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East-West Rail (EWR): Consultation updates [not speculation]

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nuneatonmark

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For the avoidance of doubt, my comment was mainly about what seems to be such a long time for these projects to even start, let alone finish. I get the point about the whole permanent way needing to be replaced but this project has taken years and years and years to get this far, which isn't very far at all. At this rate HS2 (assuming it gets built) will start to catch it up! (he says tongue in cheek). This thread started in 2014 with a comment that EWR had been delayed from 2017 to 2019 and here we are in 2019! Any sign of a new railway yet? Thought not!
 
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swt_passenger

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richieb1971 said:
Apparently the first 15 years was people talking with empty pockets.
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There’s a lot of that goes on. I suspect a huge amount of optimistic PR from the EWR consortium (of local authorities), with well meaning but completely flawed construction key dates that would never have stood up to scrutiny by railway experts.
 
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richieb1971

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Are political figures the right people to start a project? Lobbyists?

Whose the best placed body to say "we need a new railway?"
 
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richieb1971

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Lmao. The funniest thing I've read in these forums.

It can't be the users though. I think there is a void for this.
 
DarloRich

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nuneatonmark said:
For the avoidance of doubt, my comment was mainly about what seems to be such a long time for these projects to even start, let alone finish. I get the point about the whole permanent way needing to be replaced but this project has taken years and years and years to get this far, which isn't very far at all. At this rate HS2 (assuming it gets built) will start to catch it up! (he says tongue in cheek). This thread started in 2014 with a comment that EWR had been delayed from 2017 to 2019 and here we are in 2019! Any sign of a new railway yet? Thought not!
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have you considered the machinations of funding and political outmaneuvering/spin in your thoughts? I suspect not. Perhaps you have a naive view of how big projects like this are funded, how politicians of all types manage media announcements and what the point of such announcements is !

richieb1971 said:
Apparently the first 15 years was people talking with empty pockets.
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Now you are getting it! Finally ;)

swt_passenger said:
There’s a lot of that goes on. I suspect a huge amount of optimistic PR from the EWR consortium (of local authorities), with well meaning but completely flawed construction key dates that would never have stood up to scrutiny by railway experts.
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agreed. Thye local councils haven't a pot to persist in so aren't really offering the most useful thing: cash.

richieb1971 said:
Are political figures the right people to start a project? Lobbyists?

Whose the best placed body to say "we need a new railway?"
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All kinds of stakeholders: Councils, government, pressure groups, user groups, business groups, randoms. Only one person can make the decision and pay for most of it: Government
 
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nuneatonmark

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Nah, never thought about that DarloRich! Not at all. I have personally run projects and programmes of up to £25m so yes I do know something (rather a lot actually) about sizeable projects (not as big as EWR, I know). So it's fine then, we accept these projects take ages to get any traction and ages to get funding and ages to actually do anything? Whether it's funding, political machinations or a bunch of newts that need to move, it's ridiculous it takes this long.
 
DarloRich

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nuneatonmark said:
Nah, never thought about that DarloRich! Not at all. I have personally run projects and programmes of up to £25m so yes I do know something (rather a lot actually) about sizeable projects (not as big as EWR, I know). So it's fine then, we accept these projects take ages to get any traction and ages to get funding and ages to actually do anything? Whether it's funding, political machinations or a bunch of newts that need to move, it's ridiculous it takes this long.
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Let's not play my project is worth £x because I will win ;)

Ok. I take your point. Things take ages. Perhaps with your experience (which many posters lack) you could suggest ways to make the process more lean and efficient
 
DynamicSpirit

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Bald Rick said:
No. Let’s not bother with design.
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Does anyone know of any links that explain what the all the processes are for this kind of project (or - even better - a link that explains that AND clarifies where E-W Rail is in this process)? I imagine that would help to keep this discussion informed, if such a link exists.
 
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Class 170101 said:
How about one design or a couple not so many options you spend as much on designing options as you would on building one of them.
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The Ely Southern Bypass cost £49m instead of £36m These are some quotes from:
https://www.elystandard.co.uk/news/...s-to-blame-for-ely-bypass-overspend-1-6190964

"However, due to the desire of key stakeholders to get the project completed in the shortest timescales possible, and the consequent design of the contract, insufficient time was given to the project planning stage which, when combined with the type of contract used during construction, meant that the true costs of the project were not available to officers nor members until the project was near completion."

The deputy head of internal audit, Neil Hunter, made a point of clarifying the language used, saying, "in our opinion there has not been an overspend there has been an under-provision," before referring to the £13m as an "overspend" later on in the meeting.
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They needed much deeper foundations that had been originally planned. With a more detailed initial survey, they might have found that out, at a point where they could have trimmed some costs from elsewhere in the project.
 
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Class 170101

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Bald Rick said:
Do you? Any evidence to support that?
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Why else does it take so long then? Crossrail has been going on since before I was born, East West Rail probably since the Central Section closed but I have certainly read documents going back 15 years.
 
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Class 170101 said:
Why else does it take so long then? Crossrail has been going on since before I was born, East West Rail probably since the Central Section closed but I have certainly read documents going back 15 years.
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Crossrail started in 1933 if you go back far enough. I don’t suppose there are many forum readers born before that.

The reason it takes ‘so long’ is that proposals are made without cash to back them, and talked up all the while, and readers of various media are taken in by it. Even when money is made available, work has to be planned, consented, designed, and this all takes time. You wouldn’t start building your house extension without first getting drawings done and getting planning permission. For railway works (or any major infrastructure works - roads, power stations, airports, etc) the process is several orders of magnitude larger.

Boris ‘announced’ the new NPR line between Leeds and Manchester on Monday. It will be, at the very least, 6 years before any physical work is done on that.
 
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richieb1971

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It wasn't that long ago I heard a rumour that Werrington Junction was getting an under pass. I just watched a video posted on youtube this month that shows 2 or 3 fields completely filled with earth removing equipment. They are rechannelling water by the looks of it, propping up the sides of the active railway with deep embedded fencing and it goes on for a mile or so.

In comparison that project is in top gear, getting well funded, planned, drawn, built and delivered in record time.

So it is possible to get things cracking. I wonder what the motivation is to get Werrington done ASAP?
 
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richieb1971 said:
It wasn't that long ago I heard a rumour that Werrington Junction was getting an under pass. I just watched a video posted on youtube this month that shows 2 or 3 fields completely filled with earth removing equipment. They are rechannelling water by the looks of it, propping up the sides of the active railway with deep embedded fencing and it goes on for a mile or so.

In comparison that project is in top gear, getting well funded, planned, drawn, built and delivered in record time.

So it is possible to get things cracking. I wonder what the motivation is to get Werrington done ASAP?
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I saw plans for Werrington in 2002.
 
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richieb1971

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Maybe you did. So pockets weren't filled for 17 years. I'm getting the time lines now.
 
DarloRich

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richieb1971 said:
It wasn't that long ago I heard a rumour that Werrington Junction was getting an under pass. I just watched a video posted on youtube this month that shows 2 or 3 fields completely filled with earth removing equipment. They are rechannelling water by the looks of it, propping up the sides of the active railway with deep embedded fencing and it goes on for a mile or so.

In comparison that project is in top gear, getting well funded, planned, drawn, built and delivered in record time.

So it is possible to get things cracking. I wonder what the motivation is to get Werrington done ASAP?
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Bald Rick said:
I saw plans for Werrington in 2002.
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it has been knocking around for ages! The constraining factor: investment

Class 170101 said:
Do we need all the GRIP stages?
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No. We can just get out an old benson and hedges packet and a crayon and draw a bridge and thus shall a bridge be created

Class 170101 said:
How about one design or a couple not so many options you spend as much on designing options as you would on building one of them.
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is that correct? Could you support that with statement with any evidence?

DynamicSpirit said:
here E-W Rail is in this process
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without doing any digging i suspect they will be at stage 3 or 4.
 
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The Planner

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Class 170101 said:
How about one design or a couple not so many options you spend as much on designing options as you would on building one of them.
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What happens when your only design comes up against a challenge or scrutiny?

DarloRich said:
without doing any digging i suspect they will be at stage 3 or 4.
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Considering the maturity of the signalling plans and network change documents knocking about, it is going to be at GRIP 4.
 
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edwin_m

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I think a lot of the problem is to do with the relationship between development and funding. We go ahead developing schemes which then sit around for years awaiting funding. And when there is some prospect of funding it turns out that something else has changed so some of the development needs re-doing. And that may increase the price so the committed funding is no longer enough...

I don't claim to have a solution for this, but it could be around government making commitments to fund up to certain limits for schemes that deliver certain defined benefits. The agreed funding would be for construction not just for development and design. These commitments would have to be given based on early stage business cases, and would then by default continue to be valid as long as the scheme stayed within the defined cost and benefit parameters at each later stage. There would have to be a mechanism for them to be revoked if wider issues intervened, but I suggest this should require a politician to stand up and make an unpopular announcement, rather than just ignoring requests and allowing the long grass to grow up around a proposal as they can now.
 
DarloRich

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edwin_m said:
but it could be around government making commitments to fund up to certain limits for schemes that deliver certain defined benefits. The agreed funding would be for construction not just for development and design. These commitments would have to be given based on early stage business cases, and would then by default continue to be valid as long as the scheme stayed within the defined cost and benefit parameters at each later stage. There would have to be a mechanism for them to be revoked if wider issues intervened
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The problem is that you can very easily end up in a situation such as that described by @bspahh above where the full costs of a project are not know when you authorise physical work at an early stage of the project life-cycle.

At that stage your business case is based on nothing more than a guess, hopefully a good guess, but a guess nonetheless. IF you accept that then your contingency is going to have to be massive as your risk landscape will be very wide ranging and very vague which, of course, impacts on health of the business case. This also means that money has to be provided which (bizarrely but accurately) hopefully sits around doing nothing. That, of course, has a cost both in interest and in lost opportunity elsewhere. You don't even, really, know your scope at such an early stage! What do you do when you run out of money because of the unknown mineshafts, failed earth works or underground water courses that aren't on the maps?

This idea does work for smaller, repeatable projects with relatively fixed and well known costs ( IT being an example) but how could you hope to provide an accurate and reliable cost estimate for a 30 mile long new railway at such an early stage?
 
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