East West Rail - EXPLAINED (2022 Update)

[@Hession0Drasha]

Should be fully electrified, and line from oxford to reading to basingstoke to southampton, should also be fully electrified. It's madness that the uk's second largest port is not connected properly to it's main north south rail corridor. Bypassing london for this is a must. Maybe even extend that to portsmouth and add 2 or 3 new stations, to allow greater development and integration of porthampton.

[@ds1868]

Electrification would be a good idea and I agree on the other points you suggest as well However the project will be over budget as it is (due mainly to inflation) so there isn't the money. I do hope they improve on the proposed use of second hand DMU's. That really is unacceptable.

[@frankparsons1629]

Excellent. The most concise explanation I've yet seen regarding the East West Railway Connection between Oxford & Cambridge, thence to the port of Ipswich. Great maps too.

[@amskaya]

As well as linking Oxford and Cambridge, it will enable through trains from Bristol to Norwich, from South-West England to East Anglia.

[@grassytramtracks]

Living in Bath that would be nice!

[@JB-ek4yx]

I travelled most of the line at least 30 years ago, not on service trains though, so it'll be good to do the Bedford to Cambridge bit to finish it!

[@MikeWillSee]

3:20 1 million seems very cheap. Is it possible you meant to say billion instead? Anyway great video, I love following the progress of this line and can't wait to see any future developments it may have!

[@fToo]

Yes, @3:28 shows the total of 1,084,726,000 gbp

[@frankcorr6566]

Thanks for that. I needed some clarity and this video did just that.

[@L.A.T.E.84]

To be honest here, this rail is existing because of freight. Having to remove the barrier and congestion of London, frees freight to a whole new level. Using the westbound and eastbound junctions at Didcot to connect it to the GWR mainline and then having a direct connection to the WCML is much better. It should be electrified which I agree with a lot of people as I also feel this is an oversight by the project team. The removal of the link to Aylesbury is idiotic. The connection between the route and the town is not that far.

[@stevieinselby]

Thoughts on EW Rail: 🚆 It's a good scheme, we need to get on with it. 🚆 Very short-sighted that it isn't being electrified from the start. 🚆 Eastern leg is going to be dragged out for years and cost millions of pounds more than it needs to because of tedious nimbies objecting to everything. 🚆 No need for an interchange with HS2, for people coming from Oxford or Milton Keynes it would be quicker to use GWR, Avanti or XC to London or Birmingham and change there for onward travel if heading further north. Not worth the disruption to HS2 to add an extra stop for the very small number of people who would find it a better option.

[@mastertrams]

What is it with major UK rail projects having issues with their Eastern leg?

[@AlexanderWright1]

"Eastern leg is going to be dragged out for years and cost millions of pounds more than it needs to because of tedious nimbies objecting to everything." Funnily enough, this did not seem to be a problem when HS2 was planned. They just drew a line, and the bulldozers then moved in.

[@stevieinselby]

@@AlexanderWright1 HS2 has already been heavily delayed and costs ballooned because of nimby action.

[@andrewmagnusthegreatesttra1230]

Great upload mate

[@rolandharmer6402]

A good overview. Looking at the map for stage 3 - would be simpler to go east north east from Cambourne to the old St Ives branch and then run alongside the busway into Cambridge? Heading SE to the Cambridge - Royston line just to call at Cambridge South seems a bit perverse.

[@sihollett]

Ever since the beginning, the aspiration has been to lessen the isolation of East Anglia. A northern approach makes trains from Oxford (and west of there) to Ipswich and Norwich need a reverse. I also believe there's not the alignment width to have both busway and railway alongside each other inside the urban area.

[@OhSome1HasThisName]

​@@sihollett yeah the alignment is fairly tight

[@stevieinselby]

The problem with that plan is that there's a busway there - so unless the scheme also involved conversion of the busway to rail then there's no room to run a double track railway alongside the busway. But converting the busway to rail would add a significant cost, and would mean that the route served St Ives and central Cambridge less well, unless it used tram-trains with on-street running around St Ives and through Cambridge, which would be even more expensive!

[@adamwakefield2461]

So why was the plan introduced by Ipswich Council? Missed that explanation

[@fToo]

@4:19 shows the route continuing from Cambridge to Ipswich

[@sihollett]

There was even a study that looked at the idea of building an entirely new line from Cambridge to the GEML near Stowmarket (where there would be a full junction, rerouting fast Cambridge-Norwich trains away from Ely, as well as serving Ipswich with through trains to Oxford/Bristol) as a further phase just to please Suffolk. Needless to say, upgrades of the existing line (and keeping the town centre stations at Newmarket and Bury on the regional/interregional service, rather than using parkway stations and having the centres only served by local services) faired a lot better.

[@Eurobazz]

@@fToo Indeed but he said he was going to explain why. We can only assume it has something to do with freight traffic from Felixstowe but this is outside Ipswich's boundary so please tell us why it was proposed by Ipswich Borough Council.

[@timempson2146]

I don't think Milton Keynes and Bletchley are in Peterborough City Council! Apart from that glaring error good update.

[@crossleydd42]

And Huntingdonshire hasn't existed since the 1970s. And it's not East GrinDstead!

[@DavidShepheard]

It's crazy that the current plans for East West Rail, are for it to be built as a non-electrified railway. Electrification was invented two centuries ago. Electric trains have better acceleration. And, because they don't need to carry a lot of diesel, they have more room for passengers, and the stations and areas around the railway line don't get polluted. So there is a better customer experience for the passengers and for the people living along the line. And one train per hour is a bit of a joke, if you actually want to create modal shift away from cars. If anyone misses their train, the train gets cancelled or the train is full, it's going to mean commuters will be an entire hour late for work. And, if they do that on a regular basis, they could get the sack. So, creating a service pattern like that, is going to put a lot of pressure on anyone on the line, who is dependent on the service. Four trains per hour, like London Overground's service pattern, really needs to be a bare minimum for any new railway lines in populated areas of the country. Frequency is freedom and we need to have good frequency outside of the South East. It's far easier for passengers to get an earlier train, if they only have to get up 15 minutes earlier. And if someone is 15 minutes late, that causes a lot less pressure on other people. People choose cars, as they believe that allows them the most flexibility with travel times. So railways really do need to provide as much freedom as possible, to compete with that. If the spur services make it impossible for them to provide four trains per hour, over the main route, they should instead put in extra platforms, and make those spurs have separate shuttle services to the interchange stations (except maybe on Sundays, when the line drops to two trains per hour). But electrification is the key thing here, as the better acceleration it provides reduces the travel time and allows extra trains to be squeezed onto routes. There really is no excuse for East West Rail to be built without electrification, because we are going to need to electrify the line in the future and that means we will create a passenger base and then expose those passengers to large amounts of engineering works, that could be done now, when nobody is using the line yet. We also need to get rail freight electrified, and East West Rail could be a good way to get freight around London, without trains having to come in and go back out.

[@stevieinselby]

According to the diagram on Wikipedia, the proposed service is: 2tph Oxford to Cambridge 2tph Oxford to Milton Keynes 2tph Bletchley to Cambridge 1tph Aylesbury to Milton Keynes alongside the existing 2tph Oxford to Bicester and London 1tph Bletchley to Bedford stopper So apart from the Aylesbury spur, all of the route will have at least 4tph along it.

[@johnclarke2997]

Diminishing returns on electric lines. OHV costs more than running a diesel engine for the number of services, that was always the problem going back to BR owning the lines. Anyway modern DEMUs meet more than meet the required emissions standard for the future. Remember OHV requires substations, electrical switch gear, supporting structures and miles of OH steel wire in place. Also electricians trained on maintenance of the OHV and emergency callout. Difficult for even the mainlines like ECML and WCML.

[@TheRip72]

@@johnclarke2997 I think you mean OLE, not OHV. Diesel is not a fuel for the future. Anything built now needs to be more flexible than that. DMUs only meet current emission standards. They are continually changing so it is impossible to claim they "meet more than meet the required emissions standard for the future". I hope you are aware that the UK companies cannot buy any new diesel locos right now because no available power units meet emission regs. Their dodge is to have old ones re-built because these are allowed to have dirtier power units. It is more efficient to generate electricity in huge power stations, even after accounting for distribution losses. It does not matter where or how the electricity is generated either; It could just as easily be from a coal fired power station or a wind farm.

[@themanformerlyknownascomme777]

@@TheRip72 clearly you've never heard of biodiesels (or even hydrogen locomotives), besides not to mention that when you actually factor in how much cargo can be hauled even these "dirty" diesels (and even god damn coal-burning steam engines) are pretty eco friendly (one class 66 hauling a heavy stone train certainly gives off less emissions than the 100s of trucks you would need to do haul the same amount)

[@untensil]

I thought the Aylesbury spur had been postponed indefinitely!

[@malcolmsmith4603]

I wish you were wrong but sadly you're right

[@JoeyLovesTrains]

Oh lord, I thought this was for the Massachusetts east west rail project lol. I didn’t think they planned on linking Oxford and Cambridge here in Massachusetts lol

[@malcolmsmith4603]

Although the Aylesbury bit has been abandoned

[@bringingverneyjunctionback9642]

Isn’t Aylesbury link in doubt at the moment, even though in the original scope?

[@Andrewjg_89]

I do hope that the missing link to Aylesbury Vale Parkway is being added.

[@ds1868]

@@Andrewjg_89 no its been axed. Shame really.

[@LostsTVandRadio]

With Bedford, Bletchley and MK all 25kv overhead electrified, and with Oxford set to join them eventually (once the new track and platform layout has been finished) I'm wondering whether the next generation of EMU/Battery trains could deliver a reliable service pattern over East West Rail without the need for wholesale electrification. It would of course depend on trains' battery capacity (for achievable range), charging rates and time spent under the wires but surely it's not beyond the realms of possibility in the future.

[@joginns778]

Winslow station this line isn't even open yet and the graffiti thug's have started, the new footbridge west of the station that leads to cemetery, graffiti on it already,let's hope the station is manned if not it should have camera's watching 24 Hours a day let's hope they catch these thug's and make them pay for the cleaning of what they have done and a police record,

[@themanformerlyknownascomme777]

battery trains are incredibly stupid ideas. If it was feasible it would have been done long ago. hydrogen is a much more feasible option.

[@LostsTVandRadio]

Battery trains have been around for decades on different continents, with differing levels of success. Mind you, I really like the idea of hydrogen.@@themanformerlyknownascomme777

[@davidwho1011]

I love Ashley, but there are some big errors in this update. Plus, the update needs an update, aha. So here we go: 1. “Wimslow” is actually Winslow. 2. The Aylesbury spur is no longer happening. No idea why. 3. Milton Keynes and Bletchley are part of Milton Keynes Council. MK was recently given city status, oh yes. 4. There is strong local opposition to East-West Rail by the residents between Bedford and Cambridge, so much so that it would be politically very difficult to complete Phase 3. (Then again, there is HS2.) 5. The point where East-West Rail crosses over HS2 is reportedly… problematic, so I was told. 6. All the level crossings between Bletchley and Bedford are apparently a bit of a pain to re-do. 7. Most of Bletchley-Bedford is already double-tracked, except for the section through Fenny Stratford, because of the road bridge for Watling Street. It can be fixed, but why bother for such a short stretch of track. 8. Vivarail, who own the current Bletchley-Bedford stock, have gone into administration. This means that trains on Bletchley-Bedford are suspended until further notice. As for East-West Rail, all this does is limit the options of stock it can use. However, it’s also an opportunity to start on Phase 2 earlier than planned, if the budget allows.

[@ds1868]

Agreed. The project between Bletchley and Bedford is quite big. Everything will replaced, with only six stations. Bedford station will be completely rebuilt. Shame about the current service though.

[@marcelwiszowaty1751]

Didn't know about Vivarail going I to administration... how recently did this happen?

[@iainsear7830]

You are right on the Aylesbury link, its still in their longer term goals, I think they didn't want to impact HS2 which was using the track for waste removal and I believe they literally just pulled it up very recently (cant recall where I read that)... Obviously there is no consideration that very expensive relaying and reengineering of track will mean big contracts going to those same engineering companies... call my cynical but we we have gone from a refurb of a largely existing line in the 90s to a multi billion pound contract to build something that is disappointing. They should have either built a new line, electrified/125 or refurbed the existing line on a budget with lower speeds and less ambition. The current plans are better than nothing but seem very expensive for the benefit on offer. The next phase will not be popular given the impact on the existing line/stations so I'm hopeful but not confident it will get built.

[@ds1868]

@@iainsear7830 I agree, the whole project does look strange, except for the big issue of freight. That is now one of the big reasons for the project now that the 'Cambridge Arc' has been dropped. Freight trains from the North Sea ports are diesel, once you tie this in with EWR it begins to make some sense.

[@fToo]

What happened to the original line from Bedford to Cambridge - can they not use at least some of it ?

[@sihollett]

It's been built on in a few places and - as both the currently under-construction section, and the Met Line Extension found out (on more recently abandoned track) - the preexisting earthworks and the like are more in the way than useful as they aren't fit for reuse.

[@andrewreynolds4949]

People are complaining about the railway not being electrified, but honestly with most sections of the project now being uncertain, that would probably sink the initial service business case. It’s probably never going to happen before Oxford is electrified, which is still a ways off. I rather doubt the 3rd section actually being built anytime in the foreseeable future. It’s really expensive in a time when many other projects are being cut back, and there’s a lot of local opposition.

[@Eurobazz]

You didn't mention why Ipswich Borough Council initiated it.

[@AlexanderWright1]

As an Aylesbury resident, I can say we are really keen an a rail link north, rather than having to travel through London, or a slow infrequent change at Princes Risborough. The whole link is a much better use of money than the London to Birmingham HS2 link, a line with no stops, only termini.

[@chrisgooding4395]

i know i am writing this a little late.. i would like to see a phase 4a and 4b... let me explain 4a >>>> Once go ahead of the route to link Bedford to Cambridge is announced planning should go in to reinstate Wisbech station to Cambridge.. fully Duelled and Electrified.. yes i know a planned freight track from March does have the go ahead part of the way but just extend to Wisbech. fully duel line to Kings Lynn single track is already electrified. fully duel line to Ipswich parts are single. via Bury St Edmunds, This could be Electrified at a later date if the Varsity line does get electrified . 4b >>>> This when you think about it makes sense .. reinstate an old Line that ran from Cambridge to Haverhill then onto Sudbury to Colchester.. Mainly freight to Harwich Via Ely the North and Midlands with x-country services from said north or midlands going to places like Clacton on sea. Haverhill needs a rail link .. all you need to do is move Sudbury station 50 metres and upgrade the the line from Sudbury to Colchester. love to hear your thoughts thank you.

[@jckblck]

0:45 wasn't aware MK was now Peterborough 😬

[@memofromessex]

If this was run by Network Rail (rather than a quango) it wouldn't have left Oxford by now. I am contractors so I move around a lot - and NWR is easily the worst run organisation (private, government and NGO) I have worked. So bureaucratic and top-heavy it beggars belief. They honestly exasperated me whilst I worked there, every tiny decision needed several meetings to be made and involved more managers than you can possibly imagine. And all the junior staff did all the work because all the seniors were too busy having meetings about meetings to prepare for meetings for meetings. There is a real culture of doing as much as possible to do as little as possible.

[@johnclarke2997]

Seems to be the normal with any state own business these days. I always recall the nonsense of BR justifying not to rebuilding the Brighton to Bedford line, yet they owned the trackbed and still wanted the public to pay more to put the line and signalling in place.

[@memofromessex]

@@johnclarke2997 I've worked for a few government-owned business, I shalln't name them, but they were inefficient but no less inefficient then a few super global corps I have worked for.

[@mikepowell2776]

Forgive a naive question but how does lifting the line between Quainton Road and Calvert help this development?

[@philipgibbard304]

Interesting presentation, thank you, but no electrification? That's ridiculous.

[@Andrewjg_89]

Electrification on the new East West Rail link is possible. But I don't think it wouldn't happen.

[@TheRip72]

The government are trying to force us to go electric with road vehicles, so building a new line which is diesel only is ridiculous & hypocritical.

[@philipgibbard304]

@@TheRip72 Agreed 100%

[@GustavSvard]

My opinions on it? So much money being spent on car infrastructure really ought to be spent on rail infrastructure instead. Pretty much all of it, really. Which would enable this to be one project (built in stages, sure, but all in one go one after the other) with all double track, all electrified, all with non-flat junctions. etc.

[@neilboulton9813]

Just listened to “everybody out” Mick Lynch on 5 Live. So trains are great until the unions and their antiquated working practices brings everything to a complete standstill. Then apart from climate protesters you at least don’t have to worry about anything other than congestion stopping you actually getting to where you want to go.

[@GustavSvard]

@@neilboulton9813 You're not making any sense. Unions? lol! Unions is how we all got 2-day weekends, how we're not all dying from easily preventable accidents at work, etc etc. Read up a bit. also: what do they have to do with railways? Tory/ukip car enthusiast spotted, methinks.

[@neilboulton9813]

I think you are one who needs to ‘read-up’ as the fool who doesn’t realise the RMT union is currently undertaking industrial action in the UK. This closing the railway down for days on end and causing misery to thousands and will impact on all range of other businesses over the festive period. You are clearly a left wing uneducated member of the wokerati, if your penchant is to trade unsubstantiated insults on KZbin. All the best Gustav!

[@noeldunford4955]

Oxford to Cambridge should never had closed in the first place

[@scottpeacock5492]

You can blame that on Labour Transport Minister Barbara Castle, Richard Beeching wanted the line to stay open. Now we have moaning old nimbys from Cherry Hinton in Cambridge wanting a review of the final section of the line.

[@JohnSmith-bx8zb]

Pity they don’t seem to want to connect North and South Wales via Aberystwyth, the trackbed still exists and such a line would link all the universities of Wales!!!!

[@andrewjames3908]

thats becasue the Welsh Gov only cares about South Wales

[@grassytramtracks]

Agreed, it seems to abrupt how the line just stops at Carmarthen and leaves Wales so badly connected

[@stewartellinson8846]

EW rail is a really good ide abut there's likely to be significant opposition, especially East of Bedford where it doesn't use the original alignment. However, with the imminent demise of the personal vehicle as a mode of transport, any and all rail development is to be applauded.

[@grassytramtracks]

There's always resistance to anything and you can't really call yourself an environmentalist for opposing this sorely needed connection

[@OhSome1HasThisName]

I understand why they re-used the old route via Winslow from Oxford to Bletchley, but in an ideal world they would have used a new alignment via Buckingham - much larger town with a university - rather than Winslow

[@bringingverneyjunctionback9642]

They’ve given Buckingham a cycle path all the way to Winslow station to make up for that 😜

[@OhSome1HasThisName]

​@@bringingverneyjunctionback9642 ahaha bet that is well paved, well lit, and segregated from cars the entire way

[@bringingverneyjunctionback9642]

@@OhSome1HasThisName 2 out of 3 😄 Not lit, but fully surfaced alongside main road and separate from road. It just needs maintenance as usual

[@JKK_85]

There's an old trackbed running from Verney Junction up to Buckingham that could be used for a branch line in the future.

[@peteregan3862]

Main thing is to get the railway operating, they advocate for service improvements with route changes.

[@CullenRick]

Should have been rebuilt in the 1990s, so ought to be done as soon as possible now. The NIMBY brigade will delay the third section for decades, as usual. The Aylsbury Spur and an interchange station with HS2 ought to be considered essential - but won't happen under the present London-centric government. In fact, I doubt that anything not started will happen unless the present lot are replaced by people who are aware that there are people living outside the M25.

[@scottpeacock5492]

The nimbys brigade are the problem around Cherry Hinton there a sign on the field no East West Rail Here, which is plan for the line to curve of Shepreth Junction a tunnel under the A428 Cambourne and St Noets.

[@CullenRick]

@@scottpeacock5492 Or they could just build a West East Rail instead? ;)

[@scottpeacock5492]

@@CullenRick That does not make sense, It's East West Rail the route has already been choosen, most of it will be in cuttings and there will be a tunnel under the A428, They need to crack on with it. 30 years of wasted time on consultation meetings and argument, The cost will continue to rise at this rate.

[@CullenRick]

@@scottpeacock5492 My flippant suggestion was that if they complain about the East West Rail link, just call it somethineg else and ignore them. I have no time for NIMBYs.

[@Andrewjg_89]

Apparently East West Rail is to inherit the Class 196 Civity from West Midlands Railway. Unless CAF does win the contract to manufacture new Class 1xx Civity DMUs for the East West Rail with possible extensions to Aylesbury from Cambridge & Bedford via Bletchley. I can't wait to see it fully open once it's completed. And with HS2 also under construction that will pass underneath the former Varsity Line that once went from Cambridge to Oxford. And with a new flyover and new high level platforms being built at Bletchley.

[@JKK_85]

They're only getting 196s temporarily.

[@stevieinselby]

Interesting - is that a sign that more of the West Midlands is going to be electrified? (And an admission that buying new diesel trains was a mistake?)

[@Andrewjg_89]

Be better off let CAF manufacture new Civity trains for East West Rail instead of temporarily using West Midlands Railway Class 196s. Or maybe Class 170 Turbostars could be ideal for the EWR. With EMR being the only one getting more Class 170s.

[@peteregan3862]

Every intercity rail line on the island of Great Britain should end on the coast, hopefully with a turn-back loop after the last station.

[@hogyndrwg6253]

They mainly do already.

[@johnclarke2997]

Cannot think of many lines which don't terminate in a city or coastal area other than Borders Railway. Intercity was never designed to be coastal but as the name suggest - inbetween cities which are not always coastal.

[@peteregan3862]

@@johnclarke2997 Yes. But terminal stations are capital and operationally inefficient, and best minimised. It is better that intercity trains stop 3 or 4 times in a large metropolitan area to minimise passenger interchanges and terminate at a siding, or an end of geography city (on the coast), rather than stop at one huge expensive terminal station.

[@teecefamilykent]

Brilliant video but huntingdonshire stopped existing years ago.

[@Andrewjg_89]

Huntingdonshire was a historic county but yes it's now part of Cambridgeshire. Peterborough could of been in Huntingdonshire and was at one point in Northamptonshire.

[@ds1868]

I believe Huntingdonshire still exists as a district council within Cambridgeshire.

[@atomiswave1971]

East west rail is a flawed design. Its minimalistic in design. There are no freight loops anywhere on the line, anything breaks down its going to stop everything. Forcing the line to use Bedford Station will mean over congesting an already congested station, eating up more of the car park to expand it which is already full at 7am. The sidings at Bedford are currently used for 12 car London trains, scrap that and use the tracks as through lines for EWR. Now London trains are restricted to 8 cars as there is nowhere else to put them 12 car trains. I preferred the other route through wixams and I would have a double tier station there for thameslink and EWR. Going north of Bedford is insane with the amount of new bridges and station rebuilds required it's nuts. Wixams is just down the and Bedford Town centre is a ghost town. Its a cheap bus ride or taxi away and Kempston folk are nearer home anyway.

[@MrGeeyess]

Winslow NOT Wimslow

[@atomiswave1971]

1 billion for phase 2 not 1 million. 1 million would get you a few feet of track.

[@JohnSmith-bx8zb]

As the push continues to short range, particulate producing, very expensive to obtain / run / repair / environmental disastrous recycling electric cars; the rail service needs to be considerably expanded with cheap fares. Or is it that the government do not want people to travel about

[@Sarahbryson321]

Ok

[@huwprice881]

It's a total no brainer, heaven knows why I has to take ten to twenty years to complete. As to the cost, how about the much vaunted HS2 dividend, and £1bn is chicken feed - this is the government that spent £34bn on a glorified excel spreadsheet during covid.

[@ds1868]

This presentation has a number of errors. The link to Aylesbury is not going ahead. The section between Bicester and Bletchley is not £1 million it's just over £1 billion. The section between Bletchley and Bedford will be a much bigger project than you suggest. You need to firm up on the details in future presentations.

[@stevencutts6314]

we need to invest heavily in rail, it should be remembered that in 13 years of government the Blair-brown administration electrified 11 miles of track and the current administration is doing better than that. However, we could still go faster. The Oxford Cambridge link isn;'t something to build some day it should be prioritised immediately.

[@duane7345]

p̷r̷o̷m̷o̷s̷m̷

[@ianhosier4042]

East west fail more like!

[@ignatikklokov]

not first

[@Andrewjg_89]

And why say that. 🥱