Every breath we take: the lifelong impact of air pollution

[RickH]

There's a rub here with the infrastructure too.
Someone should have had the foresight to put the bridges in high enough in the first place. Did they think?

Many of them (round here at least) will have dated back to the days of steam trains so it is a bit much to expect them to foresee electric trains when they hadn't even got diesels on the lines.

Rick.

[reohn2]

RickH
I agree about the cost,and disruption,I've been using those bridges for donkeys to get to the moors,the last couple of years has been a little 'trying'

But we need to invest and invest heavily in an electric rail system,for long term benefits,as sooner or later we'll need to rely more on public transport and if we can get it right not only will pollution be vastly reduced but travel in general vastly improved.
We live on a long thin island with a fat bit at the bottom,it's made for long distance travel by train if it's clean and cheap* that can only be better for the whole country.
The worrying bit is that we keep building or widening motorways for more and more cars,it's not the answer,not only for personal travel but for goods logistics.

*not the present dog's dinner of a pricing system we suffer under ATM.

[RickH]

RickH
I agree about the cost,and disruption,I've been using those bridges for donkeys to get to the moors,the last couple of years has been a little 'trying'

At least the one by Blackrod Station had a temporary pedestrian bridge so I could still cycle that way on my regular runs to/from getting on/off a train at Wigan.

But we need to invest and invest heavily in an electric rail system,for long term benefits,as sooner or later we'll need to rely more on public transport and if we can get it right not only will pollution be vastly reduced but travel in general vastly improved.
We live on a long thin island with a fat bit at the bottom,it's made for long distance travel by train if it's clean and cheap* that can only be better for the whole country.
The worrying bit is that we keep building or widening motorways for more and more cars,it's not the answer,not only for personal travel but for goods logistics.

I whole heartedly agree. I was just pointing out that it is more complicated than many realise, at least in part because much of the infrastructure is Victorian.

Don't tell anyone else I said this but I'm even generally in favour of HS2! But I do think that trying to sell it on speed, speed, speed was an error. The current lines are pretty much full - not just passenger trains but growing numbers of freight trains too. I don't believe you can add a great deal more capacity to the current main lines without compromising safety. The alternatives are to discourage people from using the trains (possibly by just doing nothing) or add more track.

*not the present dog's dinner of a pricing system we suffer under ATM.

Yes, simpler would be better but I'm not sure quite how you get rid of all the anomalies. I certainly wouldn't want to lose the bargains - I got to Glasgow in December for £10 & only booked 2 days in advance.

Rick.

[reohn2]

Yes, simpler would be better but I'm not sure quite how you get rid of all the anomalies. I certainly wouldn't want to lose the bargains - I got to Glasgow in December for £10 & only booked 2 days in advance.

Rick.

The anomalies could easily be got rid of by charging per mile,with a standard limit charge of say 150miles,and reduced for longer journeys,there could be off peak enticements/reductions.But the maximum should be a standard and affordable rate.
£10 to Glasgow(I'm assuming from Bolton or similar)is bonkers,I think you'll agree.
It costs me £10 from N-le-W to Frodsham,with the same cost if I stay on the train to Chester

I would also stop some of the crazy parking charges at some stations and increase parking capacity to above capacity by law.
Commuter station car parks where we live are completely overloaded,with cars parked everywhere and anywhere and roads/streets are chocker,the residents must be sick of it.
If myself and Mrs R2 want to go to Manchester or Chester any station we use we have to park the car 1/2 a mile from the station unless we're lucky,which is rare.

[Mark R]

My local branch line is diesel powered. It uses the filthiest variety: the Diesel Multiple Unit, or DMU with a diesel engine under the floor of every carriage

After a particularly noxoius journey with the inside of the train literally stinking of exhaust fumes and crankcase vapours I decided to make a fuss.

I wrote to the train company - (they offered me two free first class tickets and hoped I would go away.)

I wrote to the RMT transport union pointing out that if it was bad for me as a passenger, it must be horrendous for the train staff who have to spend their whole working week in that environment. (This lot were not interested at all)

I wrote to the Dapartment of Transport with a freedom of information request asking:

1: What are the legal limits for VOC, NOX, PM10 and PM2.5 on railway platforms and inside train carriages?

2: What emission control equipment do train engines by law have to have fitted.

The answers.

There are no legal limits on toxic diesel pollutants, none whatsoever either on station platforms or inside trains.

Train engines do no have to have any emission control equipment fitted whatsoever; that's right: no particulate filter, no oxidation catalyst, no exhaust gas recirculation, the crankcase vapours are even allowed to be vented directly to atmosphere! This is literally 1960's technology (of course the idea that modern diesels are clean is a myth, but this is just horrendous).

The train operating companies have no incentive to clean up their toxic emissions, it would only hurt their profits. It's ultimately down to the Dept for Transport. If any of this bothers you, get writing, perhaps get your MP on the case. Lone voices just get ignored...

BTW electrification will take at least a few years , probably longer for the reasons cited earlier They probably don't intend to bother doing the local branch lines at all. However the idea of a binary choice between dirty diesel and clean electric is false. In India they are busy converting diesel trains to use natrual gas which cleans up the toxic emissions massively. If they can why cant we?

[mjr]

Far more about polluting trains at www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=114282 but basically the new InterCity Expresses are better. The refitted old InterCity 125s are better than the awful noisy smelly 1980s Sprinters... which were themselves a big step forwards from the original DMUs. Even the awful Pacers have had their 1970s engines replaced by now, so I'm not sure where the 1960s engines still lurk? Anyway, even if not quite that bad, it's still not good.

[Mark R]

Stand at Cheltenham Spa station and witness the noise and filth coming out of a Cross Country DMU as it accelerates away, the pollution is orwellian, it can hardly be overstated. Don't believe the lies from the operating companies about upgraded engines. The pacer train on my local line has the crankcase breather vented directly to atmosphere which is basically 1960's technolgy regardless of when the engine was manufactured.

[PDQ]

Stand at Cheltenham Spa station and witness the noise and filth coming out of a Cross Country DMU as it accelerates away, the pollution is orwellian, it can hardly be overstated. Don't believe the lies from the operating companies about upgraded engines. The pacer train on my local line has the crankcase breather vented directly to atmosphere which is basically 1960's technolgy regardless of when the engine was manufactured.

It's an outright disgrace that this is the state of our rail system on a busy urban route in 2016.
I blame successive govts plus the bad decision to go diesel in the first place.
Other places went straight from steam to electric.
The technology. albeit in less sophisticated form, has been around that long!

Perhaps others on here are right, its just about short term profit; though personally I think it verges into corruption and vested interest at high level.

[MartinC]

Stand at Cheltenham Spa station and witness the noise and filth.........................

Lucky it only happens in Cheltenham then!

[MartinC]

Air pollution is a major problem. The demonisation of diesel is a handy smokescreen ( ) for those who want to avoid talking about all the other problems. Let's ban diesels so that I can use my car as much as I want, let's have electric trains 'cos then the pollution will be somewhere else........................................

[PDQ]

Air pollution is a major problem. The demonisation of diesel is a handy smokescreen ( ) for those who want to avoid talking about all the other problems. Let's ban diesels so that I can use my car as much as I want, let's have electric trains 'cos then the pollution will be somewhere else........................................

I imagine you mean coal fired power stations, though you have not made the point very clearly, perhaps I misunderstand.

However in the case of trains that is not necessarily true because there are ways to generate electricity that create virtually no pollution at all.
I didn't say it would be easy, by the way, though it would be easier if we had started in earnest some decades ago.

[squeaker]

If you're in the Sussex area next Thursday evening, this talk might be relevant / of interest?

[MartinC]

...............I imagine you mean coal fired power stations.........................

Not specifically. Very little of the electricity we generate is a free go from a pollution point of view. It was just a knee jerk reaction to the cherry picking that characterises these discussions. It's always far more complicated than a simple Orwellian diesel bad electricity good. I think that we all agree that using '60s rolling stock with engine technology that pollutes far more than the current stuff is just crazy.

[Mark R]

...............I imagine you mean coal fired power stations.........................

Not specifically. Very little of the electricity we generate is a free go from a pollution point of view. It was just a knee jerk reaction to the cherry picking that characterises these discussions. It's always far more complicated than a simple Orwellian diesel bad electricity good. I think that we all agree that using '60s rolling stock with engine technology that pollutes far more than the current stuff is just crazy.

When it cones to rail transport I don't think this is true at all.

Firstly electricity can be produced in ways that have very little impact on local air quality. In any case it is certainly easier to control the emissions from a few powerstation chimneys than it is to deal with hundereds of diesel exhaust pipes.

Secondly an electric power train only consumes fuel when the train is in motion, whereas diesel trains have to blast away non stop.

Thirdly, an electic powertrain is going to be at least 80% thermally effiecient compared to about 35% at best for a diesel. (e.g. at least 65% of the energy in diesel is lost as heat and noise without doing anything useful)

Can we please get away from this idea that it is only the 1960's diesels producing scary levels of pollution. The diesels blasting between Penzance and Glasgow for example look modern enough, (Pendolinos?) yet the pollution they emit under the station canopies really IS quite Orwellian!

Later models diesels might be somewhat cleaner than the 1960's stuff but for some pollutants, NOx for example, the level of emissions hasn't really decreased at all. The entire network needs to be electrified ASAP.

[mjr]

Secondly an electric power train only consumes fuel when the train is in motion, whereas diesel trains have to blast away non stop.

That bit isn't true. The Desiros currently on Trans Pennine have been upgraded with stop-start engines, shutting some down when not needed. The D-Trains (if they ever see service) have stop-start.

Can we please get away from this idea that it is only the 1960's diesels producing scary levels of pollution. The diesels blasting between Penzance and Glasgow for example look modern enough, (Pendolinos?) yet the pollution they emit under the station canopies really IS quite Orwellian!

They're Voyagers not Pendolinos - the tilt kit has actually been disabled on the cross-country ones that had it. They've got Cummins QSK19s which http://www.cummins-engine.com/qsk19-c600.html says are Euro II engines, the emissions standard of the time the Voyagers were built. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_ ... _and_buses

Later models diesels might be somewhat cleaner than the 1960's stuff but for some pollutants NOx for example, the level of emissions hasn't really decreased at all. The entire network needs to be electrified ASAP.

NOx has gone from 7.0g/kWh in Euro II to 0.4 in the latest Euro VI, which looks like a real decrease to me. What was the limit before that? 7 to 0.4 seems like a reduction.

But yes, a near-totally electric network would seem a logical move for many lines. I think we're undervaluing air quality.