Lincoln has been campaigning for a regular rail service to London since it was removed in May 1993 after the early 1990s recession. As part of a massive rewrite of the East Coast Main Line timetable, Lincoln was promised seven 125 mph trains in each direction between Lincoln and Kings Cross per day as from May 201.
Currently, many people from Lincoln drive to Newark instead and catch a fast East Coast train to Kings Cross. To attract businesses and tourists from the South-East, it is argued that Lincoln needs a regular fast rail service to and from Kings Cross.
So it was quite disappointing yesterday when East Coast, the nationalised train operator running most Inter City services between London Kings Cross and the North, announced that their new timetable would only include one through train between Lincoln and Kings Cross. The recession and the concomitant reduction in income from rail (especially First Class) passengers are clearly the reasons for this.
The new timetable, which East Coast is marketing under the Eureka! brand, was designed to provide much needed additional capacity on the route. For most of the day, services will run to a regular interval plan – something which has never been attempted on the East Coast Main Line before. This will be much more efficient and will enable more trains to run.
It was planned to operate a through train in each direction every two hours between Kings Cross and Lincoln each day but the plan was even better than that. After arrival in Lincoln, the train would provide a shuttle service to and from Newark before returning to London. In this way, Lincoln would have a through train or connection by East Coast train each hour all day to and from London.
As the seventeen miles between Lincoln and Newark are not electrified, the service had to be operated by diesel train. East Coast leases 13 nine-coach High Speed Diesel Trains but these are fully employed on long distance services such as Kings Cross to Aberdeen and Inverness. There was no spare capacity to provide a Lincoln to London service in this fleet.
First Great Western was operating five-coach 125mph trains but decided to take these off lease and concentrate their long distance services on High Speed Diesel Trains. Although the latter were initially introduced in the late 1970s, they are popular with passengers. Both First Great Western and East Coast re-engineered their High Speed Diesel Trains so that they are far more reliable and, for many, appear to be brand new trains.
So there were five-coach 125mph trains available and East Coast leased five of them for the London to Lincoln service. As there had been reliability issues and they needed a thorough refresh internally, considerable expense would be required for these to match the standard of other East Coast Trains.
Not only that, but drivers and guards would need to be trained on these very different trains. Indeed, additional train crew would be required to operate the additional services on the East Coast Main Line.
As is well known, National Express East Coast ceased to operate this franchise because of the effect that the recession was having on total passenger revenue.
As noted earlier, the new East Coast timetable was designed to provide additional capacity and some wondered if it would be deferred until passenger revenues return to growth.
The advantages of regular interval services are many. Not only is it easier for passengers to understand and remember the timetable but it generally results in far more efficient use of trains and train crew.
So, it was worth introducing the new timetable if at all possible because of the many operational benefits that it would provide.
It had already been decided that in the new timetable most East Coast trains would cease to go to Glasgow and leave the London to Glasgow service to Virgin Trains. This would enable East Coast electric 125mph trains to operate more services in the core routes from Edinburgh, Newcastle to London and Leeds to London. These electric trains have also been re-engineered and are very reliable.
Existing East Coach diesel and electric have nine passenger coaches. Paths for high speed trains on the East Coast Main Line are in short supply and some wondered if the use of five coach trains was making effective use of this scarce resource.
The plan is either to sub-lease these five coach trains elsewhere or to return them to the rolling stock operating company. Some of them have been sub-leased to Northern already to help deal with gross overcrowding on trains in the north-west of England.
East Coast will use one of their nine-coach diesel trains on a 07:22 Lincoln to Kings Cross and a 19:06 return train. East Midlands already operate a through train between Lincoln and St Pancras at similar times leaving earlier and arriving later – taking an hour longer in each direction.
East Coast will also provide four additional through services between Kings Cross and Newark making use of their nine-coach electric trains.
In this way, by making even better use of their existing electric and diesel trains, East Coast will save £9 million per year in this change to planned Lincoln services and will get most of the benefits of their new timetable.
Of course, it may be significant that Lincoln no longer has an MP who is a minister in the Government. Gillian Merron was the Parliamentary Under-Secretary of State for Transport in 2006-2007.
The Lincolnite welcomes your views. All comments are reactively-moderated and must obey the house rules. Please stay on topic and be respectful of other readers.
A Lincoln-based photographer has spoken of her love of capturing images of spectacular aircraft flying in the county’s skies.
Claire Hartley’s main photography interests are aviation and nature and several of her pictures have been published, including of the Red Arrows as the sun was low on a winter’s day which featured on the front page of The Times.
In an interview with BBC Look North, Claire said it’s “nice to know that people want to use” her photographs and she picked out to of her personal favourites from her collection.
This photo of a Lancaster flying over Tattershall Castle is a personal favourite of Claire’s. | Screenshot: Claire Hartley/BBC
A photo she took of a Lancaster flying back to Coningsby over Tattershall Castle will always be a favourite, with Claire saying: “That was one of those days where I just sat out in the rain and then just for a split second it came really good just as it passed over the top of the castle.”
She added that her second favourite “is probably one of the Red Arrows” flying in formation.
Claire’s photo of the Red Arrows was used on the front page of The Times. | Screenshot: Claire Hartley/BBC
“It’s not a technically perfect shot, it’s not very good resolution, but it’s the first one for me that took off on social media and that’s kind of the one that made things work for me,” she said.
A group of pupils in Sleaford have represented their school at a recent national track and field event, with four relay runners winning their race and earning the crown of English champions for their age.
On Saturday, July 2, an Inter Girls Athletics team made up of year 9 and 10 students from St George’s Academy in Sleaford, took part in the English Schools Athletics Association Track and Field Cup National Finals in Oxfordshire.
The girls qualified for the event for the first time in the school’s history after winning the regional round comfortably in Derby on June 16.
Heading into the national final they were already the best school for girls’ athletics in the whole North Midlands, and despite difficult conditions they did themselves and their school proud.
Lily Wilcox and Holly Dilks ahead of their triple jump competition.
The team consisted of 15 athletes and one team manager, they were:
Kyla Copus – Team Manager
Lily Wilcox
Lucy Cullum
Laurel Mountain
Maddie Cody
Freya Nicol
Holly Dilks
Holly Johnson
Keira Woollaston
Izzie Hemmant
Gabby Greig
Sienna Slater
Tia Coulson
Natasha Doggett
Holly Young
Tegan Thompson
Notable achievements for the girls were a 2nd place finish for Keira Woollaston, who threw a new personal best in the Hammer event, as well as a 4th place in the 100m for Sienna Slater. Her time of 13.0 seconds saw her qualify for the English Schools competition too.
Freya Nicol, Maddie Cody, Tegan Thompson and Natasha Doggett are officially the fastest school relay team in the country!
However, it was the relay team of Tegan Thompson, Maddie Cody, Freya Nicol and Natasha Doggett who stole the show – winning their race with an impressive time of 57.2 seconds.
St George’s Academy finished in 11th place out of 13 competing teams, missing out on the top 10 by just 15 points across the board.
In a competition dominated by independent and grammar schools, the performance of St George’s Academy caught the eye as the Lincolnshire-based girls took on, and in some instances beat, some of the best athletes in the entire country.
The girls did fantastically well competing against some of the country’s top young athletes.
Miss Cox, the coach of the team and a PE teacher at St George’s Academy, said: “I am so proud of what the girls have achieved this season and they have been a pleasure to work with!
“Their successes have been as a result of a huge team effort; commitment and dedication to training has been exceptional and the bond and friendship between the girls has driven them to push for more.
“They have become role models to younger year groups and are inspiring the younger teams to be as positive and enthusiastic about Athletics as they are.”