[Travel] HS2 to be scrapped?

[Madafwo]

1987 advert for the project. Shame we dropped the ball on it

The thought of cross continent sleeper trains being binned off still annoys me. Imagine going to bed in London and waking up in France/Spain/Portugal/Germany.

Whats even more annoying is that the pandemic gave a lot of European countries an excuse to bin off their sleep services, here's hoping they make a swift return.

 

[A1X]

The cost would soon be forgotten once it was up and running and being a benefit.

I recall when the Elizabeth Line was being built there were endless whinges about the cost and how terrible it was and why it should be scrapped. As soon as it was open those whinges disappeared because everyone realised how damned useful it was.

 

[Weststander]

The cost would soon be forgotten once it was up and running and being a benefit.

140 miles on just one part route was going to add £100b to public debt with interest at 2023 prices. With cost estimates forever rising exponentially.

The all party parliamentary committee in the end said it didn’t offer value for money. They would assess it for cost-benefit against other public spending.

Many of us have this romantic view, often from experience eg train journeys across France, Spain or Japan. But they’re vast routes built at a fraction of a cost per km. We’re a relatively small congested island.

 

[clapham_gull]

The thought of cross continent sleeper trains being binned off still annoys me. Imagine going to bed in London and waking up in France/Spain/Portugal/Germany.

That's a serious night out.

 

[El Presidente]

That's a serious night out.

Little can top Guppy's night out though. The Albion were away to Plymouth, Guppy was shitfaced at Home Park and kicked out by the stewards, he stumbled his way back to the station, got on a train, fell asleep, and ended up in Penzance two hours later having got on the train heading in the wrong direction and missed the last train back to Sussex.

 

[Madafwo]

That's a serious night out.

I've had worse.

 

[BrightonCottager]

The thought of cross continent sleeper trains being binned off still annoys me. Imagine going to bed in London and waking up in France/Spain/Portugal/Germany.

Whats even more annoying is that the pandemic gave a lot of European countries an excuse to bin off their sleep services, here's hoping they make a swift return.

There's no fast train from Madrid to Lisbon now (or vice versa).
I agreed with one of the talking heads that it makes little sense to have HS rail service between cities so close to each other. The main justification in the first place for HS2 was time savings for business people. That disappeared with binning Euston (& even then I saw something that no one had factored in the need to expand the tube station so passengers would have to wait to get on it, thereby cancelling a lot of the time 'saved') & covid / work from home / videoconferencing. When I worked for a national organisation we'd have monthly meetings in Brum. The train was chocka with others heading to New Street. Those days are gone.

We should have:
1) connected HS2 to HS1
2) started HS2 in the north, building it towards London
3) missed out Brum

 

[Weststander]

Our near neighbours have built 4,600km of high or very high speed rail at a combined cost of €109b.

The reasons as to why it’s vastly more expensive here are many and complex, there’s a long parliamentary report on this. Fragmented construction industry, contracts that give no price risk to contractors, planning battles, environmental mitigations (the French and Spanish just brutally do it), seeking perfection with a line capable of 400kph, entirely new stations and yards costing multi £100m’s each, land cost, routing through dense urban landscapes.

 

[clapham_gull]

I've had worse.

In the words of someone I know who would often fall asleep on the London to Hastings and fail to get off at intervening station, "when you hear the sound of seagulls you know you've f@@@@@ up"