Traffic rates are usually worse on Sundays, a lot of people lag FTB servers on Sundays because of their bad internet connection. Just so many people use it.
I was actually planning on making my own private modpack in MultiMC, based on the FTB Ultimate pack. 1.4.7 has roughly 700 or so mods overall
http://modlist.mcf.li/list/1.4/1.4.6_1.4.7.php
It is faster at downloading with automatic then downloading from England1/England2
This is probably because of the traffic connections
I live in Australia
The Asian region should be faster for me.
Not that it matters though.
I personally prefer to add:
Mo Creatures
Optifine
Millenaire (or) Minecraft Comes Alive
AE is an awesome mod. Thankfully it comes in-built in the modpack