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HS2: Support or Scrap?

Poll

HS2: Support or Scrap?

Like any major infrastructure investment, High Speed 2 has been a controversial policy for many years.

The TSR Government in the Model House of Commons is currently thinking about what we should do with HS2.

There have been plenty of news stories in recent weeks about the increasing costs of the project (as is similar with a lot of massive transport projects) and there are pros and cons to the whole plan.

We want to know what you would do? :beard:

Would you continue to build or would you pull the plug?

It's worth saying that significant public money has already been put into this, and a lot of that can't really be retrieved. If building operations were terminated a lot of that money is "wasted". Although if you're a massive opponent of the project you might argue that the whole thing is a waste of money.

What are your thoughts? :holmes:

(This thread is part of a Government Consultation from the Model House of Commons. You can get involved in our other threads here.)

Scroll to see replies

for me - continue the project, but under the larger aim of fully re-nationalising the railways. Public transport is a public good and should be run by the country, for the people, not for profit or private interests. It should also be heavily subsided in key areas to promote growth, allowing more people to move around for work in areas that desperately need better transport links.
Scrap has a small majority at the moment on the poll, would love to know people's thoughts though!
theres no alternative, virgin trains are packed, west midland trains are packed and the roads have alot of traffic jams.
Original post by Gent2324
theres no alternative, virgin trains are packed, west midland trains are packed and the roads have alot of traffic jams.

I agree about the need for extra capacity, though I would have preferred an east coast route with a fast Leeds to Manchester extension.

Even so I would build it not scrap it. We also need then to make best use of it to reduce journey time to Scotland so that flying is much less or nil.
I meant to click 'scrap' but accidentally clicked 'support'.
Scrap it.
To be honest, its been going on for far too long now, they havent really got anywhere with it. The costs have been going up and up.
Just get rid.
Scrap it until brexit is sorted, may need the cash to hire border agents for border checks. May also need to subsidise food stuffs for everyone but the 1%.
Support. The WCML is full. The commuter trains into London are already at full length and more servies are needed. Additionally in the West Midlands, the express services runs entirely on the same tracks as commuter services (unlike how the London end is quad tracked). It is crazy in 21st century Britain that many semi-major suburbs [mainly more deprived ones as well.... #ClassSegregation] in the 2nd City only get hourly or half hourly trains. These types of frequencies don't extract masses to use trains over cars as a "turn-up-and-go" frequency does. HS2 will release capacity from these lines allowing for more commuter services. The annalists have already looked into just adding more tracks to the existing lines - and they reckon HS2 is much much cheaper - hence it should be supported.

Original post by barnetlad
I agree about the need for extra capacity, though I would have preferred an east coast route with a fast Leeds to Manchester extension.

Even so I would build it not scrap it. We also need then to make best use of it to reduce journey time to Scotland so that flying is much less or nil.


The West Coast route has larger population settlements on it, London is closer to them so more people can make use of the non-stop London services. The London end of commuter services on the ECML have just been heavily upgraded capacity with the Thameslink Program.

Original post by Emma:-)
Scrap it.
To be honest, its been going on for far too long now, they havent really got anywhere with it. The costs have been going up and up.
Just get rid.

Planning is a very important process! It is a massive project hence it's planning period is so long. We are now nearing the end of the long and expensive planning period with some initial construction having already begun. Will be quick from this point on!!
(edited 4 years ago)
Reply 9
Avatar for Ikeo
Ikeo
16
The added capacity is desperately needed, with the added benefit of quite a substantial time saving (as much as scrappers may say that the time saved is meaningless, it is not). As time progresses and the population grows, with more people turning to rail as a method of transport for a more environmentally friendly and quicker way of getting around, we need to make sure that our infrastructure can support this to be better prepared in a modernizing society and contribute to the countries economic growth.

It just seems short-sighted of those against HS2 to argue based on the short-term costs of constructing this huge project when the cost benefits would reach far beyond this century, and help to bring the UK's rail system up to the standards of many other advanced and advancing nations. Although one point I do agree with is that as technology progresses, we're creating a railway that France has had for decades so what's to say that once HS2 is complete we will still be behind other countries in terms of our rail infrastructure - however, constructing HS2 is 100x better than doing nothing.
For every £1 put into HS2 the UK will get out £2.30, seems like a fair deal to me.
Considering that the budget, with predicted overspend included, is £25 billion the UK would make £57.5 billion back.
It is more of an investment into parts of England that have been forgotten.
So why should it be scrapped?
Original post by Glimmerz
I meant to click 'scrap' but accidentally clicked 'support'.


That's pretty much what happened in Parliament.
Original post by Satyr
For every £1 put into HS2 the UK will get out £2.30, seems like a fair deal to me.

That's the original propaganda figure that Adonis and the HS2 contractors put forward when the government rigged, er, informed the Parliamentary votes that approved HS2. It's repeatedly been shown to be inflated by many studies. It's based amongst other things on alleged transfers of freight to rail, which are now seen as optimistic, by alleged journey time reductions which have vanished into thin air as slower trains are proposed and by acting as though the budget was fixed at £56bn when the estimated cost is now over £100bn and still climbing.
Keep it

People are already packed in like sardines on the WCML AND the ECML.
Original post by Ikeo
The added capacity is desperately needed, with the added benefit of quite a substantial time saving (as much as scrappers may say that the time saved is meaningless, it is not). As time progresses and the population grows, with more people turning to rail as a method of transport for a more environmentally friendly and quicker way of getting around, we need to make sure that our infrastructure can support this to be better prepared in a modernizing society and contribute to the countries economic growth.

It just seems short-sighted of those against HS2 to argue based on the short-term costs of constructing this huge project when the cost benefits would reach far beyond this century, and help to bring the UK's rail system up to the standards of many other advanced and advancing nations. Although one point I do agree with is that as technology progresses, we're creating a railway that France has had for decades so what's to say that once HS2 is complete we will still be behind other countries in terms of our rail infrastructure - however, constructing HS2 is 100x better than doing nothing.

HS2 is certain to reduce capacity, the existing lines are going to be downgraded or closed to passengers when they open it, so that 'unfair' competition (eg, cheaper, more convenient trains) won't be on offer to take passengers as an alternative to the wildly expensive and inconvenient HS2 fares and stations.
Honestly travel from the north to london is fine as it is, virgin trains and LNER trains are pretty quick already
Something preferable would be fast link routes from different northern cities to each other but that will never happen as if it's not got the word london it it westminster dont care. Trains in general need improving to reduce cost and increase capacity, train travel is so expensive and the service is terrible.
Scrap due to habitat loss and cost
We need extra capacity and high speed rail to provide a real alternative against domestic air travel so support 100%
Original post by BlueIndigoViolet
We need extra capacity and high speed rail to provide a real alternative against domestic air travel so support 100%

London-Birmingham won't compete with air travel, the train is already far more convenient. London-Manchester won't come on stream for another 25 years if we're lucky and with the huge cost, it's implausible that HS3 will ever be built. Scotland-London, where air travel is at a serious level, will probably never be on HS.
Original post by CoolCavy
Honestly travel from the north to london is fine as it is, virgin trains and LNER trains are pretty quick already
Something preferable would be fast link routes from different northern cities to each other but that will never happen as if it's not got the word london it it westminster dont care. Trains in general need improving to reduce cost and increase capacity, train travel is so expensive and the service is terrible.
Scrap due to habitat loss and cost

HS2 is about local capacity. The speed of the service is just an extra benefit. It creates more local capacity on the existing lines by taking express trains off what can be turned into local lines for London, Birmingham, Manchester and a few other cities. These lines are already at capacity. It allows foe more local services to get people into work in the cities, we need to take the high speed services off those tracks to give them those services.

#Don'tNegelectTheMidlands
Reply 19
Avatar for 3121
3121
21
The line from London to Birmingham is stupidly unnecessary, I just can’t understand why it was approved when we already have 2, TWO lines from London to Birmingham. Keep and prioritise the northern section though. We don’t need to spend 10’s of billions on building a new line to arrive a few more minutes early, it capacity is an issue, just upgrade the existing lines for bigger trains - were the only European country to not have double decker trains which are outstanding in terms of efficiency at high capacity

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