beorhthelm
A. Virgo, Football Genius
- Jul 21, 2003
- 35,290
note you avoid the crucial question: how much you willing to pay for this option?
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Gov't: 'No case' for BML2
- Thread starter The Large One
- Start date
note you avoid the crucial question: how much you willing to pay for this option?
Completely agree with you BG. I am old enough to also remember the schemes at both Worthing and Arundel being promoted. Not as a motorway but to dual carriageway the A27 through West Sussex. Houses were compulsory purchased in Worthing and stood empty for years until Highway Agency sold them again and kept the profits in house price increases.
The Large One
Who's Next?
- Thread starter
- #43
I haven't avoided it (a) because you haven't asked it and (b) it's completely the wrong question to ask.
A far more pertinent one is - how much does Sussex and Kent have to pay to not have this option?
I still need to be convinced that a route from London via Sutton, Leatherhead, Dorking, Horsham and Arundel with the only construction needed being the "missing" spur south of Arundel would be any less practical than the BML2 project. This route would avoid the bottleneck at Croydon. Perhaps those more knowledgable with Railway matters could help me?
kevo
Well-known member
- Mar 8, 2008
- 9,091
As others have said, the closure of the Uckfield to Lewes line wasn't part of the Beeching cuts - it happened a few years later. I believe it was actually making a profit at the time. I can't think what possible advantage there was in closing an 8-mile stretch of track that linked up the local network and provided an alternative route to the Brighton mainline. Ridiculous decision.
Hereford Gull
Active member
All developments like rail and road should be funded by the people who use them, no taxpayer money should be involved, then a proper business case would be needed.
Well the "good" news is at present they are staying away!
Er, there was a double track right up until about 1990 and there is plenty of room for it. None of the track bed has been built on except in lewes, but that section doesn't matter as there is an alternative route via Hamsey.
Iggle Piggle
Well-known member
- Sep 3, 2010
- 5,314
I used to regularly commute from Coventry to London. The quickest train was 57 minutes (and then it took me forever at rush hour to get from Euston to Victoria)
Nobody in the area wants HS2. It's pointless. I've said for years the investment would be better in the South East. HS2 by the way has now been approved despite large opposition to it.
The government is moving towards doing this with rail but hasn't with road ... yet. It would be interesting to hear how the people who want a dual carriageway A27 would be happy to pay to use the road. A £5 toll?
I disagree entirely, there are lots of people who would indirectly benefit from improved infrastructure, why shouldn't they indirectly fund it as well
No they weren't! The bottleneck is East Croydon and the lack of tracks; all they ever talked about was new trains, 'improved signalling' and changes to Redhill. On its own the Gatwick expansion would have made the problem worse, and our sole hope would have been that the Authorities might have noticed and not just believed Gatwick's publicity machine.
In The Rough
New member
Uckfield to Lewes was closed thanks to the bloke who was arguably worse than Beeching - Ernest Marples. East Sussex Council wanted to put a relief road in around Lewes and so put in an application to clsoe the line.
... a guy who was a director of a construction firm that built roads. No conflict of interest in closing rail lines then, no siree, bob.
He also fled the country before he was prosecuted for fraud. Nothing dodgy there ...
beorhthelm
A. Virgo, Football Genius
- Jul 21, 2003
- 35,290
improved signalling is improving the line. signalling is the major issue with capacity on the line, you can only put so many trains as you can safely control, by upgrading the signalling you increase capacity. point is there was additional investment on the table, which is in Gatwick's interest as expansion needs to compete with Heathrow and getting suits between the City and airport reliably and quickly would help that.
Norman Potting
Well-known member
I clearly remember "Folkestone to Honiton Trunk Road" signs by the numerous roadworks we used to pass on the way to Devon when I were a lad. This was on the occasions we went the A303 (pre M25) way rather that the via the lovely (if you are in no particular rush) A272. Both routes have had affectionate travelogue books written about them, "A303 Highway to the Sun" and "A272 An Ode to a Road", the latter by an Anglophile Dutch couple!
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No, it's just tinkering and wouldn't even be enough to cope with what the line currently has to deal with let alone the increased traffic from the Gatwic expansion, the increased traffic from the growing population, and the fact that we're still depending on Victorian engineering and Victorian planning. That's before you even factor in what happens when 'normal' running issues (power failures, signal failures, train failures, staff shortages etc) disrupt services - and that's assuming your superficial improvements solve the congestion issue.
I remember those signs, too (summer holidays in Cornwall).
However, I think it was just a plan to improve the route generally and there was never any proposal that it would all be dual carriageway, let alone a motorway.
BensGrandad
New member
I think that the idea was to by pass Worthing north of Shoreham / Beeding and rejoin the existing A27 near Patching to go over a new bridge at Crossbush and rejoin the A27 west of Arundel Hospital and then by pass Chichester to the north. The idea nI thought, was a dual carriageway that would possibly be upgraded to a motorway perhaps with tolls as in France.