More tube cooling efforts

TfL have put out a press release discussing ways they plan to keep the tube cool during the summer. Methods mentioned include using cold water from underground (Victoria, later on Stockwell), "mechanical chillers" (Oxford Circus, later on Euston and Waterloo), portable fans (Seven Sisters, Chancery Lane), improved ventilation shafts (Liverpool St, Holland Park) and reworking a condenser at Charing Cross. They also say 50 disused fans have been reactivated during recent renovations, doubling the capacity of the "fan network", though presumably not of ventilation capacity in general.

St Pancras rebuild

Fantastic detailed article from Arup about the St Pancras rebuild, written in 2004.

Channel Tunnel Rail Link domestic services

This isn't news, but I've noticed the Southeastern website has a decent description of what high speed services to Kent will run, along with a map showing journey times. For some reason it doesn't mention any trains calling at Ashford off-peak, though we can safely assume all the East Kent trains will, giving it two trains per hour.

Untangling Crossrail Line 2

Crossrail Line 2 is a bit of an enigma. It's a development of the Chelsea-Hackney tube line, for which a route was safeguarded in 1991 and then promptly forgotten about. Control of the plan was given to Cross London Rail Links Ltd, to work on as soon as they finish Line 1.

That was the situation a couple of years ago, at least. Visiting the Crossrail website today that Line 2 has its old Chelsea-Hackney name back, and Line 1 is referred to simply as "Crossrail". This suggests to me the notion of a large number of RER-style numbered Crossrail lines is dead. Line 1 will be "Crossrail" and everything else is on its own.

Possibly related, possibly not, last month the DfT announced a refresh of the Chelsea-Hackney plans, and again there's almost no mention of the name "Crossrail Line 2" anywhere. The refresh itself seems purely procedural, since they more-or-less admit they're never going to build it in this form.