New rail service from Heathrow Airport for West London

[This article is cross-posted with followups directed, somewhat
arbitrarily, to misc.transport.urban-transit; amend as appropriate.]

According to an article in Modern Railways magazine, a new rail
service called Heathrow Connect is scheduled to begin operations
on Sunday, June 12.

Remember that Heathrow has two existing rail services, Heathrow
Express and the London Underground's Piccadilly Line. Heathrow
Express has trains that run nonstop from Paddington to their
Terminals 1,2,3 station, then continue to Terminal 4. The
Underground has its own Terminals 1,2,3 station (and its own
to Terminal 4 station, but this is closed until mid-2006 for
reasons related to the construction of Terminal 5).

The new Heathrow Connect service will also run from Paddington
along the Great Western mainline, but its trains will stop at
Ealing Broadway, West Ealing, Hanwell, Southall, and Hayes &
Harlington before terminating at the same Terminals 1,2,3 station
used by the Heathrow Express. (Passengers for Terminal 4 will have
to change and use the Express between the two airport stations.)
This means that passengers traveling between Heathrow and other
points on the Great Western will now have the option of changing
at Hayes & Harlington instead of going into Paddington and doubling
back, or taking the bus to Reading.

Heathrow Connect will run every 30 minutes and will take 25 minutes
end-to-end, or 10 minutes longer than the Heathrow Express. The short
section from Heathrow to Hayes & Harlington will cost 6 pounds, but
fares from there to Paddington will be at the usual rates on that
line, so the end-to-end trip will be about 9 pounds, or about halfway
between the Express and the Underground.

However, apparently passengers are not supposed to be concerned with
price: the train is also intended to carry local traffic between the
intermediate stations (it partially replaces some services on the main
line), and the operating company doesn't want all the seats filled with
through passengers when the Heathrow Express is available for them.
To this end, the article says, Heathrow Connect trains will "likely"
not be shown on departure signs at their endpoints as going all the
way to the other endpoint: instead they will be shown as terminating
at the second-last station!

(The plan is that when Terminal 5 opens in 2008, Heathrow Connect
will be extended to Terminal 4 and take over the present Heathrow
Express station there; Heathrow Express itself will then run to
Terminal 5. On the Underground, most trains will serve Terminal 5
and the rest will serve Terminal 4. All of these trains will still
run to Terminals 1,2,3.)

One limiting factor for Heathrow Connect, by the way, is Airport
Junction, where the 2-track Heathrow branch leaves the 4-track
Great Western main line. Heathrow Express trains use the "main"
(fast) lines on the GW, and the junction is aligned that way, but
Heathrow Connect will have to use the "relief" lines, forcing an
awkward route through the junction. There is a plain to improve the
junction to avoid this, but it won't happen until it's known whether
Crossrail will be built and also have trains running to Heathrow,
so the rebuilding can be done to the correct requirements.
--
Mark Brader | this take
Toronto | "If is shall really to
| flying I never it."
| -- Piglet ("Winnie-the-Pooh", A. A. Milne)

My text in this article is in the public domain.

Mark Brader wrote:

The new Heathrow Connect service will also run from Paddington
along the Great Western mainline, but its trains will stop at
Ealing Broadway, West Ealing, Hanwell, Southall, and Hayes &
Harlington before terminating at the same Terminals 1,2,3 station
used by the Heathrow Express.

That at least will provide some relief for the change (stupid and
disasterous change, in my view) of the cancellation of the Airbus
service which made many stops from Heathrow into Central London. (The
only remaining bus service leaves, as does the Heathrow Express, from
the center of old Heathrow, not from each individual terminal formerly
used by Airbus. It stops only at Victoria Coach Station.)

Read on rec.travel.europe, and response aimed mainly at that NG:

"Mark Brader" wrote in message
...
[This article is cross-posted with followups directed, somewhat
arbitrarily, to misc.transport.urban-transit; amend as appropriate.]

According to an article in Modern Railways magazine, a new rail
service called Heathrow Connect is scheduled to begin operations
on Sunday, June 12.
SNIP

The new Heathrow Connect service will also run from Paddington
along the Great Western mainline, but its trains will stop at
Ealing Broadway, West Ealing, Hanwell, Southall, and Hayes &
Harlington before terminating at the same Terminals 1,2,3 station
used by the Heathrow Express. (Passengers for Terminal 4 will have
to change and use the Express between the two airport stations.)
This means that passengers traveling between Heathrow and other
points on the Great Western will now have the option of changing
at Hayes & Harlington instead of going into Paddington and doubling
back, or taking the bus to Reading.

Note, however, that Hayes & Harlington is used only by slow and semi-fast
trains. If transferring to destinations west of Reading served by fast
trains (e.g. Bristol, Cardiff, Penzance) a further change at Reading would
be necessary.


Heathrow Connect will run every 30 minutes and will take 25 minutes
end-to-end, or 10 minutes longer than the Heathrow Express. The short
section from Heathrow to Hayes & Harlington will cost 6 pounds, but
fares from there to Paddington will be at the usual rates on that
line, so the end-to-end trip will be about 9 pounds, or about halfway
between the Express and the Underground.

Implication is that Travelcards will be valid Paddington to Hayes.


However, apparently passengers are not supposed to be concerned with
price: the train is also intended to carry local traffic between the
intermediate stations (it partially replaces some services on the main
line), and the operating company doesn't want all the seats filled with
through passengers when the Heathrow Express is available for them.
To this end, the article says, Heathrow Connect trains will "likely"
not be shown on departure signs at their endpoints as going all the
way to the other endpoint: instead they will be shown as terminating
at the second-last station!

Quite a common practice on the Great Western lines. For example, a train to
Slough may be shown as going to Langley at Paddington, with its true
destination revealed only at Ealing Broadway. The aim is to assist
travellers in finding the fastest train, since a stopping service to Slough
will almost always be overtaken by a faster tarin continuing beyond that
station.

Alan Harrison

Earlier I (Mark Brader) wrote:
Heathrow Connect will run every 30 minutes and will take 25 minutes
end-to-end, or 10 minutes longer than the Heathrow Express. The short
section from Heathrow to Hayes & Harlington will cost 6 pounds, but
fares from there to Paddington will be at the usual rates on that
line, so the end-to-end trip will be about 9 pounds, or about halfway
between the Express and the Underground.

However, apparently passengers are not supposed to be concerned with
price: the train is also intended to carry local traffic between the
intermediate stations (it partially replaces some services on the main
line), and the operating company doesn't want all the seats filled with
through passengers when the Heathrow Express is available for them.
To this end, the article says, Heathrow Connect trains will "likely"
not be shown on departure signs at their endpoints as going all the
way to the other endpoint...

Further, according to a followup in misc.transport.urban-transit, it is
not intended that end-to-end tickets will even be sold. You would have
to buy one ticket from Heathrow to an intermediate point, and another
from there to Paddington, and it isn't even clear that they'll sell you
both tickets at once.

However, the ticket for the Paddington end of the trip *could* be a
Travelcard covering suitable zones.
--
Mark Brader "I like to think of [this] as self-explanatory."
Toronto "I hope *I* think of [it] that way."
-- Donald Westlake: "Trust Me On This"

My text in this article is in the public domain.