Suppose HS2 was cancelled

Author
Discussion

Essarell

1,225 posts

53 months

Tuesday 14th March 2023
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Silver3ides said:
Drone footage ..HS2 Route Kenilworth to Burton Green - March 2023
https://youtu.be/OfHqKgewtYw
Wow, to be fair the service roads look pretty good

Chrisgr31

13,440 posts

254 months

Tuesday 14th March 2023
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andy97 said:
There are loads of smaller Network rail projects.
Nuclear power.
Thames Tideway Tunnel.
The new lower Thames crossing.
Several defence projects
The Lower Thames crossing is also delayed!

https://www.romfordrecorder.co.uk/news/23377058.lo...


abzmike

8,241 posts

105 months

Tuesday 14th March 2023
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On a brighter note for rail projects - the Luton Airport Dart is now open! Only 2 years late, and 30% over budget - for less than a mile and a half…. We really aren’t very good at these things.
https://news.sky.com/story/amp/luton-airports-dart...

Condi

17,085 posts

170 months

Tuesday 14th March 2023
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Silver3ides said:
Drone footage ..HS2 Route Kenilworth to Burton Green - March 2023
https://youtu.be/OfHqKgewtYw
Yeah, lots of work been done. What it doesn't show is the amount of new roads and infrastructure been constructed in that area to get soil in and out where they're digging cuttings etc. The improvements for HS2 goes beyond just the train line.

aeropilot

34,295 posts

226 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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Well, I became a casualty of the culling of the Euston station part of HS2, when the company I was contracting for terminated my contract yesterday as all the design work they were doing on Euston has now stopped.

Hey ho.....

Flying Phil

1,578 posts

144 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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Sorry to read that Aeropilot.
Hope you get a new contract somewhere soon.
This start/ stop process on gov't jobs just raises the eventual price!! So frustrating....

aeropilot

34,295 posts

226 months

Tuesday 21st March 2023
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Flying Phil said:
Sorry to read that Aeropilot.
Hope you get a new contract somewhere soon.
This start/ stop process on gov't jobs just raises the eventual price!! So frustrating....
I wasn't even working on HS2....!

But they had so many that were, that now have no work, that I've been kicked out so they can give what I was working on to one of the now workfree permo staff.


Essarell

1,225 posts

53 months

Sunday 28th May 2023
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Latest hs2 board meeting minutes have some heavy redaction:

https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/governmen...

Coupled with the 6 monthly report to parliament being late could there be an announcement coming?

Edited by Essarell on Monday 29th May 00:56

hidetheelephants

23,735 posts

192 months

Sunday 28th May 2023
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abzmike said:
On a brighter note for rail projects - the Luton Airport Dart is now open! Only 2 years late, and 30% over budget - for less than a mile and a half…. We really aren’t very good at these things.
https://news.sky.com/story/amp/luton-airports-dart...
Only 30% bloat is pretty good for 2 years late, especially with inflation running as it is.

LotusOmega375D

7,580 posts

152 months

Wednesday 31st May 2023
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I flew back into Heathrow from Germany on Friday. Due to the wind direction, we headed over NW London before landing from the West. From a cloudless sky, I looked out over the Chilterns and was appalled and embarrassed by this huge broad scar of construction work stretching as far as I could see towards Birmingham. It’s incredible that the project was ever given the go ahead in the first place. You might not be able to see the Great Wall of China from space, but I bet you can see this!

Simpo Two

85,147 posts

264 months

Wednesday 31st May 2023
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LotusOmega375D said:
I looked out over the Chilterns and was appalled and embarrassed by this huge broad scar of construction work stretching as far as I could see towards Birmingham. It’s incredible that the project was ever given the go ahead in the first place
Quite. The country was already bankrupt and the population density too high to make it remotely sensible. Now we are even more bankrupt and the population density even higher. The country would be moving better if the money had been spent on the roads, but that wasn't what Mrs Johnson wanted.

Chrisgr31

13,440 posts

254 months

Wednesday 31st May 2023
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LotusOmega375D said:
I flew back into Heathrow from Germany on Friday. Due to the wind direction, we headed over NW London before landing from the West. From a cloudless sky, I looked out over the Chilterns and was appalled and embarrassed by this huge broad scar of construction work stretching as far as I could see towards Birmingham. It’s incredible that the project was ever given the go ahead in the first place. You might not be able to see the Great Wall of China from space, but I bet you can see this!
Had you come in from the south east you would have seen HS1 which did similar damage but has now blended in with the landscape and takes up significantly less space than a motorway.

redrabbit29

1,274 posts

132 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
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How are we so utterly dire at any building projects in this country?

Every construction project seems to take over a decade and is way over budget

Where I live they've just opened a new train station (Reading Green Park). Announced in 2007 but stopped and resubmitted and changed, it has just opened after four years of building.

Four years... To add a two platformed station to an already used track.

Not to mention to 17 years it took from first announcing to opening

megaphone

10,692 posts

250 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
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redrabbit29 said:
How are we so utterly dire at any building projects in this country?

Every construction project seems to take over a decade and is way over budget

Where I live they've just opened a new train station (Reading Green Park). Announced in 2007 but stopped and resubmitted and changed, it has just opened after four years of building.

Four years... To add a two platformed station to an already used track.

Not to mention to 17 years it took from first announcing to opening
And it's ugly.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O4Q3JrdMdGs

Condi

17,085 posts

170 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
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LotusOmega375D said:
I flew back into Heathrow from Germany on Friday. Due to the wind direction, we headed over NW London before landing from the West. From a cloudless sky, I looked out over the Chilterns and was appalled and embarrassed by this huge broad scar of construction work stretching as far as I could see towards Birmingham. It’s incredible that the project was ever given the go ahead in the first place. You might not be able to see the Great Wall of China from space, but I bet you can see this!
If you took that attitude we would have no railways at all, no motorways, and certainly no airports for you to fly from! Ever seen how much space an airport takes up, or how wide the M1 is?

For comparison, the M1 is about 35m wide, and the East Coast Main Line is 10m wide. Once it all goes green again you'll never notice it...

Facts are inconvenient when they collide with emotional nonsense. Maybe we should return the motorway network to green fields, as they are an "appalling and embarrassing broad scar stretching as far as the eye can see towards Birmingham"?

LukeBrown66

4,479 posts

45 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
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The problem is I live in the area, nobody needs it here, nobody wants it, it has just caused problems. Roads are filthy, traffic is insane in areas it should not be and all you see is waste.

I understand why the project was looked at initially, but the world was a very different place then, and now, the costs are insane, and the govt is ONLY carrying on because rightly;y the companies involved would have drawn up contracts with horrendous penalty clauses in them if it is cancelled, it already has in some areas and no doubt the govt are having to pay immense amounts for that.

LotusOmega375D

7,580 posts

152 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
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According to the Avanti West Coast website, their average journey time from Euston to Birmingham New Street is 1 hour 16 minutes. That’s not bad at all for about 115 miles. Why do we need to dig a whole new route? The vast majority of the UK population will never use it.

DoctorX

7,240 posts

166 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
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LotusOmega375D said:
According to the Avanti West Coast website, their average journey time from Euston to Birmingham New Street is 1 hour 16 minutes. That’s not bad at all for about 115 miles. Why do we need to dig a whole new route? The vast majority of the UK population will never use it.
It's about increasing capacity on the existing lines for slow trains and freight by diverting the fast trains away. However, if the only section which gets built is the London to Birmingham bit, then it really is just a faster way of getting to Brum hehe. Presumably the rest will get built one day, maybe.

valiant

10,066 posts

159 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
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LotusOmega375D said:
According to the Avanti West Coast website, their average journey time from Euston to Birmingham New Street is 1 hour 16 minutes. That’s not bad at all for about 115 miles. Why do we need to dig a whole new route? The vast majority of the UK population will never use it.
You could say that about any large infrastructure project.

The vast majority of the U.K. population don’t use the M74 or M8 so does that mean it shouldn’t have been built all those years ago? What about Heathrow’s second runway? Most won’t use it but does that mean it shouldn’t go ahead?

HS2 is about capacity, not speed. It frees up great swathes of the WCML, which is practically at capacity, as the intercity trains will be transferred to the HS2 line which are a massive pain in the arse when planning paths for these trains as they need long headways to maximise their speed and timings. Take them away and you have loads more paths for stoppers and freight meaning that intermediate stations will receive a much better service and more lorries off the roads.

It’s a bit of a scar at the moment as it is a building site. Once built it will blend in a lot better and will be no more of a visual impact than HS1 is and less than what the WCML is now.

Once spades are in the ground, things move along generally at pace. It’s the problems with planning, political interference and accommodating nimbyism before a shovel hits the ground that slows things down to a glacial pace.

hidetheelephants

23,735 posts

192 months

Thursday 1st June 2023
quotequote all
redrabbit29 said:
How are we so utterly dire at any building projects in this country?

Every construction project seems to take over a decade and is way over budget

Where I live they've just opened a new train station (Reading Green Park). Announced in 2007 but stopped and resubmitted and changed, it has just opened after four years of building.

Four years... To add a two platformed station to an already used track.

Not to mention to 17 years it took from first announcing to opening
Adding a station to a railway line that's in use is massively more complicated than building a station on HS2 or whatever.