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If it did get a “rethink” it would be renamed as Fast Train 1 and continue otherwise unchanged.
So… HS2 was designed because the southern part of the West Coast Main Line is nearing its available capacity.
OK Cancel it because the NIMBies have inflated the cost.
What do you propose to deal with the WCML capacity problems?
Long ago (last summer) my wife told Rishi he should cancel HS2 and asked whether he’d promise to do it. He said he couldn’t because the contracts were signed. Feeble, feeble, feeble.
Bill Bedford,
“What do you propose to deal with the WCML capacity problems?”
What precisely are these capacity problems? What trains are rammed with people going from Birmingham or beyond to London, and by how much?
Bloke on M4
“What precisely are these capacity problems?”
The lines are getting close to the maximum number of trains that can be run with the present infrastructure. It was decided that the cheapest and most effective upgrade path was to build a new railway dedicated to running fast passenger trains (HS2). Since these fast trains take up more space because of their longer safe stopping distance, their removal would allow more than 50% more local and freight trains to be run on the same infrastructure.
It’s usually wise when dealing with infrastructure that replacements and updates are put in hand well before it becomes completely overloaded.
That was never the business case which was about getting people to London faster and even that was a stretch.
“WCML capacity problems”, which exist only inside the spreadsheet of a consultant hired by HS2 Ltd, were the third attempt at a cost-justification for HS2. As BiND points out, the first attempt was that the project would pay for itself by time savings for highly-paid businessmen. “But anyone with a laptop can work on a train” we pointed out. Then they tried ‘Northern powerhouse’ and how HS2 would boost the economies of Brum and Manchester, until we pointed to numerous examples of high-speed lines on the continent, which merely turn the smaller, cheaper location into a dormitory suburb of the larger, more expensive one.
If capacity had really been the concern, we’d be building a four-track ‘conventional’ (140-150mph) main line for a tenth the cost of HS2 (see fully costed plans for the revival of the Great Central). meanwhile, it’s as though nobody in Westminster has noticed Covid and the consequent 25% reduction in passenger rail traffic as many employers and employees discovered how effective working from home could be.
Bill Bedford,
“The lines are getting close to the maximum number of trains that can be run with the present infrastructure. It was decided that the cheapest and most effective upgrade path was to build a new railway dedicated to running fast passenger trains (HS2). Since these fast trains take up more space because of their longer safe stopping distance, their removal would allow more than 50% more local and freight trains to be run on the same infrastructure.”
This is what everyone keeps saying, but they can’t seem to say what trains are rammed with people, or how many of those people are going all the way from Birmingham to London (because someone who gets on the service at Milton Keynes to go to Euston is still going to do that even after HS2).
Chris Miller,
“Westminster has noticed Covid and the consequent 25% reduction in passenger rail traffic as many employers and employees discovered how effective working from home could be.”
This seemed to take an effect for 3 years before Covid. And none of the projections for peak rail growth happened (off-peak has risen since 2013, but there isn’t exactly a problem with mid-afternoon trains).