Rare Track Days #5: More Doncaster-York Diversions

Not content with travelling on two diversionary routes between Doncaster and York the previous weekend, on Sunday 27th January I set out to tick off a third, much rarer diversionary route. Rather than test Jonathan's hospitality once more, I set out instead on a day trip to York, no small undertaking when it ends up being a 470-mile, 12-hour round trip.

Once again the ECML between Doncaster and York was closed (see the yellow line on the map below), but this time not at Colton Jn, but rather at Shaftholme Jn, rendering both the previous diversionary routes unworkable. While East Coast were being sensible and simply running via Leeds (the blue line), Grand Central were running on a novel diversionary route via Normanton (the orange line).

(Map based on OpenStreetMap; © OpenStreetMap contributors)

Before I could go on the diversionary route, though, I had to get to either York or Doncaster. Unfortunately, the line between Sheffield and Doncaster was closed, so the easiest way to do it was to go to York, go to Doncaster, come back to York, and head home. To do it all in daylight, I started with the first train of the day from Coventry:

0837 Coventry to Birmingham New St, arr 0906
Headcode: 2C99, operated by London Midland using Desiro 350108*+350125
Distance: 19 miles

Because Saturday night and Sunday morning is used as maintenance time on the railways, the first train on a Sunday morning is comparatively late; not that an earlier one is really needed given the small handful of people on my train.

My initial plan had been to try and make a six-minute connection at New Street onto the first train of the day heading to York, in order to have some time in York. If everything had gone to plan, I would have changed once more in Derby for the once-a-day East Midlands Trains service thence to York, which because the Sheffield-Doncaster line was closed was diverted via Pontefract Baghill.

Unfortunately events conspired against me: we lost a few minutes on the way into Birmingham, pulling into the platform three minutes late. However, the signalman had only cleared us halfway down the platform - standard practice at New Street is to use the two halves of the platform separately, but on this occasion we were an eight-car train and wouldn't fit.

I was in the front coach, so I didn't notice this at first; all I noticed was that the doors didn't open. Then we heard "will the guard please contact the driver", presumably so he could ask "am I all on at the back?" The answer clearly having been no, we moved forward and stopped further down the platform.

The doors opened at 09:11, right next to the footbridge; I legged it up and across to platform 10, and ran down the stairs to find the 09:12 was down the other end of the platform. But it was too late; the doors had already been closed, and by the time I got to the back of the train it started to move off.

Having now lost all hope of having more than twenty minutes in York, I bought a sandwich to have for lunch on the train, and waited patiently for the 10:12 train to arrive.

1012 Birmingham New St to York, arr 1326
Headcode: 1S41, operated by CrossCountry using Voyager 220016+220027*
Distance: 168.75 miles

With no hope of going via Pontefract Baghill, I was instead condemned to more than three hours on a Voyager from Birmingham to York. Here we were subjected to the wrong kind of diversion: the train was diverted via Leicester, because of engineering works on the mainline between Birmingham and Derby, but I've been that way several times.

Instead of being interesting, it just made the journey to Derby over twice as long: just under 1 hour, 25 minutes for a journey that can take less than 35 minutes. Still a bit tired from the early start, I dozed off for a while.

The one good thing about this particular service was it was double the usual length. Normally CrossCountry only run four- or five-car trains on these long-distance services, but the engineering works south of Birmingham meant they had some spare, and so we ran with two Voyagers coupled together, which meant everyone could spread out a bit more; even when quite a crowd got on at Leeds there was still ample room.

Having eaten my lunch on the train, I disembarked at York and headed over to catch my Grand Central service south to Doncaster:

1352 (actual 1356) York to Doncaster, arr 1445 (actual 1451)
Headcode: 1A61, operated by Grand Central using Adelante 180114
Distance: 46 miles

With the ECML blocked, the East Coast service between Doncaster and York was reduced to hourly and diverted via Leeds. These left at 58 minutes past each hour; the diverted Grand Central service I got slotted in as the 13:52 departure. It was thus the first train to Doncaster for nearly an hour, and was thus quite busy.

Fortunately, I had anticipated this: since I was using a vaguely complicated combination of day returns, I had decided to book my tickets online to save the hassle at the ticket office. While doing so, I reserved seats for the two Grand Central services I was using. Since I was using an anytime day return York-Doncaster, it didn't oblige me to use those services, but it did get me a seat. I thus ended up with a good window seat on an otherwise nearly full train.

The Grand Central diversion used several rare bits of track, two of which I hadn't previously covered. We headed south out of York, going straight on at Colton Jn, through Church Fenton, and straight on to Milford Jn. Here, rather than turning left and heading to Ferrybridge like I did last week, we continued straight on on the line to Castleford. This five-mile stretch of line is used by a handful of Transpennine Express services between Leeds and York as a diversionary route late at night, but I hadn't done it before and was glad to tick it off.

From Castleford we headed towards Normanton and Wakefield Kirkgate (marked K on the map). But just before Kirkgate station, we turned left at Turners Lane Junction, and took the "Turners Lane curve" round to Calder Bridge Junction. This is only scheduled for use by the 2330 Sheffield-Leeds service on a Friday night, but even that doesn't always use it. To get a train doing the curve in daylight was thus a real find.

So rare, in fact, that I wasn't even the only track-basher on the train - I spotted a couple of other people with railway atlases out, clearly intent on getting a train over the rare Turners Lane curve. (I was too shy to try and say hello...)

After the extra-rare track, from Calder Bridge Jn we started on the line to Knottingley, but turned off at Crofton West Jn and headed for the Leeds-Doncaster mainline, which we rejoined at Hare Park Jn. This is regularly used by a few Grand Central services, and I'd done it once before, but it's rare enough track nonetheless.

After nearly an hour plodding round these obscure railway lines, we eventually arrived in Doncaster. With nothing much else to do, I headed over to the other platform and waited for the next Grand Central service back to York, just half an hour away:

1519 (actual 1529½) Doncaster to York, arr 1616 (actual 1625½)
Headcode: 1N92, operated by Grand Central using HST 43465+43484
Distance: 46 miles

Unfortunately an earlier broken down train near Kings Cross had caused some congestion, and our train was running about 10 minutes late by the time it got to Doncaster.

When it arrived, I was glad to see it was an HST, rather than an Adelante: the Adelante from York had been a bit cramped, while this HST was rather more spacious. Grand Central have not heavily refurbished their HST carriages, and they retain their original seats, generously spacious and low-backed for good visibility. What's more, the window seat I'd reserved was on the opposite side of the track, so I got the other view going back.

Otherwise, the journey back to York was much the same; we had to follow a slightly delayed East Coast service to Leeds as far as Hare Park Jn, but once we peeled off to retrace our steps round the Turners Lane curve and back through Castleford there were very few other trains in the area, with Castleford geting just one train every hour.

After nearly an hour we made it back to York, where I had just under fifteen minutes before heading back south again. This time, platform 3 at York was rather emptier, so I hoped the train wouldn't be too cramped...

1640 York to Birmingham New St, arr 1950
Headcode: 1V66, operated by CrossCountry using Voyager 221122*+220021
Distance: 168.75 miles

As it happens I needn't have worried: once more we had a double Voyager, with nine carriages to spread out in. I found a seat with plenty of legroom in the quiet coach and settled down for the three-hour trek back to Birmingham. While Leeds looked fairly pretty in the late evening twilight, by the time we got to Sheffield it was completely dark outside.

I thus resigned myself to getting some work done, and succeeded in finishing off a few loose ends of mathematics that I'd been meaning to do for a few days. Even so, the journey back dragged on, not helped by a (booked) nine minute stand at Leicester to let an East Midlands Trains service overtake.

After a seemingly interminable trip, we arrived back into New Street. My next train to Coventry would have been the 20:04 CrossCountry service, but the platform was quite busy and I couldn't face any more time on a CrossCountry Voyager, so I waited for the next Virgin Pendolino:

2010 Birmingham New St to Coventry, arr 2030
Headcode: 1B81, operated by Virgin Trains using Pendolino 390011
Distance: 19 miles

After the all-too-familiar run from Birmingham to Coventry, I arrived back in Coventry after a 467.5 mile round-trip, on which I spent nine hours on trains (twelve hours from first train to last train). It was a lovely sunny day of track-bashing, though a rather long one - but worth it for the rare Turners Lane curve.

Rare Track Days #4: The Soon-To-Be-Electrified Parkside East Curve

After an enjoyable evening in Sheffield on the Saturday night, on Sunday 20th I headed across the Pennines to do a short curve of track in Newton-le-Willows, making up the third side of a triangle connecting the Manchester-Liverpool via Earlestown line to the WCML between Warrington and Wigan.

I started with a trip on one of my favourite lines in England, the Hope Valley Line:

1138 Sheffield to Manchester Piccadilly, arr 1238
Headcode: 1R38, operated by East Midlands Trains using Sprinter 158862*+158788
Distance: 42.75 miles

After the Woodhead Line closed in 1981, the Hope Valley Line became the main line between Manchester and Sheffield. It criss-crosses the southern Pennines, with three of the longest tunnels in the country: Totley Tunnel, at 3 miles, 950 yards, was the longest in the country (not counting the London Underground or Merseyrail) until the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (HS1) was built in 2007.

Between the tunnels, in the Hope Valley itself, is some of the steepest mountain scenery to be seen anywhere in England; the line hugs the hillside up the valley up to Edale. On a sunny day it makes for some of the most beautiful scenery to be had on any train in England; in the snow, however, it took on a whole other-worldly feel, with little colour other than the brown of the bare trees and the white of the snow, making for a train ride I won't forget in a hurry.

But all good things must come to an end: we emerged from the last of the tunnels in the outskirts of Stockport, calling there before crawling our way into Manchester. I had intended to get a Metrolink tram from Piccadilly station to Victoria station, but there were engineering works, so I did it the old-fashioned way and walked through a fairly quiet central Manchester.

Once in Manchester Victoria, my aim was simple: head to Preston and back. The usual route was closed at Salford Crescent, so a connection from the Manchester-Liverpool line to the WCML between Warrington and Wigan was in use. This map should help:

(Map based on OpenStreetMap; © OpenStreetMap contributors)

The dark blue line running east-west is the original Liverpool and Manchester Railway, opened in 1830. What is now the WCML is marked in yellow, but in fact the green connection from Earlestown to Warrington opened next in 1831, and the orange connection from Parkside Jn to Wigan opened in 1832. The connection from Lowton to Newton-le-Willows only opened in 1847, while the WCML section between Winwick Jn and Golborne Jn opened in 1864.

Nowadays, however, while all three sides of the triangular station at Earlestown are used regularly, the only side of the Newton-le-Willows triangle that is regularly used is the Liverpool-Manchester stretch. I did the west curve (green) a couple of years ago; it's used by a couple of trains a day between Liverpool and Wigan.

However, the east curve (orange) from Parkside Jn to Golborne Jn - once the original line to Wigan - until recently saw no regular services at all. But in just a few years time it will become the main route for Manchester-Scotland trains, which will be diverted away from the busy Bolton corridor in connection with electrification works.

While there are now two trains each weekday over the east curve, they aren't conveniently timed; instead, I waited for a Sunday on which all trains were going that way, because of engineering works at Salford Crescent:

1339 Manchester Victoria to Preston, arr 1431
Headcode: 2N97, operated by Northern Rail using Pacer 142044
Distance: 36.75 miles

Unfortunately, "all" trains going that way meant just two an hour. When you consider that on weekdays the Manchester-Preston corridor gets up to ten trains an hour, it was no wonder that this titchy little two-car Pacer was... a bit busy.

It also had one of the worst seating layouts ever conceived, with all the seats in each coach facing the same direction, having very little legroom, and arranged with three seats on one side of the aisle and two on the other. I took a window seat, but came to regret it after nearly an hour crushed into a rather small space.

Nonetheless, I succeeded in doing the soon-not-to-be-rare track. We headed west out of Manchester Victoria, as if for Liverpool, before slowing down for the east curve to take us towards Wigan: it being, as the map shows, quite a tight curve, though, meant we only crawled round it at all of 20mph.

We joined the WCML at Golborne Jn, and all of a sudden our little 75mph Pacer was sharing tracks with the 125mph Pendolinos, over eight times the length. We were, nonetheless, a stopping service, in the sense that we didn't just call at Wigan and Preston, but also at Leyland.

We arrived at Preston on time; with little to do for 15 minutes, I headed over to the other platform to head back the way I'd come:

1447 Preston to Manchester Victoria, arr 1531
Headcode: 1M95, operated by Transpennine Express using Desiro 185132*+185143
Distance: 36.75 miles

Fortunately, this time I was on the Transpennine Express service, a six-car train which had come all the way from Edinburgh, and which was only calling at Wigan. There was thus plenty of room for me to stretch my cramped legs out and have some lunch.

The electrification of various lines in the north-west has been talked about now for about four years, and the line I was using between Golborne Jn and Manchester is first in line for wires. Indeed, it has long been planned that the wires will be up by the end of 2013, with electric trains running by early 2014.

But now that we're getting close to that 2014 date, things have actually started happening on the ground. The north-west electrification is no longer just a part of a budget document and a coloured line on a map somewhere; it's actually happening.

Indeed, the gantries and masts going up quite quickly now: while there was just one small stretch of wire over Ordsall Lane Jn, just outside Manchester, a variety of different types of mast adorned most of the route between Manchester and Golborne, with a few miles in the middle with no masts yet. I look forward to coming back to this route in a year or two's time to get a brand-new electric train.

We had a small hiccup stopping at Wigan North Western: it seems the driver had thought he was only driving a three-car train, but when he pulled up the guard had to say to him "oi, this is a six car!" before he moved forward and released the doors in the correct location. Fortunately that didn't delay us too much.

We arrived back into Manchester Victoria on time, and I wandered back across to Piccadilly. I glanced up at the platform indicator and saw the next train to New Street went from platform 6, and as soon as my eyes caught sight of platform 6 I saw my train just pulling in, having arrived from Birmingham.

1607 Manchester Piccadilly to Birmingham New St, arr 1734
Headcode: 1V63, operated by CrossCountry using Voyager 220016
Distance: 82.5 miles

Just as I was about to get on the train, I noticed the train said "Next stop: Stoke-on-Trent". I queried the guard, who said this was correct; on Sundays, half the trains do not stop at Stockport. So I can add Stockport to my list of stations I have passed through non-stop: thanks to my non-stopping Birmingham New Street on New Year's Day, the only stations on the WCML I haven't been through non-stop are Stoke-on-Trent, Runcorn, Preston and Carlisle.

Apart from that, the journey back to Birmingham was fairly quiet. I'd been texting Ian, and it transpired he was getting into New Street just twenty minutes behind me on his way home to Northampton; neither of us much felt like cooking, so I hung around in New Street until he arrived.

The snow, which had held off since Friday night, had started again, so we walked through the snow to Wagamama in the Bullring. After an impressively quick but enjoyable dinner, we walked back up the hill, with the snow now coming down a little heavier, and headed for the next train to Northampton, which was a stopper as far as Coventry:

1914 (actual 1924) Birmingham New St to Coventry, arr 1944 (actual 1957)
Headcode: 2Y41, operated by London Midland using Desiro 350232+350106*
Distance: 19 miles

Unfortunately some frozen points at Rugby delayed the inbound service - which had been due in at 18:59 - didn't arrive until 19:16, two minutes after we'd been due to leave. By the time the driver got to the other end and all the passengers got on, we left ten minutes late. We weren't further delayed as far as Coventry, but unfortunately Ian was delayed a bit more getting into Northampton due to the points problem at Rugby.

I made it round and up the steps just in time to make a bus home, saving me the walk home - normally the station is a twenty minute walk, but in the snow it was more like half an hour. After 217¾ miles and over 4½ hours on trains on Sunday alone, I settled down to warm up after a very enjoyable - but rather cold - weekend.

Rare Track Days #3: Doncaster-York Diversions

Over the weekend of January 19th-20th, I set off to do a few interesting bits of track in the north of England, spending Saturday night in Sheffield with my friend Jonathan. The plan had in fact been to head north on the night of Friday 18th, but with six inches of snow falling during the day I thought better of it, and instead headed north on Saturday morning instead, deliberately allowing extra time in case the snow caused problems.

The East Coast Main Line (ECML) between Doncaster and York was shut for engineering works on Saturday, so trains were diverted on a number of lightly-used passenger lines. A large network of railway lines remains in Yorkshire, many of them used principally by freight trains to and from the many coal-fired power stations. This map might help:

(Map based on OpenStreetMap; © OpenStreetMap contributors)

The normal ECML route between Doncaster and York is marked in yellow, and the two diversionary routes we took are marked in orange and blue respectively.

0911 (actual 0922) Coventry to Birmingham New St, arr 0942 (actual 0952)
Headcode: 2Y06, operated by London Midland using Desiro 350257
Distance: 19 miles

While the snowfall had wreaked havoc across the network on Friday night, by Saturday morning the problems were relatively minor. Nonetheless, London Midland's driver problems reared their head again, and my first train to Birmingham was ten minutes late having awaited a driver at Northampton. Even so, I made my connection at New Street without any problems:

1003 Birmingham New St to Sheffield, arr 1117
Headcode: 1S39, operated by CrossCountry using Voyager 221128
Distance: 77.25 miles

I headed north through Derby to Sheffield. In spite of having travelled this route many times before, the covering of snow made the familiar look new and other-worldly: gone was the normal colour palette of greenery, replaced with a beautiful yet muted spectrum of greys and browns. The snow made for quite a spectacle, particularly as we fringed the eastern edge of the Peak District.

Because of the engineering works, CrossCountry trains were not running via Doncaster, instead running either via Leeds or Pontefract Baghill. While I hadn't done the latter route, I had more important track to do, so I hopped off at Sheffield and wandered down the platform to head to Doncaster:

1141 Sheffield to Doncaster, arr 1214
Headcode: 1W36, operated by Northern Rail using Sprinter 158848
Distance: 19 miles

This Northern Rail train to Scarborough via Hull started out pretty quiet from Sheffield, but rather more people got on at Meadowhall, a major bus and tram interchange to the north-east of Sheffield. We were allowed eight minutes over standard timings to get to Doncaster, with 33 minutes allowed for a journey of just 18 miles; and sure enough, even though we were held outside the station for three minutes, we still arrived in Doncaster five minutes early.

I had arrived in Doncaster with 45 minutes to spare, which I had allowed in case one of the trains had been delayed or cancelled. I found a warm waiting room and read my book. I had no intention of missing my next train, which was the last one of the day to go on this particular route:

1255 Doncaster to York, arr 1327
Headcode: 1N92, operated by Grand Central using Adelante 180105
Distance: 35.5 miles

The section of the ECML between Doncaster and York is a recent addition to the network. Due to subsidence as a result of coal mining on the old ECML through Selby, a new diversion avoiding Selby was built and opened in 1983 to avoid the crippling speed restrictions that would otherwise have been necessary.

The new line branched off the old one at Temple Hirst Junction, and joined the Leeds-York line at Colton Junction. The points at Colton Junction were being renewed, so we branched off the main line at Hambleton, where the new ECML (running north-south) crosses the Leeds-Selby line (running east-west) with connections from north to east - which I did previously - and from south to west.

The south to west connection at Hambleton is rarely used, only being scheduled for use by the 0655 Skipton-King's Cross on Saturdays. Being able to travel on the connection in daylight is thus rather unusual; but on this occasion a few of the Grand Central services - including this one - were diverted over this connection, and then onwards to York via Gascoigne Wood Jn and Sherburn-in-Elmet (see the orange route in the map above).

At Church Fenton, our pair of tracks were joined by another pair of tracks from Leeds, to which we crossed at Colton South Junction. We then passed Colton Junction, where a large body of men were busy removing the old points; it was quite surreal to have overhead wires but no track beneath them!

The diversion only lengthened the usual 25-minute journey between Doncaster and York to just under 35 minutes, and it is certainly the shortest diversionary route available. Nonetheless, for some reason not all the trains were using it, so I made sure to get a train that did.

The train itself was just five carriages long, with Grand Central's usual six-car HSTs replaced on this particular run with a Class 180 "Adelante", a rather unloved fleet of 14 diesel multiple units capable of 125mph shared between Grand Central, Hull Trains and First Great Western. Being only five carriages, it was fairly full, and the only seat with a window that I could find was a conveniently placed tip-up seat next to one of the doors; even so, I managed to eat my lunch.

I had half an hour in York to look round - time enough to buy a magazine - before heading back to Doncaster on a rather different diversion:

1400 York to Doncaster, arr 1450
Headcode: 1E13, operated by East Coast using HST 43320+43257
Distance: 34.75 miles

The vast majority of the diversions were not via Hambleton, but instead used a route via Askern and Ferrybridge shown in blue on the above map. The route via Ferrybridge is a standard diversionary route that drivers are trained on, and that seems to have been the limiting factor: even though this diversion took 50 minutes to get from York to Doncaster, there weren't enough drivers who knew the faster route via Hambleton to run that way.

As far as Ferrybridge, we followed the Dearne Valley line, which was once considered the main line between Sheffield and York. However, the fact that it avoids almost all the major settlements of the West Riding - the only major station being Pontefract Baghill - means that almost all services now run either via Leeds or Doncaster.

We left York almost the same way we came in (crossing at Church Fenton, rather than Colton South Jn), as far as Sherburn-in-Elmet. From there we continued straight on to Milford Junction, where we crossed over to the other pair of tracks: rather than going straight on to Castleford, we curved left and headed towards Ferrybridge.

We crawled along past Ferrybridge power station, leaving the Dearne Valley Line at Ferrybridge North Junction, and used the Knottingley Curve to Knottingley West Junction. This short section of track sees no regular passenger services apart from occasional diversions by East Coast, most of which are in the dead of night; to do the curve in daylight is thus fairly unusual.

At Knottingley West Jn, we briefly flirted with the Pontefract Line between Leeds and Goole, for all of a few metres, before immediately turning off again onto the Askern Line. This ten-mile-long line from Knottingley to Shaftholme Jn, on the ECML proper just north of Doncaster, is normally used only by a few Grand Central services between London and Bradford (which I did last April), and otherwise sees relatively little use.

On this occasion it saw a train every hour between London and Edinburgh. This particular train was, in fact, the "Highland Chieftain", the once-a-day service between Inverness and London. Fortunately it wasn't nearly as busy as the previous train, and I got a nice window seat in the rear coach. Of course, being an HST, there was no underfloor engine noise to put up with, which made the journey all the more pleasant.

We arrived at Doncaster - not normally a stop for the "Highland Chieftain" but a stop today to permit a driver change - a few minutes late; I grabbed a chocolate bar and then hopped on my last train of the day, a stopper to Sheffield:

1503 Doncaster to Sheffield, arr 1541
Headcode: 2P73, operated by Northern Rail using Pacer 144006
Distance: 19 miles

It wouldn't be a trip up north without a ride on a Pacer. Fortunately, as trains made from bus parts go, the 144s are a lot better than the other kinds of Pacer, and though I was somewhat lacking in legroom, the stops passed quickly enough.

All in all, a very successful day in which I bagged two pretty rare connections. After 204.5 miles, and only just over four hours on trains, I met up with Jonathan and spent the night in Sheffield, ready for another day of rare track on Sunday...

Rare Track Days #2: The Smethwick Connection

On Sunday 6th January, I took a day trip to Worcester, to cover just 500m of new track: a connection in the Smethwick area, about four miles west of Birmingham city centre, from the Birmingham-Wolverhampton line to the Birmingham-Stourbridge line.

Wait, why is there a connection between two lines out of Birmingham? Isn't there just a junction? Ah, no, you see there's more than one Birmingham - or at least, more than one Birmingham station. The Wolverhampton line runs from New Street, while the Stourbridge line runs from Snow Hill. The connection allows trains to and from Stourbridge to divert to New Street, instead of Snow Hill.

My afternoon started slightly late with a Pendolino to New Street:

1259 Coventry to Birmingham New St, arr 1324
Headcode: 1G08, operated by Virgin Trains using Pendolino 390155
Distance: 19 miles

A journey I've done countless times before was livened up by being on 390155, one of the four newly-built Pendolinos added to the fleet in 2012. Although the train left Coventry nearly ten minutes late, we made up a little time and arrived at New Street just four minutes late, unusually coming into platform 1. I headed over to platform 5, to get my train to Worcester:

1345 Birmingham New St to Worcester Shrub Hill, arr 1436
Headcode: 1V17, operated by London Midland using Turbostar 170631
Distance: 35 miles

Trains heading south from Birmingham towards Cheltenham or Worcester normally head down the Lickey Incline via Bromsgrove - the steepest sustained gradient on the network, with nearly three miles at 1 in 37¾. However, for six consecutive Sundays in January and February, there are engineering works at King's Norton, so my train was diverted via Stourbridge, necessitating use of the Smethwick connection.

Other than engineering works, the connection at Smethwick sees very little use, with only a handful of early morning and late night services running that way for route knowledge.

It wasn't always this way, though.

When the connection was built, it was about as much use as it is today - occasionally useful but not vital to the everyday service. The connection was built in 1867 with the rest of the line from Stourbridge Junction to Snow Hill. Although originally operated by the Stourbridge Railway, they were absorbed into the Great Western Railway in 1870, and the Snow Hill-Stourbridge line quickly became part of the GWR's suburban network in Birmingham, which remained almost wholly separate from the former London, Midland and Scottish (LMS) network.

For a hundred years the connection saw very little use. In the 1960s, however, hell-bent on cost-cutting, BR decided to "rationalise" the network around Birmingham. A decision was made to cut costs by diverting all the GWR services onto LMS tracks and into the newly-rebuilt New Street station. This permitted the closure of the line between Smethwick and Snow Hill, achieved by diverting everything from Stourbridge over the Smethwick connection. Use was also made of a connection from Tyseley into the other end of New Street. This meant Snow Hill station could be closed in 1972.

The plan wasn't entirely successful, however: even in the 1960s there wasn't room to divert all the services into New Street station. The intention had been to also close Moor Street station, which lies at the other end of a 600m tunnel from Snow Hill, but Moor Street was forced to remain open to serve local services to Solihull, Leamington and Stratford.

By the 1980s, New Street was getting too busy, and plans were made to undo the closures. First to reopen was the tunnel between Moor Street and Snow Hill, closed in 1968 but reopened in 1987 along with Snow Hill station. The line from Snow Hill to Smethwick reopened in 1995, in one of BR's last schemes before privatisation, and the pre-1960s order was restored. The Smethwick connection remained in case trains needed to be diverted.

When there are engineering works or problems, being able to divert trains is invaluable - it (often) allows a service to continue running rather than having run buses (though on this occasion only London Midland were diverting, and CrossCountry's Birmingham-Cheltenham services were replaced by buses).

My train was to continue to Hereford after reversing at Worcester Shrub Hill, but I had plans for the evening, and so I headed across the footbridge to head back to Birmingham:

1455 Worcester Shrub Hill to Birmingham New St, arr 1539
Headcode: 1M12, operated by London Midland using Turbostar 172334
Distance: 35 miles

The previous train had been a class 170, well-suited to medium-distance inter-regional services such as Birmingham-Hereford. This, however, was a class 172, built in 2010 to replace the class 150 Sprinters on the Snow Hill suburban services, and are usually seen operating all-stations services, not running non-stop from Droitwich to Birmingham. They also have more seats and more standing room, with fewer tables, to enable the maximum number of commuters to be crushed in.

All this is by way of saying: I picked the wrong train to eat a late lunch on, having to eat lunch off my lap rather than a table. Ah well.

Still, the views made up for the lack of tables: as one of the guards commented, "we're going the pretty way to Birmingham". The Lickey Incline, while steep, isn't particularly scenic. However, the line through Stourbridge and Kidderminster is really rather pretty, with views across to the hills of the Wyre Forest.

From Worcester to Stourbridge, we follow the old Oxford, Worcester and Wolverhampton Railway route, opened in 1852 as the GWR's first mainline to Wolverhampton. But the section beyond Stourbridge is no more; the line through Dudley remains in situ, rusting away, waiting for someone to decide its fate, leaving Dudley as the largest town in the country without a railway station to call its own.

On getting to Stourbridge Junction, we slowed right down to 15mph and squealed our way round the curve onto the Stourbridge Railway. Most of the trains on this line are all-stations suburban trains, and so it was particularly nice to be non-stop on the next section through Old Hill: the Stourbridge Railway also had to get up the Lickey Hills, but did so a little more gradually, with just over a mile of 1 in 51, which we took at a brisk pace.

We stopped briefly at Smethwick to let a train go past in the other direction before turning right and going over the Smethwick connection once more. All of a sudden we emerged from the short tunnel on the connection to see overhead wires again; the Snow Hill lines are not wired, but the Wolverhampton line is, and we joined it at Galton Junction to follow it for just under four miles back to New Street.

1550 Birmingham New St to Coventry, arr 1611
Headcode: 1B48, operated by Virgin Trains using Pendolino 390008
Distance: 19 miles

I joined another fairly quiet Pendolino for the familiar run back to Coventry, to cap off an enjoyable afternoon in which I covered 108 miles for a very reasonable £7.15 day return.

The Smethwick connection may not be the longest or the most interesting bit of rare track out there, but it's one I'd been waiting patiently to do for quite a few years; it also reminds us that every line tells a story.

Rare Track Days #1: Avoiding Wolverhampton

New year's resolution: write more, shorter blogposts.

I've been on many trains over the last few months, but no big multi-day excursions like I usually blog about. Instead I've been on lots of little day trips, most of them to cover a short section of "rare track".

Most of the British railway network is used day in, day out. But there are a few bits of track that aren't used much, or are only used by freight trains. I'm trying to travel on the whole British railway network, so when one of these rarely-used bits of track is called upon for diverting trains, I jump at the chance.

So, here begins a new series of reports about the many little trips I do.

On New Year's Day, I traversed a line which avoids Wolverhampton; it was probably the weirdest day's train travel I've ever done.

Cynics might think that that avoiding Wolverhampton is a good thing; but it's a big enough city that everything stops, and skirting round the edge rather than going through the station is mostly pointless these days. That opinion, however, was not shared by the builders of the Grand Junction Railway, one of the pioneer railway companies of the 1830s who set out to join the country together by rail, by linking the London and Birmingham Railway to the Liverpool and Manchester Railway; they saw fit to completely avoid Wolverhampton, giving it only a station at Wednesfield Heath, nearly a mile north-east of the current Wolverhampton station.

The Grand Junction and the L&B shared a station in Birmingham at Curzon Street, a little way east of New Street; only the frontage survives, but you can see it on your right on your way into New Street from the east, just before the tunnels. Their original route from Birmingham through Aston, Perry Barr, Bescot, and Wednesfield Heath survives, but has been supplanted for through traffic by the main line heading west from New Street through Soho, Smethwick, Tipton and Wolverhampton proper.

The original route through Bescot is still used by trains to and from Walsall, but the last three miles through Wednesfield Heath - between Portobello Junction and Bushbury Junction - do not see many regular passenger services, with only some of the London-Glasgow sleeper trains using it (but only on a Sunday night!).

Except on New Year's Day, when engineering works shut the WCML between Rugby and Stafford, and the only option was to divert London-Manchester and Liverpool trains via the original Grand Junction route. Well, that was the plan, anyway...

1151 Coventry to Milton Keynes Central, arr 1219
Headcode: 1B38, operated by Virgin Trains using Pendolino 390121
Distance: 44.25 miles

The astute among you will recognise that, from Coventry, Milton Keynes is the other direction to Wolverhampton. Unfortunately, while the trains were being diverted via Wednesfield Heath, they weren't stopping between Milton Keynes and Stafford. So in order to go on a bit of track near Wolverhampton, I had to go to Milton Keynes, in order to go back through Coventry to Stafford, and then repeat on the way home. So off I headed to Milton Keynes, where I had a half-hour wait to change trains.

1251 Milton Keynes Central to Stafford, arr 1416
Headcode: 1F17, operated by Virgin Trains using Pendolino 390137
Distance: 91.25 miles

The train from Milton Keynes to Stafford is probably the weirdest train journey I've ever made in my life. As I said, we were booked to run non-stop from Milton Keynes to Stafford. On the mainline via Nuneaton and Lichfield, this would be perfectly normal. But we weren't on the mainline, we were diverted to run non-stop through Coventry, alongside platform 3.

Running non-stop through a station you normally get off or on at is really weird. Admittedly we were following a stopping train, so we only went through Coventry at 40mph, but it was still seriously weird.

From Coventry the plan was that we'd to go along the mainline to Birmingham as far as Stechford, use another little-used bit of track from there to Aston, and then join the old Grand Junction main line through to Stafford. In fact, we were to use exactly the three dashed lines on this map:

Bad news: unfortunately, there was a track circuit failure near Bescot, and so we were unable to run via Wednesfield Heath. (Boo! That was the whole point of going on the train!) Fortunately, a check of Real Time Trains suggested that trains in the other direction were able to run normally, so I crossed my fingers that coming back we'd go through Wednesfield Heath.

Good news: being unable to run via Bescot left us with just one option: go via Birmingham New Street. Since we weren't booked to call, we proceeded through without stopping.

Yes, we went through Birmingham New Street station without stopping. (At the full permitted speed... of 10mph.) That was so weird it was slightly disorienting. I still can't quite get my head around having the line

Bham New St pf 6   13/47½ (!)

recorded in my logbook (where the / means that we passed without stopping). We continued to also run non-stop through Wolverhampton; surprisingly, we arrived at Stafford exactly on time, the diversion through New Street not having cost us any time.

I trotted over to platform 1, and waited for my train back:

1448 Stafford to Milton Keynes Central, arr 1615
Headcode: 1A40, operated by Virgin Trains using Pendolino 390006
Distance: 89.5 miles

I joined the train and sat for the next fifteen minutes with my fingers crossed, hoping desperately that we'd turn left at Bushbury Junction and not go back through Wolverhampton. We duly slowed down on approach to Bushbury Junction, consistent with turning left... and we did!

I'd honestly been waiting years to do the three miles of track between Bushbury Junction and Portobello Junction, so finally succeeding had me very nearly singing the Hallelujah Chorus to myself. You see, when they rebuilt the West Coast Main Line a few years ago, and upgraded the line between Rugby and Stafford from two to four tracks, they used the Wednesfield Heath line to divert trains every single weekend for four years. And I missed my chance. So to finally get the chance was super!

Once we joined the mainline at Stechford, instead of crawling along, we were afforded a short burst of a clear run, and accelerated up to 100mph - a speed we kept even through Birmingham International, but approaching Coventry we caught up to a stopping train and slowed down again.

Normally a train non-stopping Coventry towards Rugby would use platform 2; but the Nuneaton shuttle happened to be departing from platform 2, and rather than delay us, the signaller decided to send us across, through platform 3, and back over. So in one day I passed through Coventry platform 3 without stopping... twice!

We duly arrived at Milton Keynes, and I crossed the platform for the next train home:

1628 Milton Keynes Central to Coventry, arr 1733
Headcode: 2Y34, operated by London Midland using Desiro 350267*+350233
Distance: 46.25 miles

It happened that I'd just missed the fast Virgin Trains service, so the best option was to sit on the stopper via Northampton instead. An hour later, I found myself back at Coventry station for the fourth time that day - though only the second time that I'd stopped there...

So, in summary, I spent nearly four and a half hours on trains, travelled over 270 miles, and spent £38.05, just to go on a short bit of track outside Wolverhampton. Was it worth it? Yes, not just for the track; going non-stop through Birmingham New Street is not an experience I'd ever expect to repeat.

The Government Giveth and the Government Taketh Away: the Mysteries of Rail Franchising

On Wednesday the government announced that the inter-city services on the West Coast Main Line (WCML) will no longer be operated by Virgin Trains; from December 9th, First Group - the largest transport company in Britain, who already run the Great Western, Transpennine Express, Scotrail and Thameslink (FCC) franchises - will take over running the long-distance services between London, Birmingham, Manchester, Liverpool and Glasgow.

Let's clear up what that actually means. Put simply, here's a list of things visible to the public that will happen on December 9th:

1. The Pendolinos and Voyagers run by Virgin Trains will start to be painted in the colours of First group, and the staff of Virgin Trains will start wearing new First uniforms.


2. Er, that's it.

The timetable will remain broadly the same, at least for now; the services will be run with the same trains; the same staff — except for the highest echelons of management — will drive the trains and staff the stations; the tickets will cost the same and be valid on the same trains; and so on.

One confusion is that people think that Virgin Trains owns the Pendolinos and the Voyagers. They don't. They are owned by Angel Trains, one of three rolling stock holding companies (ROSCOs), who lease them to Virgin Trains (at a suitably extortionate rate). Come December, they will simply be leased to First instead.

This enables the franchise renewal process to be relatively smooth: first companies register their interest; then a shortlist of suitable companies is drawn up, and those shortlisted are invited to tender for the franchise. Tendering for the franchise involves drawing up a detailed plan of what trains would be run and what level of service would be provided.

Crucially, it also involves agreeing the level of premium (or subsidy) with the DfT: in other words, how much money the DfT will get from (or pay to) the operator. Long-distance intercity routes are probably the only passenger services that make significant profits. As such, with the West Coast franchise — the Premier Line on the network — it was always going to be about who could pay the DfT the most money.

In that respect, First won hands-down: they have promised to pay the DfT £5.5 billion in premiums over the 13 years and 4 months life of the franchise. That's a lot: it will require passenger revenue to grow by 10% per annum for each of the next 13 years, and some analysts have questioned whether that's possible. It is definitely a very ambitious target; in fairness, though, Virgin weren't outbid by much: they promised to pay £4.8 billion, assuming 8.5% growth per annum.

In theory franchising shouldn't be about it always going to the highest bidder, but pressure from the Treasury inevitably means it is. Once First's plans were deemed achievable by the DfT analysts, it was always going to be First. If they fail to keep up with the payments, First could have all their rail franchises (not just West Coast) taken away from them.

Do I think it was the right decision? My instinct is to say no; but without full details of what Virgin planned to do, it's impossible to make an accurate judgment.

What I do know is this: by removing the West Coast franchise from Virgin Trains, we have lost one of the genuinely recognisable brands on the railway network that isn't simply another bus company running trains, and that in and of itself is a crying shame. Through clever marketing they attracted lots of new business to the railways, not just because of the huge upgrade that the WCML has seen in the last decade.

Virgin Trains came into the market at privatisation promising a whole new experience of riding trains. For better or worse, they have done that: I will miss the futuristic red-and-silver livery, replaced with yet another blue train company. Where they fell down was the trains themselves: they replaced old trains with new ones that were shorter, whose windows are tiny, and whose only significant advantage is a better top speed.

What does First West Coast mean for us?

So what will happen when First West Coast take over from Virgin Trains? Nothing fundamental will change: Birmingham and Manchester will still get three trains an hour to London, and they'll still be as quick as they are now. But there will be some changes:

• Eleven new 6-car electric trains — most probably baby Pendolinos — will be ordered to take over the Birmingham–Scotland services from the diesel Voyagers. This is good news: it will end the insanity of having an entirely electrified route served by diesel trains. (If only some of the route were electrified, I could excuse it, but not this.)


• From 2016, direct services to and from London will be restored to Telford, Shrewsbury, Blackpool and Bolton. Blackpool is not a surprise, but Telford and Shrewsbury are: until a year ago they were served by the open-access operator Wrexham & Shropshire, but there just weren't enough passengers and they went bust. Bolton is even more of a surprise, but as a simple extension of a London–Manchester service it should work reasonably well.


• Anytime fares will be reduced by up to 15% over the first two years of the franchise. This is to counteract the incredible inflation in fares in recent years which has seen an anytime return from Manchester to London climb to £296. While it is good news, it will be largely counteracted by the inflation-based fare rises anyway; I'll return to this later.


• Ticket barriers will be installed at all 21 major stations on the WCML, including London Euston, Manchester Piccadilly, Liverpool Lime Street and Glasgow Central. This is bad news: barriers make sense for commuter stations, where there isn't time to check tickets on the train; but when stations are mainly served by intercity services where people often have lots of luggage it's simply a giant inconvenience.


• The trains will be thoroughly refurbished, and the on-board catering will be revised to include an at-seat service. That means a trolley; whether it's in addition to, or instead of, the shop isn't clear. For this one it has to be watch this space: until details of exactly what's going to happen it's fairly worthless trying to speculate.

Most of that will be complete by 2016. The franchise, however, runs until 2026, so most of the franchise will be spent just raking in the money. That, however, can be done better: fares on the WCML are, frankly, insane. So insane, in fact, that it is possible to lower the fares on some trains, but increase overall revenue.

The off-peak fares are reasonably priced but unreasonably restricted so that you can't arrive in London until after 11:30 and you can't leave London between 15:00 and 18:45. The anytime fares are unrestricted on which train you can get, but insanely expensive: on Coventry to London, an off-peak return is £43.60, but an anytime return is £138. That cliff-edge means that the 18:43 train to Coventry is usually empty (at least north of Milton Keynes), but the 19:03 is rammed.

On every other major intercity line, there are not two but three tiers of fares: anytime, off-peak and super off-peak. Virgin's off-peak fares are, in fact, pretty much in line with every other operator's super off-peak fares. What is needed is a third tier of fares which is, say, 25% more expensive than the current off-peak fare, but which permits arrival into London after 10:00, and only forbids departure between 16:30 and 18:15, say. That would manage the demand, and probably result in a net increase in revenue.

Furthermore, there are currently relatively few advance fares available at peak times: by increasing the incentive for people to book in advance by offering more such fares, they will get more bums on seats in the peak — and, of course, all advance fares go straight to the operator and don't have to be shared out among the other operators on the line. The net effect of both such changes is an increase in revenue but cheaper fares for the passenger.

Does franchising actually make sense?

But this much "yield management" can only go so far, and it is difficult to see how First can deliver the 10% year-on-year growth required to pay the DfT what they've promised. What happens if they default? Fortunately First are spared from the spectre of going bankrupt, but they will lose all their train franchises — not just West Coast — if they fail to keep up with the premium payments.

Is this a realistic possibility? Yes. Twice in three years the East Coast franchise — first under GNER, then under National Express — was handed back to the DfT. The first time was due to the collapse of GNER's parent company, Sea Containers. But the second time was simply because National Express could not meet the steep demands for premiums that they signed up to in the franchise agreement.

That should have triggered a wide-ranging debate about whether franchising actually makes sense as a model, but it didn't. Frankly, the current model of franchising is terrible, and is one of the fundamental reasons our railways are so expensive.

The two extremes of franchising are to specify everything — London buses are franchised out but even the font on the destination blinds is specified by Transport for London — or to give the operator free reign. What we actually have is a horrible compromise where minimum service levels are specified but there's enough play that First can claim to actually be "running" the WCML rather than just operating trains.

Now, I'm not necessarily advocating renationalisation, but more centralised control and specification — such as there is at Transport for London — might be better in the long run. In particular, it would probably avoid some of the passenger confusion that seems to be the main product of this franchise handover: the same trains will run at the same times, but they'll be announced as a "First West Coast" service instead of a "Virgin Trains" service.

How will First West Coast actually perform?

It remains to be seen how First perform. They will doubtless try and improve punctuality: Virgin's punctuality statistics languish stone dead last by the "public performance measure", with just 85.9% of trains arriving within 10 minutes of time in the year ending 31st March 2012.

There will probably be a very subtle shift in emphasis as a result: Virgin cared more about passengers getting a good service, while First care more about their shareholders. When things go wrong, Virgin are relatively happy to just let everything run half an hour late, if it means people get home; First may well cancel more services to try and get the ones that are running back on time.

But many people are already berating First before they've even taken over. People like the Virgin brand: to see them lose the West Coast is indeed a shame and, unless they succeed in bidding for another franchise, they will probably bow out of running trains altogether.

For all that I like Virgin Trains, however, I don't think we can judge First just yet. Their record is a little patchy, but when you're running the Great Western Main Line or the Thameslink route while both are in the process of major upgrades it's always going to be tricky.

I think we should all give First West Coast a chance: I look forward to seeing what innovations they bring to the WCML. Nonetheless, I must bid a fond farewell to Virgin Trains: even if their trains are too short and have tiny windows, they are the fastest in the country (except for the Eurostar), and day in, day out, they have run an incredible service of up to fourteen trains an hour into London.

Rest in peace, Virgin Trains; long live First West Coast (hopefully).

North Country Rover: Summary

Over the course of six days over the Jubilee weekend, Ian and I packed in a lot:

Day 1 (Thursday 31st May): (Milton Keynes / ) Coventry - Birmingham - Leeds - York
Day 2 (Friday 1st June): York - (bus) - Pickering - (NYMR) - Grosmont - (replacement bus) - Whitby - Middlesbrough - (dinner in Great Ayton) - York
Day 3 (Saturday 2nd June): York - Scarborough - Hull - York - Selby - Leeds - Saltaire - Bradford - Ilkley - Leeds - Harrogate - York
Day 4 (Sunday 3rd June): Railfest 2012
Day 5 (Monday 4th June): York - Leeds - Carnforth - Barrow-in-Furness - Ravenglass - R&ER to Dalegarth - Ravenglass - Carlisle - Newcastle - York
Day 6 (Tuesday 5th June): York - Preston - Lancaster - Heysham Port - Morecambe - Leeds - Birmingham - Coventry ( / Northampton)

We racked up a grand total of 1274 miles over six days, of which we spent one day, 8 hours and 55 minutes on trains (and a couple of buses). We got around most of the area covered by the North Country Rover, as this map shows. For the 893 miles we covered on the rover, we paid just £54.15, which works out at just 6p per mile. (In contrast, I spent £39.80 to get to and from York, at 13p a mile - which still isn't too bad, I guess.)

As an illustration of how good value the rover ticket is, our day 5 trip round the Cumbrian Coast could have been done on a York-Ravenglass return (excluding the R&ER itself), which would have cost £46.75. Compared with £54.15 for the whole weekend, I think we got the value of the ticket!

Every day (perhaps not counting day 1) had something special in it. The trip to Whitby and back on day 2 was perhaps the most enjoyable day, simply because of the sheer variety of the day: a bus, a steam train through the North Yorkshire Moors, a railway line that shouldn't still exist, a wonderful evening with my cousin and my first ever rail-replacement bus. I never thought that my first rail-replacement bus would be enjoyable, let alone give us beautiful views.

In contrast, I guess day 3 was perhaps the least exciting day, because it was "just" a day of going on lots of trains - but it was still remarkably enjoyable to go on so many different trains and so much new track - especially being able to go on electric trains!

But each of the last three days were enjoyable in very different ways. Day 4 at Railfest was so much fun, just for being able to feel like a five-year-old and getting to sit in the driver's seat of numerous trains. Day 5 was an epically long day round the Cumbrian Coast, which yielded hot sunshine and some of the best views of the Irish Sea I've ever seen.

Finally, day 6 involved three bits of "rare track". Going on rare track is somehow more exciting than just going on a line which is served frequently; there's more of a sense of "event", because it's easy to travel over a line that's served ten times every hour, but that bit more difficult when there's just one train a day that can take you over the line in question. It's no good being able to say "I've been on every line... except X, Y and Z, because they're not served very often"; when you're track-bashing the whole country, you have to worry about every single line!

Our travels round the north showed a network seemingly lacking in coherent planning: while some lines get favoured with brand new trains - such as the class 185 Desiros for TPE, and the class 333 electric trains on the Leeds-Bradford/Skipton/Ilkley suburban services - other lines have to make do and mend with some of the oldest and least suitable trains on the network, such as Pacers and some very old Sprinters. The Northern Hub proposals, combined with electrification between Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and York, should go some way to addressing these issues.

But that still leaves a number of rural branch lines which seem to struggle on with a poor service owing largely to 1980s cuts on the part of BR, stemming from a lack of available rolling stock. For example, the Middlesbrough-Whitby timetable has barely changed in 25 years, and the lack of an early-morning service from Whitby means that if you want to get from Whitby to London you can't arrive before 13:45 (and if you want to make the last train home, you have to leave again at 14:30!).

This is in part due to the current Northern franchise being let on a "no-growth" basis: simply put, they planned to fund the franchise as if passenger numbers would remain steady. But passenger numbers have increased dramatically over the past few years, with a 25% increase in just the last five years; it is thus little wonder that many of Northern's key commuter trains are crowded to the hilt. (That said, Northern do a great job of sweating the fleet of trains that they do have to the absolute maximum.) I only hope that when the TPE and Northern franchises are re-let in 2014 that they plan for a dramatic increase in capacity that is so desparately needed in places.

Nonetheless, the occasional crowded train did little to diminish the experience, be it a steam train to Whitby (well, almost!), or a branch line in rural Yorkshire, or round the Cumbrian coast, or traversing rarely-used track in Morecambe, or just climbing aboard a train at Railfest. My thanks to Ian for an enjoyable and fascinating weekend on trains.