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In terms of burning political capital that is clearly an issue I agree but IMO it was lost when folk let the narrative become dominated about HS2 being an entirely London-Birmingham project. I doubt the French allowed the narrative around the phased build of LGV Est to become dominated by ‘why are we spending billions to build a railway to Baudrecourt (population 173)’. More recently and even worse we’ve let the narrative become Old Oak Common-Aston. That then allows crazy commentators to come along and make absurd statements that it will cost £1 billion per mile, which folk just lap up.
I think the issue is that LGV Est was not the first line to be built, which obviously helped an awful lot.
They had credibility that HS2 simply does not, as a result of a long line of succesful or somewhat succesful projects.
LGV Sud-Est was built in a single phase I believe, as was the original LGV Atlantique - I don't think any explicit promises were held back for a "later phase".
As for one billion a mile, probably not, but we are not far off £400m per mile in 2026 prices for Phase 1, and there is still close to a decade for it to run away further.
Sure its a cynical rhetorical device, but it works so well because it isn't even that absurd any longer.
High Speed rail can’t do everything everywhere all at once. If you are going to stop everywhere that is an valid option to create kind of Kodama style operation but a) don’t expect it to be cheaper to build (as some have claimed here) b) don’t expect significantly quicker journey times on your core markets (which you point out in your edit and would be even worse if it did Leicester, Derby, Nottingham, Sheffield, Leeds as was suggested by the OP) which leads onto c) don’t expect it to generate the kinds of modal shifts on core markets seen in the likes of France and Japan.
Well if you want to cite Kodama as an example, then you could probably go the Japanese mixed traffic route, at which point I would expect you would get major modal shift. Although I'm not convinced that is the best way to do things.
If you want all stations, all stops, then you would gain some journey time back by virtue of going from, for example, 3 trains per hour London-Manchester to 10 or so. The average weight time goes from ten minutes to three, which is seven minutes clawed back.
The core markets will always be Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester - and those are not that far north at the end of the day. Leeds and Manchester would still absolutely crush the classic railway, albeit by a somewhat smaller margin, and Birmingham is out of scope for this thread because we are at Handsacre already!
I think the issue is that LGV Est was not the first line to be built, which obviously helped an awful lot.
They had credibility that HS2 simply does not, as a result of a long line of succesful or somewhat succesful projects.
LGV Sud-Est was built in a single phase I believe, as was the original LGV Atlantique - I don't think any explicit promises were held back for a "later phase".
As for one billion a mile, probably not, but we are not far off £400m per mile in 2026 prices for Phase 1, and there is still close to a decade for it to run away further.
Sure its a cynical rhetorical device, but it works so well because it isn't even that absurd any longer.
LGV Est was built over two phases as I said. The first phase to Baudrecourt (a field in the middle of nowhere) opened in 2007, the second phase to Strasbourg started construction in 2010 and opened in 2016.
I would point out that by its very name HS2 isn’t the first high speed line built in this country! But I do agree it failed to capitalise on the success of the first project and the wider European network, and I think it certainly got bogged down in an argument/image about it simply being a railway line to Birmingham from which it never recovered. Even in this very thread folk are still claiming they should have just enhanced the Chiltern line instead. In this country it seems that if your particular town isn’t directly on the high speed route itself and served by a station, the prevailing view is it wasted money that could be spent on improving local rail services. An argument which other countries simply haven’t allowed to happen, mainly because it isn’t true.
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Well if you want to cite Kodama as an example, then you could probably go the Japanese mixed traffic route, at which point I would expect you would get major modal shift. Although I'm not convinced that is the best way to do things.
If you want all stations, all stops, then you would gain some journey time back by virtue of going from, for example, 3 trains per hour London-Manchester to 10 or so. The average weight time goes from ten minutes to three, which is seven minutes clawed back.
The core markets will always be Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester - and those are not that far north at the end of the day. Leeds and Manchester would still absolutely crush the classic railway, albeit by a somewhat smaller margin, and Birmingham is out of scope for this thread because we are at Handsacre already!
I totally agree with all this. The reason I cite Kodama as an example is that is what happens if you stop everywhere. Clearly, I don’t think it would be the best thing to do either!
Thats three extra stops @ 5-6 minutes each. So you’ve slowed down services by 15-18minutes to potentially gain a few extra passengers. But this is at the expensive of loosing passengers in much larger markets further north because they’ll just stick to their cars or the plane to make their journey
This is a pretty bad take. Obviously the intermediate stops wouldn’t be called at by all trains.
If you look at the passenger numbers for the intermediate stops in France you’d be looking at something like a couple of million passengers a year at a Stoke parkway station, maybe more, it wouldn’t be small.
Additionally the only destination speed is really important for where you are competing with air is London-Glasgow - and for that the key win is having 2tph so you can have one as express in the north and one to handle the medium sized intermediate stops - and the key barriers for that are freight north of Preston and the lack of capacity that phase 1 will address.
You probably also almost want to add more stops to that in the south and midlands to a Glasgow express to get the passenger numbers up, as 500k (Preston) + 750k (Glasgow) doesn’t really even fill an hourly 200m train that would give you around 5m seats a year. And Stoke parkway is going to give you a lot more passengers than e.g. Lancaster.
The LGV Est to Strasbourg discussed earlier for example doesn’t call into Nancy (metropolitan population 500k) or Reims (metropolitan population 300k) because it simply doesn’t present the best value for money. It goes straight to Strasbourg (metropolitan population 860k).
The 19:24 to Strasbourg from Paris est does go via Nancy, and there are TGV trains that stop at intermediate stops en-route. To the west and south west there are a lot more that call at intermediate stops off route. To the south east there are quite a few trains that call at Lyon Part Deiu before going back on.
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I totally agree with all this. The reason I cite Kodama as an example is that is what happens if you stop everywhere. Clearly, I don’t think it would be the best thing to do either!
LGV Est was built over two phases as I said. The first phase to Baudrecourt (a field in the middle of nowhere) opened in 2007, the second phase to Strasbourg started construction in 2010 and opened in 2016.
I would point out that by its very name HS2 isn’t the first high speed line built in this country! But I do agree it failed to capitalise on the success of the first project and the wider European network, and I think it certainly got bogged down in an argument/image about it simply being a railway line to Birmingham from which it never recovered. Even in this very thread folk are still claiming they should have just enhanced the Chiltern line instead. In this country it seems that if your particular town isn’t directly on the high speed route itself and served by a station, the prevailing view is it wasted money that could be spent on improving local rail services. An argument which other countries simply haven’t allowed to happen, mainly because it isn't true.
Agreed. The approach by other countries is that they make a decision to build a railway for the benefit of their country/economy/people etc, and they see it through.
The sorry UK approach is to think of an idea, then pay a fortune to numerous consultants and countless lawyers for aspects and justifications that foreign Govts simply don't allow themselves to get bogged down with. They just do the necessary bits.
Then we're petrified of adverse publicity so we desperately seek out ways that new projects like HS2 can try to become all things to all people. Which it clearly never can, but that doesn't stop us spending fortunes trying.
And then we're vulnerable yet further, to clueless politicians like Sunak and others, and all this is before we even start to consider the all too powerful roads lobby.
Given all these handicaps, designing new rail routes in the UK isn't a happy place to be
If we are talking about a tunnel to get round the Lake District (Shap etc) then how does that compare with the cost of tunnelling under the Pennines to link Manchester and Leeds ?.
For the East coast we are wandering from upgrades into a totally new line when we have not even finished HS2 to any where useful. Furthermore the useful addon to HS2 Phase1 ie Phase 2a is going to be roughtly as cheap per mile as a Hight Sprred line on the cheapest parts of the East Coast.
Cleared for 140mph if they could reach that. More bottlenecks than now were in situe then. If the train could do 140mph for all the ECML and 160mph on some long sections it will clearly exceed an average of 95.02 mph handsomely.
I think upgrading the East Coast Mainline in places might be generally useful BUT as a large project improving line speeds we only need to look at how much the West Coast Mail Line upgrade from yesteryear achieved and at what cost - not very positive. So the conclusion is a decent relief route that is not stopping at lots of places.
Adding stations willy nilly on a new route completely undermines the point of building a relief route with limited stops.
Also I doubt if adding stations would reduce objections much in those areas. It might get a few more supporters but the objectors are not going to be bought off by a station.
Using the existing stations does not free up capacity on the existing lines. In fact it makes the whole system worse as delays on the classic lines impact the High Speed line and vice versa. There is a reason the Shinkansen is so reliable. It’s segregated.
Building parkway stations was what was proposed. Birmingham Interchange is just that. However, the Toton and Sheffield/Rotherham parkways were both unpopular and both were used as an argument against building HS2.
How does building extra stations result in smaller tunnels?
Probably ends up costing more for tunneling as more portals and worksites and disruption for the locals. That is before we add in the cost of grade separated junctions. The timetabling of the fast trains dipping in and out of the existing routes stations would be complicated and possibly impossible.
Come on man. A basic rural station with lifts and passing tracks or PEDs isn’t going to cost “huge amounts of money”. It doesn’t anywhere else.
And if you do one at Stoke and then have to do one in Buckinghamshire and one in Warwickshire the sky truly isn’t going to fall.
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Why can’t you fit the HS2 services in the gaps between existing trains? Are there really 10 trains an hour per platform to those places?
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The people of the Chilterns would be much more relaxed about HS2 if they got to use it.
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This is true to a point. But a service that only calls at one stop and goes back out onto the fast line with a grade separated junction isn’t going to disrupt other trains. There are lots of these in France.
You want to completely undermine the point of a new route with limited stops that brings the major cities closer together time wise. It is meant to relieve the existing lines with all their stations and semi fast services.
This is what is wrong - too many people do not understand the point of new lines like these.
The legal powers to build the section under the Phase 2a Act are scheduled to expire today 11 Feb. If not extended at the last minute, delivering any future rail link on any section of this alignment would become significantly more complex.
The Act gave HS2 Ltd, and the Secretary of State, powers to compulsorily acquire land and proceed with construction for Phase 2a between Fradley and Crewe. If not extended, there will be a loss of compulsory purchase powers. The government can no longer legally force landowners to sell land for Phase 2a works under the existing Act. That means no further land acquisition for the route can take place unless new legislation is passed. Land already acquired may be sold off. Reports suggest that, once the powers lapse, land already bought by HS2 Ltd is likely to be sold off back into private ownership.
Safeguarding has already been lifted in many areas, separately from the expiry of powers. The government removed planning safeguarding for much of the Phase 2a route earlier, meaning local authorities no longer have to consult HS2 on planning applications and the land is more open to other development.
The government announced last month that they wouldn't sell off land already procured along the Phase 2A route. They just haven't extended the powers to acquire the rest of the land needed.
Agreed. The approach by other countries is that they make a decision to build a railway for the benefit of their country/economy/people etc, and they see it through.
The sorry UK approach is to think of an idea, then pay a fortune to numerous consultants and countless lawyers for aspects and justifications that foreign Govts simply don't allow themselves to get bogged down with. They just do the necessary bits.
Then we're petrified of adverse publicity so we desperately seek out ways that new projects like HS2 can try to become all things to all people. Which it clearly never can, but that doesn't stop us spending fortunes trying.
And then we're vulnerable yet further, to clueless politicians like Sunak and others, and all this is before we even start to consider the all too powerful roads lobby.
Given all these handicaps, designing new rail routes in the UK isn't a happy place to be
Yes.... And there is the answer. We are hung up and can only achieve anything by throwing more money at it, too much money. I have had a thought. Thinking about Newcastle to Edinburgh improvements.
How much of an improvement to possible London-Edinburgh times would there be if Carlisle to Edinburgh were linked by a more direct route ?.
Crayons out for the Waverley line reopening throughout !.
You want to completely undermine the point of a new route with limited stops that brings the major cities closer together time wise. It is meant to relieve the existing lines with all their stations and semi fast services.
How much of an improvement to possible London-Edinburgh times would there be if Carlisle to Edinburgh were linked by a more direct route ?.
Crayons out for the Waverley line reopening throughout !.
Not as much as you think. As the crow flies Carlisle to Edinburgh is 74 miles, vs 101 via Carstairs, and the Waverley route isn’t as the crow flies. I suspect it’s closer to the walking distance which is 90 miles.
Even at 90mph the existing route only costs you 18 minutes over the crow flying, and like 7 minutes over a 90 mile alternative.
The Environmental Impact Assessment and Environmental Statement for HS2 resulted the long tunnels in the Chilterns before the locals ever got involved.
The British system doesn’t really have clear rules like that. If you are in a position where the local people are neutral on a project rather than opposed that stuff can be slimmed down - even if it needed primary legislation to do so.
The fact that HS2 were extremely bad at small p politics - and certainly wildly worse than e.g the French who were prepared to overpay farmers for their land is a big part of the cost overruns.
The British system doesn’t really have clear rules like that. If you are in a position where the local people are neutral on a project rather than opposed that stuff can be slimmed down - even if it needed primary legislation to do so.
Yes it does. If the EIA/ES etc says to mitigate harm to X you need to do Y you do Y, and you aren’t going to try to get away with not doing Y because the lawyers will pick that apart straight away.
Yes it does. If the EIA/ES etc says to mitigate harm to X you need to do Y you do Y, and you aren’t going to try to get away with not doing Y because the lawyers will pick that apart straight away.
Which you couldn't do because the government didn’t have sufficient parliamentary majority because HS2 has always been setup to only benefit the big cities.
I always thought that was musing, not firm, because they were placating Burnham re: keeping him out of Westminster, so we give you this this Birmingham to Manchester railway,. A railway that will not be looked at until NPR is completed, and after HS2 is operational. So it will fizzle away.
Statement to Parliament on 14th January 2026 by the Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander (referring to the government's long-term aim for a full new north-south line from Birmingham to Manchester):
"this won't be a revival of HS2 and no decisions have been taken on the specification or timetable. In the meantime, we'll retain land the government has already purchased between the West Midlands and Crewe. "
Which you couldn't do because the government didn’t have sufficient parliamentary majority because HS2 has always been setup to only benefit the big cities.
Sorry you’re arguing that HS2 should be exempt from the environmental protections that are in place to protect the environment, and everyone else is subject to. Right.
Sorry you’re arguing that HS2 should be exempt from the environmental protections that are in place to protect the environment, and everyone else is subject to. Right.
Or you streamline the rules in general. I am not sure the 10,000 page environmental impact assessments are sensible.
But the other side of it is that you have to be in a position where the projects care about the interests of the people who live along the route - which they clearly do not.
The fact that we are still arguing about whether Oxenholme gets HS2 service to London or whether Stoke gets a parkway station at all makes that clear.
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Statement to Parliament on 14th January 2026 by the Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander (referring to the government's long-term aim for a full new north-south line from Birmingham to Manchester):
"this won't be a revival of HS2 and no decisions have been taken on the specification or timetable. In the meantime, we'll retain land the government has already purchased between the West Midlands and Crewe. "
Which you couldn't do because the government didn’t have sufficient parliamentary majority because HS2 has always been setup to only benefit the big cities.
The High Speed Rail (London – West Midlands) Hybrid Bill, i.e. the legislation for Phase 1, passed its final reading in the Commons with a vote of 399 for, 42 against. HS2 did have a massive majority in favour before they started blowing the budget.
Or you streamline the rules in general. I am not sure the 10,000 page environmental impact assessments are sensible.
But the other side of it is that you have to be in a position where the projects care about the interests of the people who live along the route - which they clearly do not.
The fact that we are still arguing about whether Oxenholme gets HS2 service to London or whether Stoke gets a parkway station at all makes that clear.
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Good news as far as it went, but they only did half a job. They should have extended the CPO powers for another five years. (Unless they already have all the land needed for what they gave in mind but just aren't letting on?)
Good news as far as it went, but they only did half a job. They should have extended the CPO powers for another five years. (Unless they already have all the land needed for what they gave in mind but just aren't letting on?)
and where the public transport network feeds people to and froom it, rather than encouraging driving out of "urbanisations" to get to a parkway station.
Getting back to restarting Phase 2A: One question I'm curious about is, could we achieve most of the capacity benefits that Phase 2A was intended to unlock with improvements to the existing WCML between Handsacre and Crewe? The obvious thing there is you'd need to grade separate Colwich Junction, but that's hardly a bad thing anyway. I'm guessing grade separation where the line from Birmingham joins just south of Stafford might be needed too. Obviously you wouldn't get the speed benefits of HS2 by doing that, but over 36 miles that's not going to make a massive difference to times.
Getting back to restarting Phase 2A: One question I'm curious about is, could we achieve most of the capacity benefits that Phase 2A was intended to unlock with improvements to the existing WCML between Handsacre and Crewe? The obvious thing there is you'd need to grade separate Colwich Junction, but that's hardly a bad thing anyway. I'm guessing grade separation where the line from Birmingham joins just south of Stafford might be needed too. Obviously you wouldn't get the speed benefits of HS2 by doing that, but over 36 miles that's not going to make a massive difference to times.
Getting back to restarting Phase 2A: One question I'm curious about is, could we achieve most of the capacity benefits that Phase 2A was intended to unlock with improvements to the existing WCML between Handsacre and Crewe? The obvious thing there is you'd need to grade separate Colwich Junction, but that's hardly a bad thing anyway. I'm guessing grade separation where the line from Birmingham joins just south of Stafford might be needed too. Obviously you wouldn't get the speed benefits of HS2 by doing that, but over 36 miles that's not going to make a massive difference to times.
I'm no expert but this idea has been raised many many times and the general consensus is that you'd get some of the benefits for most of the cost of phase 2A. Plus when you run out of capacity again in a few decades you'd need to build 2A anyway.
I'm no expert but this idea has been raised many many times and the general consensus is that you'd get some of the benefits for most of the cost of phase 2A. Plus when you run out of capacity again in a few decades you'd need to build 2A anyway.
OK fair enough. But on the other side, if you went for improving the WCML for now, you'd get additional benefits that HS2 2A couldn't give you. Grade separating Colwich frees up a huge timetable restraint what would have otherwise still be there even after building Phase 2A. Some 4-tracking between Colwich and Stafford could allow a very useful new station at Baswich for the Trent Valley stoppers. It wouldn't cost that much to throw properly reopening Polesworth into the mix too. And maybe someone could come up with a design for Colwich grade separation that allows for a station at Colwich (though looking at Google maps that does seem tricky). If for the time being you could do those things instead of Phase 2A, and that allowed a much improved local service through the Trent Valley, as well as sufficient capacity to run a few additional fast trains per hour on top of that, is that necessarily a bad thing?
(After all the capacity issues at Manchester mean that even if you did build Phase 2A tomorrow, you wouldn't be able to make full use of it anyway).
Which you couldn't do because the government didn’t have sufficient parliamentary majority because HS2 has always been setup to only benefit the big cities.
This is part of the problem. Too many decision makers not seeing the big picture. Improving links between the big cities improves the whole economy. That is something I never see politicians explaining to the masses. The UK economy is not great and we are leaving it so late that we will not be able to spend to improve.
OK fair enough. But on the other side, if you went for improving the WCML for now, you'd get additional benefits that HS2 2A couldn't give you. Grade separating Colwich frees up a huge timetable restraint what would have otherwise still be there even after building Phase 2A. Some 4-tracking between Colwich and Stafford could allow a very useful new station at Baswich for the Trent Valley stoppers. It wouldn't cost that much to throw properly reopening Polesworth into the mix too. And maybe someone could come up with a design for Colwich grade separation that allows for a station at Colwich (though looking at Google maps that does seem tricky). If for the time being you could do those things instead of Phase 2A, and that allowed a much improved local service through the Trent Valley, as well as sufficient capacity to run a few additional fast trains per hour on top of that, is that necessarily a bad thing?
(After all the capacity issues at Manchester mean that even if you did build Phase 2A tomorrow, you wouldn't be able to make full use of it anyway).
If you are going to four track Colwich to Stafford then you might as well call it a new line and avoid any difficult bits by choosing a slightly different route plus go past Stafford and Colwich in the process. It was all the faff for improvements to other parts of the West Coast Main Line back in the past that made the alternative, HS2, inevitable in most planners eyes.
OK fair enough. But on the other side, if you went for improving the WCML for now, you'd get additional benefits that HS2 2A couldn't give you. Grade separating Colwich frees up a huge timetable restraint what would have otherwise still be there even after building Phase 2A. Some 4-tracking between Colwich and Stafford could allow a very useful new station at Baswich for the Trent Valley stoppers. It wouldn't cost that much to throw properly reopening Polesworth into the mix too. And maybe someone could come up with a design for Colwich grade separation that allows for a station at Colwich (though looking at Google maps that does seem tricky). If for the time being you could do those things instead of Phase 2A, and that allowed a much improved local service through the Trent Valley, as well as sufficient capacity to run a few additional fast trains per hour on top of that, is that necessarily a bad thing?
The problem is that all this 4 tracking, and grade separated junctions requires many miles of new cuttings, embankments and bridges. And it is not that easy to do adjacent to a live railway.
But of course if going to dig cuttings, build embankments, build bridges then might as well do it on the straighter HS2 alignment, and not interfere with current route whilst it is built.
The main difference the new route would create, is a new noise corridor (although lot of it would be not far from existing rail lines or roads). On the southern section some of the noise (and visual) bunds are 15+m wide on both side of the line. Of course it will be expensive when constructing 45m (150 feet) wide earthworks, for a trackbed that's nearer 11m wide.
You need to understand a speech Lord Hendy made to Lords couple of weeks ago, if ORR is turning down access applications because WCML is full, then doing nothing (or just dabbling to give minor uplift) is no longer an option (short and longer term).
It is becoming more and more obvious, that a line (but not one specified for 400km/h) is urgently needed. The Government really needs the HS2 reset report before it can say yes, and needs it to say got and understanding now, and need some extensions to utilise it properly but built to 300-320km/h standards not the excessively expensive 400km/h standard. A 30 mile HS2a line at 300km/h takes 10 minutes, at 400km/h would take 7.5 minutes. But assuming got to slow down at northern end of it, only going to save 1-1.5 minutes at 400km/h because won't be at that high a speed for a lot of it.
If a sensible longer term plan was being adopted, would be constructing bypasses of the sections Network Rail and ORR consider full, extend these new sections, working back towards the new line coming north from Birmingham
If you want to deliver phase 2a (and any future phases) for a reasonable amount of money you do also have to make sure the project benefits those affected by the construction.
That happened when the railways were built in the 19th century and it also happened when the motorways were built. It’s an important part of making sure the project gets delivered.
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and where the public transport network feeds people to and froom it, rather than encouraging driving out of "urbanisations" to get to a parkway station.
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