HS2 under review

[Coombe Barton]

HS2: Cameron faces backbench rebellion

 

So says http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27180654

[jamie92208]

HS2: Cameron faces backbench rebellion

 

So says http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27180654

At least they have got the projected cost correct for once and mention that it includes contingencies.   That makes a welcome change for the Beeb.

 

Jamie

[Debs.]

HS2: Cameron faces backbench rebellion

 

So says http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27180654

 

  £42,000,000,000 

[melmerby]

HS2: Cameron faces backbench rebellion

 

So says http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27180654

"Bigged up" somewhat considering it is expected to be only about 30 MPs

 

I'm surprised there aren't more Tories in their heartland who oppose it.

After all, Big house + Chelsea tractor = No HS2!

 

Keith

[Re6/6]

The the 'free market' IEA are at it again. : http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27184269

 

Why should they be believed after their discredited last report? In it they postulated an imaginary figure of £90B which included spurious costs like the Nottingham tram extension and other non-existent schemes.

 

It was reported this morning on the BBC that with the wavering Labour support now has now firmed up and after some long parliamentary proceedings it will now certainly go ahead. One can almost feel a collective sigh of relief.

 

Their mouthpiece Professor Wellings was on the radio this morning still suggesting 'upgrading' existing lines including the WCML yet again. If this was done instead of the new line, the questions have to be asked about all the houses alongside the southern end of the line that will have to be demolished and all the years of endless disruption that would take place to existing users. He even suggested that resignalling would improve journey times and capacity issues. These 'think tanks' don't seem to have even an elementary grasp of current, let alone future railway operations and requirements.

Edited April 28, 2014 by Re6/6

[Edwin_m]

In theory re-signaling with ETCS would open the door to 140mph operation, reduce headways somewhat and allow removal of some restrictions that are in place due to signal sighting or spacing issues.  However the main determinant of capacity on routes like the WCML is the difference between faster and slower trains, and speeding up the faster trains would make this worse. So the claim has a grain of truth but is disingenuous in this context. 

Edited April 28, 2014 by Edwin_m

[pete_mcfarlane]

The the 'free market' IEA are at it again. : http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27184269

 

There's a definite overstating of the backbench 'rebellion' in these BBC article - a couple of dozen Tory MPs voting against the Bill is irrelevant when most of the Labour party is voting for it. Journalists trying to invent a crisis when there isn't one to make some headlines.

 

As for the report and the people behind it:

 

 

 

He said employment levels in east Kent had fallen by three percentage points since the opening of the High Speed One line in the county

It may, just may, be nothing to do with HS1 and possibly something to do with the recession thing that's been going on for the last few years.

 

 

 

Mr Wellings said that instead of building HS2 the government should improve local and regional links in the north of England.

And yet nother outing for the nonsense that HS2 is happening instead of investment in the existing railways.

[Coombe Barton]

MPs reject calls for HS2 plans to be halted

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-27184269

[HornbyA3Fan]

Why can't the government fund for our current railways without having this monstrousity which is this HS2 build. There are many disused routes in the UK, like the Monsal Trial in Derbyshire, The Woodhead Route in the Pennines, GCR, etc etc, which is in desperate need of returning to mainline use to free up the roads and the current rail system to extend the freight and passenger usage. Call me old fashioned (not that old by the way) but I rather prefer having these old routes and our current rail services extended upon rather than being neglected in years to come if HS2 does get built, especially if it does, and I mean if it does, what about the communties and houses in the firing line of this purposed route. 

 

And whenever I see pictures or read about locomotives, still operational locos getting scrapped even in preservation, it disguses me that such things still happen. 

 

What has happened to this country's heritage of British built locos, and rolling stock, and buildings etc. 

[Ron Ron Ron]

Why can't the government fund for our current railways without having this monstrousity which is this HS2 build. There are many disused routes in the UK......

 

.....but they are funding the railways to a massive extent, with investment on a scale not seen since the 1800's Victorian era.

The long list of major projects, new and re-opened lines, new stations and major re-developments of some big stations, is seriously impressive and something no-one would have imagined possible back only 20 or 30 years ago.

 

Re-opening old routes may not always be a good thing, if they are unsuitable or inappropriate to present day circumstances.

Just re-opening because there was once a line there is not a justifiable reason in itself.

Although quite a few could be brought back, many closed for good reason, or newer "greenfield" routes may be more appropriate to the completely different demographic, economic and geographic environment of today.

 

There is a genuine concern that HS2 will abstract investment from the current network and future projects. IMHO, I think agreement to proceed with it should be bound up with a long term commitment to other rail investment and by that I don't mean mealy mouthed verbal promises, but a proper commitment incorporated either legally, or in any enabling acts of parliament.

 

 

.

 

.

Edited April 29, 2014 by Ron Ron Ron

[Sheffield]

I have thought that if the  GCR mainline had been kept and run along the lines of the Chiltern route it would now be a useful connection between London, the Midlands and the North West. But it does seem that improving or restoring existing lines is just puting the railways where they should be today, whereas HS2 is the future.

Edited April 29, 2014 by Sheffield

[28XX]

A friend asked about the current route today, so I looked back to page one, in order to give him the web address.  The links there (2010) are no longer valid, could the MODS please find and pin the link to current route to the top of the topic as a sticky?

[Fat Controller]

Why can't the government fund for our current railways without having this monstrousity which is this HS2 build. There are many disused routes in the UK, like the Monsal Trial in Derbyshire, The Woodhead Route in the Pennines, GCR, etc etc, which is in desperate need of returning to mainline use to free up the roads and the current rail system to extend the freight and passenger usage. Call me old fashioned (not that old by the way) but I rather prefer having these old routes and our current rail services extended upon rather than being neglected in years to come if HS2 does get built, especially if it does, and I mean if it does, what about the communties and houses in the firing line of this purposed route. 

 

And whenever I see pictures or read about locomotives, still operational locos getting scrapped even in preservation, it disguses me that such things still happen. 

 

What has happened to this country's heritage of British built locos, and rolling stock, and buildings etc. 

A lot of these routes became disused for the simple reason that there was no traffic for them, or because they duplicated other routes which were easier to maintain or more lucrative.

As for locos and stock being scrapped, this has happened since the very beginning of railways; if anything, the Victorians had far less regard for preserving artefacts than we have today. How many of the locos that participated, unsuccessfully, in the Rainhill Trials were still extant even five years afterwards.

The Victorians would think nothing of driving a new line through some site we would now think inviolable; York City Wall, Newcastle's castle and walls, the cemetery at St Pancras. In England, Ruskin railed against the Iron Road, which he believed would encourage the interbreeding of all the fools of Buxton and Bakewell.

 

Here's a link to the current map:- http://www.hs2.org.uk/interactive-map

[pete_mcfarlane]

 In England, Ruskin railed against the Iron Road, which he believed would encourage the interbreeding of all the fools of Buxton and Bakewell.

 

 Sounds like a good reason for not reopeneing the Midland route through the Peak District.

[298]

In England, Ruskin railed against the Iron Road, which he believed would encourage the interbreeding of all the fools of Buxton and Bakewell.

 

 

But said line doth make it easier for said fools to travel poste haste to Manchester, for filming of thee Jeremy Kyle show...

[melmerby]

The problem with our Victorian railway network was that it was built by private enterprise, without any co-ordinated plan, much of it in bouts of "Railway Mania"

 

Some places had duplicated or even triplicated lines whilst other deserving places got none.

 

Taking HornbyA3fan's wish that the GCR should have been kept open.The GCR was too late getting to London.

From London to Rugby it went through sparsely populated areas, generating little revenue and from Rugby onward went where there were already established routes.

It was never really succesful even though it was built to more modern standards than earlier lines.

 

IMHO it's a pity that BR didn't look into the possibility of more links between the different company's lines, which could have made possible some new through routes and closing of some duplicates.

 

I'm not sure how the capacity shortage on the WCML would have been alleviated by keeping open existing routes which have since closed.

 

Keith

[Edwin_m]

If the GCR had remained open then with some strategic links to other lines it might have alleviated capacity problems by taking long distance trains on its sparsely-populated route so that other routes could have better served the areas of population they pass through.  Alternatively it could have been developed as a strategic freight route, alleviating capacity on the WCML slow lines in particular. 

 

This might have reduced the need to built HS2, but we are where we are and with GC reinstatement virtually impossible north of Leicester that pass has been sold.  HS2 provides faster journeys and more capacity than the GC would have, albeit at greater cost.  Incidentally HS2 follows the GC route quite closely for a considerable distance in the less-populated area north of Aylesbury - so reopening the GC on a similar route would probably have attracted just as much objection...

[The Stationmaster]

North of Woodford Halse the GC was an important freight route with a smattering of passenger traffic.  Its purpose largely ended when there was insufficient freight traffic left to justify the route's retention and what was left could readily be accommodated on other routes which had also suffered declining traffic.  It came onto the scene late and left it early purely because of changing circumstances and an end, in reality, to wasteful competition between railway companies as well as the change in the way we heat our homes.

 

Like various other routes which closed due to or in the wake of Beeching (and the 1955 strike which killed so much railway freight traffic) its retention would simply have been yet another drain on a cash-strapped railway system.  As Edwin has noted it does now offer - in part - a suitable route for HS2 so maybe it won't be as dead as it once was but that is no argument at all for keeping it in aspic for 40 plus years between its two lives.

[Joseph_Pestell]

I have had a couple of trips on Eurostar in the last two weeks, one to Paris and one to Brussels. During the day, we were working in the Business Class Lounge as we also did for a day at St Pancras earlier in the month.

 

On all occasions, the trains seemed fairly packed - not only in second class with tourists but in Business as well. Accepting that it is the holiday season and this may not be entirely typical (Brussels trains were fuller than usual due to a pop festival in Belgium), I can't help feeling that they are going to need some new trains soon.

 

Given that Eurostar now runs entirely on dedicated continental gauge lines (HS1), surely it would be sensible to provide some double-deck trains for that service and cascade the current Eurostar sets (both the short inter-regional sets and the main sets) for use on HS2 as they have the capacity to run on the conventional network. The only obstacle to such a sensible use of resources is the current obsession with setting up HS2 for speeds up to 250mph. Using trains that run at up to 187mph would only make a very marginal difference to journey times.

 

Of course, the Class 373 sets will be getting on a bit by the time that HS2 finally gets built but they could be put into service before that and their availability might just encourage Govt to accelerate the building of HS2.

[Edwin_m]

Good idea in principle but there are several problems in practice, one being that HS2 will have ERTMS signalling which Eurostars don't have.  Fitting new on-train signalling equipment is something of a minefield especially on a train that will be around 30 years old at the time of HS2 phase 1.  There is also the problem that Eurostars are too long for most British stations and that the pantograph is set up for high speed overhead and was rumoured to have done a lot of damage when they were used on the ECML a few years back. 

 

On the long non-stop run from outer London to Birmingham 300km/h vs 360km/h probably does make quite a difference, especially as the new sets would also have better acceleration - I would guess at least 5min in the Phase 1 journey time of around 50min.  This section would carry 18 trains per hour, which I think is as many as any high speed railway outside Japan, so it would be necessary to slow down the faster trains to match the Eurostars.  All this is surmountable, but given that "classic compatible" trains will still be needed after phase 2, by which time the Eurostars will be nearly 40 years old, it probably makes sense to order these in time for Phase 1 instead. 

 

Incidentally Eurostar has ordered some new trains, the first of which is in the UK for testing.  These are to European loading gauge but are only single deck. 

[Joseph_Pestell]

Good idea in principle but there are several problems in practice, one being that HS2 will have ERTMS signalling which Eurostars don't have.  Fitting new on-train signalling equipment is something of a minefield especially on a train that will be around 30 years old at the time of HS2 phase 1.  There is also the problem that Eurostars are too long for most British stations and that the pantograph is set up for high speed overhead and was rumoured to have done a lot of damage when they were used on the ECML a few years back. 

 

On the long non-stop run from outer London to Birmingham 300km/h vs 360km/h probably does make quite a difference, especially as the new sets would also have better acceleration - I would guess at least 5min in the Phase 1 journey time of around 50min.  This section would carry 18 trains per hour, which I think is as many as any high speed railway outside Japan, so it would be necessary to slow down the faster trains to match the Eurostars.  All this is surmountable, but given that "classic compatible" trains will still be needed after phase 2, by which time the Eurostars will be nearly 40 years old, it probably makes sense to order these in time for Phase 1 instead. 

 

Incidentally Eurostar has ordered some new trains, the first of which is in the UK for testing.  These are to European loading gauge but are only single deck. 

 

As I understand it, the specification for trains on HS2 is that they will be the same length (400m) as 2 x TGV. So some stations on the classic network will have to be adapted to accommodate them.

 

That sounds like a nightmare but the alternative (some short trains) involves a waste of capacity on HS2 which should not be tolerated given what it will cost to build. I suppose that could be remedied by splitting/joining trains at the last station on HS2 but that creates problems of its own.

[The Stationmaster]

Good idea in principle but there are several problems in practice, one being that HS2 will have ERTMS signalling which Eurostars don't have.  Fitting new on-train signalling equipment is something of a minefield especially on a train that will be around 30 years old at the time of HS2 phase 1.  There is also the problem that Eurostars are too long for most British stations and that the pantograph is set up for high speed overhead and was rumoured to have done a lot of damage when they were used on the ECML a few years back. 

 

Eurostars didn't actually damage any ohle on the ECML during operational running (by then the pantographs had been altered following extended trials in France) but there were distinct problems during testing with a lot of contact wire bounce due to the somewhat flimsy nature of BR's cut-price design of catenary which didn't sit very well with the uplift forces generated by the (British running) pantograph on the 373.

 

Trying to fit ERTMS to Eurostar would probably be a major job as it is totally different in nature from TVM.  Theoretically it would 'only' mean a software adjustment plus the physical equipment changes but both would likely be long drawn out processes and in my view are unlikely to be even considered on a 30 year old train because of the cost and complexity.

[pete_mcfarlane]

I'm sure SNCF could find a use for any surplus Eurostars. so they wouldn't go to waste

 

That sounds like a nightmare but the alternative (some short trains) involves a waste of capacity on HS2 which should not be tolerated given what it will cost to build. I suppose that could be remedied by splitting/joining trains at the last station on HS2 but that creates problems of its own.

 

Surely HS2 won't be running at anything like full capacity at the start? I would hope that there's plenty of extra capacity for the amount of traffic to grow over time. (Cue "Fury as HS2 half empty!" style headlines in the Daily Liar in about 2030). 

.  

Edited August 4, 2014 by pete_mcfarlane

[Edwin_m]

As I understand it, the specification for trains on HS2 is that they will be the same length (400m) as 2 x TGV. So some stations on the classic network will have to be adapted to accommodate them.

 

That sounds like a nightmare but the alternative (some short trains) involves a waste of capacity on HS2 which should not be tolerated given what it will cost to build. I suppose that could be remedied by splitting/joining trains at the last station on HS2 but that creates problems of its own.

The HS2 sets, both captive and classic compatible, are proposed to be 200m long with the ability to run as coupled pairs.  For comparison an 11-car Pendolino is about 250m and a 2+8 HST is about 220m, so almost every station with long-distance service will be able to take a single classic compatible. 

 

Splitting and joining is very likely to happen. 

[Christopher125]

Surely HS2 won't be running at anything like full capacity at the start? I would hope that there's plenty of extra capacity for the amount of traffic to grow over time. (Cue "Fury as HS2 half empty!" style headlines in the Daily Liar in about 2030).

With trains to Birmingham/Manchester/Leeds/Liverpool/Newcastle/Scotland there'll be little spare track capacity between London and Birmingham, at least during the peaks, but that's how the huge cost is justified - that said they aren't all going to justify 400m trains from day one and some routes that use the existing network won't allow them so there will be some potential for increasing the number of seats.

 

Chris

Edited August 7, 2014 by Christopher125