why all the hate for hs2?

I am always conscious of not being too critical of stuff I know little about, not least stuff as massively complex as national infrastructure. But HS2 seems to have been a monumental cluster thingy from the start. It is massively complex, but our inability to budget for national infrastructure is crazy. Make a budget, make a worst case, triple the worst case and that's your budget....just dont tell anyone.
 
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I think its good news, since the cancellation my local area has had announcements for some actual useful transport infrastructure from diverted funds, not just for a fast luxury train passing through the region.

Apparently the message hasnt filtered down though, expensive houses are still being purchased on the cancelled route.

Interlinking east-west, and expanding capacity of existing routes is a far better bet, not sure what was going through people's heads when HS2 was devised. We need to push economy away from London not towards it.
 
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chrcoluk said:
I think its good news, since the cancellation my local area has had announcements for some actual useful transport infrastructure from diverted funds, not just for a fast luxury train passing through the region.

Apparently the message hasnt filtered down though, expensive houses are still being purchased on the cancelled route.

Interlinking east-west, and expanding capacity of existing routes is a far better bet, not sure what was going through people's heads when HS2 was devised. We need to push economy away from London not towards it.
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So far the announcement has been the typical mess of deliberate lies and nonsense.

He announced "new" routes that had been announced before, he announced "new routes" that were under already work, and "new routes" that had already been in place in some cases for nearly 10 years, whilst others on his list have been quietly removed so the only proof they existed is now archives of the page and copies of the speech where it may have mentioned them.

I'll be amazed if frankly a tiny fraction of what he's said is going to be spent on "alternatives" gets spent on them given either he or someone directly under him seems to have been pulling names of stations and old proposed projects out of the hat.

The reason why it hasn't "filtered down" is apparently he didn't even discuss this with the cabinet, or Network Rail, let alone the civil servants who will continue acting under their last officially received and documented instructions (as they legally have to do) until they've received new instructions that have come down the proper channels not a press conference or a party speech without any assent or approval of cabinet let alone parliament on record.
 
Housey said:
I am always conscious of not being too critical of stuff I know little about, not least stuff as massively complex as national infrastructure. But HS2 seems to have been a monumental cluster thingy from the start. It is massively complex, but our inability to budget for national infrastructure is crazy. Make a budget, make a worst case, triple the worst case and that's your budget....just dont tell anyone.
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It's not complex it's a bloody Trainline with limited stops.

What is complicated is the cluster #### of nimbys and lawyers milking the system.

Compulsory at X market price. If shenanigans were found at a later date then said people go to prison for 15 years minimum. No appeals no it's no buts. If at a even later date then family assets are to be stripped no if's no buts this stands for 75 years after that the world has moved on.
 
Werewolf said:
So far the announcement has been the typical mess of deliberate lies and nonsense.

He announced "new" routes that had been announced before, he announced "new routes" that were under already work, and "new routes" that had already been in place in some cases for nearly 10 years, whilst others on his list have been quietly removed so the only proof they existed is now archives of the page and copies of the speech where it may have mentioned them.

I'll be amazed if frankly a tiny fraction of what he's said is going to be spent on "alternatives" gets spent on them given either he or someone directly under him seems to have been pulling names of stations and old proposed projects out of the hat.

The reason why it hasn't "filtered down" is apparently he didn't even discuss this with the cabinet, or Network Rail, let alone the civil servants who will continue acting under their last officially received and documented instructions (as they legally have to do) until they've received new instructions that have come down the proper channels not a press conference or a party speech without any assent or approval of cabinet let alone parliament on record.
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It's going to be the exact same situation, only with multiple projects instead of one.

Announce x "new" projects to spend the HS2 money on. Watch as costs for each of them increase.

Cancel some of those projects. End up building x/10 fewer projects and only deliver 1/3 as much as promised even of those that still go ahead.

This is the way. So long as some Tory donor is raking it in, does it really matter whether anything succeeds or not? If failure is still profitable for the company that will employ you after you quit as an MP, then who cares?
 
Werewolf said:
So far the announcement has been the typical mess of deliberate lies and nonsense.

He announced "new" routes that had been announced before, he announced "new routes" that were under already work, and "new routes" that had already been in place in some cases for nearly 10 years, whilst others on his list have been quietly removed so the only proof they existed is now archives of the page and copies of the speech where it may have mentioned them.

I'll be amazed if frankly a tiny fraction of what he's said is going to be spent on "alternatives" gets spent on them given either he or someone directly under him seems to have been pulling names of stations and old proposed projects out of the hat.

The reason why it hasn't "filtered down" is apparently he didn't even discuss this with the cabinet, or Network Rail, let alone the civil servants who will continue acting under their last officially received and documented instructions (as they legally have to do) until they've received new instructions that have come down the proper channels not a press conference or a party speech without any assent or approval of cabinet let alone parliament on record.
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Possibly, but in my area, when HS2 was announced various projects were scrapped as the money was to be used on HS2 instead, local news is reporting reactivation of these projects and local funding that can be bid on for further projects as well.

Whilst HS2 merely passed through the region with no stops (because they were obsessed with limited stops mantra) so absolute no benefit to the local economy whatsoever, Whilst having record ££ per mile costs.

Of course other projects will suffer probably from their own inflated costs, but at least they wont be projects just aimed at a couple of cities and the capital.
 
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The estimated cost of the HS2 line from London to Birmingham has ballooned to as much as £66bn, the scheme’s executive chair has told MPs.

Jon Thompson told the transport select committee on Wednesday that the current estimate for the first phase of the line could add “between £8bn and £10bn” to the current top-end estimate of £56.6bn.

The government currently has a policy in which it only updates the prices for big infrastructure projects at spending reviews, meaning the HS2 phase 1 cost has stayed at a level put forward in September 2019, when Sajid Javid was chancellor.
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Cost of materials can't be avoided but twice the original budget, the same cost as the 'next' estimated cost and all for one part of it.

Could we see the exact same thing happen with the London to Brum phase (start creeping back up to nearly £100bn)?
 
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SpellowHouse said:
If the government had a clue it would probably cost half that.
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No one in politics is interesting in fighting the good fight regarding planning reform because it is guaranteed to make you unpopular. Politics is run by moral cowards and no one will do what is right. The Thames lower crossing has already spent £250m on the planning process without a spade seeing the ground. We wrap ourselves in knots with inquiries, environmental reviews etc and wee money away. The whole lot needs a radical overhaul so decisions stay made rather than the constant churn we currently labour under.

The failure of HS2 has been 50 years in the making with every Government failing to do what was needful. We will never close the productivity gap whilst any investment is so fraught with cost.
 
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Liefrich said:
I don't like Spiked but that article is decent. Do we have a source for those figures about the DEI managers being paid £200k a pop? I've had a look, but her link goes to the Sun website which doesn't really provide them...
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Agghhhh you made me click on that and read it..

They reference the £8M PR team with a 'Sun' article (https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/24224581/hs2-staff-pr-department-costs-eight-million-year/), if you read that, it says "Three of them are working on woke training in their £200,000-a-year Equality, Diversity and Inclusion team, with a vacancy for a fourth."
Sounds like all three's salaries = £200,000..

You should know by now that all extremes of media are shady as hell, this is a double combo of referencing The Sun as your source for facts and then misreading it.. LOL

I don't have anytime for DEI idiocy, but you can't overblow it like this as if it's some significant factor..
 
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I don't know about the details of this increase, but it's inevitable that there would be some cost increase after scrapping the northern sections of HS2 whatever else happened. Any necessary investment in skills and equipment etc to deliver new sections of railway will need to be recouped over a smaller project, and the risk factor for the project which was probably already high has been raised again.
 
Demon said:
Agghhhh you made me click on that and read it..

They reference the £8M PR team with a 'Sun' article (https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/24224581/hs2-staff-pr-department-costs-eight-million-year/), if you read that, it says "Three of them are working on woke training in their £200,000-a-year Equality, Diversity and Inclusion team, with a vacancy for a fourth."
Sounds like all three's salaries = £200,000..

You should know by now that all extremes of media are shady as hell, this is a double combo of referencing The Sun as your source for facts and then misreading it.. LOL

I don't have anytime for DEI idiocy, but you can't overblow it like this as if it's some significant factor..
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I agree with your points and I certainly would never trust the Sun or Spiked. I'm all in for just building it properly as originally intended. Massive infrastructure projects in advanced democracies on small islands where the value of land is high are always going to cost astronomical amounts. But if we can't build this, what can we build? What have we built in the last 25 years (other projects in London)?
 
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