HS2

[DK123GWR]

12 minutes ago, 62613 said:

About 40% of it, no? Do they receive the 6 - monthly dividend payments?

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/independent-evaluation-office/ieo-report-january-2021/ieo-evaluation-of-the-bank-of-englands-approach-to-quantitative-easing

My reading of this analysis is that since 2012 net profits are paid to the treasury. The Asset Purchase Facility (the Bank of England's QE program) do receive coupon payments and use these to fund their operations. Net profits would be paid to the treasury, who also cover net losses.

https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/-/media/boe/files/asset-purchase-facility/2022/afp-annual-report-2022.pdf

Page 23 of this document shows that the treasury paid around £40bn in 2021 and £30bn in 2022 in order to cover the APF's losses. Looking back over previous reports, this is unusual. In 2017 for instance, the APF paid £50bn to the Treasury.

[martin_wynne]

5 hours ago, John Tomlinson said:

If this were the case, then HS2, like its predecessors in Victorian times, arguably could/ should have been financed by private, not public capital.

 

How was Stonehenge financed?

 

[Compound2632]

15 minutes ago, martin_wynne said:

How was Stonehenge financed?

 

Donations, I should think. Chiefly of labour and time.

[Bernard Lamb]

29 minutes ago, martin_wynne said:

 

How was Stonehenge financed?

 

The original self build scheme?

Bernard

[martin_wynne]

1 hour ago, martin_wynne said:

 

How was Stonehenge financed?

 

 

Perhaps they used a Pyramid Scheme?

 

[martin_wynne]

 

[jamie92208]

4 hours ago, Foulounoux said:

We will be there in a couple of weeks. So will check up on progress

Last summer they were working on bridges across the lanes west of chabanais. But seemed a token workforce

 

 

 

 

  

I'lreply on the thread about the line.

 

Jamiel

[melmerby]

4 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

 

Perhaps they used a Pyramid Scheme?

 

Surely that was Egypt.........😉

[martin_wynne]

1 hour ago, melmerby said:

Surely that was Egypt.........😉

 

Stonehenge was a dry run for the Egyptian Pyramids, which were built about 1000 years later. They waited that long for the patent to be granted to UK Pyramid Designs Ltd, who were the design consultants for the Pyramid project. The Pyramids were made that shape to avoid having to wait even longer for plastic guttering and downpipes to be invented.

 

 

[Compound2632]

6 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

Stonehenge was a dry run for the Egyptian Pyramids

 

Dry run? They dragged half the stones from west Wales...

[corneliuslundie]

"Donations, I should think. Chiefly of labour and time."

Yes, the labour and time of slaves.

So who is volunteering to be buried at OOC?

Jonathan

[Ron Ron Ron]

8 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

 

Stonehenge was a dry run for the Egyptian Pyramids, which were built about 1000 years later. They waited that long for the patent to be granted to UK Pyramid Designs Ltd, who were the design consultants for the Pyramid project. The Pyramids were made that shape to avoid having to wait even longer for plastic guttering and downpipes to be invented.

 

 

The ancient Brits came up with the idea of Pyramids, but the project was abandoned due to excessive budget overruns and the engineers going off down a design “blind alley”.

Stonehenge was the prototype, but for some bizarre reason they ending up going round in circles.

 

The Egyptians realised the bl**di’n’ obvious. It should have been a flippin’ triangle !

 

.

[The Stationmaster]

Recent postings in this thread suggest to me that HS2 has dropped out of  the media headlines (and every other line come to that) and the pace of work is not advancing quickly enough for daily reports.

[lmsforever]

I reckon that things have slowed down around here as the only obviously busy sites are Wendover and behind Aylesbury   ,where the High Wycombe Rd crosses there is a brick abutment to the left and an enormous hole on the right .Where the tunnels are coming out is being prepared and the start of a bridge over the railway and the A413  is being started ,there is also the site where the Risboro branch has been moved which is nearly ready . But to the north of Aylesbury work is in progress to make the new road junction where the A41 is to join the Waddesdon bypass ,the new A41 is already tarmacked and visible  .This is going to be a major road junction with the A41 going underneath and the road from Whitchurch being placed above  ,the bridge sides were delivered and placed two weeks ago .Talking to the reps at a recent event I felt that work is definitely slowing down  what a situation for the premier engineering project  in our country.Only in Britain could this happen we are becoming a country that is going backwards this project should be charging forwards but no. indecision by governments so many people wanting no progress .They have even rewritten a couple Berty Wooster books because the originals could offend our nervous youngsters ,what next!!!!! 

[Mark Saunders]

1 hour ago, lmsforever said:

.Only in Britain could this happen we are becoming a country that is going backwards this project should be charging forwards but no. indecision by governments so many people wanting no progress .They have even rewritten a couple Berty Wooster books because the originals could offend our nervous youngsters ,what next!!!!! 

 

If things stay like this there’ll be no change!

[Northmoor]

2 hours ago, The Stationmaster said:

Recent postings in this thread suggest to me that HS2 has dropped out of  the media headlines (and every other line come to that) and the pace of work is not advancing quickly enough for daily reports.

From my days working on MoD projects, we used to see project teams reluctant to commit to any sort of expenditure (even relatively low value consultancy contracts like ours) as elections approached; a sort of "paralysis by purdah".  I wonder if HS2 is seeing politicians circling like vultures and fearing the project is going to be scrapped, not committing to anything until after the next General Election (which could be as late as January 2025)?  Not that this explains a lack of boots on the ground; presumably there isn't a similar lack of project managers in HS2 right now?

[Bob83a]

It appears that there have so far been 3 occupancies of froth coming to the surface in the Ruislip area. This froth is the fluid used by the TBMs boring the Northolt tunnels. It is reaching the surface thru the boreholes that were used to test the ground conditions for the tunnels. One would assume that if the high pressure fluid can reach the surface thru the boreholes then they cannot have been sufficiently filled once the test bores were completed. If the fluids can reach the surface then and surface water could go in the reverse direction which would probably lead to sinkholes, albeit only small ones.

 

HS2 were last week laying metal trackway to gain access for machinery presumably to repack the boreholes.

[Peter Eaton]

Per last message :-

Believe when the ''Channel Tunnel'' was being bored water came in though their test bores under the channel

One to remember ! or in this case not learned from history.

Edited April 17, 2023 by Peter Eaton

[Edwin_m]

17 minutes ago, Peter Eaton said:

Per last message :-

Believe when the ''Channel Tunnel'' was being bored water came in though their test bores under the channel

One to remember ! or in this case not learned from history.

I saw a TV programme recently (probably a repeat from some years ago where they interviewed a geologist who was called out to one such leak.  She tasted it and was able to reassure the workforce that it was a fresh water spring and not an inundation of the sea.  

[298]

18 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

 

Stonehenge was a dry run for the Egyptian Pyramids, which were built about 1000 years later. They waited that long for the patent to be granted to UK Pyramid Designs Ltd, who were the design consultants for the Pyramid project. The Pyramids were made that shape to avoid having to wait even longer for plastic guttering and downpipes to be invented.

 

And due to Nimby protests, they had to build them just outside the British Empire in Cairo...

[melmerby]

19 hours ago, martin_wynne said:

Stonehenge was a dry run for the Egyptian Pyramids, which were built about 1000 years later

Dunno where you got that from.

Much closer together.

Pyramids in about 2800BCE, Stonehenge about 3100 BCE.

 

Egypt was part of the British Empire but not back then.

 

BTW, Ancient Egypt didn't have slaves, contrary to a lot of twaddle written about the pyramid builders.

 

Edited April 17, 2023 by melmerby

[martin_wynne]

58 minutes ago, melmerby said:

Dunno where you got that from.

Much closer together.

Pyramids in about 2800BCE, Stonehenge about 3100 BCE.

 

Egypt was part of the British Empire but not back then.

 

BTW, Ancient Egypt didn't have slaves, contrary to a lot of twaddle written about the pyramid builders.

 

 

Sorry, my photos from that time have gone missing.

 

But Google says "Estimated as being erected in 3100 BC, Stonehenge was already 500-1,000 years old before the first pyramid was built". But it's probably fake news.

 

Martin.

[APOLLO]

 

Brit15

[melmerby]

1 hour ago, martin_wynne said:

 

Sorry, my photos from that time have gone missing.

 

But Google says "Estimated as being erected in 3100 BC, Stonehenge was already 500-1,000 years old before the first pyramid was built". But it's probably fake news.

 

Martin.

The first pyramid was Djoser (Sakkara) in about 2800BCE, which was stepped.

The next one was similar but had a limestone casing which IIRC fell off.

It took the pyramid engineers some time before they got the construction & outer slope right and they didn't collapse.🙂

The great pyramid of Khufu (Giza) was about 2570 BCE.

Edited April 17, 2023 by melmerby

[martin_wynne]

On 17/04/2023 at 22:59, melmerby said:

The first pyramid was Djoser (Sakkara) in about 2800BCE, which was stepped.

The next one was similar but had a limestone casing which IIRC fell off.

It took the pyramid engineers some time before they got the construction & outer slope right and they didn't collapse.🙂

The great pyramid of Khufu (Giza) was about 2570 BCE.

 

I do hope they are scratching "2023 AD" into the wet concrete on HS2. We don't want any arguments breaking out on RMweb in 5000 years time.

 

Martin.

Edited April 19, 2023 by martin_wynne