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Cancelled HS2

Public travel infrastructure projects in the UK are all about connections to London, because London is the only place that counts. CBA of the HS2 link shows that 90% of the benefit of the link that will be built accrues to guess where?

High speed links for Leeds, Manchester, Liverpool etc is a waste of money for the Tories
 
Mullardman said:
I was brought up within a few yards of the Great Central north of Nottm. It was criminally closed by Beeching. Some bollox about the tunnels being too low to electrify, which, from 60 years ago is possibly the lamest excuse in the history of excuses, considering that much of the present system is still not electrified. Also, the (admittedly numerous) tunnels through Nottm, were in soft 'Bunter' sandstone, which is very easily tunnelled, such that a bit of extra height could have been easily achieved. Given the will.
Brunel would be turning in his grave...

So now.. much discussion of 'East Midlands Parkway' etc.which to me is just some place in the middle of nowhere.

Meanwhile, I now live within a 15 minute drive of Rainhill, on the Liverpool to Manchester line. Edge Hill, the first stop out of Liverpool is I believe the oldest still operating passenger station in the World.
Yet the journey from Liverpool to Manchester takes an age, and getting on from there to Leeds or Hull..is a nightmare. I can't see how that line can be 'upgraded'.

With the single exception of London to the South West.. cross country routes have been shit for a century and this Govt. is doing nothing to remedy that.
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Just about the only place not affected by all this is Liverpool as it was never included in any part of HS2 or even the West East 'Powerhouse' line
I guess this is one area where BJ could not lie his way through the Red Wall.
 
Interestingly this could turn into a tricky area for Labour, as some of their heartlands would have been negatively effected by this.

We really need an independent infrastructure body which can decide on such things outside of politics. This could lead to more meaningful connectivity rather than top down vanity projects which don’t meet needs. I do think Covid has changed mindsets & how we plan to work.
 
Woodface said:
We really need an independent infrastructure body which can decide on such things outside of politics. This could lead to more meaningful connectivity rather than top down vanity projects which don’t meet needs. I do think Covid has changed mindsets & how we plan to work.
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I was thinking the same yesterday. However, Boris would just overrule as he saw fit and change the rules/law to suit his personal agenda and line his and his mates pockets.
 
There isn't really a way of separating such projects out of politics, other than in the sense that every party will say that, in theory, they are committed to better public transport, better schools, better hospitals etc. Which is why it's amusing when politicians of party A accuse politicians of party B of 'playing politics' with a particular issue.

(Unless of course this MMT malarkey provides a way out of the conundrum of what taxes should be levied to fund such infrastructure, and at what level).
 
h.g. said:
It hasn't been cancelled just f****d up. It will run to East Midlands Parkway (pretty much the middle of nowhere except for the airport) and then split. They will upgrade the existing lines to Derby and Nottingham although major work upgrading started about a year ago at least on the Derby section so what is new I am not sure. In the absence of HS2 there is some sense to this although how much will depend on the details. What doesn't make sense is the third split where instead of completing killing the major hub at Toton (half way between Derby and Nottingham and making some sense as a major hub even if unpopular with the locals), they are talking about pressing on with a pointless local hub. I'm hoping this is just lies and nonsense from the usual suspects but if not it is hard to see how it could be done in a way that would be beneficial.
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I would say it pretty much does cancel the East. How does the East mainline connect? So much for leveling up. They won't even dual the A1 North of Morpeth. One of the largest accident black spots in the country. Its a horrendous road, permanent traffic jam in summer and nightmare to dive on in the evening in winter.
 
Spike said:
I would say it pretty much does cancel the East. How does the East mainline connect? So much for leveling up. They won't even dual the A1 North of Morpeth. One of the largest accident black spots in the country. Its a horrendous road, permanent traffic jam in summer and nightmare to dive on in the evening in winter.
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and Bradford remains almost completely cut off too. Bradford is the 7th largest English District (population over half a million) after Birmingham, Leeds, Sheffield, Cornwall, Manchester and Bucks. You could make a good case for Cornwall and a SW leg too, forking to Birmingham and the Smoke...
 
Spike said:
I would say it pretty much does cancel the East. How does the East mainline connect? So much for leveling up. They won't even dual the A1 North of Morpeth. One of the largest accident black spots in the country. Its a horrendous road, permanent traffic jam in summer and nightmare to dive on in the evening in winter.
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I agree on HS2 - it’s a missed opportunity and makes them look like a bunch of incompetent liars.

Cameron committed to some A1 duelling North of Morpeth. Not the whole lot as it should be, but better than nothing:

https://nationalhighways.co.uk/our-work/yorkshire-and-north-east/a1-morpeth-to-ellingham-dualling/

It’s no wonder Scotland wants to go it alone. I would be happy to help rebuild Hadrians Wall if Northern England could join them.
 
A Railway chappie on Today this morning pointed out that the government spending of a £gazillion on upgrading the current system rather than building an alternative, cannot, in any logical sense, deliver the Boris Promises of improvements in speed and capacity.

A high speed train sharing a track with slow speed trains will necessarily result in either a slower service, or crashes. The current system stops at many local stations. A slower but no less essential service. If the snail train system has to grind to a halt every now and again to let a raging monster through, the only non-crash consequence is a slower service for local train users.

Presumably the raging monster will have to pick it’s timings with greater care too, thus slowing that down as well.

Could it be that Boris Johnson is telling a bit of a naughty fib?
 
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Barrymagrec said:
Boris IS an incompetent liar, just look at how many times he`s been caught out at it.
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Like his mentor Trump he’s managed to create a culture where a sufficient percentage of the voterbase to keep him in power simply don’t care about facts, evidence, truth, honesty, integrity, decency etc. If anything they actively reject such concepts if it shunts the Overton Window a little further in their direction.
 
Tony L said:
Like his mentor Trump he’s managed to create a culture where a sufficient percentage of the voterbase to keep him in power simply don’t care about facts, evidence, truth, honesty, integrity, decency etc. If anything they actively reject such concepts if it shunts the Overton Window a little further in their direction.
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Give it time, he'll drown in his own vomit eventually. Starmer's just behind him in the polls ;)
 
gavreid said:
Reports say that the scrapping of the extension was about reducing costs, but Leeds is one of only two core cities outside of London that are net contributors to the Treasury.

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/nov/20/leeds-hs2-government-eastern-leg-jobs-homes
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The problem is not costs. We know that the government cannot run out of Pounds, but even on it’s own Monetarist terms, the £200b uplift to the economy would pay for the line to Leeds with quite some left over.

We don’t know what the real reason for cancelling HS2 to Leeds was, but it wasn’t costs.
 
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