“Network North”

Just like in the 90's then, which inevitably led to the Hatfield and othet crashes.

 

Too right... when it was announced that it was coming our way we stood to lose an ancient woodland and around 230 mostly new houses, our MP lobbied Hs2 to save them by tunneling. They told him it was technically impossible due to the geology... under FOI we found that they had lied.. their engineers reports that said it was only cost that was a factor. We also found that 22% of the southern route was earmarked for tunnelling compared to less than 7% up north.

 

The cost of building the Victorian infrastructure was enormous, but over the last 150 years it's proved pretty useful.

These people know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

Long term thinking my harris.

 

We really need proportional representation to get rid of this shortermism.

That being said I never really believed HS2 was the solution. The rail links to London in this country aren't bad. Shaving 20 minutes off the journey time from Manchester to London is a red herring as you often get stuck on the platform at Euston for 20 mins during rush hour. A bigger platform would have been a much more cost effective solution. Also a much more important factor is internet speeds on our train lines. If I can work from the train, what time I arrive becomes much less important.

Fast, prompt, internet Accesible connections between hub cities in the midlands and up north is much more important. This would create the talent pool needed to fuel the growth of the north.

 

Already one of the Network North plans - the Leamside Line - has shifted to "we're thinking about it" despite the local Tory MP bragging about it yesterday.

https://www.chroniclelive.co.uk/news/north-east-news/fury-government-u-turns-fairytale-27848664

 

HS2 would have provided a second west coast line with a gauge that would have allowed euro size freight to be carried.

This second line would have freed up the existing line to offer more local traffic.

We desperately need a modern high speed train system in this country, one with the prospect of linking up with Europe, to allow trade to be moved seamlessly from up here to Germany. France etc.

It’s not just about trips to London.

 

Unreal.

 

At the end of the day it would have brought f all to South Yorkshire... the best was a slow speed spur into Sheffield City Centre.

 

Just like Brexit never happened,,,, seamless!

 

HS2 has nothing to do with getting anywhere faster. It’s primary purpose is to free up capacity which is currently be taken by freight. So a combination of more track. Better station platforms and general improvements allows you to run more trains more frequently .Gets more lorries off the road.

it will do that Birmingham - London so they should fairly quickly be able to run more passenger services. Leaving it at Birmingham will make northern services worse.

 

Anyone travelling north of Birmingham will get there 20 minutes faster - to Curzon Street - then have to walk to New Street - 15-20 minutes - to travel onwards north. Not really saving much time for anyone further north than Aston...

 

it should be possible to remove some. Freight from lines meaning more trains (in theory) I think from memory as last meeting I had on HS2 was over a year ago. Like ending there should allow a significant 20% increase in train capacity.

 

Tottenham will win a trophy before you get that Spur.

 

Tottenham not spur.
Al get mi coyt.

 

That's only because Sheffield were successful in lobbying to get a station for South Yorkshire moved from Meadowhall, which is accesible to more people, to the city centre, which turned out to be as you say a lower speed spur. Served them right for being selfish.

 

It's largely unknown how duplicitous Julie Dore and SCC were over the Meadowhall route. All the other South Yorks Council's were in favour of it, but behind their backs Dore wrote to Sir David Higgins, (Chair of Hs2) rubbishing the route and asking for a full high speed Sheffield City Centre station... the particularly duplicitous part was that she didn't write the letter on Sheffield City Council headed paper, she used Sheffield City Region paper.. giving the possible impression that she was speaking also for Barnsley, Doncaster and Rotherham. This led to a major rift between the four Councils... Dore then compounded this by publicly attacking Doncaster MBC's Chief Exec. They spent nearly £100k on a report that tried to undermine the route, and nearly £10k on a Business breakfast at which they entertained unnamed Hs2 officials... FoI didn't solve it, they just claimed that as it was unminuted they couldn't remember who attended.
It was never confirmed what SCC's motivation was, there were three possibilities mooted, one was that a lot of Chinese investment hung on a City Centre station, the second was that Sheffield had an aspirational 'Grey to Green Scheme' to rejuvenate a large area around Victoria Station, a large Hs2 station on the site would have saved Sheffield a lot of money on that, the third option was that Sheffield wanted Meadowhall to build on, it was noticeable that on the cancellation of the route the big IKEA was announced.