HS2

[jjb1970]

13 hours ago, melmerby said:

Perhaps he doesn't read anything that doesn't agree with his point of view.

 

In fairness that is increasingly the norm. We now have an information sector which has an offering for every niche no matter how odd. In a way the on-line diversity of media channels catering to particular political and ideological views is just an extension of the long existing tendency of the media to occupy certain positions on the spectrum.  For as long as I have lived you have been able to make a good estimate of people's political slant from the papers they read, now it's on-line material they read.

[Edwin_m]

11 hours ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

I guess he also didn't read the bits criticising his brief. I got the impression the judge didn't think much of them. 

I suspect the brief knew he was on a hiding to nothing, but was obliged to make the best of poor material.  

[caradoc]

14 hours ago, lmsforever said:

I hope that fast expresses to the north will be kept on the WCML so as we can still travel without dragging into London and adding to journey times by over an hour.But I am not holding my breath as with all the money being spent the DFT will try and force us onto this new line to justify its exstence.

 

Seriously ? The whole point of HS2 is to divert the fast expresses to the north onto it, thus reducing journey times and providing increased capacity, while at the same time also releasing capacity on the WCML for more passenger trains to serve the intermediate stations, and more freight. And even as it is now, many of the fast expresses to the north don't stop anywhere on the route being relieved by HS2 anyway !

 

[pete_mcfarlane]

29 minutes ago, Edwin_m said:

I suspect the brief knew he was on a hiding to nothing, but was obliged to make the best of poor material.  

But shouldn't they have pointed out to their client that there was no realistic chance of success?

 

Or is this going to be an ongoing problem with crowdfunded legal challenges, where they've already raised the cash and so instruct their solicitors to go ahead regardless. 

[caradoc]

15 hours ago, melmerby said:

Perhaps he doesn't read anything that doesn't agree with his point of view.

 

He appears to have that in common with another prominent anti-HS2er, Lord Berkeley, as per my post from Friday; 

 

'Moreover we note that Lord Berkeley did not read all of the documents that were made available to him in any event. Despite that apparent handicap, he was still able to present a 71 page Dissenting Report.'

 

Ouch ! Perhaps he only read the documents that agreed with his point of view ?

[jjb1970]

1 hour ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

But shouldn't they have pointed out to their client that there was no realistic chance of success?

 

Or is this going to be an ongoing problem with crowdfunded legal challenges, where they've already raised the cash and so instruct their solicitors to go ahead regardless. 

 

I suspect the curse of the legal profession is clients opinions. However, like most other professions, if the client wants to ignore professional advice then so long as they have the money then the meter keeps running. I have been there in engineering, if you advise a client they need a cow but they insist on buying a pig then ultimately that's what the client will get. The problem comes later with selective memory and a desire to blame someone else for stupid decisions. Although at a certain point potential reputational damage and ethical concerns act as a brake to really being paid to give someone a rope with which to hang themselves. 

[Matt C]

2 hours ago, caradoc said:

 

He appears to have that in common with another prominent anti-HS2er, Lord Berkeley, as per my post from Friday; 

 

'Moreover we note that Lord Berkeley did not read all of the documents that were made available to him in any event. Despite that apparent handicap, he was still able to present a 71 page Dissenting Report.'

 

Ouch ! Perhaps he only read the documents that agreed with his point of view ?

 

 

But but but. . . How could he know if a document did or didn't agree with his point of view if he DIDN'T read it ? ! 

 

I think as we have seen in this thread, there are those who despite any inconvenient evidence to the contrary will INSIST their opinion is OF COURSE the correct one  

[Pete the Elaner]

1 hour ago, caradoc said:

 

Seriously ? The whole point of HS2 is to divert the fast expresses to the north onto it, thus reducing journey times and providing increased capacity, while at the same time also releasing capacity on the WCML for more passenger trains to serve the intermediate stations, and more freight. And even as it is now, many of the fast expresses to the north don't stop anywhere on the route being relieved by HS2 anyway !

 

 

That's exactly the point.

 

The problem with the WCML as it is now is that it is crowded with different trains. Local services stopping at most stations, middle distance ones which want to go faster than these, long distance once which are packed with passengers for places (like Crewe, Manchester, Liverpool) & also freight. That's 4 different stopping patterns, but in reality, there are a lot more than this. It is very difficult to find paths for all of them to run together & this is getting more difficult all the time.

 

You can't move the stopping services because they serve stations on the existing line.

Longer distance services are full with passengers for further stations (I am amazed how crowded Euston-Stoke/Manchester trains are...but they are). If they are already full, then why would they stop at more intermediate stations?

We may see more longer distance stopping services & this is currently a trend with some Euston-Glasgow/Edinburgh services going via Birmingham. These are in addition to the faster Trent Valley services which make less stops, not in place of them. Those which stop less frequently can take another route entirely: HS2.

 

[Trog]

3 hours ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

.............................................................

We may see more longer distance stopping services & this is currently a trend with some Euston-Glasgow/Edinburgh services going via Birmingham. These are in addition to the faster Trent Valley services which make less stops, not in place of them. Those which stop less frequently can take another route entirely: HS2.

 

 

That is perhaps a good scale model for what is intended for HS2. With the TV playing the part of HS2, and the RBS Rugby - Birmingham - Stafford lines playing the part of the slower with more stations WCML.

[Edwin_m]

5 hours ago, Pete the Elaner said:

 

That's exactly the point.

 

The problem with the WCML as it is now is that it is crowded with different trains. Local services stopping at most stations, middle distance ones which want to go faster than these, long distance once which are packed with passengers for places (like Crewe, Manchester, Liverpool) & also freight. That's 4 different stopping patterns, but in reality, there are a lot more than this. It is very difficult to find paths for all of them to run together & this is getting more difficult all the time.

 

You can't move the stopping services because they serve stations on the existing line.

Longer distance services are full with passengers for further stations (I am amazed how crowded Euston-Stoke/Manchester trains are...but they are). If they are already full, then why would they stop at more intermediate stations?

We may see more longer distance stopping services & this is currently a trend with some Euston-Glasgow/Edinburgh services going via Birmingham. These are in addition to the faster Trent Valley services which make less stops, not in place of them. Those which stop less frequently can take another route entirely: HS2.

 

 

The London-Birmingham-Scotland was a result of Virgin (as then was) combining a London-Wolverhampton and Birmingham-Scotland to reduce costs and take one path off the busy Birmingham-Wolverhampton section.  This has resulted in some better connectivity and probably more revenue for the operator but it's unlikely to survive beyond HS2.  The largely unmodified WCML north of Wigan just doesn't have the capacity - it's already planned to have (after Phase 2b) two London-Glasgow/Edinburgh splitters per hour, plus an hourly Birmingham-Glasgow/Edinburgh via HS2 alternating between the two and Manchester and Liverpool to Scotland trains similar to today's.  It's already a busy route with three passenger trains in most hours (four in some) plus freight.  

 

Instead of say an hourly through train from Milton Keynes to Scotland, the post-HS2 service will have more trains from Milton Keynes to Birmingham.  The fairly few people heading for Scotland will be able to change and hopefully get a seamless connection between the stations into a faster journey north of Birmingham as their train will use HS2 as far as its northern end near Wigan.  I agree there are a lot of details to be sorted out for this to work well in practice!  

Edited April 12, 2020 by Edwin_m

[Edwin_m]

6 hours ago, jjb1970 said:

 

I suspect the curse of the legal profession is clients opinions. However, like most other professions, if the client wants to ignore professional advice then so long as they have the money then the meter keeps running. I have been there in engineering, if you advise a client they need a cow but they insist on buying a pig then ultimately that's what the client will get. The problem comes later with selective memory and a desire to blame someone else for stupid decisions. Although at a certain point potential reputational damage and ethical concerns act as a brake to really being paid to give someone a rope with which to hang themselves. 

I'm not an expert here but I believe barristers are bound to accept any work for which they are professionally competent, under the "cab rank principle".   It follows that they have less scope to turn down business for reasons such as reputational risk.  

 

Perhaps a lawyer can comment (but I'm not paying...).  

[Ohmisterporter]

Perhaps that is the problem with crowdfunding. Money was collected to fight this through the courts. If the case so far has only used up a part of it, the complainants will keep going until they have spent all or most of it regardless of the validity of their case.

[Mark Saunders]

12 minutes ago, Ohmisterporter said:

Perhaps that is the problem with crowdfunding. Money was collected to fight this through the courts. If the case so far has only used up a part of it, the complainants will keep going until they have spent all or most of it regardless of the validity of their case.

 

Isn't that the way Government works just on larger scale!

[Edwin_m]

2 hours ago, Mark Saunders said:

 

Isn't that the way Government works just on larger scale!

Government can divert any spare money to other projects or pay down the National Debt or even cut taxes!  I imagine the people that put money into this will be miffed if it can't be spent on its intended purpose.  But to my mind now it would be far better to put it into researching woodland management, perhaps an experiment to see what works best to improve biodiversity?  

Edited April 12, 2020 by Edwin_m

[Ron Ron Ron]

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[black and decker boy]

Those pictures of Euston will change in the next few weeks according to this

 

https://www.constructionenquirer.com/2020/04/14/hs2-euston-works-to-restart-next-week/

[jonny777]

 

 

Cubbington Wood, near Leamington Spa. 

 

Soon to be destroyed by HS2. 

 

 

[black and decker boy]

A major milestone has now passed, sympathies to Packham, StopHS2,  LMSForever and others on here against the new line as it’s game over.

 

construction contracts have been signed for phase 1 so the final design and start of main construction is now underway. £12bn.

 

https://www.constructionenquirer.com/2020/04/15/hs2-signs-off-four-main-civils-contracts-worth-12bn/

[caradoc]

2 hours ago, jonny777 said:

 

 

Cubbington Wood, near Leamington Spa. 

 

Soon to be destroyed by HS2. 

 

 

 

Sad but necessary. I recommend that anyone, whether pro-, anti- or indifferent to HS2, watches the fly-through video to see just how much environmental mitigation is planned:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bkoGvw9kbA

 

[298]

2 hours ago, jonny777 said:

 

 

Cubbington Wood, near Leamington Spa. 

 

Soon to be destroyed by HS2. 

 

 

 

It's like that photo of Diana sat on the bench in front of the Taj Mahal and as recent events will testify- there are getting on for 8 billion people in the world and you can't post a photo with any degree of solitude without many people then turning up en masse expecting the same view. For balance I ought to post one of standing room only on a train out of Euston on a Friday evening or a traffic jam caused by a woefully inadequate road system near a provincial station as family go to pick up their weary traveller but I really can't be bothered.

[lmsforever]

The line is going to be built I probably wont see these wonder trains rushing by very close to were I live . Lets hope that passengers use it and that the wcml is freed up if not someone is going to have a red face .After all the vitriol poured out on this thread I hope now that it will concentrate on very complex project I shall post on construction nearby as an when something happens.

[Edwin_m]

Here is the plan for the Cubbington Wood area (large file): https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/378399/C223-CSI-CV-DPP-030-000004.pdf

 

The wood is about three quarters of the way across to the right.  It's clear that HS2 only takes a strip near the edge of the wood, and has gone to the expense of providing a retaining wall to reduce this land take compared with a cutting.  If that photo is taken from the public footpath in the location where HS2 will be (and will provide a bridge) then the photographer is only just within the wood itself.  The route in this area looks to be chosen to stay as far as possible from the villages of Cubbington and Stoneleigh. 

 

So "soon to be destroyed by HS2" is somewhere between disingenuous and downright misleading.  

[JeffP]

53 minutes ago, caradoc said:

 

Sad but necessary. I recommend that anyone, whether pro-, anti- or indifferent to HS2, watches the fly-through video to see just how much environmental mitigation is planned:

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1bkoGvw9kbA

 

It's really interesting, but what is a balancing pond?

[62613]

10 minutes ago, JeffP said:

It's really interesting, but what is a balancing pond?

For evening out flows in watercourses? Basically flood alleviation by diverting excess water into a pond, and releasing it when the flow lessens.

 

[Fat Controller]

11 minutes ago, JeffP said:

It's really interesting, but what is a balancing pond?

As far as I understand it, it's one of those ponds that are built alongside motorways to contain run-off from the road, allowing for a controlled discharge into a waterway.