The ancient city of Lincoln can trace it's roots back over 2000 years, and with an impressive cathedral and rural setting you may think it's got a busy and lively railway scene, unfortunately being just off the ECML it's not as busy as it once was, but with four possible routes to and through there is quite a diversity of traffic, depending on what time of day you look at. I am suggesting the route from Lincoln to the South West to Nottingham and then maybe hooking up to the ECML at East Midlands Parkway. TRAINS The main trains on this route are sprinters, including the class 153, 156 and 158. These form the backbone of much of the UK regional fleet, especially in the old East Midlands Trains livery which is based on stagecoach colours CLASS 156 : Built in the late 80s for BR these trains have been in constant service across Britain serving regional routes and stopping services everywhere from Norwich to West Wales. With a max speed of 75 but two motors these versatile units can be worked singly or in tandem with many different classes of sprinters and pacers allowing incredible versatility Class 158 Designed to be the pinnacle of sprinters these 90mph units have been in service on regional routes since 1990. Built in 2 or 3 car variants they provide fast simple service on a variety of routes across Britain, working from Penzance to Wick. Class 60 This heavy freight loco fell out of favour when the class 66 came on stream but these beast still work oil and tanker runs. THE ROUTE Rural Lincolnshire is our home, along with twee villages, many level crossings and a fair few picture box station houses and their accompanying signal boxes. From LED signals to colour lights and semaphore the signalling of this line is in flux and you'll need to learn all of the signalling forms to drive properly, including approach control to level crossings! Stations include : Lincoln central NEWARK CASTLE FISKERTON LOWDHAM STOPPING PATTERNS All stopper : Lincoln - Hykenham - Swinderby - Collingham - Newark Castle - Rolleston - Fiskerton - Bleasby - Thurgarton - Lowdham - Burton Joyce - Carlton - Nottingham (Beeston - Attenborough - East Midlands Parkway) - Operated by Class 156 Semi Fast : Lincoln - Hykenham - Collingham - Newark Castle - Nottingham (Beeston - Attenborough - East Midlands Parkway) - Operated by class 158 Freight - Numerous full length services including multimodal and tankers POSSIBLE FUTURE LAYERS - The Class 222 operates several rush hour services on this route including direct from Lincoln to London 4 times a day with ECS from Derby via Nottingham POSSIBLE EXTENSIONS - Extending up to Doncaster via Gainsborough would reuse the locos (literally no new locos needed) but would give an addition to passengers and extend almost all freight throughout the area, all for a measly 36 and a half miles... bargain!
This looks interesting, and (unlike a lot of the suggestions here) is reasonable in terms of length and rolling stock.
