Future of HS2?

[waveyswirley]

As a Lime St user I visit London 2 or 3 times a year - my destinations are usually:

• My sister's flat in Camden
• My friend's house in Dalston
• Me and my partner's budget hotel of choice in Wood Green
• The West End for theatre
• General Central London sightseeing
• Tottenham Hale for continued journey to Bishop's Stortford to see other family

Not looking forward to getting booted off at OOC as Euston is rather convenient for these!

 

[Bletchleyite]

You make a rather good argument for binning off the whole lot then!

My personal view is indeed that if it's not going to Euston it should just be canned entirely, yes. A central London terminus is a non-negotiable essential.

 

[Towers]

As a Lime St user I visit London 2 or 3 times a year - my destinations are usually:

• My sister's flat in Camden
• My friend's house in Dalston
• Me and my partner's budget hotel of choice in Wood Green
• The West End for theatre
• General Central London sightseeing
• Tottenham Hale for continued journey to Bishop's Stortford to see other family

Not looking forward to getting booted off at OOC as Euston is rather convenient for these!

Nobody is suggesting that you’ll be walking from Old Oak!

 

[Bletchleyite]

Nobody is suggesting that you’ll be walking from Old Oak!

No, but changing onto a cramped, overcrowded (as it would be) Lizzie train would make Euston look good. Particularly with luggage, for which the Lizzie has extremely poor provision.

 

[Towers]

No, but changing onto a cramped, overcrowded (as it would be) Lizzie train would make Euston look good. Particularly with luggage, for which the Lizzie has extremely poor provision.

As opposed to an empty, spacious and luggage rack-equipped tube train from Euston?

 

[Bletchleyite]

As opposed to an empty, spacious and luggage rack-equipped tube train from Euston?

I refer you to my earlier post about not everyone continuing by Tube from Euston, indeed a very substantial number of people do not. Those heading to central London hotels with luggage often opt for a taxi or Uber, which would be both unaffordable and slow from OOC.

 

[Trainbike46]

Obviously two stations offers a wider range of further transport options than just one station, so I don't understand why some people are arguing OOC is somehow superior. OOC and Euston will always beat just OOC. I agree with Bletchleyite that a central london terminus is essential, and studies done before construction started considered many terminals and chose Euston. Now that there is a design for a tunnel to Euston, and the land has been acquired and cleared, Euston is by far the best option for a central london terminus.

What we need is a government that will invest in infrastructure across the country, and the OOC to Euston bit of HS2 is one of those projects. The government/ministers/politicians also need to stop changing what they expect out of projects all the time, as repeated redesigns are a good way to guarantee increased costs

 

[MPW]

Was kings Cross considered as a london terminus? I remember seeing it on the list of options considered (couldn't find it again this morning), but I don't remember what the implementation would have been. If HS2 switched over to kings Cross approach via tunnel and the current services in-turn diverted euston then you would have hs2 right next to eurostar.

Would that allow euston to be scaled back based on size of trains (assuming kings Cross is currently served by shorter trains).

This genuinely is a question rather than suggestion. As I said, I couldn't find the paper that summarised the pros and cons of the various options.

I also remember royal Parks being on the list. A really fun and fanciful idea I had was for the king to move out of Buckingham Palace and convert the whole thing to London Central... might win back some popularity after recent family troubles. Totally unrealistic but imagine that, it'd be the coolest station in Europe.

 

[SynthD]

Was kings Cross considered as a london terminus?

There was a long list including Kings Cross, KX lands cut and cover, KX lands cavern. The cut and cover option was third on the final shortlist, after Euston 'same' level and Euston double stack. From this PDF. https://learninglegacy.hs2.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/10/J011-McNaughton-jtran.18.00070.pdf

Would that allow euston to be scaled back based on size of trains (assuming kings Cross is currently served by shorter trains).

What would be scaled back, the WCML station at Euston that has fewer long distance users?

 

[Nottingham59]

My personal view is indeed that if it's not going to Euston it should just be canned entirely, yes. A central London terminus is a non-negotiable essential.

Maybe, but Old Oak and Euston are both just three stops from Tottenham Court Road.

For any high speed line terminus, there comes a point where people have to get out of long trains at low frequency where everybody has a seat, and get onto shorter trains at high frequency where many people have to stand.

 

[Bletchleyite]

For any high speed line terminus, there comes a point where people have to get out of long trains at low frequency where everybody has a seat, and get onto shorter trains at high frequency where many people have to stand.

No, there doesn't. There comes a point where people have to get out of long trains and onto their chosen method of onward urban transport. As active travel is to be encouraged, that may be to cycle or walk, or it might be a taxi, or it might be a bus, or it might be the Tube or Liz.

Terminating at OOC in any useful sense removes all but one of those options - in many peoples' eyes the worst one, too. It is a terrible, terrible idea other than for a temporary measure while Euston is fully constructed.

This is the sort of nonsense a poorer country like Thailand comes up with (I still can't forgive them for Krung Thep Aphiwat - it's beyond a stupid idea which was led by land values). It is not what a modern European country or city should be doing.

 

[Nottingham59]

Maybe. But even at Euston, more than half of arriving passengers catch the tube

 

[fishwomp]

In the modelling I believe that the majority of GWML would transfer to Elizabeth Line at OOC rather than continue to Paddington. It will be faster to change from GWML to EL at OOC than at Paddington

Only because stopping the fast GWMLs at OOC has slowed down the existing GWML journey.

Anyone who wanted to be on Elizabeth line eastwards from Paddington will have a slower journey whether changing at OOC or Paddington, than they can currently do today.

Saving minutes on the WCML route but slowing down the GWML doesn't seem clever.

 

[grove]

Reading this thread and earlier threads, who is actually working on the strategic side of unravelling the muddle of HS2 we currently have?

• OOC and Euston go/no-go
• Incompatible train lengths and lack of tilt running on the existing infrastructure
• The bottleneck of capacity north of Birmingham and Manchester Piccadilly
• Is Birmingham-OOC even viable as a commercial operation?
• In its present form does it actually free up any WCML capacity?
• Overall funding
• ... there are probably more

Whatever is decided will still need to be turned into an acceptable political choice.

 

[Shrop]

This from Louise Haigh (Transport Minister) today sounds like good news for HS2 ...

MSN

Hopefully this link will work, it's Louise Haigh being quoted by MSN in "The Independent" today, "indicating" that HS2 WILL run into Euston after all

 

[grove]

The story from The Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...ransport-secretary-louise-haigh-b2625673.html Not quite an announcement yet, but optimistic noises.

 

[poffle]

Reading this thread and earlier threads, who is actually working on the strategic side of unravelling the muddle of HS2 we currently have?

• OOC and Euston go/no-go
• Incompatible train lengths and lack of tilt running on the existing infrastructure
• The bottleneck of capacity north of Birmingham and Manchester Piccadilly
• Is Birmingham-OOC even viable as a commercial operation?
• In its present form does it actually free up any WCML capacity?
• Overall funding
• ... there are probably more

Whatever is decided will still need to be turned into an acceptable political choice.

My impression is at this stage the adults are working on how to do Euston and Crewe. I get the impression that it's pretty much agreed that HS2 that doesn't go close to Crewe will not really deliver much benefits and the costs of building the track to Crewe are not that great relative to the rest of HS2.

The big decision in the north is what to with Crewe. I think a lot of the signalling/ track infrastructure in Crewe is going to need replacing anyway regardless of HS2. But do they go for a long term solution or just join into the existing tracks south of Crewe.

Likewise Euston. I think it's pretty much decided to go to Euston but the real decisions are how you rebuild the whole of Euston. How many platforms can HS2 access ? How many platforms are accessible from WCML ? How do you sequence a build ?

 

[The Planner]

My impression is at this stage the adults are working on how to do Euston and Crewe. I get the impression that it's pretty much agreed that HS2 that doesn't go close to Crewe will not really deliver much benefits and the costs of building the track to Crewe are not that great relative to the rest of HS2.

The big decision in the north is what to with Crewe. I think a lot of the signalling/ track infrastructure in Crewe is going to need replacing anyway regardless of HS2. But do they go for a long term solution or just join into the existing tracks south of Crewe.

That was the original plan anyway, the tunnel was a 2b construct.

Likewise Euston. I think it's pretty much decided to go to Euston but the real decisions are how you rebuild the whole of Euston. How many platforms can HS2 access ? How many platforms are accessible from WCML ? How do you sequence a build ?

HS2 can't access any conventional platforms or vice versa.

 

[Shrop]

Here’s one way of looking at HS2, as food for thought …

It seems almost unbelievable that at this point there are so many undecided matters with HS2. We all know about Sunak stabbing the whole project in the back, but it seems we can't just revert to where we were before he trashed it.

At risk of making sceptical forum members yawn, I've previously pointed out how quick progress was with the Beijing to Shanghai route in China. This was barely ahead of HS2 in its development in the mid 2000s, and yet this 809 mile route was fully open by 2011, with a journey time the same as London to Edinburgh or Glasgow is today, at a mere half the distance. Before anyone says it, the Chinese don't treat their citizens anything like as badly as our western ignorance likes to believe. No, their people can't really object to projects that are deemed to be in the national interest, but they do get well compensated if they have to lose their properties / businesses etc.

So perhaps there is something to be said for having system better than ours where an outgoing leader can not only kill off a national project just for attempted short-term political gain, and can also then try to sabotage parts of it purely in order to make it harder to resurrect by a rival political Party; where we cow-tow to objections with endless enquiries and appeals etc.

No, of course I'm not advocating that we have a dictatorship in the UK, but people looking at us from abroad could be forgiven for thinking that our approach to major projects that are in the national interest, really is a bit soft.

 

[HSTEd]

. We all know about Sunak stabbing the whole project in the back,

HS2 stabbed itself in the back when it singularly failed to deliver what it promised.
It had fifteen years of political consensus and still failed to deliver on time or on anything close to a budget - especially given all the accusations in the press about its behaviour and practices.

At risk of making sceptical forum members yawn, I've previously pointed out how quick progress was with the Beijing to Shanghai route in China. This was barely ahead of HS2 in its development in the mid 2000s, and yet this 809 mile route was fully open by 2011, with a journey time the same as London to Edinburgh or Glasgow is today, at a mere half the distance.

The Beijing to Shanghai line wasn't built through lots of highly protected terrain! It was also designed to provide people living near the route with useful transport services. Indeed, large parts of it seem to run relatively close to expressways and other major roads.

It's conception was far more similar to HS1 in that regard. It didn't decide to cross a beloved AONB at its widest point and then complain when it was forced into a tunnel.

If you were trying to select a route for HS2 that would generate the most opposition, I'm not sure you could do much better than the one that was selected.

 

[Shrop]

HS2 stabbed itself in the back when it singularly failed to deliver what it promised.
It had fifteen years of political consensus and still failed to deliver on time or on anything close to a budget - especially given all the accusations in the press about its behaviour and practices.

Yes, it was a double whammy if ever there was one - a badly conceived and developed project, presided over by inept politicians who were only ever supportive for their perceived political gain, rather than because they were actually interested in what was really needed. Politicians have never been interested in, nor understood road or rail transport. (As I've said before, the Yes Minister episode "Bed of Nails" way back in 1982 epitomised the political understanding of transport, and nothing has changed since).

The Beijing to Shanghai line wasn't built through lots of highly protected terrain! It was also designed to provide people living near the route with useful transport services. Indeed, large parts of it seem to run relatively close to expressways and other major roads.

It's conception was far more similar to HS1 in that regard. It didn't decide to cross a beloved AONB at its widest point and then complain when it was forced into a tunnel.

If you were trying to select a route for HS2 that would generate the most opposition, I'm not sure you could do much better than the one that was selected.

The Eurostar route to Paris runs parallel to the A1 motorway for much of its length once it gets into France with the many benefits of doing so, such as NOT ploughing up protected countryside without even providing any benefits for people in those areas. I've never understood why so little genuine effort was put into using the M1 corridor route for HS2.

 

[swt_passenger]

The Eurostar route to Paris runs parallel to the A1 motorway for much of its length once it gets into France with the many benefits of doing so, such as NOT ploughing up protected countryside without even providing any benefits for people in those areas. I've never understood why so little genuine effort was put into using the M1 corridor route for HS2.

That’s because you never seem to read the sources people refer you to when you’ve asked before. It definitely was looked at. The curvature is wrong, the gradient is wrong, the motorway junctions would all get in the way, there are whole towns such as Luton right alongside the M1 that get in the way. The M1 doesn’t head for Birmingham.

 

[Shrop]

That’s because you never seem to read the sources people refer you to when you’ve asked before. It definitely was looked at. The curvature is wrong, the gradient is wrong, the motorway junctions would all get in the way, there are whole towns such as Luton right alongside the M1 that get in the way. The M1 doesn’t head for Birmingham.

Thanks, but I've prevoously answered those points.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

The story from The Independent https://www.independent.co.uk/news/...ransport-secretary-louise-haigh-b2625673.html Not quite an announcement yet, but optimistic noises.

The political winds have to remain favourable for another three weeks to make it into the Chancellor's budget decisions.
She has many other issues to deal with, one of them reversing the "Network North" budget allocation by Sunak (notionally £36 billion).
I doubt there is a meaningful cost estimate for completing Euston, so that will be finger in the air.
The "paused" elements of the Phase 1 project (eg the northern leg to Handsacre) also have to be restarted, as well as the Euston tunnels.

 

[Mikey C]

That’s because you never seem to read the sources people refer you to when you’ve asked before. It definitely was looked at. The curvature is wrong, the gradient is wrong, the motorway junctions would all get in the way, there are whole towns such as Luton right alongside the M1 that get in the way. The M1 doesn’t head for Birmingham.

HS2 was built to be a 225mph railway, therefore it needed to be very straight. If they had built it to the standard 186mph, they could have built a curvier line following existing corridors more closely.

 

[swt_passenger]

HS2 was built to be a 225mph railway, therefore it needed to be very straight. If they had built it to the standard 186mph, they could have built a curvier line following existing corridors more closely.

In your opinion? It might have made very little difference. The main point here is that an M1 corridor route WAS looked at, amongst dozens of other alternatives, as has been discussed dozens of times in these forums over nearly a decade.

 

[Verulamius]

My understanding of the Mayor's proposal is that the line would use the already approved route of HS2a to Crewe. Thus any reductions in planned speed would not change curvature etc. Any reductions would only change potential building spec of the line which are likely to be marginal in cost given that HS2a would be the cheapest section to build given limited tunnels and viaducts.

I think that the cost reductions arise mainly from excluding any rebuild of Crewe from the numbers.

 

[Shrop]

In your opinion? It might have made very little difference. The main point here is that an M1 corridor route WAS looked at, amongst dozens of other alternatives, as has been discussed dozens of times in these forums over nearly a decade.

And it was looked at when? The priority to serve Heathrow was downgraded before HS2 was officially announced, but by then much had already been invested in legal fees, planning considerations etc, not to mention politicians nailing their colours to the HS2 mast and therefore not wanting to be seen to change their minds. Please could you point to studies that were done about the M1 corridor route BEFORE the investment of time and money into the Heathrow route, ie WELL before the official announcement of HS2 in January 2009?

 

[swt_passenger]

And it was looked at when? The priority to serve Heathrow was downgraded before HS2 was officially announced, but by then much had already been invested in legal fees, planning considerations etc, not to mention politicians nailing their colours to the HS2 mast and therefore not wanting to be seen to change their minds. Please could you point to studies that were done about the M1 corridor route BEFORE the investment of time and money into the Heathrow route, ie WELL before the official announcement of HS2 in January 2009?

I suppose I could spend a few hours searching on line, but so could you. If you are so determined to redesign HS2 feel free to do so. I’m out.

 

[Shrop]

I suppose I could spend a few hours searching on line, but so could you. If you are so determined to redesign HS2 feel free to do so. I’m out.

You're underlining my point, I have looked but I can't find anything, so was anything really investigated when it should have been rather than as an afterthought to "prove" something that had already been decided? There's no point redesigning HS2 now as you well know, but if it really wasn't investigated properly when it should have been, ie early on, then there are lessons to be learned for the way we approach future projects. I'm happy to be proved wrong, but despite your assertions, not by you it seems