Roland Perry <roland@perry.co.uk> wrote:
> In message <stpd33$tna$1@dont-email.me>, at 21:03:31 on Sun, 6 Feb 2022,
> Recliner <recliner.usenet@gmail.com> remarked:
>> Roland Perry <roland@perry.co.uk> wrote:
>>> In message <stou1q$1qt$1@dont-email.me>, at 16:46:50 on Sun, 6 Feb 2022,
>>> Recliner <recliner.usenet@gmail.com> remarked:
>>>> Roland Perry <roland@perry.co.uk> wrote:
>>>>> In message <81kvvg53pd8pvbfa8frm0g8t067i3me8je@4ax.com>, at 13:50:32 on
>>>>> Sun, 6 Feb 2022, Recliner <recliner.usenet@gmail.com> remarked:
>>>>>> On Sun, 6 Feb 2022 06:10:16 +0000, Roland Perry
>>>>>> <roland@perry.co.uk> wrote:
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> In message <stlqjg$atd$1@dont-email.me>, at 12:29:36 on Sat, 5 Feb 2022,
>>>>>>> Recliner <recliner.usenet@gmail.com> remarked:
>>>>>>>> Roland Perry <roland@perry.co.uk> wrote:
>>>>>>>>> In message <sthla7$h7m$1@dont-email.me>, at 22:34:47 on Thu, 3
>>>>>>>>> Feb 2022,
>>>>>>>>> Recliner <recliner.usenet@gmail.com> remarked:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>>> many, perhaps most, large civil engineering projects would never get
>>>>>>>>>> approved if the proposals had included the true costs and timescales.
>>>>>>>>>> It's why the government adds an automatic optimism bias factor when
>>>>>>>>>> evaluating such projects. It's a hefty 66% at the initial stage:
>>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>>> And what's your response when the cost ends up at twice that 166%?
>>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> In which projects has that happened?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I think the Ely bypass is an example, up from 22m to 49m.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Note that the budget would be set at 100%, not 166% (ie, the OBF is
>>>>>>>> used when evaluating proposals, but doesn't get added to the budget).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> In the sense that the 22m above might have been 13m + 9m, yes (depending
>>>>>>> on when the 66% was introduced and/or what equivalent percentage was
>>>>>>> applied to the budget).
>>>>>>
>>>>>> The 66% isn't added formally, but the factor is applied when evaluating
>>>>>> the project's BCR. So it's never added to the
>>>>>> budget or the approved spending limit.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> The Cambridge guided bus started at 54m, got to 116m when approved (some
>>>>>>> of which might have been adding an optimism bias factor), and ended up
>>>>>>> at £152m.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Cambridge North station went 15/24/44m
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> The Ely North junction upgrade is going through a similar upwards spiral
>>>>>>> (and they haven't even decided on a plan, yet).
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>> Crossrail's overshoot has been relatively modest: it was
>>>>>>>> expected to cost
>>>>>>>> £15.9bn in 2007, subsequently cut to £14.8bn in 2010, while the
>>>>>>>> final cost
>>>>>>>> is likely to turn out to be £19bn. So that's an overshoot of just under
>>>>>>>> 20%.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> But they've reduced the spec over and over again to control the costs.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> What specs have they reduced?
>>>>>
>>>>> The first was scrapping toilets at all the stations. That won't have
>>>>> been the only spartanising of the project.
>>>>
>>>> https://www.london.gov.uk/questions/2020/0957
>>>
>>> Which shows that none of the stations in the core have the originally
>>> planned toilets.
>>
>> Farringdon does have a toilet that was added. So the only omissions are
>> Bond St, Tottenham Court Rd and Whitechapel.
>
> There was always "last resort" toilet at Farringdon. If that's the one
> they have repurposed, more shame on them.

I don't know if they're referring to the old, long-closed one, or a new
one, built as part of the NR station extension.

But I do agree with you that, just as the stations are all accessible, they
really all ought to have toilets.

>
>>>> What else do you think has been dropped?
>>>
>>> First Google hit: <https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2010/sep/27/crossrail-
>>> budget-cuts>
>>
>> Perhaps you should have read it before posting?
>>
>> "The company building the rail line across London said that the scope of
>> the project would not change, meaning that all the stations and the
>> outer-London spurs will still be built."
>>
>> In other words, nothing was cut.
>
> Apart from the new toilets in all those core stations, and who knows
> what else?

You've not been able to come up with anything but missing toilets in three
or four stations, so let's assume nothing else was cut. So, overall,
Crossrail will deliver a higher spec overall than originally planned.

>
>> "Efficiencies would be found by making use of existing train designs,
>> rather than building new carriages from scratch, the company said."
>>
>> All the trains were in fact brand new, built to a new design, unique to
>> Crossrail.
>>
>> "The latest cuts are part of Crossrail's ongoing review of costs on the
>> line, which will run for more than 73 miles from Maidenhead and Heathrow in
>> the west, through new, twin-bore 13-mile tunnels under central London to
>> Shenfield and Abbey Wood in the east."
>>
>> Do you think that's a cut? The line was subsequently extended to Reading.
>
> Only by finding separate funding. It's well known that the Crossrail
> project would never have got approval for an initial plan to go as far
> west as Reading, including the OHL costs that far west and the
> consequential rebuilding of Reading station.

It's still an extension, and needed extra station work and more trains.
That will have cost more than a few station toilets.

>
>>>>>> The spec changes I can think of were additions, such as the Woolwich
>>>>>> station and the extension from Maidenhead to Reading.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Just like (and I know people think I'm imagining it) Thameslink was
>>>>>>> going to have a 4-platform station at St Pancras, originally.
>>>>>>
>>>>>> Was that ever part of the official, budgeted spec, or just something
>>>>>> that would have been desirable, but was never approved?
>>>>>
>>>>> They left the provision of that station to the last minute, having to
>>>>> get some special extra funding to fit out the box under the west-side of
>>>>> the site. The original plan was to have two platforms each way, so that
>>>>> for example a northbound train which was stalled there because the route
>>>>> via Finsbury Park was blocked, didn't also block the route towards
>>>>> Luton. Southbound, it would allow better regulation of the service
>>>>> because a slightly late-running train on one of the converging branches
>>>>> could overtake one from the other branch.
>>>>
>>>> Yes, four platforms would certainly be better, but was they ever part of
>>>> the budgeted plan?
>>>
>>> Fitting out the station at all was never in the budget. Which is a shame
>>> because it means the original budget omitted to mention something which
>>> had inevitably to be funded in one form or other.
>>
>> So it wasn't a cut at all? It was something added to the project, just not
>> in the gold-plated form you'd have preferred.
>
> No, as other posters have confirmed, it was a cut from four to two
> platforms.

Yes, but was that a cut from an actual plan, or just an unfulfilled
aspiration? I think it was the latter.