and there were loads of vehicles on site. They even built a fake cutting with concrete walls and some sort of bridge across - for some reason it's not on StreetView!

I'm sure a lot of such roads have been built running towards yet-to-be-built bridges, over the years, and while some of those bridges got built a few didn't. There was one I remember from my youth in Harrow, where Harrow View and Courtenay Avenue both existed with houses built, but the bridge over the LNWR^▸ (London North Western Railway) (between Harrow & Wealdstone and Headstone Lane) was only opened just after I left school in 1969.

[TonyK]

Charfield station's been talked about for at least as long as Portishead, hasn't it?

It was put to a vote of residents about 20 years ago. They said no, because they didn't want people from Wotton under Edge using it.

Charfield. A local village for local people.

[Red Squirrel]

Charfield station's been talked about for at least as long as Portishead, hasn't it?

It was put to a vote of residents about 20 years ago. They said no, because they didn't want people from Wotton under Edge using it.

Charfield. A local village for local people.

Charfield Station is very much 'there', in black ink, in JLTP3 and JLTP4. Did they put it to another vote, reflecting the fact that some of the older, more xenophobic residents have moved on to a better place?

[TonyK]

Charfield Station is very much 'there', in black ink, in JLTP3 and JLTP4. Did they put it to another vote, reflecting the fact that some of the older, more xenophobic residents have moved on to a better place?

I think that this time they are consulting rather than asking people what they want. Having a second vote just because the xenophic element has gone to a better place - hopefully with a lot of foreigners waiting to greet them - could set a dangerous precedent. (I saw what you did there, you mischievous squirrel, you!)

To quote the late Dick Tuck, loser of the contest for a California seat in the US Senate (and the inspiration for a plastic surgery procedure) "The people have spoken, the b*st*rds!"

[Bmblbzzz]

Charfield station's been talked about for at least as long as Portishead, hasn't it?

It was put to a vote of residents about 20 years ago. They said no, because they didn't want people from Wotton under Edge using it.

Charfield. A local village for local people.

Presumably meaning they didn't want Wottonians parking their cars in Charfield streets?