The key point is this quote from the head of the National Audit Office:
"The rationale for East West Rail rests on its wider strategic aims of increasing economic growth in the Oxford to Cambridge region.
“To maximise the economic benefits from its investment in East West Rail, government must ensure stronger strategic alignment between departments and with wider local growth initiatives, so that there is a shared, coherent vision for the future of the region, and the contribution that the East West Rail project will make to it is clear.”
Gareth Davies, head of the NAO
Increasing economic growth is about new businesses, most of which don't exist yet, located in or near Cambridge and Oxford because of synergies with the Universities, which are in the top ten in the world. Two examples of this already happening are ARM and Abcam: increasing economic growth is about more such companies starting up and growing.
The railway won't just connect Cambridge and Bedford, it connects Cambridge to MK and Oxford.
East West Rail is only partly about this. The eastern end of EWR stands or falls on its ability to deliver a workforce for the new businesses in the Cambridge area, so that the economic growth aim is achieved. That means having places for that workforce to live and transport infrastructure that gets them from home to work and back again.
As the NAO report says, that needs "more strategic alignment across government". And it isn't just about building railways and houses, it is also about water. Another report published yesterday highlights this issue:
Experts say the East of England faces a projected shortage of 800 million litres per day by 2050.
www.bbc.co.uk
The East of England faces "projected water shortages of 800 million litres" per day by 2050, according to a group looking at water security.
Water Resources East (WRE) said food safety was at risk unless scarcity issues were tackled.
WRE, set up by Anglian Water, includes various concerned bodies, and has been tasked with creating a
"regional water resources plan" for the government.
It called for £15bn to be invested before 2050 to address the issues.
The 800 million litres projection equates to a third of the region's water usage, WRE said.
"Action is needed now, otherwise increasing water scarcity will constrain agricultural production and curtail economic and housing development, as is already the case in parts of Cambridgeshire," it said.
Anglian Water, based in Cambridgeshire, recently warned that rising temperatures, low rainfall and
population increase posed a "significant risk" to water supplies.
One £billion for ten miles of road is outrageous. That is nearly 3 times that of building new railways. Is a new road really needed or is it the road lobby at it again?
The A428 Black Cat-Caxton Gibbet road is of no benefit to economic growth in and around Cambridge. Where it does help is improving the link between Milton Keynes/Bedford and Felixstowe, where it is the last remaining bit of single carriageway road.
It doesn't help Cambridge because the local road network in and around the City is already full, and frequently grinds to a halt because of traffic congestion. It doesn't matter how long it takes to get from Bedford to the edge of Cambridge by road because it will still take ages to get from the edge of Cambridge to the final destination. If anything the A428 Black Cat-Caxton Gibbet improvement will make traffic congestion in Cambridge worse not better.
Surely this new road avoids the need to build an entirely new railway from Bedford to Cambridge, and the expenditure required to do construct it? The former United Counties 128 bus service from Bedford to Cambridge (or whatever it is currently numbered) could be accelerated to provide any improved public transport required between these 2 places.
The guided busway has already demonstrated that buses do not work for Cambridge. That's partly due to congestion, and partly due to lack of drivers in a very heated local labour market. There's no point investing in more bus services while Cambridge can't make proper use of the very expensive bit of bus infrastructure that it already has.
On the other hand, the huge growth in rail commuting into Cambridge, most notably on the Fen Line, demonstrates that heavy rail is what is needed to generate economic growth in Cambridge. That will take a further step forward in 2025 when Cambridge South station opens next to the Cambridge Biomedical Campus, with more than 20k jobs already within walking distance of the new station.
The notion that economic growth can be delivered by improving the Bedford-Cambridge bus service shows a complete lack of understanding of the scale of what is happening in Cambridge. I am old enough to have travelled on the old United Counties 128 bus service: it was half a century ago and Cambridge was a very different place. Cambridge needs transport infrastructure that will work in 50 years ahead, not what worked 50 years ago.
https://maps.app.goo.gl/WrYkuqkdSgLCNGeGA
www.nao.org.uk
