Great Central Corridor Re-Railing new-build makes a whole load of sense - please give your support!

 

Schemes:

1. Heathrow Links:

 

Scheme	Status
a. Reading- Heathrow
b. The Windsor Link
c. Southern Heathrow Link
d. Crossrail
e. David’s Waterloo/Byfleet-Denham Link
f. Another including Heathrow-Gatwick via Guildford, Horsham and Three Bridges?

2. Key Goals of ERTA:

a. Great Central Corridor Re-Railing

b. Lands at Calvert to be made available for Aylesbury-East-West Rail link and connection

c. new route junctioning off east-west rail west of Claydon for link near to the former Great Central corridor

d. new build domestic rail for mixed traffic (passenger and freight) with Parkway Stations at east of built Brackley – Brackley East Parkway – adjacent to A43 roundabout with connecting buses to Silverstone and elsewhere.

e. new alignment to Woodford Halse area, Willoughby and hence Barby to link with either WCML/Northampton Loop into WCML Rugby and also a terminal branch to a new station ‘Rugby Central’ with road access, parking and facilities.

f. Rugby WCML – Magna Park-Lutterworth-Narborough via Midland/GC corridor amalgam for links with through running to Leicester/Nuneaton/East Midlands and vice versa/wider connectivity for more passenger and freight movements by rail.

3. GC Corridor Re-Rail:

a. Southampton/Bristol-Oxford-Leicester/East Midlands linkages. Quicker than via Bedford for example. Relief to existing north-south radial main lines and decluttering M1 and associated trunk roads networks and urban interfaces.

b. WCML/M1 modal shift/relief/capacity and enabling more.

c. MK Central is inadequate as per capacity issues and accommodation between Bletchley-Northampton and Rugby even with HS2 and/or modal shift from roads to rail more.

d. Bedford, Aylesbury, Oxford, West London, Euston + freight + fast services and growth all vie for access to Milton Keynes and more. Can’t be done with current constraints, so GC corridor re-railing could free up for more by rail overall and ensure MK Central can cope better.

e. There is a need for a nurturing of a government tiered led plan to declutter M1 end-to-end and all in between. Unless we nurture these rail options, it defaults to more roads, road building with associated bads of congestion, delay, costs, fossil fuel burning, pollution, hazards and waste, let alone land take which could be used for more environmentally sustainable uses like rail, like housing, like farming, like conservation or employment.

f. The former GC corridor from Old Oak Common to Leicester has a growing population, is being developed rapidly and Brackley is one of the largest towns in England without ready rail access/station in close proximity.

4. Old Oak Common (OOC):

a. Chiltern needs to have 2 twin bays for terminal capacity access and enabling more, if not built-in design now, when and how and problems ahead with retrospective costs.

b. a tunnel linking Southern Rail Heathrow project to OOC and Chiltern Lines with a subsurface station for OOC connectivity (HS2, GWR, Crossrail, Underground, others) on a north-south trajectory. This would enable Portsmouth/Guildford-Aylesbury/Banbury respectively and if our GC corridor is built, Leicester and via East-West Rail, Milton Keynes, Northampton and Bedford.

c. Southall-Brentford make a through link for Reading – Waterloo lines and South London orbitals.

5. SW Main Lines – Denham new link via Byfleet:

a. needs working up with identification of population catchments it may serve

b. define stretches overground and underground approximations

c. sites for stations potentially

d. needs local government support and buy-in

needs formal studies to build the case, engineering and advocate to tiers including TfL, Greater London Authority, DFT and Treasury for example.

e. land for stations, connections and junctioning designs need to be established as per feasibility. This must include tunnel requirement specifications.

f. East-North curve not west-north as that would rival and compete with established professional campaign, we support of Heathrow Southern scheme from Woking.

R. B. Pill 15-03-2022

Conclusion and appeal: ERTA has goals, aims and wishes for aspirations to be met. We believe them to be good and in the wider societal interest. I attach a dossier put together and diagrams for your kind perusal and possible support. 

It is too easy to be prisoners of the past and past glories or failures. We need to think of where we are now and build back better investing in nurturing all-weather-proof solutions which do not cost the earth. 

Please join us in the quest for modal shift from road to rail more. We are not anti car but pro choice, which thanks to the closures is denied in many cases. We need your support and shared vision to get it moving more towards what we wish for, the re-railing of Britain.

Enquiries to richard.erta@gmail.com

Below, although not our own diagram, we thank harry Burr for this contribution: