New Fotopic site - vintage railway images

Only trying to help, John.

And IMHO it *ought* to have been closed in 1960s when taken alongside other lines through nowhere were also closed.

Freight traffic that is using the route today is in many ways artificial - these long haul coal imports from Ayr mines and Clyde ports really ought to be electrically hauled via Glasgow Edinburgh and York thence only diesel worked for as short as possible. Yes I know theres no electric locos and the ECML probably can't take it - but it still makes diesel over S&C artificial.

And keeping the S&C as a diversionary route after 1974 I've never accepted as being valid. That was too much of opertors having got used to doing it during the electrification works. Money would have been better spent on proper reversable working and facing and training crossovers at intervals for single line working when appropriate, and diverting money spent on S&C to sorting out the Maryport and Carlisle to a proper loading guage for a diversionary route when both WCML tracks blocked.

-- Nick

"Tony Polson" wrote

That may be, but I think it would be extremely difficult to find alternative routes for the significant number of Anglo-Scottish coal trains which use the line.

John.

See what I just posted in another branch.

They should go electrically via ECML. Theres more than enough 92s in store. That the OLE can't deal with this is a nonsense part of the way railways have been planned. The coal traffic level would more than justify a power supply upgrade.

-- Nick

You're right, but that does not change the economics. The only lines that cover their costs are those that carry relatively large numbers of passenger trains.

Well said, Nick. The only reason the S&C did not close was sentiment. Exactly the same applies to the Heart of Wales line being discussed in another thread.

Does the ECML have suitable paths available for slow coal trains? If it's such a better route, why is it not used with diesel traction?

Ian

"Tony Polson" wrote

I can't argue the logic of what you say, but imagine the real cost of diverting that traffic to the roads.

John.

"D7666" wrote

And where are the paths for relatively slow moving freights going to come from; can you imagine them trying to fit them in between all the Pendolinos and Voyagers?

John.

Real cost? What about the real cost of carrying it on rail?

Of course I accept that putting the imported coal traffic on the roads would not make any sense, but you should accept that it is heavily subsidised on rail, because freight access charges are set very low.

Taking this a stage further, the taxpayer is therefore subsidising the cost of electricity generation using coal, which is the higest CO2 emitter of all the fuels used to generate power. Where is the sense in that?

The subsidy also helps imported coal compete against coal mined in Britain. Where is the sense in that?

There are none on the ECML.

-- Nick

"Tony Polson" wrote

I wouldn't dispute that, but to shift all the rail borne freight to the roads would have a financial impact too.

There's no sense in any of it. The environmental cost of recycling refuse is probably higher than just dumping it in holes in the ground, so which is worse? I really don't know, but I did hear that it's more enviromentally friendly to use disposable nappies that to use energy to clean re-usable ones!

Agreed, but our mining industry is all but decimated thanks to the combined efforts of Thatcher and Scargill.

John.

Joking aside, you're all missing the general point.

The money that was wasted in keeping the S&C open through nowhere ought to have been better spent on a proper ECML and WCML with sufficient OLE and loops and crossvers and reverible signalling so such a mix of faster passegner and slower freight could be handled.

-- Nick

Roads are heavily subsidized by motorists - roads have to be built 16 times stronger for maximum axleweight trucks compared to the normal car. You and I pay that extra factor of sixteen even though we get no advantage at all from it.

Remove the trucks and you will have 8 times the oil available that railways need to power Diesel locos for the same work. Use that same oil to generate electricity and they will use half that i/8th.

Save the coal for when the oil runs out.

And IMHO it should never have been built - let's not forget that the line was proposed as a bargaining tool, to get the LNWR to play ball about services via Ingleton and Low Gill. The LNWR did, in fact, agree, but too late - Parliament refused to allow the Midland to abandon its powers to build, so they had to construct the line.

Quite. If the line hadn't been built then the WCML between Low Gill and Carlisle would have evolved to handle the traffic.

Doesn't work for existing pits. They have to be worked or else they flood and can never be reopened no matter how valuable the coal becomes in later years.

(kim)

Which was one of the tragic legacies of the Thatcher era - we had more than 300 years worth of known coal reserves that she lost for the future.

Pendolinos run on the ECML between Edinburgh and Haymarket.

Peter

If you want to be sensible about minimising environmental impact / moving the loads in the most efficient manner then that coal should be going directly to the east coast ports by sea, then it's a short rail haul to the power stations. Unloading the coal in Ayrshire and hauling it overland is - frankly - bonkers. Particularly when you're beating the infrastructure to death doing it that way.