Revealed: The 36 rail projects at risk of being scrapped to plug Labour’s £22bn black hole and related issues

[Nicholas Lewis]

Independent are running this as their front page tomorrow

Revealed: The 36 rail projects at risk of being scrapped to plug Labour’s £22bn black hole

Main casualty potentially is Portishead but its all largely the reopening your railway projects which she had already kicked into the long grass back in July I thought anyhow. If this is all that is at risk I would say thats a good outcome for the rail industry given the funding pressures.

Sixteen new train stations and 250 miles of railway lines that would benefit millions of passengers are on a list of projects at risk of being scrapped as Labour tries to plug a £22bn budget black hole, The Independent can reveal.

The full list of 36 schemes includes several where work has already begun as part of Boris Johnson’s now ditched £500m restoring your railways (RYR) initiative.

The north of England and the South West are the areas set to be hit hardest if all the plans are axed in chancellor Rachel Reeves’ autumn Budget, with the long-awaited Portishead to Bristol line and the much-delayed White Rose station in Leeds among those at risk.

 

[JonathanH]

That article is a bit disingenuous in that many of the projects are nowhere near becoming a reality. It seems a bit difficult to cancel a project that isn't even at the planning stage, let alone budgeted. It certainly isn't going to address the £22bn 'black hole' if they weren't in the budget to start off with.

The key phrase is 'now finds herself wielding an axe over £85m worth of projects'. That sounds like just cancelling the feasibility studies that were going to rate the projects as 'poor value for money' and not worth proceeding anyway, saving money on consultancy fees.

 

[Harpo]

Main casualty potentially is Portishead

Apart from reinstating two roads on Filton Bank, the record on delivering Bristolian transport projects seems pretty slim.

 

[Carlisle]

Wasn’t the comprehensive Avon Metro proposal abandoned by the Blair Government along with several other tram schemes in the UK ?

 

[yorksrob]

That article is a bit disingenuous in that many of the projects are nowhere near becoming a reality. It seems a bit difficult to cancel a project that isn't even at the planning stage, let alone budgeted. It certainly isn't going to address the £22bn 'black hole' if they weren't in the budget to start off with.

The key phrase is 'now finds herself wielding an axe over £85m worth of projects'. That sounds like just cancelling the feasibility studies that were going to rate the projects as 'poor value for money' and not worth proceeding anyway, saving money on consultancy fees.

White Rose station seems almost complete when I go past it.

£85m is chicken feed in the scheme of things. They need to get Portishead finished, given how far its got.

 

[I'm here now]

It’s all DafT with the pro road bias. Cut all the pothole spending nonsense and all road bypasses etc, and redistribute the funds to rail.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

It’s all DafT with the pro road bias. Cut all the pothole spending nonsense and all road bypasses etc, and redistribute the funds to rail.

Its upto Haigh to assert herself shes been pretty vocal about rail and buses since she was appointed not roads or aviation

 

[deltic]

It’s all DafT with the pro road bias. Cut all the pothole spending nonsense and all road bypasses etc, and redistribute the funds to rail.

There is no road bias in DfT, National Highways refers to it as the Department for Rail.

 

[slowroad]

There is no road bias in DfT, National Highways refers to it as the Department for Rail.

If you express it on a per traveller-km basis, public spending on rail is over 10 times higher than on roads.

 

[fishwomp]

That article is a bit disingenuous in that many of the projects are nowhere near becoming a reality. It seems a bit difficult to cancel a project that isn't even at the planning stage, let alone budgeted. [].

The key phrase is 'now finds herself wielding an axe over £85m worth of projects'. That sounds like just cancelling the feasibility studies that were going to rate the projects as 'poor value for money' and not worth proceeding anyway, saving money on consultancy fees.

That's exactly it for 90% of the list. Honestly, if someone would send me her £1m I would happily run through the list in 30 mins and give all involved closure, err, I mean clarity.

The money spent on talking about the self-evidently impossible has better places to go. They could even send some of it to this forum to polish the webserver.. we discuss enough of them on here for free..

White Rose station seems almost complete when I go past it.

Surely West Yorks chancing its arm trying to get someone else to pay for its own mismanagement - (is White Rose company contributing ? It ought to..)

£85m is chicken feed in the scheme of things. They need to get Portishead finished, given how far its got.

Is that got 'on paper' or 'on the ground'? This one along with Ivanhoe line are the realistic line reopenings on the list - decent populations to serve so I would like to see them happen.

 

[Re 4/4]

Labour's £22bn black hole

Can I point out the obvious: Labour was not in power when the hole was dug.

The people in Bristol who want an underground or perhaps even a cable car are looking even sillier than before, though. I'd personally love to see trams like the Swiss manage, there's even a nice turning loop on something called Tramway Road, but it's not going to happen unless we start charging overseas students council tax or something.

 

[Magdalia]

Independent are running this as their front page tomorrow

Revealed: The 36 rail projects at risk of being scrapped to plug Labour’s £22bn black hole

Main casualty potentially is Portishead but its all largely the reopening your railway projects which she had already kicked into the long grass back in July I thought anyhow. If this is all that is at risk I would say thats a good outcome for the rail industry given the funding pressures.

This is a classic piece of pre-budget lobbying, I wouldn't read anything from it.

It certainly isn't going to address the £22bn 'black hole' if they weren't in the budget to start off with.

This is for the 2024/25 financial year. Only projects which had 2024/25 funding allocated, or where the previous government had made commitments for 2024/25 without backing them with allocated funding, are at risk in the context of the "£22 billion black hole".

Wait for the budget on 30 October to find out more. The only media speculation worth paying attention to will be over the weekend 26-27 October, when the budget is almost finalised.

 

[yorksrob]

That's exactly it for 90% of the list. Honestly, if someone would send me her £1m I would happily run through the list in 30 mins and give all involved closure, err, I mean clarity.

The money spent on talking about the self-evidently impossible has better places to go. They could even send some of it to this forum to polish the webserver.. we discuss enough of them on here for free..

Surely West Yorks chancing its arm trying to get someone else to pay for its own mismanagement - (is White Rose company contributing ? It ought to..)

Is that got 'on paper' or 'on the ground'? This one along with Ivanhoe line are the realistic line reopenings on the list - decent populations to serve so I would like to see them happen.

I'm not sure, but Portishead seems to have been on the starting blocks for ages.

I think the language being used by the government is problematic. I'd rather they said that some projects were "paused" until the economic outlook improved, rather than cancelled.

 

[xotGD]

I can't see White Rose being binned by a Chancellor representing a Leeds constituency.

 

[fishwomp]

I think the language being used by the government is problematic. I'd rather they said that some projects were "paused" until the economic outlook improved, rather than cancelled.

Alas almost all of the list cannot ever be affordable or offer any value in today's cost structure. It would be better to stop funding more surveys and studies into the nostalgia ones - and get behind the ones that can work. I think this is the most likely outcome anyway!

The study I'd most like to see that should be done before the line or station reopenings: cost. Why can't we have stations that cost the same as those built in 1980s. It's becoming a "no station" or "gold plated station" and nothing in between.

 

[yorksrob]

Alas almost all of the list cannot ever be affordable or offer any value in today's cost structure. It would be better to stop funding more surveys and studies into the nostalgia ones - and get behind the ones that can work. I think this is the most likely outcome anyway!

The study I'd most like to see that should be done before the line or station reopenings: cost. Why can't we have stations that cost the same as those built in 1980s. It's becoming a "no station" or "gold plated station" and nothing in between.

I've said the same thing many times myself. We need to get back to being able to open cheap "halts" as WY Metro did in the 1980's.

There still needs to be a place for line openings though.

 

[fishwomp]

I've said the same thing many times myself. We need to get back to being able to open cheap "halts" as WY Metro did in the 1980's.

There still needs to be a place for line openings though.

Yup, sigh..! The way to see if something was worth doing was to do it cheaper, and try.. the Speller act (?) enabled trials that could be closed without the regular closure process.

Now lots is spent on studies and not trying out ideas.

Oxford - Bicester reopened on the cheap - good enough for ~1987 to 2016.. 30mph - not a patch on the 2016- rebuild - but nearly 30 years of use first!

Deighton, Cottingley - have done 35 years or so on those wooden platforms and their bus shelters.. only now getting replaced due to the TPU. Berry Brow, Silkstone Common remain and many others remain.

 

[yorksrob]

Yup, sigh..! The way to see if something was worth doing was to do it cheaper, and try.. the Speller act (?) enabled trials that could be closed without the regular closure process.

Now lots is spent on studies and not trying out ideas.

Oxford - Bicester reopened on the cheap - good enough for ~1987 to 2016.. 30mph - not a patch on the 2016- rebuild - but nearly 30 years of use first!

Deighton, Cottingley - have done 35 years or so on those wooden platforms and their bus shelters.. only now getting replaced due to the TPU. Berry Brow, Silkstone Common remain and many others remain.

They should reopen Exmouth Junction concrete works and start churning out the concrete "harps" and slabs (plenty of them still around on the Southern).

 

[Bletchleyite]

I can't see White Rose being binned by a Chancellor representing a Leeds constituency.

The impression I have is that nobody local actually wants it.

 

[The exile]

Wasn’t the comprehensive Avon Metro proposal abandoned by the Blair Government along with several other tram schemes in the UK ?

Not helped by the “but they get £1 more than we do so we oppose it” attitude of the various local authorities.

 

[66701GBRF]

It’s all DafT with the pro road bias. Cut all the pothole spending nonsense and all road bypasses etc, and redistribute the funds to rail.

Since when is fixing potholes nonsense?

 

[Gerald Fiennes]

I thought Avon Metro got chopped (if it ever existed...) in the early 1990s following the 90/91 recession. One John Major i/c back then!

Still many more times it will get chopped yet, m'thinks.

Bit odd, because Bristol is a place that is so spread out (eg. Filton, Bradley Stoke, Portishead, Yate, Bedminster, Airport, Pucklechurch) that a light rail scheme (with car parks at the stations...) might actually make transport sense as trams are quite fast (see Germany for many examples)!

 

[I'm here now]

If you express it on a per traveller-km basis, public spending on rail is over 10 times higher than on roads.

Lower Thames Crossing?? Costs around (or quite a bit more) HS2's Northern bit to Crewe.

Since when is fixing potholes nonsense?

Why should there be a focus on repairing infrastructure that is to a detriment of people's life rather than rail, which can have a more positive impact?

 

[stuu]

Why should there be a focus on repairing infrastructure that is to a detriment of people's life rather than rail, which can have a more positive impact?

Good luck getting a rail ambulance next time you are ill

 

[Baxenden Bank]

I'm struggling to find any news in that article. It has already been stated that RYR as a programme is cancelled and/but each scheme will be subject to individual review.

I remember when The Independent launched, with such promise....

Wellington is supposed to be happening but it's RYR bid is combined with Cullompton which I guess isn't.
Aldridge doesn't feature in the article but has already been announced as 'deferred'.
Beeston Castle and Tarporley, ahem, an oversight by the journalist or is it really going to be built? Oh dear, oh dear, oh dear. Sheep to Chester and cattle to Crewe!
Mablethorpe and Firsby, the scheme that slithered into the update report by a secret backdoor?

 

[66701GBRF]

Good luck getting a rail ambulance next time you are ill

Indeed!

 

[WelshBluebird]

This just seems like a rehash of the announcement from a while ago? And many of those projects aren't solely reliant on RYR funding. E.g. Portishead is getting most of its money from elsewhere so I'll be amazed if that ends up getting cancelled.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

This just seems like a rehash of the announcement from a while ago? And many of those projects aren't solely reliant on RYR funding. E.g. Portishead is getting most of its money from elsewhere so I'll be amazed if that ends up getting cancelled.

Probably more to the point are the Network North schemes (many not in the north).
They were announced exactly a year ago by Rishi Sunak as spending the £36 billion of savings from cancelling HS2 Phase 2 (ie not "new" money).
It included money for potholes and bus subsidies as well as a myriad of local transport improvements.
We were always doubtful of where that money was supposed to come from, given that the HS2 spend was way in the future.
Some money has undoubtedly been spent already, and more will have been committed before the election.
Labour now has to re-draw that spend in the light of wider HS2 and infrastructure spend generally, and whether to reinstate Phase 2 in some form.

Another side to this is that £12 billion of the £36 billion was allocated to "Liverpool-Manchester improvements", presumed to be a new line via Manchester Airport.
Mayors Andy Burnham and Steve Rotheram seem to think the £12 billion is theirs to do what they like with, and would object to any change to that notion.
Labour somehow has to cap the Network North project and divert the funds to whatever its advisors think is best.
Then there's what to do with what is left of the HS2 Crewe-Manchester Bill going through parliament (ie the expensive High Legh-Piccadilly section).

 

[mikeb42]

Indeed!

Or, erm, a train to... anywhere... given that most train drivers do and will forever more use a car to get to work. Or any rail infrastructure for them to run on, given that building and maintaining it is heavily dependent on road transport.

Good luck with getting some food to eat so you don't starve, or someone to build you a home to shelter in or having some working energy infrastructure so you don't freeze to death without ubiquitous road transport, pretty much in perpetuity.

It's possible to be supportive of rail transport in the limited circumstances where it makes some kind of sense without resorting to bizarre delusions that road transport can end up as some demonised fringe activity. It is, and will remain, essential to an even basically functioning country.

 

[The Planner]

Lower Thames Crossing?? Costs around (or quite a bit more) HS2's Northern bit to Crewe.

Why should there be a focus on repairing infrastructure that is to a detriment of people's life rather than rail, which can have a more positive impact?

Lot more voting drivers than voting rail users.