HS2 Phase 1 redesigns

[eldomtom2]

The i is reporting that ministers are demanding further redesigns to HS2 Phase 1 in an attempt to keep costs down:

HS2 facing further spiralling costs with redesign needed on London to Birmingham leg

i reveals that Government failed to seek advice from Network Rail or HS2 Ltd on plans to cut northern leg

inews.co.uk

Vast swathes of the London to Birmingham leg of HS2 will have to be redesigned as part of a review ordered by the Government that could push costs even further, i can reveal.

Ministers have demanded that the initial leg of the high speed rail line be looked at again after Rishi Sunak announced his plans to axe the northern route to Manchester, in a bid to find up to £9bn in savings on the line.

But industry experts have warned that any redesign of the scheme, which is currently under construction, could further add to the spiralling costs of the scheme and lead to lengthy delays.

Industry sources have also told i that the Prime Minister took the decision to scrap the later phases of HS2 without first consulting Network Rail and failed to take any advice about the implications of such a move from the Government’s own delivery arm for the scheme, HS2 Ltd.

The Prime Minister ended weeks of speculation in Manchester on Wednesday when he announced that he would scrap the train line north of Birmingham, promising to reinvest the £36.5bn earmarked for the project into hundreds of local transport schemes under a new Network North plan.

But buried in the small print of the decision is the demand from the Department for Transport [DfT] to find as much as £9bn in additional savings from the London to Birmingham stretch.

A footnote in the Network North document states that the DfT believes that the cost of the current design of HS2 phase one “should lie between £45bn and £54bn”, but it warns that HS2 Ltd must “deliver at the lower end of this range even if that entails difficult choices”.

“The scope of phase one will now need to be reviewed to make sure only what is required for the reduced HS2 scheme is being delivered, including the revised approach to Euston,” the document states.

Industry insiders have warned that major re-scoping works to the initial phase of the rail line will require significant sections of the project going back to the drawing board, with the likes of Curzon Street station in Birmingham being dramatically pared back to make cutbacks.

The sources also raised serious doubts whether the decision would lead to reduced costs, given any substantial redesign of stations and rail systems will take time and incur costs of their own.

What could these redesigns involve, and will they succeed in keeping costs down?

 

[HSTEd]

Probably they will axe the slab track, cut Curzon street to three or four platforms and delete any and all provision for the later phases in terms of junctions etc.

And no, it won't save any money.

The redesigns (including supporting the vastly increased track maintenance access requirements) will push the cost up again in another cost spiral until Handsacre gets axed and the scheme is officially dead. That's my prediction anyway.