High Speed Two (HS2) discussion

[bnm]

Haha, oh deary me. You think train fares in this country will ever go down?

Regulated rail fares went down in January 2010.

Bucked the trend but it did happen, thanks to the Retail Price Index being at -1.4% the previous July. With the regulated rail fare escalator set at RPI+1% this meant a 0.4% decrease that year.

My local TOC, FGW, reduced all fares that January, not just the ones they were required to do by legislation.

 

[yorksrob]

A new fleet built in 2030 onwards is going to have more comfort and features in standard than we have in first class today. It won't be a bad place to be!

On the issue of standard having more comfort and features than first class does today , I‘ll believe that when I see it (or more accurately, feel it in my butt !).

 

[Dave1987]

Despite the denials of many members on this forum, I've mentioned in the past HS1 was over budget. 57% over budget in fact according to this case study:

http://www.omegacentre.bartlett.ucl.ac.uk/studies/cases/pdf/UK_CTRL_2P_080911.pdf

According to the management of HS1 in the BBC prog by Evan Davis called "Built in Britain" it came in on budget.

 

[Chris125]

OK, let's assume all those people previously in favour, in government or otherwise, who have now come or are coming out against it now having had access to the figures, are wrong.

I think ill-informed would be a fairer description - while some would be opposed to HS2 irrespective of the arguments, most people with little background knowledge or interest tend to base their opinion on what they've heard second hand, and that is as true for politicians as anyone else.

Not only does this mean opinions can be influenced by poor reporting, but by stunts like the IEA report whose findings were reported days in advance of the flawed report, ensuring no mainstream critical analysis.

You only have to look to Alistair Darling for evidence of this - according to a a recent radio interview it seems he's under the impression that HS2 and HS1 won't be connected, nor will the line provide an interchange with Heathrow services - he might have been in favour of the project when Labour were in power but he clearly didn't pay much attention to what was actually being proposed.

Let's also assume that all the original projections are correct in that no-one ever does any work on the train nor will do and that every commuted minute is a dead minute as forms a key part of the HS2 calculations.

This is precisely what I mean by people basing their opinion on negative press - if you looked into this whole issue you would quickly see that a) their 'original projections' simply uses the standard analysis that any such project does for calculating the value of saving time and b) it was never actually suggested that people don't work on trains.

It is a generalisation for modelling purposes - while a more sophisticated approach could assume some productive work being undertaken during travel, it would also have to include other factors which also come into play such as the effect of crowding, how the 'saved time' is used, and more besides as discussed in this strategy unit paper - as it points out...

"Criticism of the current approach tends to focus on whether travellers work on trains, which has led some stakeholders to propose reductions to the value of business time savings in the appraisal of HS2. In isolation, this adjustment would represent an incomplete treatment of the issue.

If the appraisal of HS2 is to allow for the possibility that work may be undertaken during journeys, it is necessary to take into account all of the associated impacts on the appraisal results, including a potential uplift in the
value of de-crowding benefits, and potentially the increased productivity impact of shifting modes. There is considerable uncertainty about how to value these effects."

Chris

 

[Dave1987]

When I look at this project and other big projects I really do feel ashamed to be British at times. We must look like a laughing stock with our inability to build big projects without massive opposition. I mean Cross rail was thought of decades ago then took years and years to get through government. Didnt one politician proudly announce that his greatest accomplishment in his time as an MP was delaying Cross rail by some 20 odd years? I look at Germany with their ICE trains and just think why can they build something like that no problem yet we have years of people battling big projects in the courts. Maybe that's why Germany's economy is so strong?

I see HS2 as a pivotal point in the future of Britain, and our ability to get these big projects built.

 

[PR1Berske]

When I look at this project and other big projects I really do feel ashamed to be British at times. We must look like a laughing stock with our inability to build big projects without massive opposition. I mean Cross rail was thought of decades ago then took years and years to get through government. Didnt one politician proudly announce that his greatest accomplishment in his time as an MP was delaying Cross rail by some 20 odd years? I look at Germany with their ICE trains and just think why can they build something like that no problem yet we have years of people battling big projects in the courts. Maybe that's why Germany's economy is so strong?

I see HS2 as a pivotal point in the future of Britain, and our ability to get these big projects built.

Getting penis envy over the lack of construction projects is futile. Germany is a country in the middle of continental Europe, of course it's going to have major transport infrastructure to enable travel within and beyond its borders

We're an island. We need different things than Germany, done differently, built differently. Thinking smaller, cheaper, less disruptive, is how we should always do things. Why bother building a train station the size of Berlin for the sake of it when England alone is not big enough?

There's no need for HS2 to be built as it is - if your argument rests on wanting the UK to be "just like everyone else", then that's pretty rubbish reasoning.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

I look at Germany with their ICE trains and just think why can they build something like that no problem yet we have years of people battling big projects in the courts. Maybe that's why Germany's economy is so strong?

Actually Germany has seen many delays to its high-speed routes for various reasons. The antis are very active there.
Unlike France, federal politics means there is another layer of government to square before anything can be done.
They also tinkered with maglev for a while before switching back to conventional rail on Hamburg-Berlin.
The new airport in Berlin is years late because of bad planning and project management, and is a national embarrassment.
But the rail system as a whole is great, of course, with massive investment over many years.

But Crossrail is doing well now it has got going, and Network Rail has the opportunity to do a blinder with the electrification programme (crosses fingers ).

 

[ainsworth74]

We're an island. We need different things than Germany, done differently, built differently.

Indeed we're are different from Germany. We, for instance, have the advantage of having a number of defined conurbations that mean linking them with high speed rail has a lot of advantages unlike a country like Germany where the population are rather more spread. The likes of SNCF and DB would love to have the definition that our population centres do.

Why bother building a train station the size of Berlin for the sake of it when England alone is not big enough?

Actually I rather suspect that if we were to decide to build a station like Berlin Hauptbahnhof it would need to be at least as big as that. Think about it. You'd be trying to fit most of the long distance services of the East Coast, West Coast, Midland and Great Western Mainlines. Along with at least some suburban, and commuter services. That's a hell of a lot of trains and people which would demand a station not dissimilar in size to Hauptbahnhof.

 

[PR1Berske]

Indeed we're are different from Germany. We, for instance, have the advantage of having a number of defined conurbations that mean linking them with high speed rail has a lot of advantages unlike a country like Germany where the population are rather more spread. The likes of SNCF and DB would love to have the definition that our population centres do.



Actually I rather suspect that if we were to decide to build a station like Berlin Hauptbahnhof it would need to be at least as big as that. Think about it. You'd be trying to fit most of the long distance services of the East Coast, West Coast, Midland and Great Western Mainlines. Along with at least some suburban, and commuter services. That's a hell of a lot of trains and people which would demand a station not dissimilar in size to Hauptbahnhof.

So where in the UK would you build a station that size? And how many homes, businesses, listed buildings, parks, libraries or sports grounds would you sacrifice to do so?

 

[tbtc]

Let's forget about those money-sink projects liked the BBC's £100m loss on a digital platform or any of the government £10bn IT projects for which they've got nothing to show

the unfinished Edinburgh Tram project, greatly shortened, running between the wrong places, with a current cost of £1bn or £125m per mile

There are always Government schemes that come out over budget - often because politicians move the goalposts part way through the project to cave in to some vested interests.

There are often some good Government schemes that don't - which don't tend to make the headlines. Also, some private sector schemes go horribly over budget too.

Is the answer not to build new infrastructure? Would lots of small projects never go over budget?

I'd reckon there was a Good chance that this forum, Google, the internet as we know it, working patterns, population etc will be very different in 22 years. Unlike the "everything will be the same" calculations of HS2

I've been online for twenty years. I'd guess that most white collar jobs (i.e. the ones that most long distance commuters tend to have) have had a good fifteen years online (or more) - i.e. roughly since the railways were privatised.

In that time, the move to "home working" etc has been so marginal that commuter numbers have gone up and up (hence the congestion we now see into London at rush hour).

Obviously things will be different in another fifteen/ twenty years, but I think that the population growth we'll see over that time will mean more need for rail capacity - and HS2 is one tool to solve that.

I don't think that we'll be using hoverboards in 2015, despite the predictions of Back To The Future - I'd expect the future to be depressingly similar to the present.

 

[ainsworth74]

So where in the UK would you build a station that size? And how many homes, businesses, listed buildings, parks, libraries or sports grounds would you sacrifice to do so?

I never suggested it was a good idea. I'm simply stating that if we had a desire for such a station (and it would be advantageous for travellers to have one main long distance station) it would have to be at least as big as Berlin Hauptbahnhof to cope with all the services such a station would be dealing with.

 

[tbtc]

Getting penis envy over the lack of construction projects is futile

The quality of debate goes from bad to worse.

Given the capacity problems on the WCML in 2013 (no room to fit in a couple of extra Virgin services to Shrewsbury, TOCs complaining about unreliability of the line) and the big increase in population we'll see by 2033, we need extra capacity.

That's regardless of how other countries do things, but most comparable countries are building High Speed lines - just like they were building "motorways" around the same time that we were building new fast roads to take pressure of our busy A-roads.

 

[AndyLandy]

We're an island. We need different things than Germany, done differently, built differently. Thinking smaller, cheaper, less disruptive, is how we should always do things. Why bother building a train station the size of Berlin for the sake of it when England alone is not big enough?

There's no need for HS2 to be built as it is - if your argument rests on wanting the UK to be "just like everyone else", then that's pretty rubbish reasoning.

Conversely, arguing that we don't need this sort of infrastructure "because we're an island" is equally rubbish reasoning. There are 112 route miles from London to Birmingham and 183 from London to Manchester. These aren't short distances! The Isle of Wight is an island that doesn't need high speed rail, the UK mainland is a different matter altogether.

And those aren't even our longest rail journeys. There are 523 miles between London and Aberdeen and just shy of 719 miles between Aberdeen and Penzance. Wanting to improve journey times between the major cities in this country and encourage modal shifts away from air travel makes total sense.

 

[PR1Berske]

The quality of debate goes from bad to worse.

Given the capacity problems on the WCML in 2013 (no room to fit in a couple of extra Virgin services to Shrewsbury, TOCs complaining about unreliability of the line) and the big increase in population we'll see by 2033, we need extra capacity.

That's regardless of how other countries do things, but most comparable countries are building High Speed lines - just like they were building "motorways" around the same time that we were building new fast roads to take pressure of our busy A-roads.

Using intelligent timetabling and working on specific parts on expanding/extending the WCML would present much quicker results than a 20-30 year project ever will.

Other countries wouldn't allow schemes to run over budget as often as we do - they would have done the WCML properly first time round.

 

[tbtc]

Using intelligent timetabling and working on specific parts on expanding/extending the WCML would present much quicker results than a 20-30 year project ever will

Such as?

 

[AndyLandy]

Other countries wouldn't allow schemes to run over budget as often as we do - they would have done the WCML properly first time round.

You mean you'd have built a 250mph-capable quad- or even six-track railway in 1830? I find that hard to believe...

 

[Dave1987]

So where in the UK would you build a station that size? And how many homes, businesses, listed buildings, parks, libraries or sports grounds would you sacrifice to do so?

You see this the exact kind of thinking that is holding back our country. Imagine what the country would be like if the Victorians had the same attitude as you have today. I doubt ANY railway would have been built. Why can you not see this project as real progress?

 

[AndyLandy]

You see this the exact kind of thinking that is holding back our country. Imagine what the country would be like if the Victorians had the same attitude as you have today. I doubt ANY railway would have been built. Why can you not see this project as real progress?

Indeed!

In fact, I suggested something like the Berlin Hauptbahnhof for London in that "outrageous infrastructure" thread.

 

[Dave1987]

Using intelligent timetabling and working on specific parts on expanding/extending the WCML would present much quicker results than a 20-30 year project ever will.

Other countries wouldn't allow schemes to run over budget as often as we do - they would have done the WCML properly first time round.

OMG seriously, I really don't think you are qualified to make a judgment that they didnt do a "proper" job of the WCML in the last wave of upgrades. There was a mass outcry from the travelling public about the amount of disruption it caused.

A close family member of mine WORKS on the timetabling of the WCML! There is hardly any spare capacity in the WCML. You clearly do not know what you are on about.

 

[dggar]

You mean you'd have built a 250mph-capable quad- or even six-track railway in 1830? I find that hard to believe...

I think you might be meaning 1837.

(I'm just trying to pre-empt Prbeserk ripping you argument to shreds)

 

[Dave1987]

Indeed!

In fact, I suggested something like the Berlin Hauptbahnhof for London in that "outrageous infrastructure" thread.

Having all the major lines into London converging into one purpose built station would be amazing. No more travelling across the underground between hub stations. But it will never happen.

 

[NSEFAN]

OMG seriously, I really don't think you are qualified to make a judgment that they didnt do a "proper" job of the WCML in the last wave of upgrades. There was a mass outcry from the travelling public about the amount of disruption it caused.

A close family member of mine WORKS on the timetabling of the WCML! There is hardly any spare capacity in the WCML. You clearly do not know what you are on about.

I understand that any spare paths remaining are currently not used to allow for faster service recovery. There is currently a legal battle between Network Rail and Virgin over this, no?

 

[PR1Berske]

Why can you not see this project as real progress?

*It's too expensive
*The cost benefit is derisory (by the HS2's own website, we lose something like a quid for every two spent, I think it is.)
*The initial London-NotQuiteBirmingham expressway avoids dozens of towns and cities and millions of potential customers who will not be able to use a service which a) they've paid for, and b) runs through where they live.
*It's London-centric
*It does nothing for the millions of people who travel in Wales, SW England, Scotland and the East, and almost nothing for northerners above Manchester
*The costs have already increased to £73bn (Treasury Figures) and can only increase.
*The work robs the rest of the existing national network of the regional specific infrastructure improvements it needs
*It's centered on an idea of office work which by its 2030 completion date would be wholly outdated
*It doesn't solve any of the existing issues with travel through the West Midlands, and indeed exasperates them to some degree by the enforced requirement of additional lines being built into the centre of Birmingham. By simply fixing the WCML within Birmingham, none of this would be necessary
*It will be completed so far in the future that many of the assumptions made about those who will benefit would have been radically altered
*England is too small to justify so much countryside being sacrificed for a London-centric transport link

And that's just for starters.

 

[bnm]

Given the capacity problems on the WCML in 2013 (no room to fit in a couple of extra Virgin services to Shrewsbury, TOCs complaining about unreliability of the line) and the big increase in population we'll see by 2033, we need extra capacity.

Capacity issues are at the London end. Why not look to reduce the need for people to travel to and from London? Carry on as we are and the capacity of London as a whole becomes a serious issue.

Job creation, house building, local transport spending. Spread out the capital spending and wealth generation to regions. Do that and and you reduce the demand for travel to and from London.

That's a radical solution. But with a Westminster bubble holding the purse strings, making decisions, and dressing them up as being in the national interest, when they are anything but, then we will continue to have large capital projects centered on the interests of London rather than the country as a whole. 8.1 million people live in London. 54.6 million people don't.

 

[Proud Salopian]

*It's too expensive

No it's not.

*The cost benefit is derisory (by the HS2's own website, we lose something like a quid for every two spent, I think it is.)

Nope, but never mind.

*The initial London-NotQuiteBirmingham expressway avoids dozens of towns and cities and millions of potential customers who will not be able to use a service which a) they've paid for, and b) runs through where they live.

It's meant to be a high speed railway line, quickly connecting our cities, not another metropolitan railway connecting small towns and suburbs.

*It's London-centric

How do you work that one out? One end of the line is in London, the other(s) aren't. So how on earth does it "centre" on London? *head in hands*

*It does nothing for the millions of people who travel in Wales, SW England, Scotland and the East, and almost nothing for northerners above Manchester

Oh for goodness sake, each piece of infrastructure serves certain places and people. Obviously more places and people are not served by any single infrastructure than are.

In any case, the motorway network doesn't serve everywhere, certainly not where I live, but I do use it when I travel about, and I appreciate not having millions of cars trying to head up the A49.

*The costs have already increased to £73bn (Treasury Figures) and can only increase.

Where did you get £73bn from? The official figures are a lot lower than that. Please tell me you're not including a hundred years' worth of operating costs in or something daft like that??

*The work robs the rest of the existing national network of the regional specific infrastructure improvements it needs

Not necessarily. Only if the government diverts money to HS2. Any anyway, HS2 would increase the prominence of the railways generally and give the railways a higher standing in the nation's politics and life. It will be the centrepiece of a new railway age in this country.

*It's centered on an idea of office work which by its 2030 completion date would be wholly outdated

People will still travel. We've undergone massive developments in telecommunications in the last 15 years and... we've seen rail usage also massively increase.

*It doesn't solve any of the existing issues with travel through the West Midlands, and indeed exasperates them to some degree by the enforced requirement of additional lines being built into the centre of Birmingham. By simply fixing the WCML within Birmingham, none of this would be necessary

What? What are you talking about? It would provide a massive increase in rail capacity, far more than "simply fixing the WCML"... "simply"??

*It will be completed so far in the future that many of the assumptions made about those who will benefit would have been radically altered

So you're arguing that because it's in the future we can't plan for it?

Right - stop everything! Now!

*England is too small to justify so much countryside being sacrificed for a London-centric transport link

"so much countryside"? Come again? What % of the countryside of England will be taken up by HS2?

I'll give you a hint: it's less than 1 billionth of a percent.

 

[PR1Berske]

Capacity issues are at the London end. Why not look to reduce the need for people to travel to and from London? Carry on as we are and the capacity of London as a whole becomes a serious issue.

Job creation, house building, local transport spending. Spread out the capital spending and wealth generation to regions. Do that and and you reduce the demand for travel to and from London.

That's a radical solution. But with a Westminster bubble holding the purse strings, making decisions, and dressing them up as being in the national interest, when they are anything but, then we will continue to have large capital projects centered on the interests of London rather than the country as a whole. 8.1 million people live in London. 54.6 million people don't.

This is what I meant by "London-centric" so thank you for this post.

The initial London-NotQuiteBirmingham Expressway assumes that office workers would be grateful for the extra 15 minutes they can fit into filling in a su doku or eating a bacon butty or whatever.

Two things:

1) By the completion date of 2030, the reality of commuting would be so different as to make the sole justification for HS2 irrelevant
2) Workers could always just take an earlier train.

If the Westminster Bubble HiveMind thinks that the north should be dragged as though by magnets into London's orbit, just say so, rather than inventing make believe vanity projects the country can't afford.

 

[Philip Elliott]

OMG seriously, I really don't think you are qualified to make a judgment that they didnt do a "proper" job of the WCML in the last wave of upgrades. There was a mass outcry from the travelling public about the amount of disruption it caused.

A close family member of mine WORKS on the timetabling of the WCML! There is hardly any spare capacity in the WCML. You clearly do not know what you are on about.

I work in west coast planning...

 

[Dave1987]

I understand that any spare paths remaining are currently not used to allow for faster service recovery. There is currently a legal battle between Network Rail and Virgin over this, no?

There is currently one unused 125mph path in both directions. All others are allocated in some way shape or form.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

I work in west coast planning...

No doubt you know my close family member then. The statement above is what he told me so if it is incorrect then I will retract my comment.

 

[PR1Berske]

"Where did you get £73bn from?"

Here

 

[Dave1987]

"Where did you get £73bn from?"

Here

Again that figure is what the cost will be in money terms in 2030 based on inflation not the cost today. That's like saying I won't buy a chocolate bar today at 60p because in 2030 it will cost £1.20 and that will be very expensive. In 2030 £73bn will seem like £43bn today because the cost of everything will have gone up. That's how inflation works.