LIGHT RAIL ROUND-UP
WARM air extracted from London
Underground tunnels is being used to heat more than 1000 homes, an idea that could be extended across the LU network. The Bunhill 2 energy centre, on the site of the long-closed City Road Underground station in Islington, opened in early March. It uses a large fan to extract warm air from the Northern Line tunnels, which then passes over a series of pipes to heat water that is then pumped to nearby buildings via a distributed heating system. Electricity is also generated for use by LU and an adjacent tower block. The fan can also be reversed in summer to help cool the Tube tunnels if required.
The Sheffield City Region Mayoral Combined Authority has put the cost of renewing the city’s Supertram system at £439 million, and looks set to ask the Government to fund most of the bill. The scheme includes a new fleet of 28 trams to provide an enhanced service, track renewals, improved passenger facilities, refurbishment of the depot at Nunnery Square, renewal of control and signalling systems, and improved power supply. The plan covers the tram network only, so excludes the tramtrain service to Rotherham which uses some of the tram network.
The Government has agreed to fund most of a £100 million scheme to increase service frequencies and reduce journey times on the Tyne andWear
Metro. The ‘Metro Flow’ project includes upgrading and electrifying the freight line that runs parallel to the Metro between Pelaw Junction and Jarrowon the South Shields branch, effectively eliminating remaining single track sections of the South Shields branch and therefore removing bottlenecks.
Other work will see service frequency outside central areas increased from one every 12 minutes to one every 10 (six trains an hour instead of five) and increasing capacity for an extra 30,000 passengers a day.
The first tracks have been laid at Five Ways as part of the West
Midlands Metro’s Westside extension to Edgbaston. The line is a continuation of the recently-opened extension to Centenary Square in Birmingham, and is due to open in 2021 with new stops at Brindley Place, FiveWays and Edgbaston.