why all the hate for hs2?

[thebennyboy]

I don't use the trains up here in Wales at all unless i'm going long distance, costs a lot of money and you're often forced to stand in a rush hour train with TWO COACHES!!!

Not everything revolves around ****ing London, it's an overcrowded **** hole.

 

[jonneymendoza]

I don't use the trains up here in Wales at all unless i'm going long distance, costs a lot of money and you're often forced to stand in a rush hour train with TWO COACHES!!!

Not everything revolves around ****ing London, it's an overcrowded **** hole.

Dont you start trolling and slating london please.

Londoners in this forum will bite back and have a field day slating your area.

Leave it out mate

 

[thebennyboy]

Dont you start trolling and slating london please.

Londoners in this forum will bite back and have a field day slating your area.

Leave it out mate

Ha, bring it on.

 

[do_ron_ron]

A massively expensive vanity project that will run well over time and budget. Business will love overcharging(as usual) the Govt project and the taxpayer will end up footing the bill for what will probably end up being cut back due to the expense. So you will get 20 mins earlier to the next queue. Better spending a fraction of the money on electrification of lines and new rolling stock.

 

[thebennyboy]

A massively expensive vanity project that will run well over time and budget. Business will love overcharging(as usual) the Govt project and the taxpayer will end up footing the bill for what will probably end up being cut back due to the expense. So you will get 20 mins earlier to the next queue. Better spending a fraction of the money on electrification of lines and new rolling stock.

Should be electrifying all existing lines before spending more on an already well served area.

 

[do_ron_ron]

Not everything revolves around ****ing London

Unfortunately, Govts of all shades seem to think it does. From projects to Lottery good causes money.

 

[Freefaller]

Crossrail 2 is a waste of time IMO.

its just a glorified version of the central line

I personally disagree - I think it will complete the awesome Crossrail project. Crossrail 1 is already going to be a huge step up for London. CRL 2 will just be the icing on the cake. And it will improve the connectivity of London to the suburbs, and to mainline stations. Meaning you're not going to have to live in overcrowded and loathesome London

I also did state however in my post that we need improved UK infrastructure. It's all very well and good having good metro services in London, Manchester etc... but if you can't get to those hubs quickly and efficiently it just pushes the bottlenecks elsewhere.

We still rely on our car to get to some places because they are too remote, or because the trains are too expensive, or because it is just as quick to take the car.

Unless there's a benefit people will not move to the train.

I've changed my behaviour in London though, I always use public transport in central London now unless I'm in suburbia as it is easier to drive.

I think HS2 is a step in the right direction, but potentially clumsily executed.

However I'm comparing it to the infrastructure in Europe which I've used extensively and find blissful to use.

 

[Murf]

I personally disagree - I think it will complete the awesome Crossrail project. Crossrail 1 is already going to be a huge step up for London. CRL 2 will just be the icing on the cake. And it will improve the connectivity of London to the suburbs, and to mainline stations. Meaning you're not going to have to live in overcrowded and loathesome London

I also did state however in my post that we need improved UK infrastructure. It's all very well and good having good metro services in London, Manchester etc... but if you can't get to those hubs quickly and efficiently it just pushes the bottlenecks elsewhere.

We still rely on our car to get to some places because they are too remote, or because the trains are too expensive, or because it is just as quick to take the car.

Unless there's a benefit people will not move to the train.

I've changed my behaviour in London though, I always use public transport in central London now unless I'm in suburbia as it is easier to drive.

I think HS2 is a step in the right direction, but potentially clumsily executed.

However I'm comparing it to the infrastructure in Europe which I've used extensively and find blissful to use.

The problem you have, is that the more capacity you install in London, the more companies move to London, the more capacity you need, the more you build, and then London is the only place a company can be based.

Liverpool -> Hull and improved links between Newcastle & Leeds, and proper investment in infrastructure for businesses would be a better long term solution for the country as a whole.

Hugely Skewed Investment

The 'Northern Powerhouse' is a total joke. Even if investment was simply equal per head in each region every part of the country other than London would benefit. And that would just be equalising the investment, not favouring the north to address the balance.

 

[bayo000]

Should be electrifying all existing lines before spending more on an already well served area.

Electrifying existing lines is expensive as well. It's not as easy as just putting some wires up and to get maximum benefit you need to redesign the track. It causes lots of disruptions. In some places brand new lines would be much better solution.

 

[Glaucus]

The problem you have, is that the more capacity you install in London, the more companies move to London, the more capacity you need, the more you build, and then London is the only place a company can be based.

Liverpool -> Hull and improved links between Newcastle & Leeds, and proper investment in infrastructure for businesses would be a better long term solution for the country as a whole.

Hugely Skewed Investment

The 'Northern Powerhouse' is a total joke. Even if investment was simply equal per head in each region every part of the country other than London would benefit. And that would just be equalising the investment, not favouring the north to address the balance.

The problem with that is, it's silly spending equal amounts. Its also annoying the north always plays the hard done by card. Public transport in the north is far better than anywhere in the south outside London.
Fact is the denser the population the more money needs to be spent on public transport and the more sense it makes. Its absolutely to spend it equally per head. And o have no interest in London and still agree on the spending.

And what most people miss in this thread about hs2 is its far more to do with capacity and we absolutely need that. Is it perfect? of course not, what government project is. However it is absolutely needed.

 

[Housey]

I think HS2 is too little and not enough move forward. We always do this in Britain.

Give me the same train service you give me today, add a few carriages for the norms so they don't have to push past me to get their seat and most of all, make sure I have quality network services end to end and you have fixed the issue.

Getting me to London 15 minutes earlier is of zero value and I am the business person that this service is aimed at, smack in their demographic. First class business traveller who works up north but commutes to the city of London.

Don't give me the "yea but it also means that London can come north" as that shows a total lack of reality. Look what happens when the tube breaks. Now try and get the Londons to have a meeting they can't get to on a tube or ideally, a 2 minute walk via Costa. London people expect you all to come to them, now they will expect you there quicker.

 

[Werewolf]

Electrifying existing lines is expensive as well. It's not as easy as just putting some wires up and to get maximum benefit you need to redesign the track. It causes lots of disruptions. In some places brand new lines would be much better solution.

Aye, people don't tend to realise that one some lines they might only be able to do 3-4 hours work a night without totally closing it down.

They did upgrades to the line near me and it took a year+ despite them being able to close some of the track as there was a second line running alongside.

Also if you put in new up to date lines you can get higher capacity on those lines, then shut down the old line and update it to the same standard at a later date if needed.

The network should really be a minimum of two lines each direction for every semi mainline route, preferably spaced far enough apart to allow for work on one set to be done without interrupting the other.
Unfortunately like a lot of the innovations the UK brought to the world, as we were the first we're stuck with stuff that isn't as good as some other countries simply because everyone learned lessons, and once you've already got a version of something in place it becomes very hard to persuade people that it's worth the cost to upgrade or replace it.
One of the reasons come countries are skipping copper phone lines entirely in some areas, as if you're laying new cabling anyway it's better to lay fibre (IIRC BT and VM aren't even doing that in the UK as standard).

 

[FishFluff]

Public transport in the north is far better than anywhere in the south outside London.
Fact is the denser the population the more money needs to be spent on public transport and the more sense it makes. Its absolutely to spend it equally per head. And o have no interest in London and still agree on the spending.

What a load of nonsense. Lets take Leeds for example. It's the biggest economy in the country outside of London and has no mass transit system. There was going to be one, but Westminster pulled the funding for it. Biggest city in Europe with no mass transit. We have to rely on buses and the roads are completely gridlocked most mornings/evenings.

If the government actually gave a crap about anywhere other than London then they'd move parliament to a northern city (especially since Westminster needs renovation anyway...). Or they could start with HS3 connecting Leeds - Manchester instead of spending 50bn and climbing on a line that will decrease journey times by about 20 minutes.

 

[dbmzk1]

It's a total waste of money - it's not ambitious enough. Too slow, too far out of many towns, no real advantage to anyone. 99% of people really don't care if they can get to London 10-20 mins faster than before.

What we need is a proper high speed (300mph+) inter-city service with east-west links as well as north-south, not a half baked London vanity project. But as usual the UK only does things in halfs.

 

[StriderX]

I don't get why we don't just go for maglev?

 

[Danthus]

I would prefer to see some of the money invested in digital infrastructure.

 

[Dis86]

I would prefer to see some of the money invested in digital infrastructure.

Would actually agree with that. The need for a physical commute in many cases just isn't there yet there's a huge focus on having bums on seats.
I could do 75% of my job easily from home however my company has a policy of working from home only in extreme circumstances.

 

[helpimcrap]

The money spent on a 1 off high speed rail link between 2 cities could be better spent.

Like investing into education for the future.....

This is just a show to say we can build high speed rail 'nearly' as good as the Japanese (Magnetic rail?) or the French (which is how many years old?). It means nothing. I'm not against the ability to do it, I just think we need to think about the bigger picture and simply connecting 2 cities is not worthwhile IMO.

 

[Housey]

I would prefer to see some of the money invested in digital infrastructure.

That is my argument. I want to be able to do stuff as I travel as I don't need to be in an office to get stuff done, I would suggest that is the same for most people who travel like I do often. I have wifi, but it's not brilliant and the phone signals would be much better, though I tend not to make calls on a train.

Give me the ability to work with solid internet and the extra 15 minutes is not wasted, but the billions they seek to use is. IF we need to do this, make it a 400mph system, not a 200mph system. THAT is progress that will last. London to Scotland 1 hour is what I will get excited about.

 

[Murf]

The problem with that is, it's silly spending equal amounts. Its also annoying the north always plays the hard done by card. Public transport in the north is far better than anywhere in the south outside London.
Fact is the denser the population the more money needs to be spent on public transport and the more sense it makes. Its absolutely to spend it equally per head. And o have no interest in London and still agree on the spending.

And what most people miss in this thread about hs2 is its far more to do with capacity and we absolutely need that. Is it perfect? of course not, what government project is. However it is absolutely needed.

More would still be spent on London. Just not per head. With your twisted logic we should invest every penny we have as a country in London as it's by far the most densely populated place?

It's a self perpetuating problem. Every additional pound invested in London increases the economic gap between London and everywhere else, so even more is invested.

The population gap between London and the rest of the UK is ridiculous. And far outstrips that of any other developed nation. It's bad for our economy as companies based outside of London can't recruit or retain staff due to London's economic gravity.

Crossrail cost more than all of the Northern infrastructure projects combined. ALL OF THEM.

Londoners get TWENTY FOUR times the amount spent per head on them than people in the North East. How on Earth are the regions meant to compete when they're already at a huge disadvantage, and don't even get a fair share of investment?