Scottish Infrastructure

[GordonS]

2 hours ago, Perkin Flump said:

The Danes in particular are miles ahead when it comes to renewable energy & general infrastructure. They have a biomass plant just outside Copenhagen that has to import rubbish from Sweden & Norway as there isn't enough in Denmark alone to keep it running at peak efficiency. 

On Jutland they have an underground network of pipes for slurry from pig and dairy farms - you get a bit of bacon and butter from Denmark, IIRC - and it goes to huge centralised anaerobic digesters. These units need a lot of feedstock, unless you're using stuff like crops grown for the purpose which kinda defeats the point but happens regularly in Scotland, so they need this scale.

They create electricity as well as reducing GHG emissions and water pollution so it's a win all round.

It's common in tenements in Copenhagen to have a biomass boiler serving one block, which is a brilliant way to generate heat. It probably won't be sustainable long term but it will be good for another decade or two. Point is, they just do this stuff while we talk about it endlessly. 

[GordonS]

1 hour ago, jamamafegan said:

 I would sooner have a tunnel built to the Outer Hebrides than to NI.
 

You'd rather build a tunnel to an island with 21,000 inhabitants than one of a similar length to an island with 6.8 million inhabitants? 

[Newbornbairn]

Not sure I'd want a tunnel to Ireland either, backwards move.

 

A tunnel to Denmark though...

[GordonS]

7 hours ago, Highland Capital said:

 For a country that seems to strive to be better, Scotland's attitude to infrastructure is very small time.  I know the distance isn't as long, but the Øresund Bridge is another example of how some countries attitudes are better than ours - if Copenhagen was a Scottish city people would be screaming "Whits wrong with a ferry?!?1?" 

That was one of the big messages from the Glasgow Connectivity Commission - that what they were proposing was treated as radical and unrealistic, but is completely normal for similar cities across Europe. They suggested stuff like a tunnel linking the rail line north of Queen St to the lines south of Central, served by a station under Buchanan St that would link to both the other main stations underground. That would allow crossrail north-south and services between Edinburgh and Ayrshire or Stirling and Inverclyde. These things get built in other countries but we only seem to spend serious money on roads.

https://www.glasgow.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=45064&p=0

Edited February 20, 2021 by GordonS

[Binos]

3 minutes ago, GordonS said:

That was one of the big messages from the Glasgow Connectivity Commission - that what they were proposing was treated as radical and unrealistic, but is completely normal for similar cities across Europe. They suggested stuff like a tunnel linking the rail line north of Queen St to the lines south of Central, served by a station under Buchanan St that would like to both the other main stations underground. That would allow crossrail north-south and services between Edinburgh and Ayrshire or Stirling and Inverclyde. These things get built in other countries but we only seem to spend serious money on roads.

https://www.glasgow.gov.uk/CHttpHandler.ashx?id=45064&p=0

These things get built in London

[GordonS]

5 minutes ago, Binos said:

These things get built in London

The overspend  - not the budget, just the overspend - on London Crossrail is about three times as much as it cost to build the new Forth Bridge. 

[Binos]

9 minutes ago, GordonS said:

The overspend  - not the budget, just the overspend - on London Crossrail is about three times as much as it cost to build the new Forth Bridge. 

The new forth road bridge was paid from the Scottish purse

Crossrail was deemed of national importance so paid from UK purse

Which is slightly galling

Edited February 20, 2021 by Binos

[Newbornbairn]

Just now, Binos said:

The new forth road bridge was paid from the Scottish purse

Crossrail was deemed of national importance so paid from UK purse

Which is slightly gauling

The French don't like it either?

[vikingTON]

There is absolutely zero point in a Crossrail for Glasgow when the stations are a ten minute walk from each other. Nobody is demanding a direct train for any of those proposed routes either. 

When you consider that towns and indeed whole regions have been cut off from the rail infrastructure since the 1960s, the idea of spunking any amount of money on an utterly pointless Glasgow city centre scheme or indeed that daft airport link plan is risible.

[Forest_Fifer]

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/feb/14/rail-bosses-revive-plan-to-build-tunnel-from-scotland-to-northern-ireland
1) Rebuild the bulk of the old Dumfries-Castle Douglas-Newton Stewart line for this immediately (sticking to the cost instead of a pointless loop up to New Galloway)
2) Ditch the pointless and expensive tunnel project and run the train onto the ferry instead like the one that goes to Sicily. No more ridiculous 'connecting bus' routes running down to Cairnryan from Ayr either.
Make it happen.

Completely pointless as NI railways isn't the same gauge as GB. So you'd need to buy gauge changing trains, or build a brand new line in the other side.

[vikingTON]

So 'buy gauge-changing trains' then. A problem that can be solved by the powerhouses of Belarus and Poland on a daily basis is not beyond a West European country to solve 

[invergowrie arab]

Genuinely curious as to what the benefit to putting a train on a ferry, as opposed to getting the train and ferry timetables to join up is?

[vikingTON]

22 minutes ago, invergowrie arab said:

Genuinely curious as to what the benefit to putting a train on a ferry, as opposed to getting the train and ferry timetables to join up is?

Convenience for passenger traffic and not being a massive logistical ball ache for freight transport. Roll it on, roll it off again on the other side. 

Just don't give the contract to Ferguson's or they'll sit rusting in Port Glasgow for years while the management and workers blame everyone else for not getting the work done. 

Edited February 20, 2021 by vikingTON

[invergowrie arab]

1 hour ago, virginton said:

Convenience for passenger traffic and not being a massive logistical ball ache for freight transport. Roll it on, roll it off again on the other side. 

Just don't give the contract to Ferguson's or they'll sit rusting in Port Glasgow for years while the management and workers blame everyone else for not getting the work done. 

Fair enough I was only thinking about foot passengers.

[vikingTON]

The main argument in favour is that train ferries are 100% pure box office, while some poindexter co-ordinating train and ferry timetables in an office is not. 

The logistical benefits are a happy coincidence.

[gav-ffc]

https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.falkirkherald.co.uk/news/people/new-report-states-railway-station-grangemouth-key-priority-1385418%3famp
 

this is obviously pre-pandemic but a station in Grangemouth would be good if it included a station next to the Falkirk stadium for the helix/college/ new business park planned across from the stadium.

[101]

17 hours ago, Binos said:

The new forth road bridge was paid from the Scottish purse

Crossrail was deemed of national importance so paid from UK purse

Which is slightly galling

Mean while if you're disabled you still can't access all of London's tubes, you would imagine that would be a better way to spend public money. The fact only 12 are step free is embarrassing.

[Lurkst]

14 hours ago, Forest_Fifer said:

On 19/02/2021 at 20:45, virginton said:

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2021/feb/14/rail-bosses-revive-plan-to-build-tunnel-from-scotland-to-northern-ireland
1) Rebuild the bulk of the old Dumfries-Castle Douglas-Newton Stewart line for this immediately (sticking to the cost instead of a pointless loop up to New Galloway)
2) Ditch the pointless and expensive tunnel project and run the train onto the ferry instead like the one that goes to Sicily. No more ridiculous 'connecting bus' routes running down to Cairnryan from Ayr either.
Make it happen.

Completely pointless as NI railways isn't the same gauge as GB. So you'd need to buy gauge changing trains, or build a brand new line in the other side.

I'm not advocating building a rail tunnel to Ireland, but given the enormous cost of the project an additional length of GB gauge track extending to a terminal in Belfast would be relatively small beer.

 

[Ginaro]

1 hour ago, 101 said:

Mean while if you're disabled you still can't access all of London's tubes, you would imagine that would be a better way to spend public money. The fact only 12 are step free is embarrassing.

The fact that you googled and got 12 when the actual number is 166 is even more embarrassing. https://tfl.gov.uk/travel-information/improvements-and-projects/step-free-access

[DiegoDiego]

The main argument in favour is that train ferries are 100% pure box office, while some poindexter co-ordinating train and ferry timetables in an office is not. 
The logistical benefits are a happy coincidence.

The fact you consider them box office really shows how behind the times this country is. (Well, that or your loft is full of Hornby.)