But you have to pay that cost upfront. I'm sure most people's mortgages total to more than their final offer, but they didn't have the 6-figure sum to hand.Yes, that is true, but in infrastructure planning, we always planning in advance not legging behind, upgrading in a single time is cheaper than planning twice.
This isn't a new-build railway - Crossrail and HS2 are exactly that spec, and EWR has 2 of the 3 (and should be electrified, but that's a different thread).In 2020s railway is electrified, with proper ETCS signal, and built for much higher speed. A limited budget sounds wise, but in a longer time you will waste more money to upgrade them.
This is an upgrade of an existing Victorian line that is currently operational. The business case is limited by the potential traffic the railway can actually generate. Better to build it within budget first and get trains running so that the economic forecasts can be improved and updated, then examine the case for upgrading. Not to mention it'd be an island of ETCS, the trains would never reach the possible speed (maintained at an expense, of course) and electrification would prevent cross-working to MetroCentre.
People moan enough about gold-plating the railway, to rebuild a secondary commuter branch line into a full-blown regional mainline would be an utterly ridiculous waste of money.
Everybody acknowledges the shortcomings of our railway, the problem is to resolve them is a political problem which the industry isn't in control of. The railway can only work within the framework that exists at the time, not the framework it would like to have.I want the line to reopen. But the current approach is sub-optimal. As a huge rail fan from East Asia whose county build railways at an ever imagined speed. The current UK railway industry is stretched and failed to dream big. Because the government failed to optimized the investment, the industry lack capacity, and the funding modal is not suitable for massive rail upgrading.
Sending some people to study in Japan about how to properly planning new lines, in Hong Kong to learn about how the railway can be funded, in South Korea to learn how incrementally service can be improved.
By the way, your 50mph 1920 railway's cost per mile is on par with Korea's 180 mph high-speed rail line...