Merseyrail Expansion

[Meerkat]

There is insufficient population close to intermediate stations to justify electrification from Headbolt Lane to anywhere towards Wigan. Rainford has a tiny car park; Upholland has very limited parking space, all on non-railway land; Orrell has no car park. Buying land to extend car parks would not be cheap.

Build more houses between the station and Rainford.
how expensive can open land be?

Ormskirk to Burscough Bridge; Burscough Bridge to Preston potentially a good idea, but restoration of both Burscough curves & signalling would be expensive.

Does the Southport line need resignalling anyway?
The Merseyrail line doesnt need a junction - I was wondering if they could move the bowling club and use their access bridge under the road to have a straight enough platform on the South East side of the road

Stanlow is probably a waste of space unless land could be bought affordably for a big park & ride site.

Isn’t there a business park on the site, though it would need a public access to the station. Access to jobs is important for inequality and development

Crewe? How far outside the Liverpool City Region does Rotheram want to go?

I assume the idea is to connect Wirral to Crewe for interchange.

 

[HSTEd]

I suppose the problem here is the railway network doesn't really align with the boundaries of the local government areas.

Personally I'd rather the transport system be operated in a sensible fashion, even if it means some local government areas end up administrating transport services outside their nominal boundaries.
After all, Westminster is ultimately the group paying for all of this anyway.

 

[urbophile]

I suppose the problem here is the railway network doesn't really align with the boundaries of the local government areas.

Personally I'd rather the transport system be operated in a sensible fashion, even if it means some local government areas end up administrating transport services outside their nominal boundaries.
After all, Westminster is ultimately the group paying for all of this anyway.

Transport links usually come first. Look at Metroland. Arguably the only reason that Southport was included in Merseyside was because of the rail line> hence commuter traffic> hence a stronger link with Liverpool.

 

[Bletchleyite]

I suppose the problem here is the railway network doesn't really align with the boundaries of the local government areas.

This is an issue in a lot of the UK as the local authority boundaries often don't make sense, which very much has an adverse impact on transport funding. As one example Ormskirk and Aughton really should be in the Liverpool City Region, and arguably Chester and Ellesmere
Port too, and maybe even Warrington should be in either Greater Manchester or the LCR rather than there being an awkward sliver of Cheshire there.

And then talking of Chester you have such nonsense as Saltney, just a Chester suburb, being in a different country!

 

[Bevan Price]

Build more houses between the station and Rainford.
how expensive can open land be?

As expensive as Lord ****** wants to charge for it - assuming they want to sell.

 

[Chester1]

This is an issue in a lot of the UK as the local authority boundaries often don't make sense, which very much has an adverse impact on transport funding. As one example Ormskirk and Aughton really should be in the Liverpool City Region, and arguably Chester and Ellesmere
Port too, and maybe even Warrington should be in either Greater Manchester or the LCR rather than there being an awkward sliver of Cheshire there.

And then talking of Chester you have such nonsense as Saltney, just a Chester suburb, being in a different country!

Chester is culturally quite different from Merseyside and its quite a distance from Liverpool city centre by both car and train. Ellesmere Port is bit nearer and was historically part of Wirral. The 2009 abolishment of Cheshire County Council didn’t allow for inter county transfers. The current government is pushing for unitary authorities of between 300,000 and 600,000 people. If Cheshire County Council was being abolished today then there would be a strong push for the old Ellesmere Port and Neston District to join Wirral and therefore Merseyside. Halton has effectively partially joined Merseyside through being part of the Liverpool City Region Combined Authority.

Saltney is even weirder than you state because a small part of it is in England. The border runs down the middle of "Boundary Lane". I would personally prefer a Chester / Caer twin city approach with Saltney being developed with a town centre and railway station but the politics of any border change are too much hassle.

The best solution to the boundary problems would be an equivalent to the Welsh and Scottish local government reforms of the early 90s. They were imposed in all country reform by the UK government but have worked fairly well. Sensible local government boundaries can only occur in England if they are imposed in a regional or national review. Until then there will always be artificial boundaries effecting operation of public services and transport.

 

[AlastairFraser]

I broadly agree with the OP's list, but I'd extend 2tph from Hunts Cross to 2 bay platforms at Aintree, via the entire North Liverpool Extension Railway, instead of finishing at Gateacre.

This allows it to serve Childwall, Broadgreen Hospital/Alder Hey Children's Hospital, Clubmoor, Norris Green and the Walton Hall Park end of Walton, in addition to Gateacre and Belle Vale.

This was originally intended to be Liverpool's Outer Circle Line on Merseyrail and it would provide an important role as an orbital line, the lack of which significantly hinders the Merseyside transport network since it was closed.

I'd route the remaining 2tph from Hunts Cross to Warrington Central, replacing the Northern stoppers. As others have suggested, the LNWR Liverpool to Birmingham services can pick up the calls at Mossley Hill and West Allerton.
Continue to run the semi fast CLC via Warrington Central for now - if you needed to shunt the Warrington Merseyrail stopper into a siding to permit it, build a connection onto one of the sidings west of the line east of Warrington Central. The siding is extant, but I'm not sure what sort of signalling upgrade you'd need.

 

[Chester1]

I broadly agree with the OP's list, but I'd extend 2tph from Hunts Cross to 2 bay platforms at Aintree, via the entire North Liverpool Extension Railway, instead of finishing at Gateacre.

This allows it to serve Childwall, Broadgreen Hospital/Alder Hey Children's Hospital, Clubmoor, Norris Green and the Walton Hall Park end of Walton, in addition to Gateacre and Belle Vale.

This was originally intended to be Liverpool's Outer Circle Line on Merseyrail and it would provide an important role as an orbital line, the lack of which significantly hinders the Merseyside transport network since it was closed.

I'd route the remaining 2tph from Hunts Cross to Warrington Central, replacing the Northern stoppers. As others have suggested, the LNWR Liverpool to Birmingham services can pick up the calls at Mossley Hill and West Allerton.
Continue to run the semi fast CLC via Warrington Central for now - if you needed to shunt the Warrington Merseyrail stopper into a siding to permit it, build a connection onto one of the sidings west of the line east of Warrington Central. The siding is extant, but I'm not sure what sort of signalling upgrade you'd need.

What is the business case for the outer circle line? Orbital Metrolink lines in Manchester have been proposed and dropped due to insufficient demand. What is the market size for journeys like Gatacre to Aintree? Why couldn't they be adequately served by buses? Gatacre to Hunts Cross extension would overwhelmingly be used for journeys to and from the city centre. People living in Childwall or West Derby are more likely to take the bus to the city centre than do a big loop by train.

 

[Meerkat]

As expensive as Lord ****** wants to charge for it - assuming they want to sell.

Compulsory purchase it then

 

[Bletchleyite]

What is the business case for the outer circle line? Orbital Metrolink lines in Manchester have been proposed and dropped due to insufficient demand. What is the market size for journeys like Gatacre to Aintree? Why couldn't they be adequately served by buses? Gatacre to Hunts Cross extension would overwhelmingly be used for journeys to and from the city centre. People living in Childwall or West Derby are more likely to take the bus to the city centre than do a big loop by train.

It might depend on how good the bus service quality gets under regulation, but plenty of people would do that. Going from Ormskirk to Southport via Sandhills despite a faster bus service is not at all an unusual thing to do, for example. Buses are still very much looked down upon.

I'd route the remaining 2tph from Hunts Cross to Warrington Central, replacing the Northern stoppers. As others have suggested, the LNWR Liverpool to Birmingham services can pick up the calls at Mossley Hill and West Allerton.
Continue to run the semi fast CLC via Warrington Central for now - if you needed to shunt the Warrington Merseyrail stopper into a siding to permit it, build a connection onto one of the sidings west of the line east of Warrington Central. The siding is extant, but I'm not sure what sort of signalling upgrade you'd need.

Absolutely, 100% not. From experience the CLC is one of the most horrendously unpunctual lines in the country. Importing that onto Merseyrail would be disastrous.

The only way Merseyrail should ever go onto the CLC is either if it was 4-tracked or there were buffer stops at Warrington.

 

[SeanM1997]

Personally, extending 2 of the Chester trains an hour to Crewe makes sense. The line is scheduled to be electrified with the HS2 money (I know... thats a different matter), but TfW operating a shuttle is quite a unique operation and Avanti only do a handful of Chester-Crewe/London a day and are quite sporadic.

The line is double track for its entirety and Platform 9 at Crewe is dedicated to Chester bound trains only meaning if they did use this platform, the conflicts would be minimal.

Even replacing TfW, this would be a significant boost to capacity and connectivity for both Wales and Merseyside to the rest of the country.

 

[Tetchytyke]

From experience the CLC is one of the most horrendously unpunctual lines in the country. Importing that onto Merseyrail would be disastrous.

The only way Merseyrail should ever go onto the CLC is either if it was 4-tracked or there were buffer stops at Warrington.

The CLC isn't that bad and the capacity problems that exist are all on the Manchester end. There's plenty of space for Merseyrail to shunt via the sidings at the east end of Warruington Central. It's the trains from Manchester reversing at Warrington Central that are more likely to get in the way.

I think realistically 4tph Merseyrail stoppers would be unsustainable, but 2tph turning at South Parkway or Hunts Cross and 2tph through to Warrington would be fine. Really getting the crayons out, have those 2tph extended from Hunts Cross to Gateacre or even Broad Green/Alder Hey.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The CLC isn't that bad

It absolutely is. The punctuality is appalling, largely due to the Norwich service entering with varying random amounts of delay and requiring long dwells due to overcrowding.

Merseyrail should under no circumstances integrate (other than incidentally) with anything that involves Castlefield, in any case.

That said, if the Fiddlers Ferry Northern Powerhouse Rail line goes ahead the "buffer stops" solution would be entirely workable as that would give another fast Manchester-(Widnes)-Warrington-Liverpool route.

 

[AlastairFraser]

What is the business case for the outer circle line? Orbital Metrolink lines in Manchester have been proposed and dropped due to insufficient demand. What is the market size for journeys like Gatacre to Aintree? Why couldn't they be adequately served by buses? Gatacre to Hunts Cross extension would overwhelmingly be used for journeys to and from the city centre. People living in Childwall or West Derby are more likely to take the bus to the city centre than do a big loop by train

1) The orbital road network in the Liverpool area is mostly external to the conurbation (e.g. the M57), so any bus that does not follow a city centre - suburb/town corridor in Liverpool will have an unpalatable average journey time.
In addition, there is also a significant problem with ASB on buses across Merseyside, while Merseyrail has permanently staffed stations (and the ability to install ticket barriers), which is a significant help with deterring ASB.

2) There would be an interchange with the City Line at Broad Green (enabling quick transit into the city) and the extension would provide a new link to Liverpool South Parkway for services to Runcorn, Crewe and beyond.
This would help passengers from large swathes of north/east Liverpool, Sefton and Knowsley avoid Lime St and Central, which both have significant issues with overcrowding in your average peak.
You've also got events at Aintree Racecourse, Everton's new stadium at Bramley Moore Dock (change at Aintree and a reasonable walk from Sandhills) and Anfield, which would be a 5 min bus ride from a reopened station in Norris Green.

Absolutely, 100% not. From experience the CLC is one of the most horrendously unpunctual lines in the country. Importing that onto Merseyrail would be disastrous.

The only way Merseyrail should ever go onto the CLC is either if it was 4-tracked or there were buffer stops at Warrington.

Easy enough solution to that! Split the Norwich... (I can hear the howls of don't start another discussion on that).

 

[Djgr]

My take is that nothing will happen outside of Liverpool City Region without somebody else taking money from their pockets. Nobody has the energy to change local government boundaries and we can argue until the cows come home whether Ellesmere Port is more Wirral than Cheshire.

Given the increasingly anti-rail stance at Westminster and the relative willingness of the Welsh government to actually do stuff they promise, I would have to go Bidston-Wrexham.

Of course 2024 may see the end of Sunak and his legion of Britain breakers. But let's not jinx this!

 

[RichardAsh1981]

It is technically possible, sure, but it would allow Merseyrail to acquire delays from Castlefield and the CLC. Merseyrail would never go for it. There is a reason they have, everywhere, enforced operational isolation from non Merseyrail services to the greatest degree possible. Does Merseyrail share a platform with non Merseyrail services anywhere else?

(EDIT: Platform 2 at Bidston with one train per hour from the Borderlands line, which is itself essentially totally self contained. I'm not aware of anywhere else)

Platform 7 at Chester (the only electrified platform) is used for non-Merseyrail services, certainly in the evenings once there are only 2tph. Mostly North Wales services which run through 7b (normal Merseyrail) to reach 7a (there is no mid-platform turnout in platform 7, unlike platform 3). This is part of why extra platforms at Chester are regularly talked about however.

 

[Jack Hay]

It might depend on how good the bus service quality gets under regulation, but plenty of people would do that. Going from Ormskirk to Southport via Sandhills despite a faster bus service is not at all an unusual thing to do, for example. Buses are still very much looked down upon.



Absolutely, 100% not. From experience the CLC is one of the most horrendously unpunctual lines in the country. Importing that onto Merseyrail would be disastrous.

The only way Merseyrail should ever go onto the CLC is either if it was 4-tracked or there were buffer stops at Warrington.

Merseyrail is already on the CLC line, at Hunts Cross, where every Merseyrail train in both directions crosses both CLC tracks thanks to an absurd track layout. An extension along the CLC would actually eliminate the crossing movement westbound!

My take is that nothing will happen outside of Liverpool City Region without somebody else taking money from their pockets. Nobody has the energy to change local government boundaries and we can argue until the cows come home whether Ellesmere Port is more Wirral than Cheshire.

Given the increasingly anti-rail stance at Westminster and the relative willingness of the Welsh government to actually do stuff they promise, I would have to go Bidston-Wrexham.

Of course 2024 may see the end of Sunak and his legion of Britain breakers. But let's not jinx this!

2024 may well see the end of Sunak but who knows what the Labour party's stance on rail is?

 

[CaramellDansen]

Well (reaches for crayons) build an extension from Parkway to the airport and Speke…….

I'm in full agreement. This seems like the most obvious connection to me. Firstly, a line from Lime Street to Speke (or a Halewood South station near the new housing developments) using the slow lanes via South Parkway. Reinstate the following station on the slow lanes: Wavertree, Sefton Park, (Mossley Hill's abandoned/unused platforms, West Allerton's abandoned/unused platforms, Liverpool South Parkways underused platforms), Speke, optionally a new station near Old Hutte Lane in Halewood. Then, a southward curve to the east of the airport. Likely going underground, to get further into the airport and to avoid OLE-plane collisions.

The overhead lines are already there. The tracks are basically unused between Wavertree and South Parkway, and used rarely enough to probably get a decent (2tph?) service down there during the day. The lanes are dedicated, so fast trains can pass. This seems like a no-brainer to me, especially given what a farce calling South Parkway an "airport connection" is.

The trains running on this new Airport line could transition (given a short additional distance of OLE between South Parkway and Hunts Cross) to running on the Southport line, since neither line needs batteries.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Merseyrail is already on the CLC line, at Hunts Cross, where every Merseyrail train in both directions crosses both CLC tracks thanks to an absurd track layout. An extension along the CLC would actually eliminate the crossing movement westbound!

It's only incidental compared to actually running a significant distance on them, though.

 

[CaramellDansen]

What is the business case for the outer circle line?

The business case is getting suburban coverage across the east of Liverpool to get people out of cars and relying on the railway, helping stave off the coming climate crisis and, you know, not going extinct.

It's a tragedy these social services are strangled by "needing" to make a profit, meanwhile the roads don't. We're all shocked when America's healthcare social services are ran for profit, but don't extend that shock to our own privatised transit social services, despite transit being a massive social, economic and health barrier. Given the oil and automotive industries together have more "democratic will" ($$$) than our entire country, I think our capitalist masters will continue down Beeching's ideological path as long as we continue to let them.

 

[Bletchleyite]

The business case is getting suburban coverage across the east of Liverpool to get people out of cars and relying on the railway, helping stave off the coming climate crisis and, you know, not going extinct.

It's a tragedy these social services are strangled by "needing" to make a profit, meanwhile the roads don't. We're all shocked when America's healthcare social services are ran for profit, but don't extend that shock to our own privatised transit social services, despite transit being a massive social, economic and health barrier. Given the oil and automotive industries together have more "democratic will" ($$$) than our entire country, I think our capitalist masters will continue down Beeching's ideological path as long as we continue to let them.

I don't think one could accuse anyone of a desire for Merseyrail to run at a profit, given that when it was a franchised TOC it had the second highest per passenger mile subsidy of the whole national network (first was Island Line).

 

[CaramellDansen]

I don't think one could accuse anyone of a desire for Merseyrail to run at a profit, given that when it was a franchised TOC it had the second highest per passenger mile subsidy of the whole national network (first was Island Line).

I don't see your point. You can do both. Oil and cars are some of the most profitable ventures out there, yet still receive incredible subsidies.

Regardless, I was referring to national policy as a whole, especially in regards to investment (or rather de-investment) and new infrastructure. It's telling, in fact, that we refer to a "business case" instead of, say, a "social case".

 

[Bletchleyite]

I don't see your point.

My point is that Merseyrail is subsidised to the absolute hilt and thus you can't make allegations (veiled or otherwise!) that it's run as a for profit enterprise.

(Well, the TOC itself is, but only because of the subsidy)

 

[CaramellDansen]

My point is that Merseyrail is subsidised to the absolute hilt and thus you can't make allegations (veiled or otherwise!) that it's run as a for profit enterprise.

(Well, the TOC itself is, but only because of the subsidy)

If you say so. I'm not here for an argument.

 

[Meerkat]

The business case is getting suburban coverage across the east of Liverpool to get people out of cars and relying on the railway, helping stave off the coming climate crisis and, you know, not going extinct.

Would the line compete with buses in generalised time to get where they want? It’s a long way round from the city centre.

I'm in full agreement. This seems like the most obvious connection to me. Firstly, a line from Lime Street to Speke (or a Halewood South station near the new housing developments) using the slow lanes via South Parkway. Reinstate the following station on the slow lanes: Wavertree, Sefton Park, (Mossley Hill's abandoned/unused platforms, West Allerton's abandoned/unused platforms, Liverpool South Parkways underused platforms), Speke, optionally a new station near Old Hutte Lane in Halewood. Then, a southward curve to the east of the airport. Likely going underground, to get further into the airport and to avoid OLE-plane collisions.

The overhead lines are already there. The tracks are basically unused between Wavertree and South Parkway, and used rarely enough to probably get a decent (2tph?) service down there during the day. The lanes are dedicated, so fast trains can pass. This seems like a no-brainer to me, especially given what a farce calling South Parkway an "airport connection" is.

The trains running on this new Airport line could transition (given a short additional distance of OLE between South Parkway and Hunts Cross) to running on the Southport line, since neither line needs batteries.

I wasn’t planning on going that way.
I had a vague idea of an elevated route over the Garston triangle through the business/industrial parks, through the airport car parks then terminating to the south of central Speke.
Might need to be quite twisty requiring tram-trains of some sort.

 

[Bletchleyite]

Would the line compete with buses in generalised time to get where they want? It’s a long way round from the city centre.

I think it would. Rail is far more compelling than bus to most people - as I mentioned above, plenty of people go Ormskirk-Southport via Sandhills when there's a direct bus.

If you say so. I'm not here for an argument.

It's fairly unusual to posit a view on a discussion forum if you don't want to discuss it

 

[Bevan Price]

Personally, extending 2 of the Chester trains an hour to Crewe makes sense. The line is scheduled to be electrified with the HS2 money (I know... thats a different matter), but TfW operating a shuttle is quite a unique operation and Avanti only do a handful of Chester-Crewe/London a day and are quite sporadic.

The line is double track for its entirety and Platform 9 at Crewe is dedicated to Chester bound trains only meaning if they did use this platform, the conflicts would be minimal.

Even replacing TfW, this would be a significant boost to capacity and connectivity for both Wales and Merseyside to the rest of the country.

But extending to Crewe makes no sense with Class 777s which are limited to 70 mph.

Compulsory purchase it then

That does not come cheaply - market value still has to be paid.

 

[Jack Hay]

But extending to Crewe makes no sense with Class 777s which are limited to 70 mph.

Though the 150s for which the service is timed are limited to 75mph (and have poorer acceleration), so there's not much in it.

 

[Chester1]

The business case is getting suburban coverage across the east of Liverpool to get people out of cars and relying on the railway, helping stave off the coming climate crisis and, you know, not going extinct.

It's a tragedy these social services are strangled by "needing" to make a profit, meanwhile the roads don't. We're all shocked when America's healthcare social services are ran for profit, but don't extend that shock to our own privatised transit social services, despite transit being a massive social, economic and health barrier. Given the oil and automotive industries together have more "democratic will" ($$$) than our entire country, I think our capitalist masters will continue down Beeching's ideological path as long as we continue to let them.

Climate change doesn't justify a green light to all railway reopenings. The rather obvious public transport alternative to the loop line is buses. Its not clear why train is the right form of green transportation for the route. Orbital journeys outside of London are nearly entirely done by buses for strong economic reasons.

 

[Meerkat]

But extending to Crewe makes no sense with Class 777s which are limited to 70 mph.


That does not come cheaply - market value still has to be paid.

If it’s empty land with no development permission it won’t be expensive.