Some recent HS2 news items

Guardian: HS2: the pebbledash people will rebel over high-speed rail

David Cameron ignores those living in modest homes blighted by the HS2 rail link at his peril

…No one at Westminster, least of all David Cameron, appears to be in the slightest bit interested in people living in modest homes blighted by the line in places like the West Midlands. Tory ministers have derided them as Nimbys. Labour figures have derided them as toffs. The problem is, they are neither….

BBC: Should Britain let go of London?

The BBC’s economics editor, Stephanie Flanders, visits London, Birmingham and Manchester and explores an uneasy relationship

…But when you’re sitting in Birmingham or Manchester, you can see why many people outside London think high speed rail will actually make things worse. They worry that a faster connection to London will simply make it even less attractive to go anywhere else.

Alexandra Jones, who runs the think-tank Centre for Cities, told me about research they had done, showing that businesses in cities like Manchester or Leeds tend to look first to London when they need to buy in specialist help or establish a joint venture in a particular sector, even when the talent or expertise they need is also readily available, more cheaply, in a neighbouring city.

Transport is surely one of many reasons for that. Why would you look closer to home if the nearer city takes just as long to get to?

Staffordshire Newsletter: Ruling offers chance to review HS2 compensation

THE GOVERNMENT has been given a golden opportunity to rethink the way it compensates landowners affected along the proposed high speed rail route, the Country, Land and Business Association has said.

Goole Courier: Growing unrest as HS2 campaign rumbles on

An action group opposing the government’s HS2 high speed rail link through Church Fenton has received council backing for its campaign.

Co-ordinator for CHF Says No To HS2 – The end of the line for HS2 – campaign group, Jo Mason, said Selby District Council and North Yorkshire County Council representatives were unconvinced of the benefits the proposed rail link would bring when they met protesters in the village last week.

Bucks Herald: Aylesbury Vale Greens hope to capitalise on HS2

The Green Party are putting forward candidates in Aylesbury Vale for the first time in 20 years.

Party chiefs hope to lure voters in May’s county elections with their opposition to issues such as HS2 and fracking and pledge to crackdown on speeding motorists.

Coventry Telegraph: Balsall Common pub “made worthless” by HS2

A LANDLORD has told how his business has been rendered worthless by plans to build the HS2 rail line alongside it.

The Railway Inn, in Balsall Common, will be just yards from the proposed high-speed rail line and licensees Roger and Heather Parker say the plan has left them trapped.

The Star: MPs in top level talks to save factories from HS2

HOPES of moving the HS2 high-speed rail link so that it misses three major plants at Meadowhall have been raised following a meeting between Sheffield MPs and Transport Minister Simon Burns.

City Labour MPs David Blunkett, Clive Betts and Angela Smith have held talks in Whitehall with Mr Burns and senior civil servants.

Factories and land owned by Firth Rixson, Outokumpu and Pressure Technologies all lie on the initial route of the high-speed rail line from London to Yorkshire, which is due to start being built in 2017.

Messenger: Graham Brady MP pledges to save Warburton from worst of HS2 high speed rail impact

GRAHAM Brady MP has pledged to do all he can to prevent the HS2 line ‘cutting right through the middle of Warburton’.

Presently, the West Midlands to Manchester section of the proposed high speed railway splits at Little Bollington – with one spur terminating at Manchester, with a stop at Manchester Airport, close to Hale Barns, and the other terminating at Wigan – cutting through Warburton en route.

Telegraph: Staffordshire hamlet urges HS2 to move all residents together

Residents of a hamlet which will be cut in two by the proposed high speed rail line want to sell up and rebuild their community elsewhere so they can stay together.

Everything hinges on HS2, the company running the £33 billion project, agreeing to buy all the houses at a cost up to £7 million.

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