High Speed Two (HS2) discussion

[YorkshireBear]

From the Buckingham Free Press. I have nothing to add other than I hope the case succeeds and HS2 fails.




Source: http://www.bucksfreepress.co.uk/news/10637866.Date_set_for_HS2_Supreme_Court_appeal/

Have you recently started dating someone who strongly opposes the project?

 

[PR1Berske]

I don't disagree with you on that but there are ways and means of doing so and wasting tax payers money on legal challenges that are likely to fail is not one of them. It would be much better if Bucks County Council engaged in a positive dialogue with HS2 Ltd and the DfE over ways the impact of HS2 could be minimised in the county through better mitigation rather than screaming and shouting and throwing all their toys out of the pram which is getting them nowhere.

But "mitigation" can only go so far if one side (DfT) is arguing on the basis of HS2 being there whatever else is agreed. You don't need me to tell you how I would minimise the damage caused by the project; I wouldn't build it.

 

[Dave1987]

It's unfortunate that public money is being used for the court cases, but councils have no choice. They don't want to be sliced into bits by HS2 and have a right to demonstrate against a Government's decision if they feel it correct and proper to do so.

No local authority should feel unable to fight against a national government's decision.

Ov course thy have other options! The fact that £500k plus what the government have spent defending has been wasted on lawyers and legal fees is almost criminal. If they lose this they should be made to pay for it through a cut in their grants from govt to cover the cost of what the govt has had to pay out in legal fees. This should be debated in the commons not in the courts.
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

But "mitigation" can only go so far if one side (DfT) is arguing on the basis of HS2 being there whatever else is agreed. You don't need me to tell you how I would minimise the damage caused by the project; I wouldn't build it.

No like you have made clear you would have every train in the UK stop at every single station it goes through so that everybody on the line has a chance to catch every service.

 

[PR1Berske]

Ov course thy have other options! The fact that £500k plus what the government have spent defending has been wasted on lawyers and legal fees is almost criminal. If they lose this they should be made to pay for it through a cut in their grants from govt to cover the cost of what the govt has had to pay out in legal fees. This should be debated in the commons not in the courts.

Local councils have no say in the Commons. They can only take legal action.

I regret the amount of money spent on the case, but what other options have they got? They didn't ask for HS2 to come through their country so they have a right to say "Woah, hang on, roll back please!"

 

[Dave1987]

Local councils have no say in the Commons. They can only take legal action.

I regret the amount of money spent on the case, but what other options have they got? They didn't ask for HS2 to come through their country so they have a right to say "Woah, hang on, roll back please!"

Yes they do have a say in the commons. Ever heard of something called an MP? They should be petitioning their MP to make their clear case in the commons. The only people who will benefit from this legal action is the lawyers and barristers. Bucks council have already admitted they doubt the appeal will succeed but they are pressing on because they "have to" because otherwise the £500k already spent will have been for nothing according to them. So when they fail at the appeal the £550k odd that will have spent by then won't have been for nothing??? It's senseless appealing when you even admit you stand little chance of winning, wasting even more tax payers money.

If there was a cheaper viable option on the table I would say scrap HS2. But there isn't and that is that.

 

[CalderRail]

Basically the politicians running Bucks council are prepared to spend half a million of taxpayers money so that when election time comes around they can say "we did everything we could".

 

[PR1Berske]

Basically the politicians running Bucks council are prepared to spend half a million of taxpayers money so that when election time comes around they can say "we did everything we could".

And as local councillors, a group often maligned for not responding to voters' concerns, that's a highly commendable thing to have done.

 

[jon0844]

Basically the politicians running Bucks council are prepared to spend half a million of taxpayers money so that when election time comes around they can say "we did everything we could".

(off topic)

My cousin won a case in Sweden for unfair dismissal a few years back. She got a pretty reasonable payout, but it didn't end there.

She has shares in that company and is entitled to dividends. Every year they refuse to pay, and she has to go via the courts to get it. She wins every time.

At what point does the company she used to work for stop wasting money because it allowed things to get personal and all common sense goes out the window?

 

[CalderRail]

And as local councillors, a group often maligned for not responding to voters' concerns, that's a highly commendable thing to have done.

You can look at it that way. Or you can look at it as a party political PR exercise that they are wasting taxpayers money on while knowing it's inevitably going to fail.

 

[MidlandMainlie]

Yes they do have a say in the commons. Ever heard of something called an MP? They should be petitioning their MP to make their clear case in the commons. The only people who will benefit from this legal action is the lawyers and barristers. Bucks council have already admitted they doubt the appeal will succeed but they are pressing on because they "have to" because otherwise the £500k already spent will have been for nothing according to them. So when they fail at the appeal the £550k odd that will have spent by then won't have been for nothing??? It's senseless appealing when you even admit you stand little chance of winning, wasting even more tax payers money.

If there was a cheaper viable option on the table I would say scrap HS2. But there isn't and that is that.

When it has become clear that legal challenges against HS2 have no chance of succeeding why are they being allowed to waste money when cuts are being made to local services. With any luck once the local elections come around Councillor Tett will held to account for all the money he has wasted on his legal crusade through every court in the land.

 

[CalderRail]

(off topic)

My cousin won a case in Sweden for unfair dismissal a few years back. She got a pretty reasonable payout, but it didn't end there.

She has shares in that company and is entitled to dividends. Every year they refuse to pay, and she has to go via the courts to get it. She wins every time.

At what point does the company she used to work for stop wasting money because it allowed things to get personal and all common sense goes out the window?

I'd guess when the rest of their shareholders get wind of the waste? If she's a shareholder she should go along to the shareholder meeting and air the issue in public.

Also, if it's happening serially I'd sue them for harassment, the time it takes her to sort out the case each year, stress and damages.

When it's taxpayers though... well, the taxpayer doesn't have an option not to pay council tax because their local authority wastes it. If they did, most people would have stopped paying years ago.

 

[jon0844]

Also, if it's happening serially I'd sue them for harassment, the time it takes her to sort out the case each year, stress and damages.

I think that's the plan.

 

[Geezertronic]

Local councils have no say in the Commons. They can only take legal action.

I regret the amount of money spent on the case, but what other options have they got? They didn't ask for HS2 to come through their country so they have a right to say "Woah, hang on, roll back please!"

Their country is our country too (unless you meant county?)

 

[PR1Berske]

Their country is our country too (unless you meant county?)

I did mean county.

 

[Snapper]

And as local councillors, a group often maligned for not responding to voters' concerns, that's a highly commendable thing to have done.

But what % of voters? The truth is that in all areas the protesters are a tiny minority. In Warks they're less than 3% So why are Councils spending £100s of thousands to represent such a tiny minority?

 

[Geezertronic]

I did mean county.

Lets be honest, they wouldn't think twice about it if it was in the north or the south of England, Wales or Scotland, but as long as it is in "their county" then they should stop being NIMBYs about it

 

[yorksrob]

HS2 has a viable business case behind it since in no way is it going to sit unused, while some reopenings can't be guaranteed to be commercially successful.

Well, perhaps if they could manage some of the easier re-openings, it might help to assuage my fears about the strain on future investment caused by having to keep up such a long term project. The recent Uckfield - Lewes study even identified a reopening option in which the route which would cover it's own operating costs, yet all the while the cupboard remains bare, my suspicious nature remains unpersuaded.

 

[LateThanNever]

It is intersesting to follow links to the LSE blog reccomended by Snapper and it seems that the case for is not as rosy as it might be.

Various points emerge
1 Even where economic activity can be shown to have improved as a result of a HS station there is an increase in commuting. The Network Rail summary on suggested alternatives also seems to suggest that this is a if not the major requirement. It says "the [alternatives] fail to provide sufficient capacity for commuters at the south end of the WCML, do not solve the main capacity constraint that is the primary driver for intervention on the route."
2. Only two high speed rail services in the world break even (Paris-Lyons and Tokyo-Osaka). Elsewhere ordinary taxpayers subsidise [HS] rail travel. So there are no profits!
3. “The essential message from this review is that high speed rail developments in Europe have occurred for many reasons, without any clear overall plan, but have instilled almost a mythical belief that they can solve both transport and regional development problems wherever they are built. This belief is not well founded in evidence”
High-speed rail in Europe: experience and issues for future development 1996
Roger Vickerman of the Centre for European, Regional and Transport Economics
4. less than 2% of journeys are [currently] made on long distance trains. So even if this doubled it is of lttle significance (except financial)...
5. The HS scheme tries to follow the French/Spanish model for high speed. A map of population density to area for France or Spain shows a focus of population on specific cities, which are physically distant from each other. The UK’s geography is that whilst there are large cities, there is much more population in between the cities. Many people actually require to travel from the big cities to the intermediate sized towns and vice versa. Distances are also closer, so this makes the French/Spanish model unsuitable for the UK.
6. Inter City travel is currently much better served in the UK and at much greater frequency than anywhere else in Europe.

Food for considerable thought!

 

[HSTEd]

2. Only two high speed rail services in the world break even (Paris-Lyons and Tokyo-Osaka). Elsewhere ordinary taxpayers subsidise [HS] rail travel. So there are no profits!

Only one rail operator in the United Kingdom breaks even.
So ordinary taxpayers subsidise rail travel.

If you use this as an argument against High Speed Rail then you should just drop the facade and accept that you are the ideological child of Beeching.

 

[The Ham]

4. less than 2% of journeys are [currently] made on long distance trains. So even if this doubled it is of lttle significance (except financial)...

But given that there are 125 million long distance rail passengers a year (about 342,896 a day based on a 360 day year) these are not small numbers (even if they are small percentages). To put the numbers in perspective to provide enough trains for the current numbers of passengers you would need 23 trains an hour for 15 hours a day all carrying 1,000 passengers to provide a litte more than just enough capacity for them (345,000).

5. The HS scheme tries to follow the French/Spanish model for high speed. A map of population density to area for France or Spain shows a focus of population on specific cities, which are physically distant from each other. The UK’s geography is that whilst there are large cities, there is much more population in between the cities. Many people actually require to travel from the big cities to the intermediate sized towns and vice versa. Distances are also closer, so this makes the French/Spanish model unsuitable for the UK.

We already have a network on lines which serve cities and their nearby towns, the problem is that they have their capacity reduced by running long distance trains over them. Basicly HS2 is a bypass so that people not needing to go the more minor settlements do not block those who do want to. Therefore if the main concern is to provide for these trips between cities and smaller settlements then HS2 is the right thing to be built.

6. Inter City travel is currently much better served in the UK and at much greater frequency than anywhere else in Europe.

If we have a much better and more frequent Intercity service than elsewhere then it makes sense that by splitting these services onto a new line where they will not get in the way of all the other train services will be a good thing. It may infact make HS2 another profitable HS line as there is already a much better service in existinace than other HS schemes started with.

For example if you were to look to reopen a branch line you would look at those where there were already good bus usage along the route as it has proved that there is demand for such a service. Likewise you wouldn't look at a route where no matter how many buses were provided people still opted to drive, unless there was some other reason people would be tempted to leave their cars behind to use rail when they wouldn't use the buses.

 

[Snapper]

Only one rail operator in the United Kingdom breaks even.
So ordinary taxpayers subsidise rail travel.

If you use this as an argument against High Speed Rail then you should just drop the facade and accept that you are the ideological child of Beeching.

More like the child of Serpell. Because if purely profitable services (without any consideration of the wider socio-economic & environmental benefits) are the only aim, then most of the network should shut tomorrow.

 

[AndyLandy]

Basicly HS2 is a bypass

This seems rather apt at the current time:

MISTER PROSSER: I'm afraid you're going have to accept it! This bypass has got to be built and it is going to be built. Nothing you can say or do -
ARTHUR DENT: Why has it got to be built?
MISTER PROSSER: Wha - what do you mean, “why has it got to be built?” It is a bypass! You've got to build bypasses!
ARTHUR DENT: Didn't anyone consider the alternatives?
MISTER PROSSER: There aren't any alternatives! You were entitled to make any suggestions or protests at the appropriate time!

 

[The Ham]

This seems rather apt at the current time:

Originally Posted by Douglas Adams
MISTER PROSSER: I'm afraid you're going have to accept it! This bypass has got to be built and it is going to be built. Nothing you can say or do -
ARTHUR DENT: Why has it got to be built?
MISTER PROSSER: Wha - what do you mean, “why has it got to be built?” It is a bypass! You've got to build bypasses!
ARTHUR DENT: Didn't anyone consider the alternatives?
MISTER PROSSER: There aren't any alternatives! You were entitled to make any suggestions or protests at the appropriate time!

(Like)

However the HS2 proposals wasn't "displayed" either in a locked filling cabnet in the basement with no stairs and no light bulb or serveal light years away.

 

[joeykins82]

I don't recall a pop-up on http://hs2.org.uk/ warning you to "beware of the leopard" either...

 

[Snapper]

Sometimes I despair of modern Journalists. Take a look at this from the Economist:

http://www.economist.com/news/britain/2 ... g_sardines

Then take a look at the list of the 10 most crowded trains:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... n-2012.pdf

Feel free to leave a comment on their article...

 

[jon0844]

Sometimes I despair of modern Journalists. Take a look at this from the Economist:

http://www.economist.com/news/britain/2 ... g_sardines

Then take a look at the list of the 10 most crowded trains:

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/s ... n-2012.pdf

Feel free to leave a comment on their article...

Both of those links are broken (part of it isn't within the URL tag, and therefore chopped off).

 

[GatwickDepress]

Both of those links are broken (part of it isn't within the URL tag, and therefore chopped off).

I'm going to guess the first link was to this and the Economist article was this article.

 

[The Ham]

The top ten services were:

1) Henley-On-Thames to London Paddington (3 coaches) 184% loading factor - proberbly going to be fixed by electrification of GWML
2) Didcot Parkway to London Paddington (7 coaches) 173% loading factor - proberbly going to be fixed by electrification of GWML and/or IEP
3) London Euston to Birmingham New Street (8 coaches) 166% loading factor - proberbly going to be partly fixed by the 110 project and the extra 350's which come as part of that, otherwise is dependent on HS2
4) London Bridge to Wimbledon (4 coaches) 159% loading factor - proberbly gong to be fixed by the extra rolling stock order which Southern is having built.
5) London Euston to Birmingham New Street (12 coaches) 158% loading factor - hopefuly will see some relief from 3 having 12 coaches otherwise dependent on HS2
6) Alton to Waterloo (12 coaches) 156% loading factor - no current plans would resolve this, unless trains either side of it are running at less than 12 coaches in length and/or an extra service could be put on once the International paltforms become available. Otherwise it would proberbly be waiting for Crossrail 2 (which looks a better project with HS2).
7) Banbury to London Marylebone (7 coaches) 154% loading factor - most likely to be fixed by Evergreen 3, although could benefit from GWML electrification to allow more DMU's to lengthen the service and/or put on an extra service. Could also benefit from HS2
8) Haslemere to Waterloo (12 coaches) 152% loading factor - no current plans would resolve this, unless trains either side of it are running at less than 12 coaches in length and/or an extra service could be put on once the International paltforms become available. Otherwise it would proberbly be waiting for Crossrail 2 (which looks a better project with HS2).
9) London Paddington to Oxford (6 coaches) 150% loading factor - proberbly going to be fixed by electrification of GWML and/or IEP
10) Woking to Waterloo (12 coaches) 149% loading factor - no current plans would resolve this, unless trains either side of it are running at less than 12 coaches in length and/or an extra service could be put on once the International paltforms become available. Otherwise it would proberbly be waiting for Crossrail 2 (which looks a better project with HS2).

It therefore looks like a good number of the top ten will be fixed in the next few years and those that aren't would fairly strongly benefit from HS2 (either directly or indirectly). As such why should we look at trying to find a fix for something which is already planned to be fixed.

It is also likely that a good number of the top 20, or even top 30, would also be resolved with projects which are due to compleate in the next few years. As has been stated before the capacity on the WCML is not overly problematic with the existing IC train, but rather with the slower trains. However, as the IC services tend to be more profitable it is better to get them to pay for the capacity enhancements.

 

[RichmondCommu]

So your main opposition is the speed of the line not actual line itself?
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---


The chilterns are no different any other large "green" space. A railway line will not "spoil" the view, and what would you rather have, a 6 lane motorway or a 2 track railway?? You seem perfectly happy with the M40.

Well done Dave you're certainly showing your ignorance here. Obviously you don't have an appreciation of the Chilterns but many others do. As for your question regarding the M40, well you would need to ask the locals but they might argue that at least they have access to it!
--- old post above --- --- new post below ---

The Managing Editor from "Rail" isn't immune to talking tosh himself. He's claiming in the latest edition of that the current train fleet is half the age it would have been under BR, even though the average age of rolling stock is currently in the 19 - 20 year range.

Just out of interest who is the Managing Editor?

 

[yorksrob]

Just out of interest who is the Managing Editor?

Mr N Harris.