SSR Resignalling

You probably find these are the nearest planned weekend closures available

Probably a strange analogy but it works like a ghost train at the fair, Trains que up to enter the system and are then allowed it at a rate which allows them to run at normal speed, providing there is nothing blocking their exit at the other end there should not be hold ups once running automatically,

The approach to Baker street is certainly faster now than it used to be though the departure from Finchley Rd is much slower.

Given one of the major selling points of the move to ATO was getting more trains to move in a coordinated way over the flat junctions, to hear it's worked so poorly from the start is pretty disappointing.

Oh well, on to April.

Not that there's any actual silver lining to this Coronavirus business but I suppose if there's less footfall on the tube that will serve to mask any continuing problems for a while.

Someone on Twitter claiming that signal migration areas 10, 11 and 12 (that's everything west of Baron's Court and south of Fulham Broadway) has been cancelled as part of the emergency budget

Anyone got any more info?

I understand that there has been a descope, and there is likely to be a go-slow on other areas of the project.

I know fitment of the two D78 rail adhesion trains has been paused for the moment.

Descoping is just another way of deferring costs either temporarily or sometimes for good. In the case of 4LM, potential examples include transfer of signalling control of the Local lines from Barons Court to Ealing Broadway (currently controlled by Earls Court) and the Uxbridge Branch (currently controlled by Rayners Lane) to the Piccadilly line Griffin Rooms and abandonment of NR interfaced TBTC signalling towards Wimbledon and Richmond. Those aforementioned sections would remain manually driven islands with the rest of the railway ATO.

Your 2nd question leads on to what capacity benefits a reduced 4LM project will deliver especially when considering the costs of maintaining life expired assets beyond the next 3-5 years but of course that's not the rationale bearing in mind the current fiscal situation.

New signal equipment installed to Ealing and Moor Park already!

Are we saying “descope” (in which case the project’s dead and would need to be restarted in a new form) or “deferred” (ie there’s no money at present and it is on ice). Just curious as the descriotions describe deferred but use the language of descope.

I was talking to a couple of people heavily involved with all this a couple of weeks ago. The general view is that some level of retrenchment is inevitable due to the financial pressures, however there is an issue that the existing signalling is already on extra time, and expecting it to continue indefinitely without expenditure is not an option. The state of the cabling on the Amersham branch of the Met was mentioned as a specific issue where intervention of some sort will be required one way or other. Both people were of the opinion that ultimately resignalling will probably still happen simply because if money needs to be spent then it might as well be spend it on a final solution rather than simply buying time, though equally if the money simply isn’t there then buying time might be the only option on the table.

Ultimately we will probably see some element of deferral, combined with stripping out anything from the scope which is “nice to have” rather than a bare essential.

I too am not surprised by this, even if seems a perverse decision against a backdrop of 2 million unemployed and loads more jobs only being retained by massive borrowing to keep staff furloughed.

Inherently we are in a deep recession and yet we are still making decisions which will only exacerbate things. Rather than simply endlessly borrowing money to pay people to twiddle their thumbs, the one thing HM Treasury should actually be doing is targetting funding towards delivering improvements to national infrastructure especially projects which are stalled or shovel ready which will quickly create worthwhile jobs for some of those 2 million who now need them, so they can actually start paying taxes rather than draining the exchequer.

So yes big things like HS2 should be going ahead, but funds should be available for viable infrastructure improvement projects like completing the SSR signalling project and cracking on with signalling improvements on the Picadilly line. It would be absurd to see those nice new Picaddily Line trains arrive only to see the service collapse due to the signalling system falling to bits.

This recession is a national challenge and we really need party politics to be set aside.

That's partially Covid related - one of the trains was at Ruislip to be fitted when project work ceased. There is now a plan to arrange for the two trains to be swapped over at a suitable time to enable fitment of the the second D78 RAT first.

Stopping at SMA8 leaves all Met fast line trains stopping to change to/from tripcock opposite Preston Road platforms without assistance when trouble, so not sustainable long term. Leaving SMA12 to Wimbledon leaves Earls Court Control Centre open indefinitely just to let trains in and out of Parsons Green sidings, see districtdavesforum.co.uk/post/486329/thread and responses.

So transfer control of Parsons Green to Network Rail at Wimbledon, in a similar way to Stonebridge Park depot’s signalling or reinstate the shunters panel at PG?