Why are people opposed to HS2? (And other HS2 discussion)

[pt_mad]

Because the only reason the TOCs have for TV advertising is to try to increase revenue, and the only additional passengers they can attract are leisure / occaisonal travellers. The commuters are already travelling.



Anything is theoretically possible. Unpopular schemes and changes have been and will continue to be implemented.



It's not certain after it's passed either.

It goes into law if the legislation gets passed. So it'd be very likely at that stage that it would be built. In my personal opinion the benefits of phase one alone are worth it. I think many members of the general public don't realise that HS2 will directly link in with the classic railway in the North Midlands. It's not a standalone thing wjere they're stuck on an adjacent line which becomes a dead end at Birmingham City Centre.

Honestly I don't think it'd be possible to just rip up the minimum service spec. and tell a line of towns for example, you are to lose one of your three morning hourly services. For a start you may end up with serious political opposition, due process would have to be followed, and after implementation you could end up with serious crowd control problems. As well as artificially surpressing demand by not offering the adequate number of services to cater for the numbers. If that were to be applied across a whole route then it could be an election killer, if it even got near to being reality.

 

[mmh]

It's been discussed at length by a number of posters that one of the reasons that they are against HS2 is that some stations will get a worse service than now. Is that not an issue then?

So you can ensure nowhere will have a worse service than now after all?

Throw it away if you want. Plan the timetable that you think can be run. But if the WCML is not full, as you aver, then you'll be able to fit them all in and add more, surely?

Would you disagree that a big factor in the WCML being full is how many places "must" have fast trains to London?

 

[EM2]

So you can ensure nowhere will have a worse service than now after all?

I'm pretty sure that I've not said one way or the other.

Would you disagree that a big factor in the WCML being full is how many places "must" have fast trains to London?

It doesn't matter if they're fast or slow, they still take up paths, and they still need to run to the same headways and junction margins.

 

[pt_mad]

So you can ensure nowhere will have a worse service than now after all?



Would you disagree that a big factor in the WCML being full is how many places "must" have fast trains to London?

It's not the train companies that specify these places must have so many services to London, it's the Department for Transport, on behalf of the electorate. Basically to protect people's service, and thus livelihoods and lives. And to safeguard the economy which is always spoken about as one of the most important things society must take regard for over most media.

 

[mmh]

It goes into law if the legislation gets passed. So it'd be very likely at that stage that it would be built. In my personal opinion the benefits of phase one alone are worth it. I think many members of the general public don't realise that HS2 will directly link in with the classic railway in the North Midlands. It's not a standalone thing wjere they're stuck on an adjacent line which becomes a dead end at Birmingham City Centre.

I think it's quite likely you're right, many people will think it's just London to Birmingham, with other places being added at some unknown point in the future. That's a place where the scheme doesn't help itself - it varies between being uselessly vague over what services other than Birmingham will be available on opening and being uselessly vague over the problem it is solving. It's almost as if someone thinks improving Leighton Buzzard's trains to London won't be a national vote winner.

The legislation doesn't mean it will either happen or happen in a sensible timescale. You only need to look at numerous road schemes to see that.

Honestly I don't think it'd be possible to just rip up the minimum service spec. and tell a line of towns for example, you are to lose one of your three morning hourly services. For a start you may end up with serious political opposition, due process would have to be followed, and after implementation you could end up with serious crowd control problems. As well as artificially surpressing demand by not offering the adequate number of services to cater for the numbers. If that were to be applied across a whole route then it could be an election killer, if it even got near to being reality.

There's a lot of truth there. Governments however can and do implement things which are locally unpopular. HS2's immediate problem is it's struggling to not be nationally unpopular.

 

[Bletchleyite]

HS2 introduces no new capacity north of Birmingham. Where are all the new trains going to go after there?

Onto lines that aren’t full.

 

[6Gman]

HS2 introduces no new capacity north of Birmingham. Where are all the new trains going to go after there?

What's all this work in Staffordshire and Cheshire about then?

 

[6Gman]

How do we know the reason is the journey time reduction? What about the increasing population? What about increased air fares? What about the horrendous traffic congestion around Manchester over the last few years which has now spread to the M6 meaning people are looking for alternatives to the roads? What about Manchester's regeneration and all the new firms who've opened offices there. It's impossible to pick one possible reason and claim it's the only reason.

That's a good point. The air fare between Crewe and London shot up around the time of electrification, and again when the Pendolinos were introduced.

 

[6Gman]

Both can be true because a 30 minute saving on the journey time to London is largely irrelevant (and won't come without disadvantages either)

Personally, the main disadvantage will be the less attractive views. So I may stick with the old WCML, but I think I'm unusual in this regard.

 

[6Gman]

Yes. Step 1: throw away the constraints and start again.

Which "constraints" would these be?

Platform lengths?
Speed restrictions?
Junction layouts?
Franchised service levels?
"Quality" levels?

 

[6Gman]

Anything is theoretically possible.

In theory.

In practice, no.

 

[The Ham]

Why would not building HS2 have any effect on traffic driving through Chiltern villages, and why is the alternative a motorway on the same corridor? HS2 won't serve anywhere between London and Birmingham.

As I explained if the motorway gets busy then people will either a) divert away from it or (more likely) b) those who live near the motorway but have an alternative route will stop using the motorway.

To give you an idea, go and look at roads which are broadly parallel to any motorway alignment when there's been an accident on the motorway.

 

[Ianno87]

Onto lines that aren’t full.

... plus HS2 services are likely to run in place of some current WCML services (broadly those that don't stop south of Stafford/Stoke/Crewe and thus have no purpose to be duplicated on the WCML)

 

[ABB125]

Please note that I have created a new thread for my suggestion in the Speculative Ideas section - please discuss it there (otherwise I will be told off by the Moderators )

Here is a radical new timetable suggestion for the WCML, seeing as those opposed to HS2 don't seem to have taken up the challenge. Please read the whole post before deciding it is impractical (which, to be fair, it probably is ).

Basically the service pattern to Birmingham and Manchester would consist of a half-hourly base pattern, supplemented by an additional hourly service to make up the 3tph there is currently.
For example, on the Manchester route:

• Departures from Euston at xx00 and xx30 (say), both via Stoke on Trent (which would then get a half-hourly service rather than the 20/40 interval that I believe it gets currently). Presumably this would provide increased capacity on the approach into Manchester because the service would be every half-hour, rather than the awkward 20/40 ish it is currently.
• An additional Manchester train would then run via Crewe at a convenient (as in, there's a path available) time, let's say this is at xx18. Hopefully this would be easier to path into Manchester due to the changes in the above point.

Similar for Birmingham:

• A half-hourly service (eg: xx09 and xx39), both of which terminate at New Street. As it is half-hourly, this should (?) make pathing on the Rugby - Birmingham corridor a bit easier.
• An additional service (to Scotland) when the paths exist (eg: xx57)

The other Virgin trains would run pretty much as they do currently, but probably retimed a bit.

Obviously, the exact times of the services would depend on stopping patterns and such like, but I'll leave that to the professionals who know how this works.

Also obvious is that this timetable would probably be commercial suicide for the operator, with everyone used to 20-minute intervals.

What does the forum think? Is this timetable workable? Better than the existing one? More operable?

 

[Clip]

Without HS2 there's a better chance of one though.

Explain how then

 

[The Ham]

Anyone remember those trains which were about 50% full in 2011 in the evening peak:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uk...mbers-blow-apart-case-for-HS2-train-line.html

These show that in 2011, on long-distance trains leaving Euston on weekdays between 4 and 7pm, just 52.5 per cent of seats were occupied. On some peak trains, loading was as low as 34 per cent.

Right if we apply the typical growth rate from 2010/11 through to 2016/17 for between London and West Midlands, North West and Scotland from here:

http://dataportal.orr.gov.uk/displayreport/report/html/4277ce6b-bdf3-4562-a6b1-eb036b57f065

That's a growth from 19,136 to 27,030 (thousands) or 41%. If we apply that growth rate those much talked about trains would now be about 74% full, even the low figures would be 48% (however that just means that there's more on the other trains.

Now there's a lot of assumptions in the above, however it would be interesting to see what the actual loadings were now. My guess would be that they probably much closer to the 74% full than the 53% full which they were.

Whatever the outcome I have a sneaking suspicion that those opposed to HS2 wouldn't be quite so excited about the figures this time around...

 

[mmh]

Explain how then

The money could be spent elsewhere. That's how people will judge it, and are doing. Rightly or wrongly (for what it's worth I think wrongly), that's the popular measure in the current era, and why there's no queue of politicians defending HS2.

 

[ABB125]

Please note that I have created a new thread for my suggestion in the Speculative Ideas section - please discuss it there (otherwise I will be told off by the Moderators )

Here is a radical new timetable suggestion for the WCML, seeing as those opposed to HS2 don't seem to have taken up the challenge. Please read the whole post before deciding it is impractical (which, to be fair, it probably is ).

Basically the service pattern to Birmingham and Manchester would consist of a half-hourly base pattern, supplemented by an additional hourly service to make up the 3tph there is currently.
For example, on the Manchester route:

• Departures from Euston at xx00 and xx30 (say), both via Stoke on Trent (which would then get a half-hourly service rather than the 20/40 interval that I believe it gets currently). Presumably this would provide increased capacity on the approach into Manchester because the service would be every half-hour, rather than the awkward 20/40 ish it is currently.
• An additional Manchester train would then run via Crewe at a convenient (as in, there's a path available) time, let's say this is at xx18. Hopefully this would be easier to path into Manchester due to the changes in the above point.

Similar for Birmingham:

• A half-hourly service (eg: xx09 and xx39), both of which terminate at New Street. As it is half-hourly, this should (?) make pathing on the Rugby - Birmingham corridor a bit easier.
• An additional service (to Scotland) when the paths exist (eg: xx57)

The other Virgin trains would run pretty much as they do currently, but probably retimed a bit.

Obviously, the exact times of the services would depend on stopping patterns and such like, but I'll leave that to the professionals who know how this works.

Also obvious is that this timetable would probably be commercial suicide for the operator, with everyone used to 20-minute intervals.

What does the forum think? Is this timetable workable? Better than the existing one? More operable?

Please use the new thread here to continue discussion of this
(Edit) Although all the replies that were in this thread seem to have moved.

 

[Clip]

The money could be spent elsewhere. That's how people will judge it, and are doing. Rightly or wrongly (for what it's worth I think wrongly), that's the popular measure in the current era, and why there's no queue of politicians defending HS2.

Where and how though? You do realise that the money for this project is ONLY financed for this project and if it closes down then that money will not get spent elsewhere dont you?

 

[DynamicSpirit]

The money could be spent elsewhere. That's how people will judge it, and are doing. Rightly or wrongly (for what it's worth I think wrongly), that's the popular measure in the current era, and why there's no queue of politicians defending HS2.

I would think that, right now, the reason there's no long queue of politicians defending HS2 is that most politicians at Westminster are pretty tied up dealing with Brexit, and the various political defections going on at the moment. HS2 simply isn't even remotely the most important current issue in the minds of most politicians (and indeed of most of the public).

 

[mmh]

The absolute minimum planned turnround time is usually dictated by the union train crew agreement, but obviously in general the more turnround times are reduced, the less reliability you have.

The "beauty" of the current Piccadilly 30 minute turnround times is that they cover a number of eventualities, e.g.

-Cab absorb the ~20 minute time penalty for a diversion via Northampton, which are relatively commonplace, with 10 minutes to spare and
-Permits the trains to be 'stepped up' to 10 minute turnround times should VT be down a set for whatever reason - about the only 'county' termini where this is possible.

It's likely that Weston-super-Mares turnround times can be relatively short because, in extremis, a late running train is simply turned back at Bristol TM. No such credible equivalent exists for Manchester Piccadilly (remembering the need to get there to allow crews to change over, etc)

Thanks, all of that sounds perfectly sensible, and includes two things I wasn't thinking of but do have some experience of, oops.

Staffing is too easy to ignore as an armchair critic, I think!

 

[pt_mad]

It seems quite likely that the current VHF timetable is the most efficient use of paths and train sets. Some people were surprised when they announced the three return Blackpools could be done with the existing stock. Now they have applied for 5 extra return Liverpool's as well. Many experts would have been involved in everything around the current timetable and if there was a better way there's a fair bet they would have found it.

 

[pt_mad]

I would think that, right now, the reason there's no long queue of politicians defending HS2 is that most politicians at Westminster are pretty tied up dealing with Brexit, and the various political defections going on at the moment. HS2 simply isn't even remotely the most important current issue in the minds of most politicians (and indeed of most of the public).

I'm wondering whether there was so much opposition when the West Coast Mainline was to be built in the 1800s. Were people claiming the money could be spent on other things?

What about rival routes as they were? 'No we don't need those we already have a line going north and the money should improve the crossings on that instead'?

 

[Ianno87]

I'm wondering whether there was so much opposition when the West Coast Mainline was to be built in the 1800s. Were people claiming the money could be spent on other things?

To be fair, what we now know as the WCML was built piecemeal by allsorts of private companies using private money as a speculative business enterprise (competing with each other and the canals)

 

[exile]

I'm wondering whether there was so much opposition when the West Coast Mainline was to be built in the 1800s. Were people claiming the money could be spent on other things?

What about rival routes as they were? 'No we don't need those we already have a line going north and the money should improve the crossings on that instead'?

Yes there was! Anyone who knows railway history will be aware of the opposition to rail schemes in the early days. And the question of "money being spent on other things" didn't arise as private investors raised all the money required.

 

[Bald Rick]

I'm wondering whether there was so much opposition when the West Coast Mainline was to be built in the 1800s. Were people claiming the money could be spent on other things?

Indeed there was, which is why the WCML originally didn’t serve Northampton, the denizens of which thus had to be satisfied with services off the ‘loop’ and slow lines for the subsequent 181 years.

 

[6Gman]

Indeed there was, which is why the WCML originally didn’t serve Northampton, the denizens of which thus had to be satisfied with services off the ‘loop’ and slow lines for the subsequent 181 years.

They were not alone in this - Worcester is still regretting it ...

 

[Bald Rick]

They were not alone in this - Worcester is still regretting it ...

well yes, albeit not from the WCML, that would have been quite a diversion!

 

[gallafent]

They were not alone in this - Worcester is still regretting it ...

… and Abingdon, which lost its status as the county town of Berkshire in the end as a result (and eventually had the ignominy of being thrown out of Berkshire altogether

(With apologies for drifting well off the immediate topic at hand of HS2, but relevant since the long-term effects of resisting being connected to the railway are interesting. Also interesting that the pendulum's swung the other way in some places, such as Sheffield, it seems!)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abingdon_Junction_railway_station — “In 1837 the first Bill for a railway to Abingdon was laid before Parliament; it would have brought a direct line from Didcot to Oxford through the town. The House of Commons passed the Bill, but the Lords rejected it. The Bill for the Oxford line was revived in the following year, but so strong was the opposition of Mr. Duffield, Abingdon's M.P., that the proposed line was forced to by-pass Abingdon; it eventually opened on June 12 1844, and ran no nearer to Abingdon than the village of Radley, some two miles to the east.”

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abingdon-on-Thames — “Abingdon became the county town of Berkshire sometime after receiving its Royal Charter in 1556.[14] Assize courts were held in Abingdon from 1570, but in the 17th century it was vying with Reading for county town status. The county hall and court house were built between 1678 and 1682, to assert this status. The building, now the Abingdon County Hall Museum, was reputedly designed by Christopher Kempster, who worked with Sir Christopher Wren.[15] However, Abingdon's failure to engage fully with the railway revolution, accepting only a branch line,[citation needed] sidelined the town in favour of Reading which became the County Town in 1869.[16] The corporation was reformed, under the Municipal Reform Act 1835 and was abolished under the Local Government Act 1972. In 1974, under local government reorganisation, Abingdon became part of the non-metropolitan shire county of Oxfordshire and the seat of the new Vale of White Horse District Council, with Abingdon becoming a civil parish with a town council.”

 

[Clip]

The money could be spent elsewhere. That's how people will judge it, and are doing. Rightly or wrongly (for what it's worth I think wrongly), that's the popular measure in the current era, and why there's no queue of politicians defending HS2.

You and others keep saying this though and we keep asking how and where yet you and others have not come up with one credible plan to increase the capacity apart from empty words - its basically going round in circles this thread now and its rather sad that after so many pages of posterss trying to put up a defence for scrapping it not one person has coem up with a decent idea instead of it.