Harpers Tate
Established Member
- Joined
- 10 May 2013
- Messages
- 2,047
At one time recently, Jim Ratcliffe was the UKs richest person, with assets (mostly Ineos shares) worth in excess of £16 billion. I believe James Dyson is worth a similar amount.
Suppose £16bn was handed to you with the caveat that you may only spend it on building railway routes for passenger use (with freight also permitted). Upgrading (eg electrification, doubling) of existing passenger routes is not part of your scope; conversion of freight-only routes for passenger use (construction of stations, capacity improvements) may be considered. You do not have to consider the cost of rolling stock nor of operating any services. You are merely providing infrastructure.
You can either resurrect old/closed routes (whether dismantled or in situ) or build completely new alignments or a mixture (i.e. "old" routes with new modifications or additions);
It's your choice entirely where to spend the money, and you do not have to justify, unless you care to, your choice/s based on any business case calculations. You are not expected to make any return on your spending. Some/any/all of your "projects" can be for purely personal/nostalgic reasons; based on your perception of need (real or latent) or for any other reason.
You can have as many projects as your funding allows.
You can say whether you intend it will be single or double track (or more, even); you can say whether it will be electrified.
For the purposes of this pure speculation, you don't have to "cost" your project/s with any degree of precision (or at all). You may therefore choose several and prioritise them (like do 1, then in funds allow, do 2, then if funds allow, do 3, etc). However, a broad idea of cost will clearly be useful; you couldn't, for example, build HS2 with this sum. I don't want to influence opinion here so I'm not naming the actual speculative project, but one example is the complete relaying of a certain route totally dismantled, largely on an existing derelict formation but with some new alignment estimated at £10m /mile (double track) a couple of years ago. I can't comment on how realistic that figure is but it may help.
So - what will you do with £16bn?
Suppose £16bn was handed to you with the caveat that you may only spend it on building railway routes for passenger use (with freight also permitted). Upgrading (eg electrification, doubling) of existing passenger routes is not part of your scope; conversion of freight-only routes for passenger use (construction of stations, capacity improvements) may be considered. You do not have to consider the cost of rolling stock nor of operating any services. You are merely providing infrastructure.
You can either resurrect old/closed routes (whether dismantled or in situ) or build completely new alignments or a mixture (i.e. "old" routes with new modifications or additions);
It's your choice entirely where to spend the money, and you do not have to justify, unless you care to, your choice/s based on any business case calculations. You are not expected to make any return on your spending. Some/any/all of your "projects" can be for purely personal/nostalgic reasons; based on your perception of need (real or latent) or for any other reason.
You can have as many projects as your funding allows.
You can say whether you intend it will be single or double track (or more, even); you can say whether it will be electrified.
For the purposes of this pure speculation, you don't have to "cost" your project/s with any degree of precision (or at all). You may therefore choose several and prioritise them (like do 1, then in funds allow, do 2, then if funds allow, do 3, etc). However, a broad idea of cost will clearly be useful; you couldn't, for example, build HS2 with this sum. I don't want to influence opinion here so I'm not naming the actual speculative project, but one example is the complete relaying of a certain route totally dismantled, largely on an existing derelict formation but with some new alignment estimated at £10m /mile (double track) a couple of years ago. I can't comment on how realistic that figure is but it may help.
So - what will you do with £16bn?
indeed so!!!
. I will edit my previous reply and those in bold would be my biggest priority.