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The case for NPR, sometimes erroneously known as HS3, has been growing ever since Sir David Higgins’ report on ‘Rebalancing Britain’ in 2014.
But what is NPR? And how will it align with HS2 phase 2b? NPR will be a high-capacity rail network, not high-speed in the sense of HS2, but sufficiently fast to drastically shrink travel times between the major cities and economic centres of the north and, in doing so, create an ‘agglomeration’ effect that will enable the north to perform as never before.
Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds, Sheffield, Hull and Newcastle will all be key nodal points on the network. NPR is being developed as a multi-nodal network rather than as just a fast linear route between east and west. It will be the backbone of the north’s first Strategic Transport Plan.
For TfN, and the 19 local authorities and 11 local enterprise partnerships that sit on its board, NPR is all about ‘outputs’ – conditional outputs that will guarantee train frequencies and journey times. These will be the drivers that shape the new network as it evolves over the next three decades.
Aligning NPR with HS2 will ensure that the full potential of both programmes can be realised, and that the north’s connections with the south get the boost they need at a time when capacity on the east and west coast main lines will reach the ‘critical’ point.
TfN has been working closely on examining the HS2/NPR touchpoints that need to be developed in advance of the HS2 phase 2b hybrid bill ‘design-freeze’ due to be locked in by the end of this year.
