Faster timetable soon???

Very nice I stand corrected. Are they officially allowed to exceed 50 yet?

My copy of 'Supplement To Section 11 of Appendix To Rule Book: Regulations Concerning Working Of Trains Metropolitan Line (1980)' has the following general speed restrictions listed in paragraph B.1 (b):

(b) General (unless otherwise shown in (c) or (d))

A campaign website for north end of Met line now running at

www.mettimes.org

Focus is on journey times and accountability outside London.

I wonder how that website would react if residents of Northwick Park, Preston Road, Pinner et al wrote in with how their waiting times have decreased thanks to the new timetable?

Although they did run 2 cars in the past (mainly on Missenden fasts), I don't think that happens now in peaks as the demand is too great for Chiltern services from stations north of Amersham. The platforms on the Met are too short (esp Ricky) so the 2tph stoppers are limited to 5 cars. The 1tph fasts also no longer miss out Amersham.

It doesn't help that Chiltern don't have any spare units, demand on the High Wycombe line has exploded, and that the 1tph Met peak service which departs Amersham 10 mins before a Chiltern stopper is a slow, piling more people on the already overcrowded Chiltern services.



Demand for Chiltern is too great from existing stations for them to stop at Moor Park. Maybe LU could run semi fasts from Watford Junction, calling at Watford High St, Watford Hospital, Ascot Rd, Moor Park, Northwood and then Harrow on the slow lines if there is demand.

I misunderstood.

Although if you stop Chilterns at Moor Pk, you are going to get a large number of people using it to get to London. Unless you have a policy of boarding only on Aylesbury trains and alighting only on Marylebone trains (similar to Virgin services to/from Watford Jn) but you'll need a lot of staff to implement the rule, which I can't see happening.

That would be great.

At the moment, even just offering the two Chesham trains as fasts would at least give Chesham a reasonable service while Amersham has the 2 Chilterns. Leaving Chesham with no fasts and no connection to the Chilterns is disgraceful.

The effect is that people either don't travel off peak and do something else instead (that'd be me), or they drive which is clearly against LU's aims and objectives.

Of course, all the short northbound services services are first stop Amersham or Great Missenden, so don't have to have accommodation for most Met line passengers. The only short southbound service likewise being last stop Amersham. These trains all serve Aylesbury Vale Parkway, so running slight faster to/from north of Amersham makes sense.



I don't know if these numbers for platform lengths (which agree with my Quail Western Track Plans) can be trusted. All the platforms are now the same length (bar Stoke Mandeville where the up platform is a few meters shorter than the down). The car lengths are based on 'standard' 20m long vehicles and the class 165/168 are over 23m per vehicle which means you can only fit a six car formation in an 'eight-car' platform. The class 115 were less than 19.5m per vehicle.

Article on Bucks Advertiser web site:
chesham.buckinghamshireadvertiser.co.uk/2012/09/town-pleads-for-fast-trains-ag.html

That view has been expressed before, alongside similar reasoning that Herts and Bucks are 'lucky' to have an LU service. In which case, why are TfL looking to take over more rail services outside London?

If this is the way they intend to behave, why would anyone in the Home Counties want TfL overseeing their services? Fundamentally, proper arrangements for democratic accountability need to be established for such services as LU have shown themselves to be arrogant and dismissive over this issue.

More Met trains after the power, track and signalling upgrades. Faster journey times too.

Pain before the gains for the current temporary timetable.

The LO improvements show what happens under TfL control. More trains, better stations and more passengers.

I thought LU had engaged with groups at the far north of the Met. Isn't that the reason the Chesham Branch is still open.

Because experience with the London Overground shows that TfL are MUCH better at running the local services which they have taken over from a mainline operator.



And like the other routes which TfL have their eye on, there is still an alternative fast service for those in a hurry.

Six trains per hour, off-peak, from the likes of Chorleywood or Rickmansworth is a lot more than many equivalent stations get which aren't run by TfL.

Does democratic accountability include paying market rate for off-peak fast trains? Or persuading Herts and Bucks councils to subsidise such a service at the current fares?

TfL DO NOT run London Overground. London Overground is operated by LOROL, a joint venture between Arriva UK and MTR. TfL set the terms of the concession just like the DfT set the terms of every other railway franchise in England (bar Merseyrail).

Due to the very tough terms of the LO concession, there is no chance of the operation being profitable, so TfL pay LOROL a large sum of money to operate the concession. As a result the financial risk and burden of operating the railway is solely on the (London) taxpayer and not LOROL. This is very different to the franchises offered by the DfT, where a large percentage of the risk of operating the franchises is upon the private company. The DfT also do not pay private companies to operate franchises, the private companies pay the DfT to operate them.

The DfT could make franchises have tougher conditions just like TfL has with LO, and we would see significant improvements on many lines. However, this would mean significant subsidies to the national network* (like we see in Europe) and this has not been the policy of the British Government ever since the Stockton and Darlington Railway was opened back in the 1825.

If TfL do get the power to set the terms of London and South East franchises, will we see the already stretched budget of TfL (and thus the London taxpayers) paying for services 50 miles out of London? I doubt it, so even if TfL set the terms of commuter franchises, we will have more of the current situation, where operators are profitable and pay TfL and not the application of the LO model.

*The current subsidies mainly go to Network Rail. For the last two years TOCs paid more to the DfT than they received.