Why are things so expensive?

[eldomtom2]

I saw you interpreted it as a way to make yourself sound good, and not something to do with transport costs at all. What are you going to do about that?

I am genuinely baffled by this accusation. How am I "trying to make myself sound good"?

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Walsall was resignalled and the PSB closed in 2013. All at WMSCC at Saltley.

Fully resignalled or recontrolled?

 

[The Planner]

Fully resignalled or recontrolled?

Resignalled.

 

[Class 170101]

The buffet has been shut for a year.

I believe the plan is to knock it down carefully and relocate. It’s a listed building as part of the station.

Details of the plan for the cafe Huddersfield station cafe

This example from the TRU upgrade thread also adds to the expense where structures have to be either maintained, worked around or de-constructed and then re-constructed carefully elsewhere because Historic (Hysterical) England says so.

The builders of such original structures would probably just demolished them and not messed about in this way.

 

[Nicholas Lewis]

Resignalled.

Just needs a data update potentially for a running signal then if that crossover is located clear of the replacement station so £30m now feels excessive for a single face platform.

 

[sprunt]

the Elizabeth Line was one of the most expensive by kilometre urban rail projects in the world

It involved boring tunnels through an already heavily tunnelled area with marginal clearances between the new tunnels and existing infrastructure. It would be astonishing if it hadn't been at the high end of cost per km.

 

[eldomtom2]

One topic I do not see discussed on this forum very much, but one that is a common topic in other communities, is the high costs of transit projects in the UK. My primary motive in bringing this up is to bring arguments from other corners of the "transit community" here, so that the creation of echo chambers is avoided.

To summarize some of the key arguments of the "prosecution", the Transit Costs Project was a project by a group of primarily American academics to study causes of differing transport project costs between countries. Part of this study involved collecting information on transit projects and their costs from around the world. According to their data, the Elizabeth line and the Northern line extension to Battersea were some of the most expensive transit projects per kilometre ever built, with the Elizabeth line being the most expensive project per km in the dataset outside of the US and Hong Kong.

Another part of the study did the same for high-speed rail projects. The results here are far more damning for Britain - HS2 is far and away the most expensive HSR project per kilometre in their extensive database. And, of course, even ignoring international comparisons the cancellation of HS2 Phase 2 was justified on the grounds of its high costs.

The fundamental questions here is if these high costs are justified, what their causes are, and whether or not costs could be brought down. I am linking two blogposts - one by one of the academics in the Transit Costs Project - who argue that in light of the Phase 2 cancellation transit advocacy must have as one of its focuses bringing costs down:

High Speed 2 is (Partly) Canceled Due to High Costs

It’s not yet officially confirmed, but Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will formally announce that High Speed 2 will be paused north of Birmingham. All media reporting on this issue – BBC, R…

pedestrianobservations.com

It’s not yet officially confirmed, but Prime Minister Rishi Sunak will formally announce that High Speed 2 will be paused north of Birmingham. All media reporting on this issue – BBC, Reuters, Sky, Telegraph – centers the issue of costs; the Telegraph just ran an op-ed supporting the curtailment on grounds of fiscal prudence.

I can’t tell you how the costs compare with the benefits, but the costs, as compared with other costs, really are extremely high. The Telegraph op-ed has a graph with how real costs have risen over time (other media reporting conflates cost overruns with inflation), which pegs current costs, with the leg to Manchester still in there, as ranging from about £85 billion to £112 billion in 2022 prices, for a full network of (I believe) 530 km. In PPP terms, this is $230-310 million/km, which is typical of subways in low-to-medium-cost countries (and somewhat less than half as much as a London Undeground extension). The total cost in 2022 terms of all high-speed lines opened to date in France and Germany combined is about the same as the low end of the range for High Speed 2.

I bring this up not to complain about high costs – I’ve done this in Britain many times – but to point out that costs matter. The ability of a country or city to build useful infrastructure really does depend on cost, and allowing costs to explode in order to buy off specific constituencies, out of poor engineering, or out of indifference to good project delivery practices means less stuff can be built.

Britain, unfortunately, has done all three. High Speed 2 is full of scope creep designed to buy off groups – namely, there is a lot of gratuious tunneling in the London-Birmingham first phase, the one that isn’t being scrapped. The terrain is flat by French or German standards, but the people living in the rural areas northwest of London are wealthy and NIMBY and complained and so they got their tunnels, which at this point are so advanced in construction that it’s not possible to descope them.

Then there are questionable engineering decisions, like the truly massive urban stations. The line was planned with a massive addition to Euston Station, which has since been descoped (I blogged it when it was still uncertain, but it was later confirmed); the current plan seems to be to dump passengers at Old Oak Common, at an Elizabeth line station somewhat outside Central London. It’s possible to connect to Euston with some very good operational discipline, but that requires imitating some specific Shinkansen operations that aren’t used anywhere in Europe, because the surplus of tracks at the Parisian terminals is so great it’s not needed there, and nowhere else in Europe is there such high single-city ridership.

And then there is poor project delivery, and here, the Tories themselves are partly to blame. They love the privatization of the state to massive consultancies. As I keep saying about the history of London Underground construction costs, the history doesn’t prove in any way that it’s Margaret Thatcher’s fault, but it sure is consistent with that hypothesis – costs were rising even before she came to power, but the real explosion happened between the 1970s (with the opening of the Jubilee line at 2022 PPP $172 million/km) and the 1990s (with the opening of the Jubilee line extension at $570 million/km).

The Cancellation of HS2 North should be a warning.

High project costs take another victim. Regular reminder that I am but a humble Canadian, and while I am sad that HS2 to Manchester is dead, I am not directly impacted by it. Take my thoughts with …

reecemartin.ca

The big transit news of the week (at least out of Europe) is that the HS2 leg from Birmingham to Manchester and Crewe has been cancelled, and not gently — British PM Rishi Sunak did not mince words when he discussed stopping the project and having the “bravery” to do so.

This is obviously a hugely upsetting thing for people living in the UK’s north, advocates, and people who worked on the project — but perhaps even bigger from a global perspective is how the English-speaking world is losing any remaining semblance of being able to execute big projects quickly and cost effectively.

To be clear, I don’t necessarily buy the line being trotted out that “every penny will be invested in other transport projects” (especially because some of those are road projects!). I don’t think people have a lot of reasons to have faith in the current government, and it’s also not clear that any other projects would not have very similar structural problems to HS2. At the same time, I do agree with people like Gareth Dennis, who for years made the case that the media and the project itself did a poor job communicating its very real benefits. This was particularly true recently when members of the media in the UK talked about the project in such a way as to not distinguish the infrastructure from the service — this is common in public transport journalism and communications in North America, but you’d hope media across the pond would know better.

With that in mind, I do think it’s worth mentioning that despite the very real issues with the projects cancellation, it is and was very expensive, and at least on the face of it, the general argument structure that “this project is very expensive, we could do many other valuable things with the same amount of funding as this project is set to get!” is valid, even if the funding couldn’t actually be decoupled from a given project in that way. Prioritizing projects is probably optimally done based on their value, and a very expensive project’s value is often not very high compared to smaller interventions.

What I find interesting about HS2 is that unlike some projects out there, it’s not hard to see why the price is so high. The line has the same expensive urban tunnels and urban stations as with HS1, with even more tunnels in the countryside — so much so that the prices are comparable with some metro projects! For the most part, other high speed rail lines do not approach major cities (Tokyo, Paris, Shanghai, Berlin) in long tunnels, and despite HS2 planning to do just this, it will not through operate trains onto HS1, instead using a space hungry and expensive terminal at Euston — costs are increased but transportation benefits are not increased nearly as much.

There are also a lot of smaller things that clearly didn’t help the costs that feel like concessions to NIMBYs — for example, allowing people to sell homes near the route at cost; or to (anti-electric rail) environmentalists, such as through trying to go diesel-free at HS2 construction sites. While some of these policies feel like good ideas, the macro-level sanity test worth running is asking: “do we want more high speed rail, which will have a huge positive environmental impact but potentially also some additional one-time carbon emissions to build it?”. I know what my answer would be, and that’s because when you step back from the level of a single construction site, it’s pretty obvious that the positive climate impact of big green infrastructure is huge.

What’s crazy is that I don’t see a ton of discourse out of Britain discussing what feels like pretty blatant overbuilding and cost inflating decisions, especially when there are probably less expensive alternatives that could have been used, for example for getting trains into the capital — albeit ones that might have meant accepting lower speeds, or — gasp — elevated viaducts like those seen on the Shinkansen in the Tokyo Metropolitan area.

Now, reading a CityLab article on the topic a quote from the chair of HS2 stuck out to me: “[the British are] more responsible builders than the French”. It seems absolutely crazy to claim that decision making which makes for more expensive and riskier projects is “responsible” just because it placates NIMBYs and special interests — is Paris blighted by all of the TGV trains running into it on the surface from all sides?

[...]

A problem I often see when discussing these issues, particularly over around a decade of making YouTube videos, is that those trying to defend the status quo often look to micro-scale justifications for a project or intervention or simply the status quo being the way it is. A project had to be a certain way because of some specific technical constraint ad infinitum.

I actually think this is a pretty dishonest way of debating, and it leads to people missing the point. Saying “we needed to tunnel here!” but then seeing projects around the world in more or less comparable environments (you can see how localism and exceptionalism come in here — city X is nothing like city Y and could never learn from it), it seems pretty clear that on the macro-scale this is ridiculous.

Basically, these kind of debates suffer from the same fundamental issues that housing or transport does from NIMBYism: It’s very easy in all cases to identify a “fatal” issue or a specific thing for the dissenting side to take issue with, while the constructive side needs to assemble an argument based on things which are far more dispersed. Maybe you really do need one specific tunnel, but when you start saying you need to tunnel everything, I will raise both eyebrows.

And at the same time, as with many expensive projects in other parts of the world, those who are invested in the idea behind a project often grow stubbornly defensive of a particular instantiation of that project, often citing the “inevitability” of the current state of a project, despite it not being entirely clear that this was the only valid way to build. I think in general when it comes to politics and public works projects, supportive advocates too often fall prey to the common planner rebuttal “it’s impossible!”. So often, things are “impossible” until suddenly given different high-level direction they are not! The relevant example for HS2 might be that tunneling so much of the route to Birmingham was seen as necessary to satiate project opponents, but it’s not clear to me that 1) it was the only way to satiate them, and 2) they necessarily needed to be satiated. Of course, only the chosen alternative gets “tested” — “we build tunnels, NIMBYs don’t complain!” but of course, it’s also totally possible that trains could have run… above ground, like with the vast majority of the UK rail network, and people still mostly wouldn’t have complained.

[...]

Fortunately, there is something positive to take away from this. A big part of cost inflation in the English-speaking world seems to be our stubborn attitude towards slowly pushing hugely expensive projects forward without reforming them or trying to bring costs down. While a very strong desire to build stuff is clearly not the only reason we pay more for infrastructure, it doesn’t take much thinking to know why an “at any cost” attitude leads to… more costs!

The same problem is being faced all around the Anglosphere — big projects often with big benefits are coming back with huge price tags. Usually local advocates want these projects to go forward, even understanding the issues with high prices, because that’s a problem that has future implications. It’s a bit like an addiction: the desire to get something now leads to us sabotaging our future.

[...]

This brings us back to the top. Ultimately, high prices are bad, and I am growing sympathetic to calling them a “virus”. Had HS2 been half the price, I think it would be much less likely that it would be cancelled — the government would take just as much heat, but would be “unlocking” a lot less funding. At the same time, if the project was functionally the same but cost a lot less, its value (taken as benefits/costs) would be even higher — potentially by a multiple factor!

 

[RT4038]

So I looked at the data to compare the Elizabeth line - I discounted the countries where labour is going to be cheap and those places which are not old and densely packed, or where planning rules would probably be easier than London. Came out with more expensive (per km) projects in Singapore, Hong Kong, New York, Toronto, Auckland. I came to the early conclusion that it is pointless to be comparing a line cutting through Central London with lines in expanding Chinese or Middle Eastern cities where the circumstances (and the labour costs) will not be comparable.

 

[Bald Rick]

One factor in all of this is the exchange rate. Depending which expert you choose to listen to, the pound is somewhere between 13-17% undervalued on the currency markets. That alone is part of the reason.

 

[eldomtom2]

One factor in all of this is the exchange rate. Depending which expert you choose to listen to, the pound is somewhere between 13-17% undervalued on the currency markets. That alone is part of the reason.

The difference in cost of HS2 compared to other HSR projects is much much higher than 17%!

 

[Bald Rick]

The difference in cost of HS2 compared to other HSR projects is much much higher than 17%!

I didn’t say it was the whole reason. I said it was ‘a factor’.

 

[eldomtom2]

So I looked at the data to compare the Elizabeth line - I discounted the countries where labour is going to be cheap and those places which are not old and densely packed, or where planning rules would probably be easier than London. Came out with more expensive (per km) projects in Singapore, Hong Kong, New York, Toronto, Auckland. I came to the early conclusion that it is pointless to be comparing a line cutting through Central London with lines in expanding Chinese or Middle Eastern cities where the circumstances (and the labour costs) will not be comparable.

One of the blogposts responds to this argument:

A problem I often see when discussing these issues, particularly over around a decade of making YouTube videos, is that those trying to defend the status quo often look to micro-scale justifications for a project or intervention or simply the status quo being the way it is. A project had to be a certain way because of some specific technical constraint ad infinitum.

I actually think this is a pretty dishonest way of debating, and it leads to people missing the point. Saying “we needed to tunnel here!” but then seeing projects around the world in more or less comparable environments (you can see how localism and exceptionalism come in here — city X is nothing like city Y and could never learn from it), it seems pretty clear that on the macro-scale this is ridiculous.

Basically, these kind of debates suffer from the same fundamental issues that housing or transport does from NIMBYism: It’s very easy in all cases to identify a “fatal” issue or a specific thing for the dissenting side to take issue with, while the constructive side needs to assemble an argument based on things which are far more dispersed. Maybe you really do need one specific tunnel, but when you start saying you need to tunnel everything, I will raise both eyebrows.

And at the same time, as with many expensive projects in other parts of the world, those who are invested in the idea behind a project often grow stubbornly defensive of a particular instantiation of that project, often citing the “inevitability” of the current state of a project, despite it not being entirely clear that this was the only valid way to build. I think in general when it comes to politics and public works projects, supportive advocates too often fall prey to the common planner rebuttal “it’s impossible!”. So often, things are “impossible” until suddenly given different high-level direction they are not! The relevant example for HS2 might be that tunneling so much of the route to Birmingham was seen as necessary to satiate project opponents, but it’s not clear to me that 1) it was the only way to satiate them, and 2) they necessarily needed to be satiated. Of course, only the chosen alternative gets “tested” — “we build tunnels, NIMBYs don’t complain!” but of course, it’s also totally possible that trains could have run… above ground, like with the vast majority of the UK rail network, and people still mostly wouldn’t have complained.

 

[Zamracene749]

I‘d also like to who would build a ‘whole large house’ for £250k.

You might be surprised. Depends on the definition of large of course, but I was chatting to my builder/roofer recently about this exact thing. He reckoned on around 30-40k to put up a large detached 4 bedroom. Most of the expense is the roof cos that's labour intensive work.

 

[The exile]

You might be surprised. Depends on the definition of large of course, but I was chatting to my builder/roofer recently about this exact thing. He reckoned on around 30-40k to put up a large detached 4 bedroom. Most of the expense is the roof cos that's labour intensive work.

That presumably just being labour costs…. Even then I’d be interested to see all the associated paperwork!

 

[Bald Rick]

You might be surprised. Depends on the definition of large of course, but I was chatting to my builder/roofer recently about this exact thing. He reckoned on around 30-40k to put up a large detached 4 bedroom. Most of the expense is the roof cos that's labour intensive work.

I would be surprised. I received multiple quotes in the region of £500k to build one for me, and that was nearly a decade ago. Windows alone were £30-40k.

 

[Adrian1980uk]

It's all about standards, from paperwork to actual building standards. You can try comparing other countries but each has its own standard for building new. Take building a new station, energy efficiency standards aren't free, even standards for toilets, you cannot build a lean to block out the back of a station that have singular toilet, you have to provide a male, female and accessable toilet - all adds to cost. Not only do you have to build to them, you have to prove that they are accessible and to the correct standard all adds to cost

 

[eldomtom2]

It's all about standards, from paperwork to actual building standards. You can try comparing other countries but each has its own standard for building new. Take building a new station, energy efficiency standards aren't free, even standards for toilets, you cannot build a lean to block out the back of a station that have singular toilet, you have to provide a male, female and accessable toilet - all adds to cost. Not only do you have to build to them, you have to prove that they are accessible and to the correct standard all adds to cost

Well maybe we should be looking at standards and seeing which ones impose unnecessary costs, then.

 

[The exile]

even standards for toilets, you cannot build a lean to block out the back of a station that have singular toilet, you have to provide a male, female and accessable toilet - all adds to cost.

I suspect a single gender-neutral accessible cubicle would satisfy the standards- but probably not public exoectations.

 

[Adrian1980uk]

I suspect a single gender-neutral accessible cubicle would satisfy the standards- but probably not public exoectations.

That is the other factor, public expectations

 

[Annetts key]

Worth saying the recent Portway Park and Ride station in Bristol cost almost £6m and that was as simple as you can get really - one platform on an existing single track line without any track or signalling upgrades (as far as I am aware).

I'm comparison, the still in build Ashley Down station in Bristol which will be two platforms with a bridge and lifts etc and which required fairly significant trackwork is budgeted to cost, alongside the yet to be built Filton North and Henbury stations and the associates trackwork for those (the track currently exists but as freight only so not sure how much has to be done there) is budgeted for about £70m in total.

So I'd agree £30m for one single platform station does seem on the high side!

Portway did include providing a new signal to replace an existing signal, this replacement signal is located in a different position and hence the track circuits and TPWS also required alterations.

As I understand it, the works for Ashley Down station also include relocating a signal. But I don't have any further details.

In both cases, the signalling work added/will add considerably to the cost of these schemes.

It would be interesting to understand why that is the case. Snobbery around being a tradesman, as opposed to something more “middle class”, perhaps?

Over the course of a career people are generally going to be considerably better off learning a trade, than taking on a huge student loan to do a joke degree at an ex poly, for example.

From a Network Rail perspective, they are in some areas, struggling to retain and recrute engineering staff. The younger staff especially, are finding other jobs that pay a similar amount for jobs that don't involve the same amount of shift/night/weekend working compared to what Network Rail now want them to do.

There is a crossover in the Aldrige area already although its probably not signalled for passenger moves so would need a change to the interlocking and if its still the relay based system from Walsall PSB probably not modifiable so thats a few million just for a repalcement.

Alterations to a RRI (route relay interlocking) to add an addtional crossover would likely cost more than the alterations required to change the existing freight only arrangements to make them suitable for passenger trains.

Just needs a data update potentially for a running signal then if that crossover is located clear of the replacement station so £30m now feels excessive for a single face platform.

If alterations to signals or addtional signals are needed, and/or track circuit/axle counter changes are needed, or the provision of point operating equipment with FPLs and supplementry detection to current standards is required, then it's not just a data change.

Without knowing the details of the existing and the details of the proposal, its very hard to be certain...

 

[Zamracene749]

I would be surprised. I received multiple quotes in the region of £500k to build one for me, and that was nearly a decade ago. Windows alone were £30-40k.

I'm more surprised! What on earth were you planning on building? 30K for windows? I just had some standard 6' by 4' uPVC fitted for 500 per unit. All above board etc, not mates rates either.

That presumably just being labour costs…. Even then I’d be interested to see all the associated paperwork!

Well, I'm no quantity surveyor, but I do know some. I'm going off a casual conversation, with people in the trade because I was considering rebuilding my own home rather than repairing it. 40k for materials, plus around 15k for labour were the ballpark figures. That's to rebuild a 5 bedroom detached dormer bungalow. Allowing for inevitable problems, even doubled that isnt bad. I wonder if the quotes yourself and Bald Rick have had were inflated by the builders due to the much higher resulting property values in the south? Sorry if this has drifted off topic.

 

[Bald Rick]

I'm more surprised! What on earth were you planning on building? 30K for windows? I just had some standard 6' by 4' uPVC fitted for 500 per unit. All above board etc, not mates rates either.

Thats fitting only, right? As the windows themselves are north of £400 a pop (at Wickes, at least). Even then, £500 per window fitting is essentially two person days for the job (and very cheap rates for that too, standard trader rates around here start at £300 / day, and twice that for some trades, eg plumbers)

Going back just over a quarter of a century ago, I paid £700 for a new bay window all in for my house in an inner suburb of a regional city. Paid in cash, no questions asked, and somewhat cheaper than the quotes I was getting from recognised traders. That £750 is the equivalent of £1800 now. For one bay window. The two sets of bi-folds I have here cost £6k to buy a decade ago, and installation took 4 guys (and me) one very long day…

I'm going off a casual conversation, with people in the trade because I was considering rebuilding my own home rather than repairing it. 40k for materials, plus around 15k for labour were the ballpark figures.

It must be an April Fool a few days early! £15k labour to build a house

 

[Kingston Dan]

The difference in cost of HS2 compared to other HSR projects is much much higher than 17%!

My understanding is HS2 costs includes rolling stock - which is not a comparator with international projects of a similar nature. Phase 1 also included miles of unnecessary tunelling to assuage Chiltern NIMBYs. The phase that has been cancelled is the cheapest and most comparable to European HSR.

 

[Zamracene749]

Thats fitting only, right? As the windows themselves are north of £400 a pop (at Wickes, at least). Even then, £500 per window fitting is essentially two person days for the job (and very cheap rates for that too, standard trader rates around here start at £300 / day, and twice that for some trades, eg plumbers)

Going back just over a quarter of a century ago, I paid £700 for a new bay window all in for my house in an inner suburb of a regional city. Paid in cash, no questions asked, and somewhat cheaper than the quotes I was getting from recognised traders. That £750 is the equivalent of £1800 now. For one bay window. The two sets of bi-folds I have here cost £6k to buy a decade ago, and installation took 4 guys (and me) one very long day…



It must be an April Fool a few days early! £15k labour to build a house

You suggested 500k to build a house, years ago. Odd that, when even now you can buy a large 4/5 bed house new, including the land that it's on, for around 350k. Presumably these people make a 200k loss on every home? Oh and happy 1st April if you think 500 quid fitting per window is a bargain Here's a link to a website, dated December 2023, that lays out the expected cost of window fitting https://www.checkatrade.com/blog/cost-guides/window-fitting-cost/

As an aside, regarding the ridculous prices paid by big corporations, when I started work for ICI in 1988, they used to use 'butchers' bikes to get around the sites. My eyes were opened wide when mine got a puncture. In those days of protected trades, I wasn't allowed to fix it because it was classed as fitting work, not my trade at the time. But, the fitters weren't trained or approved to work on bicycles. So, the bicycle disappeared for a few weeks, then returned, duly patched.
The invoice? £90. From a local 'approved' cycle shop. In 1988!

 

[Bald Rick]

Odd that, when even now you can buy a large 4/5 bed house new, including the land that it's on, for around 350k.

Not round here there isn’t. There ‘s a large, new, 4 bedroom house for sale not far from me. £2m. The land cost £700k, and the build was more than that again (I spoke to the builder).

There’s no 4 bedroom houses of any size within 15 miles of where I live for sale at less than £400k, new or otherwise.

 

[Zamracene749]

Not round here there isn’t. There ‘s a large, new, 4 bedroom house for sale not far from me. £2m. The land cost £700k, and the build was more than that again (I spoke to the builder).

There’s no 4 bedroom houses of any size within 15 miles of where I live for sale at less than £400k, new or otherwise.

Agreed, the location makes a hell of a difference, in particular when it comes to land. Local to me (Co Durham) there are 4 bed new builds going for 330k (Miller homes), some with 16k deposit paid! Second hand, prices are similar. Understandably, construction material has shot up in price since the Ukraine crisis due to energy costs, but even allowing for that those prices are eye watering for any young couple starting out. Some of the younger lads I worked with were taking out 40 year mortgages. I honestly feel for them!

 

[PyrahnaRanger]

Thats fitting only, right? As the windows themselves are north of £400 a pop (at Wickes, at least). Even then, £500 per window fitting is essentially two person days for the job (and very cheap rates for that too, standard trader rates around here start at £300 / day, and twice that for some trades, eg plumbers)

Going back just over a quarter of a century ago, I paid £700 for a new bay window all in for my house in an inner suburb of a regional city. Paid in cash, no questions asked, and somewhat cheaper than the quotes I was getting from recognised traders. That £750 is the equivalent of £1800 now. For one bay window. The two sets of bi-folds I have here cost £6k to buy a decade ago, and installation took 4 guys (and me) one very long day…



It must be an April Fool a few days early! £15k labour to build a house

I think there must be a large southern uplift in those prices - last window I had fitted (uPVC frame, double glazed) was around the 300 quid mark for the living room. Our composite front door was less than 500!

 

[CAF397]

Whatever happened to the Network Rail modular station plan to reduce the cost of new stations?

showcase for modular construction developed in-house by UK infrastructure manager Network Rail, which is seeking an economical way to build new stations or rebuild existing facilities.

Railway Gazette: Modular station opens this month

 

[Broucek]

I think there must be a large southern uplift in those prices - last window I had fitted (uPVC frame, double glazed) was around the 300 quid mark for the living room. Our composite front door was less than 500!

Oh yes.....

But then those Southern builders have Southern living costs of their own and demand is high

 

[eldomtom2]

My understanding is HS2 costs includes rolling stock - which is not a comparator with international projects of a similar nature.

I've often heard this claimed but I've never actually seen a specific source for it. Do you have one?