February 2002 Newsletter

BRAG Calls Passenger Strike, Mar 1st

On Monday January 7th 2002, David Da Costa from the Better Railway Advisory Group, appeared on the BBC programme �Watchdog� calling for all rail users to boycott the railways for one day on March 1st 2002.

The aim of this is to give a strong message to the government and to key players in the rail industry, that people hold their railways dear, that they want reliable services, an end to excuses and passing blame, that they have had enough of chronic overcrowding, that they want money spent on renewals and maintenance and that they want to see progress NOW.

A phone poll over the course of the programme showed a massive 94% of the 23,000+ voters thought that the day of action would be a good idea.

So why not work from home for the day or make it a long weekend, car share with a friend or take the tube from Epping. Join the thousands of people who will be making a stand to try to get the message across �No more excuses, we want fixes� and don�t use the train on March 1st.

SRA Strategic Plan

January 14th saw the launch of the SRA strategic plan amidst much publicity. Unfortunately it offers little which had not previously been announced, and it seems to push Crossrail out to 2010 or beyond. Crossrail 1&2 could have seen substantially easier journeys to King�s Cross, Tottenham Court Road or Victoria... Heathrow or Docklands with a single change of train, for example.

On a brighter note, the plan reaffirms the SRA�s commitment to capacity improvements on the West Anglia route by 2004, including:

� line speed improvements
� additional platforms at Liverpool Street
� 4 tracks Brimsdown to Tottenham Hale, for capacity & flexibility
� extra capacity at Cambridge

� Stansted services throughout the night
� establishment of services to Stratford

HRUG will in due course point out to the SRA that Stansted services running overnight could also serve major stations such as Harlow Town encouraging clubbers to leave the car at home.

WARM Phase 2 Complete

The West Anglia Route Modernisation work continues. In November, phase-2 of this project saw the commissioning of new signals, cabling and points motors on the route from Hackney Downs to Enfield Town. This stretch is now fully controlled by the Integrated Electronic Control Centre at Liverpool Street.

Phase-3, due to be complete during the summer this year, will see the complete renewal of signals, cabling and points motors between Hackney Downs and Chingford.

Whilst not preventing infrastructure failures between Harlow and Hackney Downs, a reduction in the number of knock-on delay minutes due to failures along the Seven Sisters branch to Enfield will help reliability.

Phase 4 of the work will move along the Lea Valley line from Hackney Downs northwards as far as Stansted Mountfitchet and is due to be complete in 2004.

WAGN�s Performance Figures

Monthly performance figures have temporarily been blocked by the SRA.

Let us know your experiences during any disruption... How was it handled? Was enough information given out? How late were you? Let us know the details of which service you were on, e.g. 21:03 from Liv St to Stansted Airport on Tues 15th Jan. Use the HRUG forum!