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3 hours ago, lmsforever said:

It is amazing how suddenly there is a definite appearence of the line all around us you can actually see the base of the line and bridge works are starting .After all the talking arguing its happening and is now interesting to watch.

 

It really is happening, but the protestors and others who are against HS2 appear to be living in a parallel universe, as if HS2 is still some sort of proposal, existing only on paper.

 

 

 

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26 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

 

It really is happening, but the protestors and others who are against HS2 appear to be living in a parallel universe, as if HS2 is still some sort of proposal, existing only on paper.

 

You'd think they'd have noticed, as it's in most of their back yards...

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Today a colleague made the comment from so many that there was no need for HS2 as no-one was commuting any more.  I guess all the cars I see on the roads morning and evening must be just "going out for a spin".

 

Another colleague, who is requesting permission to work from the office again (he lives 10 minutes walk away) came up with a memorable quote: "Lockdown home working is a luxury of the middle classes".  We're both about as middle class as they come and I absolutely agree with him.  It shows a very self-centred view of the world to not notice everyone who is working in the shops, delivering to the shops, sorting in the warehouses, working the production lines, none of whom can "phone in" their work.  That's to say nothing of the Armed and Emergency services; presumably all the over-worked NHS staff who have been treating Covid-19 patients this year did it all via Zoom meetings.

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51 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

Today a colleague made the comment from so many that there was no need for HS2 as no-one was commuting any more

Such declarations are pointless whilst we still need to socially distance. When that's over and a few months have passed then there might be some meaningful information on the subject, and I expect it will have a permanent impact of some sort on working patterns. But whilst the large offices which drive mass commuting are operating at 10-30% capacity you just can't draw any meaningful conclusions.

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11 hours ago, Northmoor said:

Another colleague, who is requesting permission to work from the office again (he lives 10 minutes walk away) came up with a memorable quote: "Lockdown home working is a luxury of the middle classes".  We're both about as middle class as they come and I absolutely agree with him.  It shows a very self-centred view of the world to not notice everyone who is working in the shops, delivering to the shops, sorting in the warehouses, working the production lines, none of whom can "phone in" their work.  That's to say nothing of the Armed and Emergency services; presumably all the over-worked NHS staff who have been treating Covid-19 patients this year did it all via Zoom meetings.

However for a lot of those people who have to work at a particular place, those places are distributed widely across the country so most aren't easily accessible by train (and even fewer will also have a station near the person's home).  Most rail commuters work in a big office in a city centre, and others work at shops and other facilities that are in business because of the custom from office workers.  Combined with the government advice (now ceased but not forgotten) to avoid public transport, those rail (and to a lesser extent bus) commuters will be less likely to return than those who work in places where it's more straightforward to drive.  

 

My guess is that this will affect the commuter market a lot, but less so for the business travel market which is probably the main justification for HS2.  My employer and probably many others have been doing teleconferences for many years for those less critical meeting but would still get people physically together for the important ones.  I think Covid just shifts the dial slightly on that rather than signaling a large and permanent change in behaviour.  

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I am having conversations with people on a website forneighbours   because of work and traffic lights on a local road .They have no idea what HS2 is for and what the build will entail  one woman said how disgraceful they were putting a level crossing in and it would be closed every twenty minutes.Others quote the cost and money in pockets of of companies plus the destruction of wild life.I have left several posts about how the line will speed journeys and free up lines for freight.They dont even know about freight and where the line is going to,all they moan about is having to stop at the traffic lights on the school run.

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6 minutes ago, lmsforever said:

I am having conversations with people on a website forneighbours   because of work and traffic lights on a local road .They have no idea what HS2 is for and what the build will entail  one woman said how disgraceful they were putting a level crossing in and it would be closed every twenty minutes.Others quote the cost and money in pockets of of companies plus the destruction of wild life.I have left several posts about how the line will speed journeys and free up lines for freight.They dont even know about freight and where the line is going to,all they moan about is having to stop at the traffic lights on the school run.

I'm not surprised.

It's not obvious if you just see the mainstream media, who constantly peddle the myth that it is just to speed up journeys for businessmen/women beteen London & Birmingham.

The fact that it is to take the equivalent of all the Pendolinos off the WCML to allow better services & freight capacity along the original route is never/seldom mentioned.

 

 

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12 minutes ago, caradoc said:

Latest attempt to stop HS2, or rather delay and increase the cost of it, for that is all they can hope to achieve:

 

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/hs2-may-be-guilty-of-wildlife-crime-by-felling-trees-illegally-say-lawyers/ar-BB19T57L?ocid=msedgdhp

 

Still, at least bats make a change from newts !

 

Sue Grabbit and Run must be short of fees.

 

Jamie

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The voluntary sector bat protection types could probably 'find' a nest of endangered bats on the surface of Venus,  if you gave them half the chance. They (and their possibly imaginary bat colonies) are bane of a lot of building conservation projects. 

 

Mind you, I did like 'bat detector equipment'. It sounds like something that Adam West would have used in the 1960s Batman TV series.  

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1 hour ago, caradoc said:

Latest attempt to stop HS2, or rather delay and increase the cost of it, for that is all they can hope to achieve:

 

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/uknews/hs2-may-be-guilty-of-wildlife-crime-by-felling-trees-illegally-say-lawyers/ar-BB19T57L?ocid=msedgdhp

 

Still, at least bats make a change from newts !

 

 

If they could find a colony of flying newts that would be something special.

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Some years ago our church was being renovated and as a listed building we needed all sorts of permissions. One was from Natural England to prove it wasn't a bat roost.  The lady I spoke to was actually very helpful and said that the only way was to observe the building at dusk and record bat movements.  We then had the terrible job of going up on a summer evening with two chairs and a bottle of red and watching and recording bats.  Funnily enough they always seemed to fly in pairs.   However they were never seen to come out of the church only round it so we got permission to do the work. It was very hard work.....

 

Jamie

 

 

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In one report I read, there also seems to be a suggestion that the reason why HS2's bat survey didn't find bats, is that there were protestors living in one of the trees identified as a roost? I'm not quite sure if this means the survey couldn't be done properly because of the protestors, the protestors disturbed a roost that moved, or the protesters are themselves 'batty'.

Jon

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7 hours ago, pete_mcfarlane said:

The voluntary sector bat protection types could probably 'find' a nest of endangered bats on the surface of Venus,  if you gave them half the chance. They (and their possibly imaginary bat colonies) are bane of a lot of building conservation projects. 

 

Mind you, I did like 'bat detector equipment'. It sounds like something that Adam West would have used in the 1960s Batman TV series.  

A few on Amazon:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/s?k=bat+detector&adgrpid=50810734782&gclid=EAIaIQobChMIwp2N3-Oq7AIVhGDmCh0XLwXKEAAYASAAEgLxbPD_BwE&hvadid=259076014718&hvdev=c&hvlocphy=1006596&hvnetw=g&hvqmt=e&hvrand=1747693551032815133&hvtargid=kwd-298655720787&hydadcr=28147_1724764&tag=googhydr-21&ref=pd_sl_398aj6i8v1_e

 

Re: newts, they appear to be particularly intelligent creatures. When you consider the locations they seem to choose to reside, they can clearly read preliminary planning applications.

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9 hours ago, jonhall said:

In one report I read, there also seems to be a suggestion that the reason why HS2's bat survey didn't find bats, is that there were protestors living in one of the trees identified as a roost? I'm not quite sure if this means the survey couldn't be done properly because of the protestors, the protestors disturbed a roost that moved, or the protesters are themselves 'batty'.

Jon

If the protestors disturbed roosting bats, they can be prosecuted as it's illegal to disturb them.

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Did no-one notice the 7 October news releases on HS2?

 

https://www.gov.uk/government/speeches/hs2-phase-2b-update

 

Basically Phase 2b West to Manchester gets prioritised with consultation on design changes such as NPR connections in Manchester, no real details. BUT HS2 to Leeds could be achieved via the West route & NPR as the Northern lobby has been campaigning, see YorkSire Post, Times etc.

 

Phase 2b Eastern via East Midlands to Leeds very unclear, claims to be following Oakervee recommendation to have an Integrated Rail Plan for greater connectivity with other existing & planned rail. See also the Greengauge21 report from July which is a well informed critique of HS2 East & why it is pants in so many ways.

http://www.greengauge21.net/what-is-the-purpose-of-hs2s-eastern-arm/
 

BUT it will delay HS2 East further into 2040s and Andrew Adonis is claiming this is a ruse to cancel HS2 East or defer indefinitely as the vile Cummings opposes it/costs involved.

 

There is Avery big risk that the East Midlands, having lost the MML electrification thanks to Grayling, now loses HS2 as well or it takes 20+ years to arrive. We are being levelled into the ground, not up. Our newly minted MPs are useless in lobbying for rail investment in the region.

 

The Network Rail decarbonisation reports recommends MML electrification and much else but that is just a proposal with no commitment or Timescale for govt to implement. 
 

Dava

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The Secretary of State has approved the changes to the Manchester route, which are no more than minor tweaks although they do include making provision for future junctions to a Liverpool line that would carry both NPR trains via Manchester and HS2 trains via Crewe.  

 

There are various issues with the HS2 eastern leg, not least that its indirect route means that times between London and York or beyond are not much better than via the ECML.  

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Lots of coverage of Wendover on local tv shame part of the woods are going but plenty left untouched ,tv did not say this.The protesters looked to be the usual suspects not many come from Wendover in fact you would not know that a major project was going on when you go through the place .Some works going on alongside the bypass and much digging outside Stoke Manderville 6000 graves to be moved but with all this going on not a protester in sight ! Work sites all around us now active and you can start to see the line of the route take shape whidh means of course an interesting time ahead.

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6 hours ago, Edwin_m said:

 

 

There are various issues with the HS2 eastern leg, not least that its indirect route means that times between London and York or beyond are not much better than via the ECML.  

Replicating what happened during the first railway age.

Originally trains from London to the NE went up the London & Birmingham to Hampton in Arden, then took the line up through Derby and so on to the NE.

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8 hours ago, Edwin_m said:

There are various issues with the HS2 eastern leg, not least that its indirect route means that times between London and York or beyond are not much better than via the ECML.  

A 30 minute acceleration is well with it, and that's without considering the journey time improvements to the East Mids and Birmingham, which will be bigger still.

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1 hour ago, Zomboid said:

A 30 minute acceleration is well with it, and that's without considering the journey time improvements to the East Mids and Birmingham, which will be bigger still.

That 30min is likely to be eroded by faster ECML times in the next few years.  I agree Birmingham to Yorkshire and the North East is greatly accelerated by HS2, as the existing route is slow and the HS2 one reasonably direct.  But as a resident of the East Midlands I'd say Toton doesn't offer much benefit, as it's not in the existing city centres and a connecting service to reach them means the London journey is only a few minutes quicker than by the existing route.  

 

If it was up to me I think I'd build a high speed line from Leeds to Sheffield with a branch to join the ECML somewhere south of Doncaster.  This would offer time savings on London-Leeds via ECML and Cross Country journeys.  I'd then add a connection from the stub of Phase 2b to the Derby line near Tamworth, upgrade Stenson to Sheet Stores and link it to an east-west bypass of the Trent area.  That part would benefit Cross Country again, and provide services from London to Derby/Sheffield and Nottingham quicker than today's.  

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24 minutes ago, Edwin_m said:

That 30min is likely to be eroded by faster ECML times in the next few years.  I agree Birmingham to Yorkshire and the North East is greatly accelerated by HS2, as the existing route is slow and the HS2 one reasonably direct.  But as a resident of the East Midlands I'd say Toton doesn't offer much benefit, as it's not in the existing city centres and a connecting service to reach them means the London journey is only a few minutes quicker than by the existing route.  

 

If it was up to me I think I'd build a high speed line from Leeds to Sheffield with a branch to join the ECML somewhere south of Doncaster.  This would offer time savings on London-Leeds via ECML and Cross Country journeys.  I'd then add a connection from the stub of Phase 2b to the Derby line near Tamworth, upgrade Stenson to Sheet Stores and link it to an east-west bypass of the Trent area.  That part would benefit Cross Country again, and provide services from London to Derby/Sheffield and Nottingham quicker than today's.  

I'm a bit out of touch with the latest on the Big Railway but I don't see how more than 2-3 minutes can be saved from the schedule South of Doncaster:

  • Line speed increases are unrealistic on a line that still has a significant number of level crossings;
  • The overhead wiring was built to the limits of the 125mph specification in the late 1980s, so without some very careful re-tensioning or more likely a complete re-electrification (£500M?), with masts at realistic spacing, line speeds can't really increase;
  • It's too congested South of Hitchin and the Welwyn bottleneck isn't being solved any time soon.  A stopping train at Welwyn North will just hold up faster services even more;
  • The new 800-series units already accelerate faster than IC225 sets - they are quite impressive in that regard - but any gain could well be traded off in station dwell times to help reliability.  These are expected to lengthen in years to come as an ageing population means more people who aren't comfortable making their way along a moving train to get to their luggage until the train has come to a stop.  This is a serious constraint on capacity growth on all rail transport. 

 

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13 minutes ago, Northmoor said:

I'm a bit out of touch with the latest on the Big Railway but I don't see how more than 2-3 minutes can be saved from the schedule South of Doncaster:

  • Line speed increases are unrealistic on a line that still has a significant number of level crossings;
  • The overhead wiring was built to the limits of the 125mph specification in the late 1980s, so without some very careful re-tensioning or more likely a complete re-electrification (£500M?), with masts at realistic spacing, line speeds can't really increase;
  • It's too congested South of Hitchin and the Welwyn bottleneck isn't being solved any time soon.  A stopping train at Welwyn North will just hold up faster services even more;
  • The new 800-series units already accelerate faster than IC225 sets - they are quite impressive in that regard - but any gain could well be traded off in station dwell times to help reliability.  These are expected to lengthen in years to come as an ageing population means more people who aren't comfortable making their way along a moving train to get to their luggage until the train has come to a stop.  This is a serious constraint on capacity growth on all rail transport. 

 

The journey planner on the HS2 website shows a saving of 24min between London and York compared with today's best regular journey time.  I'm not sure if this reflects the better performance of Azuma sets compared to IC225 or HSTs, but it's proportionately amongst the smallest time savings quoted by HS2 (Nottingham and Derby being even less impressive once connections at Toton are factored in).  This is a non-stop train so intermediate dwell times aren't relevant (and nor would they be on HS2).  As to capacity, the Werrington and Kings Cross works now under way create one and possibly two more fast paths each hour.  

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It's likely that Toton, with it's high speed rail and decent road links (at least looking at a map it's is right next to the M1) will grow into a population centre in it's own right. The problem with East Midlands geography is that it's a bunch of medium sized cities, so serving them all is near impossible. Putting the station at Toton at least serves western Nottingham well and there's an opportunity to provide good links to the other surrounding conurbations.

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