I agree- the branding, marketing and PR has been terrible. The name "HS2" is bad enough but having a major part of the project called "Phase 2b" is insane. It makes it sound like an unimportant add-on, gives no indication of where the construction will be or what the benefits will be. Surely some imagination could have been used - the Great Yorkshire Line, or something like that.
Maybe that's a valid point about the Great British Public and their understanding of HS2.
But on this Forum, we are all railway enthusiasts, we can make our own mind up about the benefits of a scheme regardless of Government marketing - I manage to form an opinion about various railway schemes around the UK regardless of how they are "branded" - I'm not sure that railway enthusiasts are so ignorant that our view of a project depends on how the Government try to sell it to us?
East West Rail is planned to be a conventional line which will have intermediate stations giving local people along the route access to it, something HS2 won't do directly even if it does improve the service on lines that are relatively close. In addition, EWR does something new by giving access across that region and therefore can be seen to people as something better since it can be seen as helping local people and not just people in big cities like London and Birmingham
It's still a scheme in a wealthy part of the country that hasn't attracted any criticism as a result of that - and I say this as someone who supports the ideas of EWR - I think it's a good idea (though marginally sceptical of the kind of "Bristol to Cambridge" markets that people suggest will be a significant part of trade) - people seem fine with richer counties benefitting from an infrastructure project like this - but when HS2 comes along the reaction becomes "I'm against this because it won't do anything for poorer places like Merthyr Tydfil/ Hartlepool/ Methil".
Why the different reactions?
I think another thing that is overlooked is that all of this is banking on increasing passenger numbers, something which there is no guarantee of, especially since we've started to see them level off already in places
Will the capacity be needed in 50 years? Really? I'd say technology will make it less likely, not more
How come the technologies that mean HS2 isn't needed (as we'll all be working from home etc) and the reducing passenger numbers doesn't apply to other public transport projects?
Despite widespread/mainstream use of the internet for over twenty years, passenger numbers continued to rise and rise. Maybe they'll go back down one day, but it's weird how people only think this will affect HS2 passenger numbers (maybe the technological revolution won't affect all of the other lines that people suggest re-opening... electronic business practices and further automation will decimate HS2's business case but not the Leamside/ Woodhead/ BML2/ Waverley etc etc).
Some would argue the wasted capacity is empty trains. Do we really need 3tph to Birmingham and Manchester whilst other destinations receive less, like Liverpool or Glasgow?
I'm sure if those arch capitalists Branson/ Souter could make more money from doubling the Liverpool services (by reducing the Manchester services) then they would be lobbying for it.
The fact that Virgin have previously suggested a fourth (hourly) Manchester service suggests that Manchester is more attractive to them (however much some people may want a "parity").
I would argue that perhaps Curzon Street should have been built as a through station rather than as a terminus station allowing an extension to the west / southwest this could free up capacity between Birmingham and Leeds / York
My take on this is that HS2 are very keen to avoid "mission creep", i.e. they want to keep their costs relatively under control and not get lumbered with paying for all of the junctions/ additional infrastructure that may fit alongside their project (e.g. the cost of extending the NET to Toton, the cost of electrifying parallel routes).
Curzon Street looks like it's being built with scope to extend it onto "conventional" lines, but they don't want to pick up the tab for those costs.
Just an example of modern project management.
In the PRM era a 10 minute walk is not a connection
Given a four hundred metre length train, I think it'll be unavoidable to have some ten minute connections.
True, but people, especially outside the cities, have very real worries about the poor state of their local public transport and are right to question why there's money for big projects like HS2 but no money to replace crap Pacers or an evening bus service
We are replacing Pacers though.
