All Aboards Next Route Is Crewe To Birmingham!

Crewe to Birmingham Set Modern Day is All Aboards Next Route!



fire Away the discussion!

 

Sounds interesting! Not sure about the 802. Wonder what the service patterns will be like. My question is will the voyager be useable on this route?

 

Potentially 4 different locos to drive to Crewe with that one - 350, 390, 220, and possibly the 805 if I understood the roadmap announcement. Probably some 66 runs too.

 

nothing new in terms of rolling stock apart from the 220 and no new loco to substitute for the class 66, a bit underwhelming if you ask me.

 

Great news, should be a corker. Great route mileage and should have plenty of playability. Can't wait.

 

Would be a big missing piece if they didn't have it as XC have 2 trains an hour from Birmingham that go at least to Stafford.

 

Love how we’ll now have Crewe in three different eras!

 

If Milton Keynes to Birmingham was made, you’d be able to do London Euston to Carlisle in game.

London to Milton Keynes
MK to Birmingham
Birmingham to Crewe
Crewe to Preston
Preston to Carlisle

 

Hopefully should include a London Midland 350, which I'd love as the livery was designed by the same people as South West Trains!

 

Nice long nearly 1 hour drive in a 390 too

 

Wonder if the APT will be a mastery layer?

 

Next tsw we're gonna get a WCML Connect route that just has it all in all the eras

 

it'll have some TfW layers more than likely just as they run via wolverhampton

I'm super excited with this route though i hope we get the route via stoke-on-trent too we'd will get so much use out of the 390 and now the 805 it's about a hour and a half i think via that route

 

Pretty boring

 

Nice that we're getting Crewe in the modern era. Good to have another route to drive the 390 on.

 

Let me get this right...
Crewe - Birmingham, but with a 350?
And the 805 is being released as a separate DLC?

If they 805 is included, that's a purchase.
But if they're separate, I'm out until a sale.

 

Yeah that’s how I read it, but it could just be the emphasise the new loco, however they would have said ‘Crewe to Birmingham in the Class 805’ instead of 350, if that was the case..

 

Where are you reading this?

 

From that info screen on the DT Direct.. it says ‘ride the route on the 350’ or something to that effect.

 

In the roadmap the 805 and the route are separated so very likely that the 805 is a separate DLC unfortunately + shredder post

So this route should be "good" if you have all the layers with

 

Then sale in the future it is.

 

If I'm right the 805 wouldn't feature that heavily in this route. I'm pretty sure they run the Euston to Birmingham services (AI only at Birmingham New Street), and the Chester and North Wales services, which would only be able to be driven between Stafford and Crewe.

 

Looking forward to the layers info for this. The cover page says 'a varied timetable with layers' and its set in 2019 (like BCC), so you'd have to expect all the BCC layers at the least. I'm reading it as coming with the 350 because that's a train you don't pay a premium for. I think we can expect WMR 170s to wolverhampton and the pendolino at the least. TfW as AI at least (I hear there are significant cab differences for the ones that run on this line compared to Cardiff that might be problematic). If we can have the voyager too...

Only question mark is the 805. I don't believe that train even existed in 2019? I know the pendolinos shouldn't be Avanti branded in 2019 either but I think most people could see past that. Can the 805 and 390 coexist? I hope so. Love the 390 and I'd hate not to see it.

Could be shaping up to be an absolute belter. Hopefully there will be more info tomorrow

 

My question is which route are they going to use to go form Brum to Crewe? The WMR timetable for that route right now goes through Stoke on Trent and Alsager, but there's also the turn off at Stafford for a more express style route.

 

Yeah I’ve just re-read that part too (about 2019) as they specifically stated it’s the transition period for the 350 from LM to LNR - which I believe means the license for LNR is on the cards too.

The 805 might be to compliment other routes? WCMLS?

 

Could be the 350/2

Reading all these comments about rolling stock

The 730s would like a word

730s run between BHM and WVH - WMR
170s run between BHM and WVH -WMR
LNR 730s run between BHM and CRE now

 

I think we’ll find out on Thursday’s Roadmap Part 2!

 

I really hope so. I know they've got the 3 core routes and the features to discuss, but you can't tell us that this will be the first dlc and then not give us something. I'd settle for a map, but would love to see/hear about the layers. Will tune in again for sure!

 

The 805 doesn't fit the 2019 at all, then again it should also be Virgin not Avanti. There has also been a lot of time fudging recently, which doesn't bother me, but I know really does others. You'd think their first loco DLC would be for their own route but perhaps it is for WCMLS and they're also doing a new timetable for that route too with it.

 

They could claim something like December 2019 when Avanti took over to still have the timings right on that one, but the 805 still wouldn't fit.

 

They do the occasional Liverpool services too but that's still only over the same mileage

 

805 is probably for WCMLS It wouldn't look right.

Also would the 323s make an appearance for Wolves to Brum or was it in the hands of 350s then?

 

Wolverhampton locals switched to 350s when the Bromsgrove extension of the Cross City was opened in 2016, as more units were needed for the service. I do believe 323s did appear at Wolverhampton when there was disruption though.

 

I think it may be an issue where they can't show the 2019 accurate Virgin/Avanti Voyager for whatever licensing reasons so they can instead have it's bimode successor which is good for future proofing for something in the future (perhaps a future North Wales route). Hopefully it might also layer onto WCMLS to add extra traffic there.

 

It'd be good to see some timetable improvements for the WCMLS, since they disappeared into thin air. There was a 350/2 in the livestream so would be good to see that added in.

 

In all fairness the likelihood of Virgin giving their license to anyone seems slim nowadays so it'd probably have to be Avanti or nothing.

 

I would agree with that, and we have the Avanti 390 in game that could layer onto this route wonderfully

 

Unexpected, right?

 

Where are people getting the 805 info from?

 

I wonder if the 805 will unlock a separate timetable based on 2025?

 

They call at Sandwell & Dudley, Wolverhampton, Stafford - Hopefully they add the stoke-on trent branch because it'be super fun to play and it'll provide sooo much gameplay!

 

Towards the end of dovetail direct it said the 805 was in development.

 

I think we might be jumping the gun assuming that the 805 is mainly for this route, it could be more on the other WCML Routes, or even strung between them to do London - MK, then Crewe - Preston and Preston - Carlisle.

 

Wrong era for Preston to Carlisle.

 

Both Preston routes are set decades before the 805

 

In some ways disappointed JT didn’t do this route and AA did Crewe to Preston. Would have been ideal opportunity to bring in a Class 304 and/or 310.

 

Any screenshots so far? Must be almost complete now, being in the 0-3 months category.
Hopefully they've nailed all the approach control signalling, the only real niggle I've had with the excellent ATS route. Would be great if it has the detail of the aforementioned as well (speed sign/signal plate font, trackside clutter, foliage use and placement etc etc, the list go's on).

 

They announced it in the DTG stream with the roadmap article poster

 

I was reminiscing about the 304 on the Preston-Crewe thread. Definitely could use the 304s on that, not just New Street-Lime Street services but they worked on many an occasion to Preston.

 

Hopefully today or tomorrow. We've got 2 days of roadmap articles coming out and there's a roadmap stream tomorrow.