Paddington crossover

It is used quite often during signal failures, as the next SB x-over is quite a distance away at Piccadilly Circus. I travelled through the x-over when trains were reversing SB-NB at Paddington after the failed bombing attempts with the Bakerloo being suspended south of Paddington.

Even more useful now the Piccadilly crossover is "temporarily" out of comission. With the Metronet fiasco going on it's anyone's guess when that'll get sorted now.

With no working reversing points between Paddington and Lambeth North it doesn't give the 'Loo much scope when the job goes up the wall.

When there was a shutdown at, say, Oxford Circus they could run Elephant - Piccadilly and Queens Park - Paddington shuttles. Now the whole job goes pear-shaped with no service south of Paddington, which is obviously the busiest section of the line.

Of course you could run Elephant - Lambeth shuttles but i've never known them to bother. There would be no point anyway as it's only one stop and there are no interchanges at Lambeth. It also involves a long shunt (as do all north to south Bakerloo moves in the pipe) which holds things up a little as innocentabroad rightly suggests.

Very simple line though, the Bakerloo.

Yep. Lambeth is exactly the same layout as the Elephant except with an additional route into London Road depot. Southbound trains departing Waterloo can be signalled into either SB or NB platforms at Lambeth or the yard. Additionally trains doing the long shunt on the NB road can be signalled back south to Elephant or into the yard. Hence late at night some trains are described Waterloo and go straight in the depot and others have to shunt back empty from Elephant via Lambeth limit of shunt board.

Yes, as did Edgware Road.

Somewhere I have a photo taken in the crossover cavern at Marylebone (I think).

The original Piccadilly Circus scissors crossover was famous, and photos also appeared in period (i.e. old) books. I can remember when they took out the EB/SB > WB/NB connection. It surely needs to be reinstated as asap?

I agree, in that I cannot ever see the scissors being reinstated...I do hope that the SB>NB is put back into operation though. I do remember it being used for Engineer's trains but have never seen it used in passenger service in either direction.

Thanks to you all for your replies.

I'd clean forgotten that there might be a need for a Queen's Park to Paddington shuttle - if I never travel north of Paddington why should anyone else

All south to north Bakerloo emergency reversers (lambeth, picc, paddington) in the SB platform need to stop beyond the monitors in order for the north end cab to be in the right place for the signal and monitors to run back north. if you look closely at any of these locations you will see another stopping mark provided in the 4ft beyond the normal through running one. there are also little squares (quite big at padd) that illuminate with the instruction to "reverse". and of course the "shunt ahead" or "shunt reverse" lights at the north end of the northbound platforms for trains running back south. although in practice the driver would likely have been told before they got there. Picc also has (or did have) a "rear cab clear" light at the north end of the southbound platform from the days of the shutdown for tunnel strengthening in the 90's when stepbacks took place there.

while i'm off on one, there used to be "depot" lights at Elephant northbound headwall for the london road stablers. i'm assuming they are still there too.

It may be best to reserve judgement on what went wrong there. There were a number of things which did (or may have) happened and it's not yet clear which signal tripped him.