HS2, is it right for the UK?

wotsthat

shortchanged wrote: »

How would it help the UK be less London centric when all the routes are running to London? Unless there is the argument that people will continue to live in say Leeds and commute to London to work every day.

If, say, someone from China is looking to invest in Leeds they're almost certainly going to travel via London but they'll find the journey up country more civilised. If I was an investor and had to make multiple trips to monitor the investment the current options of driving (yeah right) or taking the train and smelling the toilets for a couple of hours that would make me think the UK weren't that interested in encouraging people to invest.

ILW

No, it's a waste of money and it could be better spent elsewhere.

It would be much cheaper to just set up a couple more (or expand) airports and let people fly. Requires very little infrastructue and is way more flexible.

wotsthat

michaels wrote: »

Wasn't the French experience that the rapid Paris-Lyon link actually sucked business that was done in Lyon away to Paris?

I don't really think we've got anything like a Lyon in the North of England to worry about. There can't be many countries that are so focused on the capital as the UK - just look at the number of big cities in France and Germany by comparison.

It just seems odd to me that a small country like the UK didn't consider better links from the North to London decades ago.

princeofpounds

Personally, I find it amazing that large infrastructure projects in this country are so expensive and so hard to build.

I don't know why this is the case, but so many other countries of all sorts of different types seem to find it far easier to get moving on things like this.

High Speed 2 Ltd was established in 2009 by Labour. 5 years later still nothing will have happened on the ground.

In those 5 years, Turkey has built ~500km of high speed rail and in the next 5 is likely to build another 1500km to 14 cities. Just an example.

Same goes for the airports. Or the key motorways. Or the underground.

Now I don't know which project is the best. But I do know that we make decisions on these projects too slowly, probably spend too much on them (I suspect on lawyers and consultants as much as anything else!).

We should be building something rather than nothing.

dotdash79

I think they should do phase 2 1st and then phase 1. It would give the northern hub cities a head start. Extra capacity for flights into Birmingham would help.

MFW_ASAP

Yes, the benefits to the UK are far too great to ignore.

shortchanged wrote: »

I'm willing to be persuaded if the case is certainly strong enough.

Yeah, like that will ever happen. Have you ever changed your mind about anything once you've decided which stance is in the negative?

MFW_ASAP

Yes, the benefits to the UK are far too great to ignore.

ILW wrote: »

It would be much cheaper to just set up a couple more (or expand) airports and let people fly. Requires very little infrastructue and is way more flexible.

I fly to Aberdeen every week and I can't tell you how much hassle it is to get through airport security. The guidelines are that you turn up an hour before the flight, more in high peak such as summer holidays. Who would turn up 1 hour early for a train ride with their toiletries in a clear bag and their shoes and belts stuck through an x-ray machine?

For those who are championing the current travel times for intercity trains, you seem to be forgetting that business meetings tend not to be held in Euston, Kings Cross, etc. so you have to add on perhaps anything up to an hour in tube travel and walking. Any time shaved off the travel time is helpful.

michaels

What is really interesting is that those whose politics I would say generally tend towards more ('big') govt, public sector provision (public transport good, unionised labour good) and public sector investment are the most sceptical whereas those who might be normally more in favour of individual responsibility and allowing the market to decde whether projects should go ahead are all for a massive public sector project.

There also seems to be an attempt to quash the debate, play the man not the ball etc by one poster which seems very odd. Personal (vested) interest involved?

I came up with a list of reasons why I am sceptical, so far only one has been addressed.

shortchanged_2

No, it's a waste of money and it could be better spent elsewhere.

MFW_ASAP wrote: »

For those who are championing the current travel times for intercity trains, you seem to be forgetting that business meetings tend not to be held in Euston, Kings Cross, etc. so you have to add on perhaps anything up to an hour in tube travel and walking. Any time shaved off the travel time is helpful.

As others have stated with the advancements in technologies over the coming years surely the need for actual face to face meetings can be reduced.

It would also be better for the environment which I'm sure is a major concern for you enviroman.

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

Yes, the benefits to the UK are far too great to ignore.

I don't have much of an opinion on this particular project.

I'll almost certainly never use it, but I'm sure many millions will.

But in general terms, more infrastructure = good.

Our current outdated infrastructure is inadequate, almost embarrassingly so.

We should be investing in all sorts of things, more roads, more rail, more airports, more broadband, more power generating capacity, etc.