[News] HS2 spend £100million on a bat shed.

[Official Old Man]

Somehow, this story passed me by. Expect some mid-week voting thing overtook it on the news.
HS2 have spent £100million on a tunnel design in order to protect the bats when the trains chug by.

Bat safety barrier will cost £100m, says HS2 chairman

Sir Jon Thompson tells a conference there is "no evidence high-speed trains interfere with bats".

www.bbc.co.uk

Also. Why don't OUIGO run their double decker trains through the Channel Tunnel? They could have double capacity thus half the cost of fares. And yes, they would fit.

 

[Dick Swiveller]

But do you accept there is a chance of bat/vehicular collision?

 

[Official Old Man]

But do you accept there is a chance of bat/vehicular collision?

Yes. But £100million seems steep for a simple roof over the line.

 

[Algernon]

Covered already on the "Emily Maitlis describes Donald Trump thread".

 

[A1X]

This is why stuff costs so much more to build in this country, the amount of red tape and shit like this is insane.

As to the OUIGO, there are restrictions on certain types of train using the Tunnel owing to gradients and fire rules, so normal TGVs can’t do so. The next generation of AGV trains are, I believe, compliant. So are German ICE3 trains but it’s never been seen as commercially viable.

 

[Dick Swiveller]

Yes. But £100million seems steep for a simple roof over the line.

Fairly sure you missed the reference

 

[AmexRuislip]

Somehow, this story passed me by. Expect some mid-week voting thing overtook it on the news.
HS2 have spent £100million on a tunnel design in order to protect the bats when the trains chug by.

Bat safety barrier will cost £100m, says HS2 chairman

Sir Jon Thompson tells a conference there is "no evidence high-speed trains interfere with bats".

www.bbc.co.uk

Also. Why don't OUIGO run their double decker trains through the Channel Tunnel? They could have double capacity thus half the cost of fares. And yes, they would fit.

Isn't that the entrance to Batman's lair

 

[Thunder Bolt]

Somehow, this story passed me by. Expect some mid-week voting thing overtook it on the news.
HS2 have spent £100million on a tunnel design in order to protect the bats when the trains chug by.

Bat safety barrier will cost £100m, says HS2 chairman

Sir Jon Thompson tells a conference there is "no evidence high-speed trains interfere with bats".

www.bbc.co.uk

Also. Why don't OUIGO run their double decker trains through the Channel Tunnel? They could have double capacity thus half the cost of fares. And yes, they would fit.

There are double decker carriages for cars through the Tunnel.

 

[Mackenzie]

What a complete waste of money.

 

[GT49er]

Has anybody mentioned Bad-shed mental yet?

 

[Sid and the Sharknados]

Sounds like crap project management to have ended up spending that much.

 

[dsr-burnley]

Sounds like crap project management to have ended up spending that much.

If Labour are serious about cutting red tape in planning, this is a very easy target to start with. When someone says "there is a colony of 28,000 bats out there, and although we have no evidence to back it up, it is possible that a few dozen may die each year being hit by a train" the correct answer would have been "what a shame" and press on.

 

[nicko31]

That’s batshit crazy

 

[Sid and the Sharknados]

If Labour are serious about cutting red tape in planning, this is a very easy target to start with. When someone says "there is a colony of 28,000 bats out there, and although we have no evidence to back it up, it is possible that a few dozen may die each year being hit by a train" the correct answer would have been "what a shame" and press on.

It doesn't sound like that's been the actual issue. As far as I can tell the council have been obstructionist about it and HS2 have somehow spent far more money than should be necessary to solve what could have been a relatively straightforward problem.

 

[drew]

It doesn't sound like that's been the actual issue. As far as I can tell the council have been obstructionist about it and HS2 have somehow spent far more money than should be necessary to solve what could have been a relatively straightforward problem.

This. For HS2, there seems to have been many additional costs incurred due to obstructive councils in the affected shires. In this case, it seems there was no real requirement from Nature England for this but HS2 decided to go ahead!