My proposal for a Grand Junction Railway 2.0

[squizzler]

In the earliest days of railways the Liverpool and Manchester railway was built first. Then there was a London to Birmingham line. These two lines were linked by another company called the Grand Junction.

With HS2 going from London to Birmingham, and a commitment to build Northern Powerhouse Rail from Liverpool to Leeds, via Manchester and Bradford, it occurs to me that it might be demand to link these two lines via what I thought may be called the Grand Junction 2.0 (see what I done there, the superfluous “point zero” makes it sound high tech!). It would be built to high speed rail standards and provide a continuous link from Euston to Manchester and possibly even Scotland.

To me, the Grand Junction 2.0 seems the inevitable next step when the committed high speed lines are done, joining HS2 and NPR into a coherent network. Sign me up for the crowdfunding campaign! What do you think?

 

[eldomtom2]

I presume this is a bit of satire making fun of the cancellation of Phase 2.

 

[squizzler]

Got it in one! But like good satire it attempts to make real points: that the Victorians manages to span the gap between Birmingham and Manchester environs, that it is an obvious gap: the clue is in the name “Grand Junction”.

With the trend to name train operators after retro outfits: Great Western Railway, LNER etc, I think reviving the name “Grand Junction” for the campaign to build this link would be a hit. Untainted by the preconceptions of the HS2 brand.

Perhaps Campaign for Better Transport or Railfuture will run with it? Certainly these organisations must have an influx of engaged new members! Rishi Sunak seems to be the best recruiting sergeant for these organisations and should get a kickback.

But in all seriousness, with a gap remaining between the HS2 and NPR, I imagine it could be filled by a purely commercial venture.

Would train operators pay a premium to avoid the busy traditional railway on that stretch? Grand Junction 2.0 would have all the premium west coast mainline traffic to play for.

 

[MPW]

Rishi: I axed HS2 from Birmingham to Manchester, and in its place am building Grand Junction 2.0... yea that sounds about right. New name, all problems solved

 

[squizzler]

Presumably the Northern Powerhouse Rail will be built to the same standards as adopted for HS2: structure gauge, platform height and length, ETCS signalling and all the rest. Having two islands of state-of-the-art trunkline makes the an entirely unforced error of a gap between them all the more ridiculous.

We will, under current plans, also end up with two separated fleets of captive high speed trains, only able to be redeployed by barge or Allellys lorry between the separate euro-spec(ish) HSR networks. Utterly nuts.

 

[PeterC]

Presumably the Northern Powerhouse Rail will be built to the same standards as adopted for HS2: structure gauge, platform height and length, ETCS signalling and all the rest. Having two islands of state-of-the-art trunkline makes the an entirely unforced error of a gap between them all the more ridiculous.

We will, under current plans, also end up with two separated fleets of captive high speed trains, only able to be redeployed by barge or Allellys lorry between the separate euro-spec(ish) HSR networks. Utterly nuts.

I am sure that the only compatible thing will be the track guage.

No doubt somebody will tell me that I am talking nonsense just like they did when I predicted that HS2 would stop at Birmingham.

 

[mike57]

I suspect the problem will be solved by the watering down, delay and cancellation of various bit of NPR until there is nothing worth linking to at the northern end.

 

[squizzler]

Go back further (I’m talking the days of Adonis as transport guru towards the end of Labour in the noughties) and I remember Wolmar confidently predicting that there will never be high speed rail north of London in the UK. Well we will have soon. And that is something to build from.

When Chris Grayling “paused” the GWR electrification that was meant to be the end. But it is now back on the agenda. Supporters of HSR need to learn from the electrification promotors. Keep the faith.