HS2 and the Grand Union

[matty40s]

The white elephant continues its monstrous construction to save 2 minutes on a journey from stations not in the centre of either city at each end.

Here is the palaver in the Colne Valley over the last few days.

 

 

[Ex Brummie]

5 minutes ago, matty40s said:

The white elephant continues its monstrous construction to save 2 minutes on a journey from stations not in the centre of either city at each end.

 

 

 

Not just about faster trains, but to provide greater capacity to the transport network which is sorely needed, especially when personal transport options are being seriously curtailed and punitively charged.

[Wanderer Vagabond]

1 hour ago, Ex Brummie said:

Not just about faster trains, but to provide greater capacity to the transport network which is sorely needed, especially when personal transport options are being seriously curtailed and punitively charged.

But who is going to be travelling on it? I'm a regular rail passenger (don't have a car) but unless the fares are ridiculously cheap I can't envisage any occasions I'll travel on it. Why would anyone want to go from not the centre of Birmingham to not the centre of London on a line that is mostly in tunnels anyway. I'd sooner take 20 minutes longer and have a more interesting trip. Yes, we need improved infrastructure but this isn't it.

[MtB]

1 hour ago, Wanderer Vagabond said:

But who is going to be travelling on it?

 

Everyone currently travelling on the existing line.

 

Once they are got rid of, stacks more freight can be carried by rail on the old slow line. 

 

More capacity, see? I think that's the idea anyway.

 

 

[Tim Lewis]

It’s been delayed a bit

 

https://www.building.co.uk/news/work-on-hs2-viaduct-paused-for-urgent-remediation/5127939.article#:~:text=Work on HS2's Colne Valley,the most recently completed span.

[Tonka]

1 hour ago, Tim Lewis said:

It’s been delayed a bit

 

https://www.building.co.uk/news/work-on-hs2-viaduct-paused-for-urgent-remediation/5127939.article#:~:text=Work on HS2's Colne Valley,the most recently completed span.

Thought that was going to be for the sinkholes that have appeared near to where they are tunneling.  But no it is to to realign it. You would have thought with laser lines and GPS they could have got it right

[JungleJames]

13 hours ago, matty40s said:

The white elephant continues its monstrous construction to save 2 minutes on a journey from stations not in the centre of either city at each end.

Here is the palaver in the Colne Valley over the last few days.

 

 

London Euston and Birmingham Curzon St. As good as centre to centre.

11 hours ago, Wanderer Vagabond said:

But who is going to be travelling on it? I'm a regular rail passenger (don't have a car) but unless the fares are ridiculously cheap I can't envisage any occasions I'll travel on it. Why would anyone want to go from not the centre of Birmingham to not the centre of London on a line that is mostly in tunnels anyway. I'd sooner take 20 minutes longer and have a more interesting trip. Yes, we need improved infrastructure but this isn't it.

The mostly in tunnels bit has been caused by the likes of Matty40S complaining about how it looks. Which coincidentally adds to the cost, something these people then moan about. Forgetting they caused it in the first place. 

 

I probably won't travel on it, as I've no wish to travel under so many tunnels. 

But let's make sure we are fairly accurate in apportionment of blame.

[Wanderer Vagabond]

2 minutes ago, JungleJames said:

London Euston and Birmingham Curzon St. As good as centre to centre.

No it isn't, at the moment the bit between Old Oak Common and Euston has been 'paused', for which you can read cancelled (or else delayed whilst inflation costs increases the cost of the project even further). Still doesn't answer the question of who will be travelling on it, because when travelling between Birmingham and London, unless the fares are half of what they are on the other lines, I certainly wont be. Once the decision had been made to start the project, then it should have been finished to benefit the cities in the North, what we are going to be left with now is utterly pointless.

[Pluto]

13 hours ago, Ex Brummie said:

Not just about faster trains, but to provide greater capacity to the transport network which is sorely needed, especially when personal transport options are being seriously curtailed and punitively charged.

If it was about improving the rail infrastructure they would have built a new goods-only line from Harwich to the Midlands initially, with extensions to Liverpool, Southampton, and even that corruption centre of the NE, Teesport. The line would be similar to the one built between Rotterdam and the Ruhr, so high speed for freight, but nothing like HS standards, and thus much cheaper. The initial phase would cut across an area of low population, through fairly level ground, and relieve the congestion at Harwich, particularly noticeable during Covid. It would prove of benefit to the whole country, with the existing passenger network continuing to serve smaller towns which will be bypassed by HS2. HS2 is for the suits who want to rush around appearing to do something useful, while the general population will not be able to afford tickets if they are priced to pay for the infrastructure.

[Wanderer Vagabond]

6 minutes ago, Pluto said:

If it was about improving the rail infrastructure they would have built a new goods-only line from Harwich to the Midlands initially, with extensions to Liverpool, Southampton, and even that corruption centre of the NE, Teesport. The line would be similar to the one built between Rotterdam and the Ruhr, so high speed for freight, but nothing like HS standards, and thus much cheaper. The initial phase would cut across an area of low population, through fairly level ground, and relieve the congestion at Harwich, particularly noticeable during Covid. It would prove of benefit to the whole country, with the existing passenger network continuing to serve smaller towns which will be bypassed by HS2. HS2 is for the suits who want to rush around appearing to do something useful, while the general population will not be able to afford tickets if they are priced to pay for the infrastructure.

Exactly this^^^^^^. The HS2 that we are now going to have is purely a vanity project, Spain have got a High Speed Rail, France have got a High Speed Rail so we must have one. Unless you need a mortgage to buy a ticket on it, for the numbers likely to use it, it will never be an economic proposition in it's current form.

 

It sort of reminds me of the 'case' put for building the Humber Bridge back in the 1970's, all that was, was a vanity project so that we could have the longest suspension bridge in the world. When it was opened, after the original novelty wore off no one was using it.

Edited February 23 by Wanderer Vagabond

[Onewheeler]

19 minutes ago, Wanderer Vagabond said:

It sort of reminds me of the 'case' put for building the Humber Bridge back in the 1970's, all that was, was a vanity project so that we could have the longest suspension bridge in the world. When it was opened, after the original novelty wore off no one was using it.

Not true. I've unicycled over it. Worth every billion. See profile picture.

Edited February 23 by Onewheeler

[jonathanA]

complete waste of money always was.  for me the travel time to london by west coast mainline is 2hr 9mins. Its actually perfectly fine, cutting 30 or 40 mins off that would be a disadvantage as it wouldn't be worth me trying to get anything done on train. As for capacity there's plenty of capacity as most of the 1st class carriages are empty as no 'ordinary' folk can afford the nearly £500 return fare.  the super rich who can afford it aren't going to travel by train anyway....  

 

the billions would have been much better spent on improving the capacity of the existing, upgrading east-west links and making travel by train more attractive than car or flying (i.e reducing ticket prices) 

[IanD]

3 minutes ago, jonathanA said:

complete waste of money always was.  for me the travel time to london by west coast mainline is 2hr 9mins. Its actually perfectly fine, cutting 30 or 40 mins off that would be a disadvantage as it wouldn't be worth me trying to get anything done on train. As for capacity there's plenty of capacity as most of the 1st class carriages are empty as no 'ordinary' folk can afford the nearly £500 return fare.  the super rich who can afford it aren't going to travel by train anyway....  

 

the billions would have been much better spent on improving the capacity of the existing, upgrading east-west links and making travel by train more attractive than car or flying (i.e reducing ticket prices) 

 

But that would mean less profit for the rail franchise owners in exchange for a social good, and we can't possibly have that... 😉

[jonathanA]

2 minutes ago, IanD said:

 

But that would mean less profit for the rail franchise owners in exchange for a social good, and we can't possibly have that... 😉

what was i thinking.... 🙂🤣

 

that said a mate of mine who is a diesel fitter has bought two houses and a brand new defender off the money he has made out of cross rail and HS2 ... so if he has made that much (admittedly by sleeping in his van and working shifts).... - so maybe some social good and a tiny bit of wealth re-distribution. I can only imagine (dream) how much the big boys have trousered out of HS2💸

[BEngo]

Network rail, or Railtrack before them, had already demonstrated that they could not upgrade the west coast main line without causing so much disruption that you might as well close it and do the work.    There were also soaring costs, well beyond inflation so the project was abandoned part completed.  Virgin had to be paid a lot of money because they had invested based on a performance promise which could no longer be met.

 

HS2 is supposed to be an answer to this, but merely demonstrates that the DfT civil service knows stuff all about running a railway and ministers are readily seduced by a big shiny project.  The original business case for HS2 included aTreasury subsidy of about £1billion a year, in then money.  It assumed that people would travel to Euston from places like  Gerrards Cross, Beaconsfield, High Wycombe and others to get a train to Brum, instead of getting on a Chiltern train or the M40.  Even with such wildy optimistic assumptions and others of similar ilk, it did not stand up but no one had the brains, or balls, to kill it off. 

 

The original Great Central London Extension  was a victim of similar issues.  Once Watkin and the  the Channel link had gone there were no profitable intermediate stations and trains to Manchester and Sheffield simply did not have the loadings to pay their way.

 

A new modern but not High Speed  railway to Brum might make sense, because it could have stations on the way so that it is quicker and easier to go from a West London or leafy Bucks home to Brum, but it is too late now.

 

N

[alan_fincher]

15 minutes ago, BEngo said:

Network rail, or Railtrack before them, had already demonstrated that they could not upgrade the west coast main line without causing so much disruption that you might as well close it and do the work.    There were also soaring costs, well beyond inflation so the project was abandoned part completed.  Virgin had to be paid a lot of money because they had invested based on a performance promise which could no longer be met.

 

HS2 is supposed to be an answer to this, but merely demonstrates that the DfT civil service knows stuff all about running a railway and ministers are readily seduced by a big shiny project.  The original business case for HS2 included aTreasury subsidy of about £1billion a year, in then money.  It assumed that people would travel to Euston from places like  Gerrards Cross, Beaconsfield, High Wycombe and others to get a train to Brum, instead of getting on a Chiltern train or the M40.  Even with such wildy optimistic assumptions and others of similar ilk, it did not stand up but no one had the brains, or balls, to kill it off. 

 

The original Great Central London Extension  was a victim of similar issues.  Once Watkin and the  the Channel link had gone there were no profitable intermediate stations and trains to Manchester and Sheffield simply did not have the loadings to pay their way.

 

A new modern but not High Speed  railway to Brum might make sense, because it could have stations on the way so that it is quicker and easier to go from a West London or leafy Bucks home to Brum, but it is too late now.

 

N

 

A good analysis of the situation, I think.

[JungleJames]

1 hour ago, Wanderer Vagabond said:

No it isn't, at the moment the bit between Old Oak Common and Euston has been 'paused', for which you can read cancelled (or else delayed whilst inflation costs increases the cost of the project even further). Still doesn't answer the question of who will be travelling on it, because when travelling between Birmingham and London, unless the fares are half of what they are on the other lines, I certainly wont be. Once the decision had been made to start the project, then it should have been finished to benefit the cities in the North, what we are going to be left with now is utterly pointless.

Well if Euston is pulled, then ok. But as yet it isn't. If it is, well, bang goes any speed benefit.

But, Birmingham is still in the centre of BirmIngham. 

 

As for who will travel on it. Don't just assume that as you won't, nobody else will.

 

[David Mack]

15 minutes ago, JungleJames said:

Well if Euston is pulled, then ok. But as yet it isn't.

It is and it isn't. Work between Old Oak Common and Euston is paused.

The latest ministerial update to Parliament (https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/hs2-6-monthly-report-to-parliament-november-2023) says:

"We are going to scale back the project at Euston and adopt a new development led approach to the Euston Quarter which will deliver a station that works, is affordable and can be open and running trains as soon as possible."

and

"At Euston, we will appoint a development company, separate from HS2 Ltd, to manage the delivery of this project. We will also take on the lessons of success stories such as Battersea Power Station and Nine Elms, which secured £9 billion of private sector investment and thousands of homes. So, we will harness the future growth that the station will unleash to support its development, to ensure we get the best possible value for the British taxpayer"

No timescales are given for the new approach at Euston. All that is said is "Delivery remains on track for the initial high-speed services between Old Oak Common in west London and Birmingham Curzon Street by 2029 to 2033." So Euston is some time after that.

[Captain Pegg]

1 hour ago, BEngo said:

Network rail, or Railtrack before them, had already demonstrated that they could not upgrade the west coast main line without causing so much disruption that you might as well close it and do the work.    There were also soaring costs, well beyond inflation so the project was abandoned part completed.  Virgin had to be paid a lot of money because they had invested based on a performance promise which could no longer be met.

 

HS2 is supposed to be an answer to this, but merely demonstrates that the DfT civil service knows stuff all about running a railway and ministers are readily seduced by a big shiny project.  The original business case for HS2 included aTreasury subsidy of about £1billion a year, in then money.  It assumed that people would travel to Euston from places like  Gerrards Cross, Beaconsfield, High Wycombe and others to get a train to Brum, instead of getting on a Chiltern train or the M40.  Even with such wildy optimistic assumptions and others of similar ilk, it did not stand up but no one had the brains, or balls, to kill it off. 

 

The original Great Central London Extension  was a victim of similar issues.  Once Watkin and the  the Channel link had gone there were no profitable intermediate stations and trains to Manchester and Sheffield simply did not have the loadings to pay their way.

 

A new modern but not High Speed  railway to Brum might make sense, because it could have stations on the way so that it is quicker and easier to go from a West London or leafy Bucks home to Brum, but it is too late now.

 

N

 

Why would you want to build someting that's not state of the art?

 

The speed of modern railways largely comes from the capability of the traction units. In turn the momentum produced at speed allows much steeper gradients which ultimately reduces the amount of engineering required to build the line. Therefore designing for a lower speed wouldn't save huge amounts on construction - if it saved anything at all - but having a top speed of 100mph rather than 200mph means you need twice as many trains and while the construction cost is a one time only cost new trains come around every 25 years or so.

 

The operational model for high speed rail in Germany is different to that of France as a result of their different population distribution characteristics. The former run high speed between relatively frequent stops while the latter cover massive distances between stops. There is no great difference in the philosophy of how they go about designing and building their new railways.

 

The USP for HS2 compared to any other European high speed model is that it is essentially a self-contained network independent of the existing conventional rail network. That has both advantages and disadvantages but is largely to avoid capacity conflicts in the major cities and the very diffcult issues that arise between compatibility of the requirements for modern trains and legacy systems.

 

[Wanderer Vagabond]

2 hours ago, Onewheeler said:

Not true. I've unicycled over it. Worth every billion. See profile picture.

Oh, you were the one who used it then. Granted that now, 40 years later there is a bit more use of it probably because the motorways have been built a bit closer to it (M180). At the time it was a bridge from nowhere to nowhere. I had relatives living in Goole when it was built and they couldn't see the point behind it.

56 minutes ago, David Mack said:

It is and it isn't. Work between Old Oak Common and Euston is paused.

The latest ministerial update to Parliament (https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/hs2-6-monthly-report-to-parliament-november-2023) says:

"We are going to scale back the project at Euston and adopt a new development led approach to the Euston Quarter which will deliver a station that works, is affordable and can be open and running trains as soon as possible."

and

"At Euston, we will appoint a development company, separate from HS2 Ltd, to manage the delivery of this project. We will also take on the lessons of success stories such as Battersea Power Station and Nine Elms, which secured £9 billion of private sector investment and thousands of homes. So, we will harness the future growth that the station will unleash to support its development, to ensure we get the best possible value for the British taxpayer"

No timescales are given for the new approach at Euston. All that is said is "Delivery remains on track for the initial high-speed services between Old Oak Common in west London and Birmingham Curzon Street by 2029 to 2033." So Euston is some time after that.

I'd be interested to see what the plan for connecting from Old Oak Common to Euston involves (rather than all of the flannel about the new station). If it is an overland line, have they purchased all of the very expensive, London priced properties in between? If it is in a tunnel, the Crossrail link (Elizabeth Line) cost nearly £19 billion, so inflation is going to add a salty sum sum to that sort of figure. Perhaps they are hoping to use existing lines. I would imagine that it has been 'paused' because they realised just how much it is going to cost, although pausing it will simply add to the figure if it ever gets restarted (I suspect it wont).

[IanD]

33 minutes ago, Captain Pegg said:

 

Why would you want to build someting that's not state of the art?

 

The speed of modern railways largely comes from the capability of the traction units. In turn the momentum produced at speed allows much steeper gradients which ultimately reduces the amount of engineering required to build the line. Therefore designing for a lower speed wouldn't save huge amounts on construction - if it saved anything at all - but having a top speed of 100mph rather than 200mph means you need twice as many trains and while the construction cost is a one time only cost new trains come around every 25 years or so.

 

The operational model for high speed rail in Germany is different to that of France as a result of their different population distribution characteristics. The former run high speed between relatively frequent stops while the latter cover massive distances between stops. There is no great difference in the philosophy of how they go about designing and building their new railways.

 

The USP for HS2 compared to any other European high speed model is that it is essentially a self-contained network independent of the existing conventional rail network. That has both advantages and disadvantages but is largely to avoid capacity conflicts in the major cities and the very diffcult issues that arise between compatibility of the requirements for modern trains and legacy systems.

 

 

Like the Shinkansen then?

 

HS2 cost (latest estimate in 2024) : about £70B (including Euston) for 140miles = £500M/mile

 

The last brand-new Shinkansen line built (Hokkiado -- with a *lot* more expensive bridges/viaducts/tunnels than HS2) cost $31M/km in 2016, which is £39M/mile -- let's say £50M/mile today allowing for inflation.

 

https://www.railjournal.com/in_depth/hokkaido-shinkansen-prepares-for-launch/

 

I'm sure there's a reason why the HS2 cost per mile is about 10x higher than the Shinkansen, but I can't think of it... 😉

Edited February 23 by IanD

[Captain Pegg]

3 hours ago, Pluto said:

If it was about improving the rail infrastructure they would have built a new goods-only line from Harwich to the Midlands initially, with extensions to Liverpool, Southampton, and even that corruption centre of the NE, Teesport. The line would be similar to the one built between Rotterdam and the Ruhr, so high speed for freight, but nothing like HS standards, and thus much cheaper. The initial phase would cut across an area of low population, through fairly level ground, and relieve the congestion at Harwich, particularly noticeable during Covid. It would prove of benefit to the whole country, with the existing passenger network continuing to serve smaller towns which will be bypassed by HS2. HS2 is for the suits who want to rush around appearing to do something useful, while the general population will not be able to afford tickets if they are priced to pay for the infrastructure.

 

You surely mean Felixstowe rather than Harwich?

 

There is a rail corridor eastwards from Felixstowe on which - unlike the WCML - there is very limited conflict between freight and passenger. It has been developed specifically to remove traffic from routes into and out of London during the same timescales as HS2. That has involved the construction of a new chord at Ipswich to give direct eastward access by rail from Felixstowe, grade separation north of Peterborough, upgrade of the route between Peterborugh and Doncaster via Lincoln for intermodal traffic, and a new chord for grade separation at Nuneaton. There are plenty of latent schemes to further improve capacity on the route including grade separation in the Leicester area, double tracking at Soham and signalling upgrades since large parts of the route are still operated by absolute block signalling which is a significant capacity constraint.

 

Ultimately though given the political difficulties in building a new shiny passenger railway what chance a dirty freight railway (which is how it would be portrayed in public)?

 

Also note Dutch built both high speed passenger and freight simultaneously and the the scale of freight operation between Germany and the Netherlands is on a different level to that through Felixstowe. And Brexit would have pulled the rug from under any such scheme anyway.

 

In any event there is probably a better case for new railway infrastructure in terms of bespoke routing to serve Southampton as there is much more conflict and lack of capacity between there and the Midlands than there is from Felixstowe.

Edited February 23 by Captain Pegg

[Pluto]

Sorry, I should have written Felixstowe. All places south of Sheffield seem the same to me! One of the major problems with rail traffic to and from Felixstowe is the single track approach, which I believe restricts the number of trains which can serve the port daily. I was always impressed with the freight line from Rotterdam, as it was being constructed during the years when I was driving to Germany and Poland a few times each year. Returning to Europort, it was always interesting to see how the track had been fitted into the landscape through the 20 odd miles of the port. It does seem to have been the result of a clear integrated transport policy with wide public benefit, something the MfT seems to have failed to produce since it was formed as the MoT in 1919.

[Stroudwater1]

3 hours ago, Wanderer Vagabond said:

 

 

It sort of reminds me of the 'case' put for building the Humber Bridge back in the 1970's, all that was, was a vanity project so that we could have the longest suspension bridge in the world. When it was opened, after the original novelty wore off no one was using it.

The Humber bridge was signed off by Barbara Castle when Harold Wilson put pressure on the project due to the Kingston on Hull by election in 1966.
 

Surprisingly it was all agreed just by chance just before  by election took place. Politics seldom changes sadly. 
 

TBH it is widely used these days, and has probably saved some semblance of employment for the surrounding areas. 

 

 I don’t understand why we can’t or didn’t invest on an HS2 project from Liverpool to connect to HS1. Wouldn’t that reduce the throughput of trade to the Dutch and Belgian ports and greatly increase trade via the UK West coast ports. Brexit has probably killed that one but it never seemed to be voiced as an option? 

[IanD]

9 minutes ago, Stroudwater1 said:

The Humber bridge was signed off by Barbara Castle when Harold Wilson put pressure on the project due to the Kingston on Hull by election in 1966.
 

Surprisingly it was all agreed just by chance just before  by election took place. Politics seldom changes sadly. 
 

TBH it is widely used these days, and has probably saved some semblance of employment for the surrounding areas. 

 

 I don’t understand why we can’t or didn’t invest on an HS2 project from Liverpool to connect to HS1. Wouldn’t that reduce the throughput of trade to the Dutch and Belgian ports and greatly increase trade via the UK West coast ports. Brexit has probably killed that one but it never seemed to be voiced as an option? 

But that would mean a direct connection for through traffic between HS2 and HS1, and of course there isn't one -- in fact the chances of HS2 even getting to Euston are looking slim, what's the private sector going to get in return in they invest billions in this?

 

On top of that, you can't put slower freight trains on the high-speed lines without killing the HS speeds and schedules.

 

If only we had a joined-up transport infrastructure policy, with a government that realised that investment in this pays off in the long term, and that providing basic services and building/maintaining national infrastructure is the job of government not the profit-driven private sector... 😞

Edited February 23 by IanD