High Speed Two (HS2) discussion

[Cambus731]

I actually love the Bree Louise in Euston street, and I have drank there many times, in fact it has very much become the default place to meet up in London, with its great range of Ales and the 50p discount per pint for CAMRA members.
But i also believe that the UK NEEDS HS2, so I am prepared to sacrifice my favourite London pub to see the essential progress happen.

 

[PR1Berske]

I want to talk about something from page 11 of the latest edition of Private Eye (Issue 1348)

It reads:

After a welter of scare stories about rising
costs for the High Speed 2 north-south line, lead official
Alison Munro promised the scheme would not exceed the
existing "cost envelope"

So if costs do rise - for extra tunnels, say, to placate
objectors - savings will be needed.

One obvious candidate for the chop would be the
HS2's phase two line between Crewe and Wigan.

Plans show the new Manchester line diverging near Altrincham,
- but the track from there to Wigan
would have just three trains an hour (each way)
and could be costly to build. It would
cross major roads, railways and - on a high bridge -
the Manchester ship canal. Crewe-Wigan is
one bit of the old west-coast mainline which shouldn't suffer
capacity problems, as there are already four tracks much
of the way (including the bridge over the ship canal); widening
elsewhere would be relatively simple.

The HS2 plans even show a new line across the top of the Y
where the new Manchester and Wigan lines
diverge, though no trains would
logically use it. The government's "preference" is to
put HS2's north-west train depot at Wigan.
Empty trains making a nightly 70-mile round
trip from Manchester for maintenance (compared to four
miles for today's Virgin Pendolinos) would
undermine HS2's green credentials but help to
justify so much new track north of Crewe.

HS2 is meant to take the most direct possible
route between cities. Via Crewe isn't the
most direct Birmingham-Manchester route but linking
HS2 into the rail hub at Crewe would be useful. From
Crewe to Manchester, alas, the most direct route
would slice through Chancellor George Osborne's Tatton
constituency. Instead the planned Manchester line makes
a wide detour around Tatton which will
worsen energy consumption and journey times.

On the map the Crewe-Wigan HS2 line looks like a north-south
mainline taking priority over the straightest route
to Mancheser (the busier line); without the new Wigan
line the Tatton detour would look like blatant political interference.
Would anyone dare remove that figleaf, or will
Osborne's electoral needs take precedence over
keeping HS2's costs in the "envelope"?

So a lot of facts there which blast holes through the pro-HA2 propaganda. There is no capacity problems on a part of the network which is - shock - wide enough to carry more trains. As I said - do this elsewhere on the network and the case for HS2 crumbles.

The journey times north of the 15-minute shaving you enjoy at Birmingham is questionable because of the £600m "Osborne Detour". In any case, I could already get from Manchester to London within 2 hours, so this curve around rura l Cheshire seems doubly pointless.

And then you get to the Wigan "depot" proposals. That smacks of "Spanish airports" to me, having to justify taking trains 70 miles beyond their usual place because a multi-million pound scheme is on the skids.

Every day, in every way, the case for HS2 looks weaker and weaker and weaker. I cannot wait for it to be scrapped.

 

[tbtc]

There is no capacity problems on a part of the network which is - shock - wide enough to carry more trains. As I said - do this elsewhere on the network and the case for HS2 crumbles

Well done, you've found one part of the WCML with some spare capacity (the line from Crewe to Warrington only gets two trains an hour at the moment).

All you need to do now is find spare capacity on the section from London to Rugby, through central Birmingham, through central Manchester etc and you can start to make a case.

The fact that the line north of Crewe only gets a couple of passenger trains an hour at the moment is well known - but spare capacity here doesn't alter the fact that there's going to be no capacity on the main London - Birmingham - Manchester section in twenty years time.

the 15-minute shaving you enjoy at Birmingham

Yawn

 

[HSTEd]

I want to talk about something from page 11 of the latest edition of Private Eye (Issue 1348)

It reads:

While the Private Eye is enjoyable to read a lot of the time Ian Hislop knows virtually nothing about the condition of the modern railway.

The HS2 documentation clearly shows that this line does not go so far south as Crewe, in fact it diverges far closer to Manchester Airport.
And perhaps Ian Hislop can present a costed alternative to the short section to join the WCML at Wigan?
Or a BCR calculation that shows that the journey time increase by running on the classic line between Crewe and Wigan is justified by the marginal reduced cost (its on order of 10 minutes).

So a lot of facts there which blast holes through the pro-HA2 propaganda.

I don't see how that is the case.

There is no capacity problems on a part of the network which is - shock - wide enough to carry more trains. As I said - do this elsewhere on the network and the case for HS2 crumbles.

But the rest of the network is not "wide enough" to carry more trains.
I know you think you can wave a magic wand and override the Pauli Exclusion principle and thus allow fast trains to pass through slower ones ahead of them, but it is not the case.

The journey times north of the 15-minute shaving you enjoy at Birmingham is questionable because of the £600m "Osborne Detour".

Repeating untruths does not make them more accurate.
The journey time savingi s 40 minutes, not 20, unlss you use the travel time of one train per day per direction.

Perhaps we could run the first HS train of the day completley non stop to Birmingham, without even a stop at OOC, and then we could claim that as the High Speed journey time?

The journey time In any case, I could already get from Manchester to London within 2 hours, so this curve around rura l Cheshire seems doubly pointless.

Then why did we bother with the WCRM, we could already get to Manchester in 2hr30?
This curve around rural cheshire provides 10 minutes journey time saving to the real North West (Cumbria and north LAncashire) and Scotland for almost no cost.

Getting rid of it is stupid.

And then you get to the Wigan "depot" proposals. That smacks of "Spanish airports" to me, having to justify taking trains 70 miles beyond their usual place because a multi-million pound scheme is on the skids.

No disrepect to the people of Wigan, but the cost of land in wigan is rather lower than in Manchester.
Perhaps they save rather more money in reduced land costs to make up for the very marginal cost of running trains half an hour further north? (Its only half an hour max of driver time running DOO and the electricity cost will be rather small)

Every day, in every way, the case for HS2 looks weaker and weaker and weaker. I cannot wait for it to be scrapped.

Perhaps it does in your mind.

In the real world it does not.

 

[The Planner]

And then you get to the Wigan "depot" proposals. That smacks of "Spanish airports" to me, having to justify taking trains 70 miles beyond their usual place because a multi-million pound scheme is on the skids.

Interesting article, but best get on to XC and Virgin then for the 50 mile round trip from Birmingham to Central Rivers for the Voyager ECS moves to the depot there then.

 

[NSEFAN]

The Southern WCML (South of Birmingham) is where the capacity problems are mainly located. As explained before, building a new line to solve this is actually cheaper and less disruptive than trying to attach new bits to the current infrastructure.

The Private Eye are right to point out the "Osborne detour". They are a satirical magazine; pointing out selfish interests in politics is what they do best. From my point of view, HS2 north of Birmingham is more of a political thing than an operational necessity.

 

[Muzer]

I want to talk about something from page 11 of the latest edition of Private Eye (Issue 1348)

It reads:



So a lot of facts there which blast holes through the pro-HA2 propaganda. There is no capacity problems on a part of the network which is - shock - wide enough to carry more trains. As I said - do this elsewhere on the network and the case for HS2 crumbles.

The journey times north of the 15-minute shaving you enjoy at Birmingham is questionable because of the £600m "Osborne Detour". In any case, I could already get from Manchester to London within 2 hours, so this curve around rura l Cheshire seems doubly pointless.

And then you get to the Wigan "depot" proposals. That smacks of "Spanish airports" to me, having to justify taking trains 70 miles beyond their usual place because a multi-million pound scheme is on the skids.

Every day, in every way, the case for HS2 looks weaker and weaker and weaker. I cannot wait for it to be scrapped.

Do you actually have reading comprehension issues? It's like talking to a child - meaning no offence to any actual children who seem to be able to read and understand a simple piece of writing. You just seem to completely ignore the whole problem of widening the WCML means knocking down many, many houses. oh, but that won't matter because it won't go near any pubs you like. Oh, that's fine then - clearly upgrading the WCML is a much better choice even though it's more expensive and causes more damage to communities.

 

[PR1Berske]

The Southern WCML (South of Birmingham) is where the capacity problems are mainly located. As explained before, building a new line to solve this is actually cheaper and less disruptive than trying to attach new bits to the current infrastructure.

The Private Eye are right to point out the "Osborne detour". They are a satirical magazine; pointing out selfish interests in politics is what they do best. From my point of view, HS2 north of Birmingham is more of a political thing than an operational necessity.

You are certainly right on the last point. I can foresee Labour quietly ditching the route north of Brum if only to underline their new found love of financial responsibility. You can see by the less-than-subtle ways to placate certain groups (the "Osborne detour", the Wigan Spanish Airport), that it's really not needed, they're just patching things up to make it look necessary. I bet it's just as bad in Yorkshire too (Wakefield to Euston - 1hr 57)

 

[tbtc]

the Wigan Spanish Airport

I see you've found a new toy.

There are plenty of examples of trains that run ECS to depots beyond their final station. IIRC there are daily examples on the WCML that add up to hundreds of miles.

Elsewhere, look at EMT running empty trains from Nottingham to Liverpool each morning (due to a lack of a depot on Merseyside), or the need to run a few EMT services a day to Neville Hill in Leeds.

Northern run Pacers empty from Newcastle to Sheffield (as they are maintained at Heaton but run in South Yorkshire).

Yet now the fact that the HS2 depot won't be in central Manchester is a stick to decry the whole green credentials of the project.

Straws. Clutching.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

Crewe-Wigan via the WCML currently is a useless mix of 2/4 tracks and is not a lot better capacity-wise than a basic 2-track layout with a couple of loops.
It also carries a lot of freight and is stymied by ancient layouts and alignments.
The HS2 loop from Crewe to Wigan (Golborne) is optimised to serve both Manchester and the North-West (and Liverpool/Chester etc) in one go.
Any other alignment would disadvantage somewhere important.
I thought the route did go through Tatton constituency - it certainly slices up some prime real estate near Knutsford.
The ECS argument is only valid viewed from a local Manchester perspective.
The depot will serve all the north-west starting points and is a pretty central location.
Anyway there are many long ECS trips now: Nottingham-Liverpool, Bristol-Hereford, Edinburgh-Newcastle etc.
There will be more in the future with specialised depots becoming the norm (eg for IEP).

 

[The Planner]

I see you've found a new toy.

There are plenty of examples of trains that run ECS to depots beyond their final station. IIRC there are daily examples on the WCML that add up to hundreds of miles.

I was going to give the benefit of the doubt that my post was missed!

 

[AndyLandy]

Well done, you've found one part of the WCML with some spare capacity (the line from Crewe to Warrington only gets two trains an hour at the moment).

You're forgetting the Weaver Valley. The WCML is only twin-tracked from Winsford station through to north of Acton Bridge, and all before the line divides for Liverpool, so you get Virgin's 2tph to Glasgow that way (EUS-GLC and BHM-GLC) as well as the VT EUS-LIV service, and the two LM BHM-LIV services, as well as whatever freight is pathed that way. It's certainly not a quiet stretch of line.

 

[Geezertronic]

Every day, in every way, the case for HS2 looks weaker and weaker and weaker. I cannot wait for it to be scrapped.

You say you ridicule the ridiculous and then come out with the usual untruths, exaggeration and ridiculous quotes and wonder why yourself is a target for ridicule?

The case for WCML expansion is a lot weaker and a lot more destructive than HS2 but the NIMBYs don't worry about that as it's not in their back yard. Maybe next time you travel between Euston & Rugby you can take a look out of the window and see the demolition that would be required either side of the WCML for any track expansion to take place, and then consider the impact on the stations along that section, and also how such an implementation would take place alongside a functioning railway without years of disruption (e.g. WCRM) :roll:

 

[AndyLandy]

The Southern WCML (South of Birmingham) is where the capacity problems are mainly located. As explained before, building a new line to solve this is actually cheaper and less disruptive than trying to attach new bits to the current infrastructure.

The Private Eye are right to point out the "Osborne detour". They are a satirical magazine; pointing out selfish interests in politics is what they do best. From my point of view, HS2 north of Birmingham is more of a political thing than an operational necessity.

There's some truth to that. I can clearly see the case for the London-Birmingham route, but with classic-compatible stock able to run on the existing WCML north of Birmingham, it's harder to justify the need for direct HS links to Manchester/Leeds/etc.

That all said, I'm a firm believer that this country should be investing in infrastructure, and a wider network of new, modern, fast HS lines is most definitely the way to go. If this works, I can quite imagine HS replacing CrossCountry with new lines from Birmingham to Bristol/Plymouth, or Cardiff/Swansea

 

[joeykins82]

A thought: the arguments for HS2 phase 1 and for phase 2 aren't necessarily the same.

HS2 phase 1 (or, more accurately, "the WCML southern bypass") absolutely has to be built. The alignment can be tweaked, but no other form of intervention can be made that will enable a sufficient number of London commuter services to operate alongside the increasing demand for LDHS traffic. Network Rail's assessment that commuters will be physically unable to board trains if the bypass is not opened is not disputable in my opinion.

HS2 phase 2 then extends the WCML southern bypass and turns it in to the high speed rail backbone around which all future long distance rail services will be designed, and is a strategic decision that maximises the benefits of the essential phase 1 railway. It increases the rate at which HS2 phase 1 pays for itself via increased patronage because it vastly increases the competitiveness of long distance rail travel vs air and road to more destinations than just those on the WCML.

Could we get by without phase 2? Yeah, for a good few years. It'd mean more interventions along the ECML in particular and it'd limit the options for making big bang style changes to services, but we wouldn't be completely stuffed.

Do I support it? Yes, it's obvious to anyone who has travelled on northbound LM services during the evening peak that capacity is a major problem and all of the viable WCML interventions that exist are north of Birmingham/Rugby which doesn't help with the actual bottleneck, so phase 1 HAS to be done. Phase 2 is a logical extension that turns an expensive but essential bypass that relieves traffic on only one line in to a nationwide high speed rail core that relieves traffic on the ECML as well, and should help with passenger loadings on the MML. It'll take a huge chunk out of the domestic air market, relieving congestion at the London airports, and in doing so it'll mean the whole project pays for itself much quicker.

I understand that some people don't support phase 2 because they view it as unnecessary: it isn't necessary but it's still a good plan.
Phase 1 is absolutely necessary and opposing it is self-destructive.

 

[tbtc]

There's some truth to that. I can clearly see the case for the London-Birmingham route, but with classic-compatible stock able to run on the existing WCML north of Birmingham, it's harder to justify the need for direct HS links to Manchester/Leeds/etc

I'd be happy to debate the merits of "only" building HS2 from London to Birmingham and "Tamworth" (i.e. a point beyond the Birmingham congestion where "clasic compatible" services could run beyond on existing routes to Manchester/ Leeds etc.

I started a thread a few years ago on a similar vein:
http://www.railforums.co.uk/showthread.php?t=38951 - suggesting that instead of building a High Speed line hundreds of miles from London to Glasgow we'd be better building three new "hundred mile long" routes from London to Huntingdon/ Northampton/ Didcot.

The further away you get from London, the weaker the case for a High Speed line (until you start to fight for paths over Stockport Viaduct/ through the New Street tunnels!).

Sadly, the anti-mob (on here and elsewhere) seem to be mainly in the "no to anything big" camp - without offering much in the way of alternatives, other than "make do and mend" which can only take you so far.

 

[HSTEd]

Without the Manchester and Leeds legs being built, you can't use captive sets on the vast majority of services, only on the Birmingham ones.

That cuts the capacity of a train from ~1100-1300 to only about 700.

 

[joeykins82]

HS2 phase 1 (London to Birmingham) is the same price as the Birmingham to Manchester and Birmingham to Leeds routes combined though. You'd spend ~£60bn on the 3 London-end mainline bypasses, but each of them in isolation doesn't do enough to transform LDHS rail travel in the same way and would therefore take longer to pay for the investment.

 

[Muzer]

I think building phase 1 without phase 2 has a danger of running into the same problems as the CrossCountry route improvements did. Consider that vastly improving journey time and overcrowding to the North might encourage many more people to travel by rail - thus essentially filling up all the previously spare capacity on the north end of the WCML and creating once again overcrowded trains, etc. I think phase 2 would certainly be a way of stopping this from happening, whilst also still giving a sizeable benefit in journey times and relieving more the WCML and ECML for any future previously-impossible journey options. Stop me if I'm not talking sense; I am slightly tired at the moment.

 

[HSTEd]

So I worked up some more stuff for that proposal of the London-Cambridge-Peterborough route (hereafter referred to as LCP).

Track distance from King's Cross to Cambridge is about 75km, with that branch running into a station that will be fairly similar to whats its like today, except perhaps with some platform extensions so that there is more than one 400m platform face. (4 would be ideal, I think it will fit without demolishing the station building).

Somewhere just south of Cambridge the Peterborough branch will diverge and run ~45km more to Peterborough for a total of 120km run, perhaps approaching Peterborough along the Breckland line route.

There would also be a spur from the northbound line out of Cambridge (probably the classic line to Peterborough) to rejoin the HSL to head off to Peterborough to allow rapid access to the northbound ECML from Cambridge.

Travel time to Cambridge would probably come out at about ~20 minutes assuming a ~320kph top speed. Meanwhile travel time to Peterborough will be something like ~30 minutes.

These travel times have some interesting secondary impacts, for instance, the current Breckland Line travel time from Cambridge to Norwich is only ~1h15, giving us a ~95 minute overall travel time from London to Norwich via Cambridge. This is competitive considering the fastest travel time I can find is ~102 minutes and most seem to tend to be close to ~110 minutes.

And all that with the Breckland line not being close to its technical potential, if work could be done to remove the SP limits and to electrify it this flow could transfer the primary route to London from Norwich onto the HSL and away from the packed full GEML, relieving it significantly.

(It also potentially gives Shippea Hill a rather fast service to London).

There are some other minor impacts on the East Coast Line including the potential of electrifying the Grantham-Nottingham line and running competitive Nottingham trains down it, and some other bits.

But the Norwich thing really strikes me, later improvements might be a short ~35km section of HSL from Brandon to Wymondham, since that could shave quite a bit off the travel time thanks to avoiding that enormous curve south via Thetford, although Thetford might justify keeping its own services so I dunno (looks like it takes 35 minutes to travel what would be 35km of dash on a HSL, which should mean ten more or more minutes off, and almost no demolition to do).

Its amazing what relatively short sections of high speed line can do.

 

[Chris125]

You are certainly right on the last point. I can foresee Labour quietly ditching the route north of Brum if only to underline their new found love of financial responsibility. You can see by the less-than-subtle ways to placate certain groups (the "Osborne detour", the Wigan Spanish Airport), that it's really not needed, they're just patching things up to make it look necessary. I bet it's just as bad in Yorkshire too (Wakefield to Euston - 1hr 57)

That makes zero sense politically - even if the capacity and economic case for phase 2 wasn't so utterly compelling, if phase 1 gets built then politics alone would ensure that the second phase follows.

If you don't believe me just look at Labour's HS2 strategy over the past year or two; the idea that phase 2 could be 'quietly ditched' is a stick Labour have themselves used to repeatedly beat the current government with, hence the calls for a legal commitment to it, a hybrid bill to cover both phases etc. Even those who were at best lukewarm about HS2 in the north would likely come out in support of the second phase out of fear they'd be unfairly disadvantaged by a line that only reach Birmingham.

Chris

 

[HSTEd]

Oh and if we were to put the depot adjacent to one of the termini to reduce the length of ECS movements I am pretty sure that the cost of it would far exceed any savings from the reduced operating costs.

And if we wanted I suppose we could just have a lot of services terminating and starting at Wigan at the edges of the operation period.

 

[tbtc]

HS2 phase 1 (London to Birmingham) is the same price as the Birmingham to Manchester and Birmingham to Leeds routes combined though. You'd spend ~£60bn on the 3 London-end mainline bypasses, but each of them in isolation doesn't do enough to transform LDHS rail travel in the same way and would therefore take longer to pay for the investment.

I'm not saying I fully agree with the idea now - it was a suggestion a few years ago when I was on my journey from being an "anti" to being "pro" HS2 - I just find it surprising that none of the "anti" camp are suggesting reasonable alternatives (like having more short High Speed lines instead of one long one) - it's a straight refusal with no serious/ sensible suggestions.

 

[AndyLandy]

I'm not saying I fully agree with the idea now - it was a suggestion a few years ago when I was on my journey from being an "anti" to being "pro" HS2 - I just find it surprising that none of the "anti" camp are suggesting reasonable alternatives (like having more short High Speed lines instead of one long one) - it's a straight refusal with no serious/ sensible suggestions.

This is the thing. I started out as an "anti" as well, but I've been overwhelmingly convinced to change my viewpoint over the last year or so in light of all the explanations and evidence laid before me. I do worry that the project is expensive, but I can't see what else we can do, short of pricing people off the railways to reduce capacity.

 

[Muzer]

I started off agnostic (what Richard Dawkins calls "temporary agnosticism in practice") because I knew nothing about it ("it'd be cool to have a high-speed line but do we really need it?" sort of thing) - then when I learnt about it, I realised we did need it .

 

[jon0844]

On another forum, not railway related, they're talking about how people affected by HS2 are now having their houses valued at £0.

Seriously? What about houses near tube lines in London or backing onto railway lines? Does nobody buy or sell these homes?

According to what was posted, the house was valued at £275,000 by the owner.. but then dropped to £0 - and the Government paid her just £245,000. Now, I didn't know homes were already being compulsory purchased, but who knows it was really 'worth' £275,000? Could have simply got an estate agent to value it at £1m and then split the cash, by hoping the Government would pay whatever value it was told!!

 

[dggar]

According to what was posted, the house was valued at £275,000 by the owner.. but then dropped to £0 - and the Government paid her just £245,000. Now, I didn't know homes were already being compulsory purchased, but who knows it was really 'worth' £275,000? Could have simply got an estate agent to value it at £1m and then split the cash, by hoping the Government would pay whatever value it was told!!

Sounds like a bar room myth to me,
any indication given as to where the location was?

 

[Ironside]

Sounds like a bar room myth to me,
any indication given as to where the location was?

If I recal correctly it was that some surveyors were unable to say what the houses were worth until it was established what compensation would be awarded. Otherwise I would love to buy a £0 house in Buckinghamshire.

 

[Philip Elliott]

I'm not saying I fully agree with the idea now - it was a suggestion a few years ago when I was on my journey from being an "anti" to being "pro" HS2 - I just find it surprising that none of the "anti" camp are suggesting reasonable alternatives (like having more short High Speed lines instead of one long one) - it's a straight refusal with no serious/ sensible suggestions.

Actually, I've long thought that we should build 4/5 circa 50 mile routes - to Hitchin/Bedford/Milton Keynes/Bicester/Reading ie to where the "NSE" presence fizzles out. I'm sure I've mentioned it - but may have been on WNXX. There are plenty of alternatives but many pro-HS2 people just don't want to listen.

Some brief descriptions of alternatives that have different costs/benefits:

1. Shut Watford DC route, to be replaced by new underground route, existing route becomes route for slowest LM and freight. Existing slows become the 'semi-fasts'.

2. Six- track Bletchley - Roade, Four- track Weedon - allows increased express services out of Euston while allowing MK calls

3. High speed line London - Manchester, London - Dunstable (junction with branch to Bedford), MK, <junction for widened Rugby - Birmingham line>, Stoke, Manchester

4. New line London - Aylesbury, re-open GC to Whetstone with new route in Rugby area to join with Trent Valley with non stop trains diverted this way

5. Scrap most of Toton - Tinsley and re-instate goods lines on Erewash line

6. Widen Watford - Roade to six track based on a "4+2" basis - separate 2 track alignment parallel with exisiting route but need not be connected throughout (much of the MML is 2x 2 track railways). Very little of the WCML on this section has buildings on both sides of the line, bypass Linslade, tunnel under Watford, very few houses need to be removed

Plenty more options aswell but no doubt calls 'but it's not high speed', but it'll cost more (TV was £320 million for 12 miles...work it out)...:roll:

 

[AndyLandy]

There are plenty of alternatives but many pro-HS2 people just don't want to listen...Plenty more options aswell but no doubt calls 'but it's not high speed', but it'll cost more (TV was £320 million for 12 miles...work it out)...:roll:

I'm always interested in workable alternatives, and some of those sound quite well considered.

I guess the questions I'd have are around what sort of capacity improvements could you get with such upgrades, and what sort of cost?

A big reason why I'm pro-HS2 is that I see it as a much longer-term investment. I'm sure there are some improvements that could be made to the WCML, but I see them as merely delaying the inevitable need for HS2.