Elizabeth Line (CrossRail) opened 24th May 2022

I would have liked it to be an East-West rail link through the London bottleneck, rather than a highly-expensive New Tube for London, which is what it has become.

As far as at least 99% of the nations rolling stock is concerned, there's a break of gauge at each end of the most important bit.

But as it is an ATO railway there would be a "break of system" anyway at each end "of the most important bit".

The type of rolling stock [the implied permitted 1%] is more or less immaterial. What kit with what capability is the key point.

Given the issues with getting ONE type of stock (345s) to work with all the necessary systems (i.e. those west and east of XR core as well as the core), how much would you think not so much equipping but testing and approving every other type of stock to get through there would be ? And for what purpose ? GW IET to Clacton ? Then how do you align an IET in the core with PEDs ? Never mind the dwell time! So use one type of stock, with 345 door spacing, so more or less then limited to suburban if not metro stock ....... follow this through.

Same applies to Thameslink. North-south rail link. It in practical terms a "tube for London" even if politically placed as national rail TOC and not TfL. Similar issues apply, stock, ATO, etc. OK, does not have PEDs, but unless you then start building 20 m body inter city stock with 750 V + 25 kV + diesel engines you won't get much more out of it than there is now.

A new promotion booklet seems to confirm that, on opening of the central tunnel section, services from Reading and Heathrow to Paddington mainline, and from Shenfield to Liverpool Street mainline, will be rebranded from TfL Rail to the Elizabeth line. The diagrams here seem to suggest that some services will remain terminating at Paddington mainline as well as Liverpool Street mainline. here

I think those diagrams are more a schematic representation of the railway Crossrail will operate within as opposed to specific service patterns per say (looking at Heathrow in particular). Whilst mainline platforms at Paddington will be able to accomodate limited services during unplanned disruption, all services from the West are intended to run through the core once it has been integrated .  

Got a link to that booklet?

This FoI response only just over a year back shows that on opening the central core, the current services would remain as TfL Rail. link Someone posted at the time the problem with having trains labelled for both TfL Rail and E.Line.

The booklet link is at the end of the relevant post!

OK this change may be a bit premature, but in the grand scheme of Elizabeth Line developments it seems sensible as recently the simplyflying website carried a story confirming that work had begun preparing T4 for reopening before the summer season.

I am however unsure whether the western side Elizabeth Line service pattern ever envisaged operating direct Reading to T4 services - does this not imply a reverse somewhere?

As for T4 there are loads of contracting staff already getting the terminal complex ready, after it was pretty much abandoned during Covid. I suspect a very large workforfce will be required to first clean through and prepare the terminal in that short time period, closely followed by extensive system testing and airline staff re-familiarisation before a single passenger plane can possibly use the complex. In short they are going to have to pick up the pace dramatically especially with BA struggling to sort out the current IT and baggage problems over at T5.

If trains to T4 are about to resume services that may be a welcome relief to the current airside shuttle operation and endless vans.

Wow - thanks for that link I was completely unaware that this idea existed let alone it being so far advanced that they envisage opening in just 2 years time. I guess the article is still somewhat speculative given the use of the weasel word MAY in this bit..

" The owner-operator of Heathrow is to contribute most or all of the cost, and the Development Consent Order may be granted in late 2022. "

Looking at that map it looks like the route will mostly run beside the huge reservoirs to the west of Heathrow and unlikely to require any houses to be flattened so perhaps this is why I completely missed this development especially as the locals have been so vociferous about nearby HS2 link developments.

Looking ahead I wonder if the proposed funding approach is really sensible given the costly "Heathrow" premium demanded to use the current mainline rail link into Heathrow. As they say there is no such thing as a free lunch, so whilst the Treasury/Network Rail may not be funding it immediately, the reality is that far more money will eventually be recovered with interest in years to come from the resulting higher rail fares to get to Heathrow over that new link, which may make travel by road more attractive for some.

Do we know if the plan is for this route to be primarily serviced by Elizabeth Line services - or mostly entail diverting some existing GWR services from the west heading for Paddington?

It is also not physically possible to travel by train from Reading to Gatwick without reversing (at Redhill), and yet GWR trains do it on an hourly basis!

I don't think the train paths are there to do a reverse at Hayes & Harlington without reducing service frequency, unfortunately.

I'm not 100% sure it's a supported by the infrastructure. The Up Relief is bi-directionally signalled from Southall West Junction, through Hayes platform 4, back to Heathrow Airport Junction. Both Up and Down Airport are bi-directionally signalled. However, getting from the Up Airport to Down Relief looks difficult - it looks like you'd need to do it from Hayes platform 4 again, as I'm not entirely sure if there is a crossover (shown by a dashed line, which I think means a goods line?) and in any case, the Down Relief (platform 3) is not bi-directionally signalled, only in the down direction (towards Reading).

The Down Main is bi-directional in this area, so I suppose it would be possible to reverse off Platform 1, then cross back to the reliefs at Stockley Bridge Junction.

All in all, it's a pretty disruptive idea for some quite busy railway, but it might be feasible.

As far as who would operate it, it likely would be GWR/Heathrow Express. Connecting the ends of branches isn't really TfL's job. GWR are still providing two semi-fast trains per hour off-peak from Reading to Paddington to make up for Crossrail only providing 2tph. Unless the mysterious link to Paddington High Level in the brochure actually means that TfL will be providing this?

Information from Network Rail's National Electronic Sectional Appendix. Scroll past 'How to subscribe' and you'll find PDF copies - you want Western. The track diagrams start at page 204 of the PDF; Hayes & Harlington is in section GW103 (sequence 017) and Airport Junction is section GW180.

Heathrow Connect will disappear to be replaced by the Elizabeth line trains. 

Bond Street, Tottenham Court Road, Farringdon, Liverpool Street, Whitechapel are LU stations and gate-line staff will be LU.
MTR/Elizabeth Line will have a small staff uniformed presence for dealing with detrainments and platform screen door issues.

The gateline at Farringdon Integrated Ticket Hall (Thameslink/Crossrail) is staffed by London Underground whilst the ticket office in the same area is staffed by Thameslink. London Underground remains the overall station manager which now ecompasses Crossrail in a vaugley similar arrangement to Thameslink with regards to platform supervision as detailed above.