Telegraph: HS2 will clog up the rail system, warns freight expert
The head of the body representing Britain’s rail freight industry has dismissed ministers’ claims that HS2 will free capacity on the railways, warning that it will in fact lead to a “capacity crunch” on parts of the system.
Guardian: HS2 plans unrealistic, costly and lack expertise, parliamentary report finds
The government’s plan for a high-speed railway connecting London with Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds is beset by spiralling costs, a lack of expertise and unrealistic delivery timetables, a parliamentary report has concluded.
The public accounts committee (PAC) says the Department for Transport has “not yet presented a convincing case” for building the £50bn HS2 project, which will take 20 years to complete in two phases.
BM Magazine: High-tech industries ‘unaffected’ by deepening north-south divide
Work in High Tech industries is not as concentrated on London as in other sectors. High rents can force new companies out of the capital and more and more IT companies of all sizes have been migrating to the North West where Manchester is rapidly developing itself as the UK’s high-tech hub.
“Such a density of global companies fosters a burgeoning digital sector and the North West boasts the second-largest ‘digital cluster’ in Europe and is probably the fastest growing industry sector in the UK,” added Fletcher.
Telegraph: Fate of passengers on Kent high speed rail route triggers fears about HS2 impact
…According to Mr Doe, passengers north of London could face a similar fate with higher fare rises if they are deemed to be beneficiaries of HS2.
“The Government says there will be no premium pricing for HS2.
“If that is the case, they should remove it for HS1 or be honest and
admit there will be a premium for HS2.
Telegraph: HS2 Passengers will have to pay ”a lot of money” unless they book ahead
BBC: HS2 Staffordshire protesters hold 10-mile march
Up to 100 campaigners in Staffordshire held a 10-mile march to protest against the proposed HS2 rail route.
The march covered the proposed route of the high-speed rail line.
Wales Online: Welsh Government to seek a share of England’s HS2 billions
Rocketing cost of HS2 causing increasing concern, as a cross-party group of MPs questions whether it will provide value for money
The Scotsman: No value in HS2
The high speed rail line HS2 is a classic London idea “to help the North”, but will typically cost a fortune and end up benefiting the South.
I totally reject spending up to £70,000 million on a railway that will take 25 years to reach Leeds (what we call the Midlands!) with no plans to reach Newcastle, Edinburgh or Glasgow.
Bucks Free Press: HS2 tunnel spoil to be dumped in Chilterns AONB – Bucks Free Press
HS2 tunnel spoil to be dumped in Chilterns AONBBucks Free PressUP to 800,000 cubic metres of earth is set to be dumped in the Chilterns Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty as a result of building work on HS2, it emerged this week. The spoil will be a byproduct of tunnelling work to minimise the visual impact of the …
Independent: Agriculture minister warns of HS2 rail link’s risk to woods – The Independent
A senior minister warned today that the proposed £42.6bn HS2 high-speed rail line could damage irreplaceable ancient woodland.
David Heath, the minister for agriculture, said other environmental impacts along the planned route linking London to cities in the Midlands and northern England could be mitigated, but “you can’t grow old trees”.
Evening Standard: Evening Standard: HS2 Opponents To Form Political Party For Next Election
Opponents of the controversial proposed high-speed rail project say they might form a political party to fight in the next general election.
The move will spark alarm among MPs with marginal seats in the home counties where opposition to the £43billion HS2 link between London and the North has been fiercest.
Pingback: STOP HS2 | Some recent news items
So when hs2 gets its sums wrong again it looks at should we not go to London centre to cut costs .the whole of hs2 should be scraped and save our country billions ,rather than carry on with doing there sums on the back of fag packets and getting them wrong .
I’ve worked it out – HS2 Ltd must have invented time travel!
Having trudged my way through the recent KPMG report I was rather surprised to find that despite all the new fuss being made about HS2 being all about adding capacity and not on time travel savings, the analysis that KPMG has done is still based upon travel time, using the data from the HS2 Ltd model. The odd thing is that at the moment (to quote from the Phase consultation document) “HS2 Ltd is currently undertaking a significant programme of work in order to quality assure and further improve the robustness of the economic case for the scheme.” Or in other words they are doing the checks they should have done in the first place in order to sort out the errors that have been found in their work, including their model. And we don’t expect the new results until sometime in October.
So KPMG couldn’t have used the existing model data as they not know it is not only unreliable but also it is going to be superseded. So the only thing they could have done is travel in time into the future to get the new data to use in their analysis.
OK, now some people might argue that they might not have used time travel and did just use the old data, but this is clearly not a viable argument. Firstly, no one is going use what they know to be unreliable data for such important work. Secondly the Secretary of State has made such a big point about keeping costs under control that HS2 Ltd would not commission work that they know would have to be repeated in a few months’ time anyway.
As extra evidence, consider the fact that when the KPMG report came out there was all the fuss made by the Secretary of State that HS2 was not about time savings (which he thought were irrelevant) but about capacity. Now the KPMG does not really focus on capacity, it is about getting to places more quickly. So the argument about capacity must be based upon a report that has not been produced yet, but which HS2 Ltd must have obtained by travelling into the future. It would also help to explain why so much money has been spent (time travel can hardly come cheap).
Let’s face it, only when you accept the idea of time travel would all the work by HS2 make any kind of sense, since so of the decision making depends upon evidence that has yet to be produced.