Peterborough to Northampton on the X4 takes over 3 hours, with all the obvious implications for the journeys in-between.
You try holding a job down by relying on an hourly bus that takes an hour and a half to transport you. The local bus services are just that - local.
I don't disagree - but the fact is also that Peterborough is NOT a major employment centre for people living in Northampton, Wellingborough, Kettering or Corby, particularly those on lower wages for whom travel costs will be a consideration.
I don't really see why you feel the need to spend so much time arguing against investment in your area, even though it is clear it would be built to benefit others.
Because IF this scheme were to go ahead it would cost at least £ 1bn - that is against "benefits" which are highly questionable. As Bald Rick often points out, the first thing that needs to be answered with any such proposal is "what is the problem you're trying to fix" ? The next logical step is "Is this actually a problem"? - and this on fails on that. Then as DarloRich pointed out recently, there is only going to be a limited amount of money and this may be a 'one time' opportunity - which means schemes put forward need to be viable. Already on this one you've got local authorities spending money on exploring this seemingly without asking the basic questions. Look over on the Wisbech one and Bald Rick has pointed out the shortcomings of the "Benefits Case" the regional authority there have put forward - namely the case has been constructed to support a certain answer and has overlooked the fact that doubling the service to March would achieve circa 85% of the benefits without the need to spend a penny on a line to Wisbech.
This is clearly a visionary project, exploring what beneficial economic activity can be created through creating linkages where few currently exist. It's not a mundane project that seeks to serve existing on-paper demand, but one designed to rewire economies, building demand over time.
At the very least we should be free to creatively explore the notion.
You clearly have a very different view of "visionary" to me.
This scheme is flawed for so many reasons. Firstly there isn't the demand to link Peterborough (a smallish city in the East of England) with Banbury (a medium sized town in the South Midlands). There aren't any synergies between the two, there's not even a historic link between the two. Let's not forget the Northampton - Banbury line and Northampton - Peterborough lines were completely separate entities. There were never through services in the past.
What you actually have are two distinct corridors - let's deal with Northampton westwards first. Is there a demand for travel from Northampton westwards? Yes, the A43 provides ample capacity for that currently. What are the destinations? Towcester is one and there is a regular bus service which takes 40 minutes. Beyond that? Brackley or Silverstone aren't big places and the demand there is limited. Most people will be heading towards Oxford - so running a railway to Banbury makes little or no sense at all. Add in the fact that when EWR is in place, you'll be looking at a Northampton - Oxford rail journey time of circa 1 hour with a change a Milton Keynes - that is competitive with driving it which Google Maps reckons is about an hour as well. Going north of Banbury you've got Leamington (again accessible to Northampton by 1 change) and then Birmingham - which there's already direct connection with and anything via Banbury would be much slower.
Now look at Northampton eastwards - you've got Wellingborough, Kettering, Corby and ultimately Peterborough - the latter being about 45 miles away, same distance as Oxford the other.
Is there demand for travel between Wellingborough, Kettering, Corby and Northampton? Yes - there are regular buses, though none are 'full and standing' and the buses between Northampton and Wellingborough (lets focus on this for a sec, because it's the first bit of re-build you'd need) also run via the villages like Earls Barton - the railway line ran south of the A45 so was at least 2 miles from places like Earls Barton, so they wouldn't benefit - and before you wonder, no there isn't another formation that's even remotely viable.
The question remains though - are there enough people wanting to travel from Wellingborough, Kettering or Corby to Northampton to make such a route viable? Probably not. What about onward journeys? Well to the south you're looking at Milton Keynes - which back to EWR, it will almost certainly be quicker for people from those three towns to travel to Bedford and change to EWR than any reinstatement via Northampton would be. Apart from that, going south they have direct rail connectivity to Luton - which is something Northampton doesn't. And then it's London - so no gain there.
Going north - I pointed out that a journey from Wellingborough or Kettering to Birmingham can be done currently via Leicester and is pretty much time neutral against a via Northampton option.
So then we come back to Peterborough. Peterborough and Northampton are a similar size - a bit over 200k - Northampton being the bigger of the two. Given shopping trends, people rarely go from Northampton to Peterborough to go shopping - Milton Keynes is closer and has a better selection. So then you're looking at other leisure - not sure Peterborough has a huge amount in that space - or work.
Peterborough's lost Thomas Cook, so its large employers are people like Perkins or BGL Group - Northampton has Barclaycard, Travis Perkins and a couple of other large companies - so it's neutral on that. For people choosing jobs some of it will come down to distance - and for Wellingborough and Kettering, Northampton is preferred to Peterborough.
There are plenty of rail improvements which *could* be made in Northampton - Northants without the need to lay an extra yard of track. Getting distracted by "pie in the sky" schemes which are little more than rebuilding a pre-Beeching closure, a Beeching closure and tacking them together and claiming it's a "new transport arc" is ridiculous.
Start by defining the problem, then work out what the solutions are. This "scheme" is little more than authorities crayoning on a map and then trying to justify their crayoning.