Why was HS1 built with so much less fuss than HS2?

[Andy Kirkham]

Maybe I wasn't paying attention, but I don't remember the construction of HS1 arousing so much protest as HS2, nor suffering so many cost inceases.

 

Why the difference?   

[pete_mcfarlane]

I think it did generate a lot of noise at the time, but that has been carefully forgotten about once a) it was built without concreting over all of Kent as predicted and b) has been proven to be a success. 

[woodenhead]

I don't think it was not without protestations from the residents of Kent.

 

I believe the Javelin service was a sop to the residents so they could see some benefit from a high speed line, likely the same for Stratford, Ebbsfleet and Ashford which Eurostar has jettisoned when it could.

[adb968008]

Oh HS1 caused huge amounts of fuss…

 

lets not forget HS1 didnt arrive until a decade plus after the tunnel opened.

 

it was the same farce as HS2. I recall two towns suing each other in the UK to get rid of it, whilst in France two towns sued each other because they wanted their HS line.

 

there was a very famous cartoon in one of the dailies showing the French arriving through the tunnel on a TGV being greeted with a Tram to london.

 

The tunnel itself is another unmitigated political mess dating to the 1970’s aborted attempt, then i the 1980’s the whole debates about a road tunnel etc.

 

This country stopped building railway lines in Queen Victorias reign, since then weve been as good at cricket… the GCR itself was a miracle it completed, and another example of excess waste at Marylebone.

Britain just doesnt do railways, they exist in spite of it.

Edited September 25, 2023 by adb968008

[Wickham Green too]

51 minutes ago, woodenhead said:

... I believe the Javelin service was a sop to the residents so they could see some benefit from a high speed line, likely the same for Stratford, Ebbsfleet and Ashford which Eurostar has jettisoned when it could.

But the Javelin service is of absolutely no use to the majority of the County where the high speed line was built.

[phil-b259]

1 hour ago, Andy Kirkham said:

Maybe I wasn't paying attention, but I don't remember the construction of HS1 arousing so much protest as HS2, nor suffering so many cost inceases.

 

Why the difference?   

 

Oh it did - but one key difference between the two is length.

 

HS1 only passed through one single County (outside of London), while within London the re-use of St Pacras minimised the amount of demolition necessary to create a London termi. this minimised the number of parliamentary constituencies affected and also the number of people who could realistically claim to be affected.

 

The other key difference is speed.

 

HS1 was originally only designed with a maximum speed of 140mph throughout with the London tunnels being even lower at 125mph - all of which helped reduce landtake and the costs of excavating the tunnels. It was only after construction began that studies were undertaken which allowed certain sections to have the maximum speed increased to 160mph and even 186mph with respect to open air sections where curvature allowed.

 

 

[Jeremy Cumberland]

Everyone knew what HS1 was for: to run trains between the centre of London and the centre of Paris/Brussels, with good onward connections from all three stations.

 

Quite honestly, I still have very little idea of what the politicians and planners think HS2 is for. I cannot tell whether it will be of any benefit to me in getting from Penrith to Birmingham or London. Even if I can take it to Birmingham, will I easily be able to then get to Sutton Coldfield or Tile Hill (my usual destindations) - the choice of Curzon Street hardly shouts out onward connections, and in any case, won't Curzon Street be south-facing only?

 

A lot of talk is about easing congestion on the WCML, but this can surely be done far cheaper than HS2 is costing.

 

I support HS2, but some of the early decisions have really sapped the energy from the project in terms of public support. If instead of starting with a route, they had started with some definite proposals for stations: London Euston, Heathrow Airport, Birmingham New Street, Manchester Piccadilly, Nottingham, Sheffield and Leeds, perhaps, and then proposed HS2, and possibly an HS3 from Manchester Piccadilly to Leeds as a means of linking them up, with a clear vision of HS2 (and HS3) trains also continuing to Liverpool, Glasgow, Darlington, Newcastle and Edinburgh, there might be a lot more support for it.

 

Instead, it seems the eastern half of the country gets nothing, and even the north west might get very little. I am not even sure what Sutton Coldfield is going to gain, and that's only 7 miles from Curzon Street as the crow flies.

 

I support it - I feel I have to because it is the only game in town. Once we have one line, it ought to be a lot easier to add extensions, but if we abandon this one high speed line it'll probably wreck the chance for anything else for another fifteen years.

[BMS]

A further distraction; what was the cost of the Elizabeth line - both initial and final - does anyone know?

With both HS1 and Elizabeth line in the South, what does the rest of the country get?

[phil-b259]

4 minutes ago, BMS said:

A further distraction; what was the cost of the Elizabeth line - both initial and final - does anyone know?

With both HS1 and Elizabeth line in the South, what does the rest of the country get?

Can we not re-open this ‘north versus south nonsense’ again.

 

Yes the south gets more money but it also has more people living there and in general everything from housing to food costs more. It also generates far more in terms of tax receipts and when you crunch the numbers actually receives less spending per person than places in the north of England do.

 

 

 

 

[adb968008]

17 minutes ago, BMS said:

A further distraction; what was the cost of the Elizabeth line - both initial and final - does anyone know?

With both HS1 and Elizabeth line in the South, what does the rest of the country get?

TPE Mk5’s and loco hauled… now be grateful or we’ll bring the Pacers back…

 

🤪

[adb968008]

32 minutes ago, phil-b259 said:

Can we not re-open this ‘north versus south nonsense’ again.

 

Yes the south gets more money but it also has more people living there and in general everything from housing to food costs more. It also generates far more in terms of tax receipts and when you crunch the numbers actually receives less spending per person than places in the north of England do.

 

 

 

 

True but levelling up has in reality meant levelling down the south.

If your up north they havent seem very much, even if the south has lost quite a lot.

Quite why the northerners didnt get themselves sorted and got the TPE mk5’s running though is a northern problem… they mk5’s were a considerable investment squandered, this isnt one that can be pinned on the south.

 

class 769’s, 331’s, 195’s as well as the rest of the nova fleet actually means the north isnt that hard done by really…

 

it does need money spending on track.

I will say thiugh theres a lot of southern metro that looks like it could be reduced to me.. ive 21 stations within a 15 minute drive of my house along lines with traffic levels that gets 1tph up north in a 2 car, that sees every 20 minutes in an 8 car down here… there is a historical argument but post covid user ship has declined in the south… getting rid of nearly 50 x 455’s (200 coaches of capacity) without any impact shows this….no one noticed the 456’s go either, indeed I think SWR could have got rid of the same number of 455’s instead and retained 456’s… services only make money if they are standing room only… in Manchester thats often a 2 or 4 car, in London it used to be a 10 or 12 car, but nowadays a 4 car will often suffice, but still see’s 8.

 

The obvious slim down to me is WoE and 158’s… 

This 9 car beauty didnt have 9 passengers on it saturday when it passed me into London.

https://www.realtimetrains.co.uk/service/gb-nr:L21830/2023-09-23/detailed#allox_id=1

 

I personally think this should goto GWR, and use excess 800’s from Paddington instead, this speeds up somewhat. Then run locals from Exeter to Reading, thus reducing the Basingstoke Reading shuttle, and still providing the connection to Waterloo. This free’s up extra sprinters to contribute to the end of HSTs on GWR and Scotland. It has the added benefit of removing diesels from Waterloo.

 

Edited September 25, 2023 by adb968008

[phil-b259]

12 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

Everyone knew what HS1 was for: to run trains between the centre of London and the centre of Paris/Brussels, with good onward connections from all three stations.

 

Quite honestly, I still have very little idea of what the politicians and planners think HS2 is for. I cannot tell whether it will be of any benefit to me in getting from Penrith to Birmingham or London. Even if I can take it to Birmingham, will I easily be able to then get to Sutton Coldfield or Tile Hill (my usual destindations) - the choice of Curzon Street hardly shouts out onward connections, and in any case, won't Curzon Street be south-facing only?

 

A lot of talk is about easing congestion on the WCML, but this can surely be done far cheaper than HS2 is costing.

 

I support HS2, but some of the early decisions have really sapped the energy from the project in terms of public support. If instead of starting with a route, they had started with some definite proposals for stations: London Euston, Heathrow Airport, Birmingham New Street, Manchester Piccadilly, Nottingham, Sheffield and Leeds, perhaps, and then proposed HS2, and possibly an HS3 from Manchester Piccadilly to Leeds as a means of linking them up, with a clear vision of HS2 (and HS3) trains also continuing to Liverpool, Glasgow, Darlington, Newcastle and Edinburgh, there might be a lot more support for it.

 

Instead, it seems the eastern half of the country gets nothing, and even the north west might get very little. I am not even sure what Sutton Coldfield is going to gain, and that's only 7 miles from Curzon Street as the crow flies.

 

I support it - I feel I have to because it is the only game in town. Once we have one line, it ought to be a lot easier to add extensions, but if we abandon this one high speed line it'll probably wreck the chance for anything else for another fifteen years.

Sigh, we have been through NUMEROUS TIMES  before.

 

HS2 will (assuming it gets completed) will provide an additional two tracks all the way from the centre of London, into the centre of Birmingham and into the centre of Manchester (with opportunities for trains to leave / join at Lichfield for Stafford + Stoke plus Crewe for Liverpool, Preston and Scotland)

 

You go and take a look at satellite mapping and just look how many built up areas the WCML passes TROUGH - that’s a huge number of properties you are wanting to demolish alongside the WCML - plus if you want to improve the line speed to any degree a lot of property demolition on new alignments potentially leaving buildings sandwiched in between both routes. However you do it that’s going to be hugely disruptive and costly so no real saving on the current HS2 alignment - which once away from London mostly passes through farmland and as such is considerably less disruptive to construct.

 

As for Birmingham New Street - go look at it! The existing station is below street level hemmed in by tunnels sand tall buildings with deep foundations so  there is NO practical way of expanding it and trying to tunnel beneath it is horrendously complicated not to mention extremely expensive. Manchester Piccadilly by contrast is on a viaduct and doesn’t have so many tall buildings surrounding it making it much easier to expand the existing station to accommodate HS2 trains.

 

Yes there are some omissions in the proposals like an absence of a connection to the conventional lines in the Washford Heath area thus potentially allowing Cross Country services from the likes of Bristol to transfer onto HS2 for their onward leg northwards, but overall these are relatively minor flaws and ones which could be fixed later if electrification ever comes to the core cross country network.

 

 

[Ron Ron Ron]

59 minutes ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

......... the choice of Curzon Street hardly shouts out onward connections, and in any case, won't Curzon Street be south-facing only?

 

 

Geographically, Curzon Street station faces approximately ENE and shortly after leaving the station, the route out of central Birmingham (to join the HS2 mainline at Water Orton), goes NNE to Washwood Heath, before turning east, towards the Delta junction with the main HS2 route.

 

Train service wise......the original intention was for Curzon St. to be a terminus for services to/from....

London (via HS2 south)

Manchester (via HS2 NW)

Scotland (via HS2 NW then the WCML)

East Midlands, Sheffield, Leeds & the NE (via the Eastern leg & beyond).

 

If only Phase 1 is completed, then it will be just a "south facing" station, with some underused platforms.

 

 

.

Edited September 25, 2023 by Ron Ron Ron

[andyman7]

As @phil-b259 says, the main rationale for HS2 is a new pair of tracks serving the premier line (WCML) on a new alignment. Anyone who thinks the existing alignment should be 'upgraded' will have forgotten the disaster of the Railtrack upgrade, the existing route was laid out in the 1830s and is not ideal for modern needs!

 

Other factors which have contributed to HS2 cost escalation are time - if it takes decades to build something then it won't cost what you thought it would - and the desperate desire to mitigate every single objection so that the route is buried in tunnel for miles beyond what might be geographically required. This may or may not be a good thing but it costs money - the Victorians had no qualms about injuring or killing their workforce, evicting peasants from their homes or obliterating badger setts/Newt colonies etc.  Their biggest problem tended to be landed gentry wanting to keep the hoi-polloi at a comfortable distance.

Edited September 25, 2023 by andyman7

[The Lurker]

3 hours ago, Andy Kirkham said:

Maybe I wasn't paying attention, but I don't remember the construction of HS1 arousing so much protest as HS2, nor suffering so many cost inceases.

 

Why the difference?   

The protests about the link to the Channel Tunnel went back further than HS1; there were objections to the original planned route in the 70’s along the old SER mainline past Tonbridge and diverting towards London somewhere IIRC near Edenbridge. I remember my English teacher telling us that they’d used out-of-date maps when planning and so this route took it across a newly finished housing estate - the planners were embarrassed at a public meeting. I have vague memories of the plans being displayed in the church hall in Paddock Wood but probably was only there because I liked trains!

[adb968008]

Why not reopen the Great Central….?

 

a. oh hang on a minute… much of it already is being reopened in HS2..

 

which parts are not reopening ?

b. The parts that didnt make money last time.

Edited September 25, 2023 by adb968008

[newbryford]

1 hour ago, adb968008 said:

TPE Mk5’s and loco hauled… now be grateful or we’ll bring the Pacers back…

 

🤪

 

But we are.....

https://inter-city.co.uk/journey/st-tudno-wanderer/

 

😆

 

[MidlandRed]

7 hours ago, Wickham Green too said:

But the Javelin service is of absolutely no use to the majority of the County where the high speed line was built.

I’m not sure what you mean by this but the Javelin service serves most towns in East and Mid Kent and seems to be found useful to the people that fill the trains pretty well in both peak and off peak. I personally find the service very useful indeed.

 

It’s somewhat surprising that on HS2 the likes of Buckinghamshire CC et al haven’t sought something similar to the additional transport network Kent achieved with HS1 - they appear to have been in full objection mode rather than seeking potential economic benefits. Kent appears to have achieved both the domestic transport links, environmental mitigation and additional environmental mitigation along existing routes where planned Channel Tunnel traffic (including freight flows) would operate. 

[fulton]

4 hours ago, MidlandRed said:

I’m not sure what you mean by this but the Javelin service serves most towns in East and Mid Kent and seems to be found useful to the people that fill the trains pretty well in both peak and off peak. I personally find the service very useful indeed.

Living in the Medway Towns ( a post industrial deprived area ) Javelin has transformed travel to London, and job opportunities, that did not exist before, used to take 1 hour 10 minutes to Charing Cross, now 25 to Stratford and 35 to St Pancras, I can see the trains from my garden and they are well used. There were lots of scare stories about HS1, I worked in construction at that time, one was that we would lose all our plant operators, who would go to work on HS1 for big money, in practice they came from outside of the area, lived in caravans, worked seven days a week, long hours for relatively low hourly rate, we did not lose any operators. Habits have changed, I know people who now drive to Ebbsfleet, has a large carpark, and take Javelin to Stratford for sporting events or Westfield shopping centre, Europe's largest.

[black and decker boy]

5 hours ago, MidlandRed said:

I’m not sure what you mean by this but the Javelin service serves most towns in East and Mid Kent and seems to be found useful to the people that fill the trains pretty well in both peak and off peak. I personally find the service very useful indeed.

 

It’s somewhat surprising that on HS2 the likes of Buckinghamshire CC et al haven’t sought something similar to the additional transport network Kent achieved with HS1 - they appear to have been in full objection mode rather than seeking potential economic benefits. Kent appears to have achieved both the domestic transport links, environmental mitigation and additional environmental mitigation along existing routes where planned Channel Tunnel traffic (including freight flows) would operate. 

There aren’t really enough towns / passengers in Bucks that could warrant the extra build costs of loops & stations.

 

since the south Bucks towns (Amersham etc) insisted the line be built 30m+ below ground, they really forfeit any opportunity and they have tube and mainline options already.

 

Aylesbury could have have a station as it’s big enough and both routes to London take about an hour. Towns further west such as Thame, Risborough and Wycombe already have fast services into Marylebone of 35-40mins so are reasonably well served.

 

You could perhaps justify a station at Brackley (F1 team hub) and Warwick/Coventry area but the HS2 route was picked to avoid built up areas.

 

all of these come with a capacity impact on HS2 through traffic which is what it’s original core brief was about.

 

That remains the key difference and reason that adding tracks & capacity to the existing mainlines (HS2 was to take off the high speed long distance trains from WCML, MML and ECML) - all of which pass through and have local stations in heavily built up areas. That is a huge amount of disruption to existing railway services, housing, local roads and businesses and would make HS2 look like a cheap and easy job by comparison. 

Edited September 26, 2023 by black and decker boy
Typo

[Dava]

Last time I looked, HS1 was mainly owned by the Canadian Teachers Pension Fund.

 

Eventually, when HS2 is completed in whatever limited form, it will also probably be sold to an international owner, such as Dubai, India, China. But it’s viability is very much in question from the constraints being made on the route. 
 

Dava

[KingEdwardII]

12 hours ago, phil-b259 said:

Can we not re-open this ‘north versus south nonsense’ again.

The north vs south issue will not go away until the transport issues in the north are fixed.

 

It is staggering how bad the rail connections are between the North West and Yorkshire. Not a single electrified line. Slow as a snail.

 

Compare that with any of the major routes out of London.

 

And I live in the (deep) south!

 

Yours, Mike.

[DY444]

12 hours ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

A lot of talk is about easing congestion on the WCML, but this can surely be done far cheaper than HS2 is costing.

 

Total myth.  To get two extra tracks worth of capacity then you can probably get from Euston to Primrose Hill Tunnels cheaper.  From there you're talking about demolishing thousands of buildings to get you out to the M25.  Then thousands more between Coventry and Birmingham.  Widening Tring cutting would be a mammoth undertaking.  What do you do through Bletchley, Milton Keynes, Rugby?  Then there's the disruption.  No matter what it costs HS2 will always be cheaper to get the same amount of additional track capacity.

[BachelorBoy]

13 hours ago, Jeremy Cumberland said:

 

 

A lot of talk is about easing congestion on the WCML, but this can surely be done far cheaper than HS2 is costing.

 

 

Not really.

[Wickham Green too]

2 hours ago, fulton said:

... now 25 to Stratford and 35 to St Pancras, ...we did not lose any operators. Habits have changed, I know people who now drive to Ebbsfleet, ...

I did say the Javelin service is of absolutely no use to the majority of the County ..... it's OK for the northern Medway Towns - but a slow dawdle up the valley from Maidstone and serves nowhere else west of Ashford ........... meanwhile the South Eastern line has been deprived of anything resembling a fast service towards Ashford and beyond : it's often quicker for me to go up to St.Pancreas and High-Speed it down there - but a hell of a lot more expensive !

 

16 minutes ago, DY444 said:

...  Widening Tring cutting would be a mammoth undertaking.  ...

To be honest you can ignore Tring Cutting - with electric traction you can easily stick to ground level !