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HS2 General Thread (all phases/discussion)

4M views 32K replies 616 participants last post by  passiv 
G
#1 ·
Just thought I'd see if anybody thinks about this subject as much as I do and if anyone had ideas as to what they'd like to see under this name.

I think the best place for it's London terminus will be St Pancras but how I wonder.

Can see two options possible:

1) an annex on the west side of the existing station

Advantages being more platforms but high speed trains would be blocked from easy interchange with the Eurostars by the Midland Mianline tracks acting as a kind of barrier.

2) an annex on the east side

Infinitley more difficult but with the advantage being Eurostars and domestic HST's would be in the same area of the station.

As for the line itself, the seemingly obvious place to start is using the North London line for relatively low speed running (say about 160-220km/h) through urban London. Although I'm not sure if that single track connection from HS1 would end up being a problem capacity wise.

There would need to be another line going under the current St Pancras-NLL chord and onto the NLL. Think of it like the soon to be opened St Pancras-HS1 layout with the two running tracks going over/under each other.

A station at Willesden Junciton (see my other thread) would be good I reckon and from here the line continues at classic line speeds to Denham before the new High Speed formation breaks away.

Then to get a bit more basic from here the line should go to Coventry Parkway-Birmingham International-Lichfield Trent Valley-Stoke-Stockport-Manchester Eastlands-Preston-Carlisle.......then up to a triangle junction in the Scottish Central belt with links to Glasgow and Edinburgh.

Obviously there would be branches to Liverpool (from Stoke), Leeds (from Manchester) and Derby, Sheffield, Doncaster, York, Teeside & Newcastle (from Birminghm International).

Sorry to go on but it would be good to hear what others think, it might be an irrelevant discussion knowing this Government but it's always interesting to talk about it.
 
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#103 · (Edited)
Before I take time out to get stuck in fully on the main substance of this thread, may I must just correct your Thatcherite Conservative party political propagada. Many of the major road schemes including some of the London North Circular and A40 ones were scrapped by the Conservatives well before Labour took office in 1997, so don't blame Labour for that at least.
No, that is incorrect. The Highways agency was proceeding and funding had been allocated in the last Budget under the Major government. When Labour came in they scrapped these two projects, to the dismay of most us in North and West London.

As for your comments about 'third world' re the North Circular, surely that comment best applies to the sections of the NCR where major 'improvements' (for the motorist) have been carried out while leaving communities more severed than ever, luckless householders fronting 6 or more lanes of roaring high speed (at least off-peak) traffic, and equally luckless bus passengers waiting (often in the rain and spray, and in some cases with no shelter whatever) for the inadequate sub-bog-standard bus 'services' in this corridor.

It's a characteristic of third world dictatorships to force such 'prestige' infrastructure schemes through and sod the details and the ordinary local punters.
Apologies for being so direct, but this paragraph shows you are not at all aware of the situation. The relevant councils along the A406 largely support the upgrade as planned under the Conservatives and oppose the "tart-up job" as pushed through by Ken Livingstone and TfL. The original plan would put large parts in tunnels / underpasses and therefore stitch together the communities again, at the same time introduce parkland lining of the overground parts (by demolishing derelict houses). Many cities have large parts of their inner-city highways in tunnels so there is no reason why this cannot be done in the UK. Also, the local councils want the capacity to be increased (more lanes and no traffic lights but tunnels) such that the local rat races stop.

Have though to agree generally with your comments re HSR vs on-line upgrade, except that both are now needed in many cases.
Thank you :)
 
#104 ·
4) The flights from Manchester are normally connecting to long-haul flights to Heathrow. Many of those passengers are not destined for London at all. Flights to airports other than Heathrow are also a lot cheaper as they are with low cost airlines.
So what's wrong with HSR train/Heathrow connection? Sure they will have less chances to miss the connection due to poor weather etc. apart from other benefits being discussed on this thread.
 
#105 ·
So what's wrong with HSR train/Heathrow connection? Sure they will have less chances to miss the connection due to poor weather etc. apart from other benefits being discussed on this thread.
Nothing is wrong with an HSR connection to Heathrow per se. I simply dispute the assertion made earlier that all of the traffic on London to Manchester flights could be stolen by construction of a high speed line. From city centre to city centre it's already much faster by train. Similarly I bet much of the London to Paris air traffic is people transferring to long haul flights from the other city.
 
#106 ·
Nothing is wrong with an HSR connection to Heathrow per se. I simply dispute the assertion made earlier that all of the traffic on London to Manchester flights could be stolen by construction of a high speed line. From city centre to city centre it's already much faster by train. Similarly I bet much of the London to Paris air traffic is people transferring to long haul flights from the other city.
Time is not the decider in most peoples travel plans. It is cost.

My parents are both pensioners and when they visit me they fly from Manchester to London because it is cheaper.

And that is ridiculous.
 
#107 ·
Time is not the decider in most peoples travel plans. It is cost.

My parents are both pensioners and when they visit me they fly from Manchester to London because it is cheaper.

And that is ridiculous.
And that is what you should blame this government for.

Instead of providing capacity, they reduce demand by increasing fares. It is even not a question of how much tax money they are prepared to spend on it. For instance, if the Central Railway, which does not need a penny of government money, got green light, many of the other north-south rail connections would get space freed up for more passenger trains, creating more capacity and therefore reducing fares.

Indecision by this government on tranport schemes is what your parents are paying for.

And if you have not yet bought a house, chances are high you are paying for it a second time as a result of the huge demand-supply inbalance in any urban centre and the area within commuting distance, which again is a result of failing planning and the inability by this government to provide tranport infrastructure to unlock brownfield and other sites and to bring larger areas within commuting distance.
 
#110 ·
So you do not want brownfield sites to be cleaned up and redeveloped and instead all space for urban development to be taken from green areas?
They can never be properly cleaned up, they need to be left for years. Developers should concentrate on producing high quality high density housing. The Notting Hill set probably live ata higher density than your average Wimpey Home dwellor. Too much space in this country is being taken up by the car.

Bring back tall narrow terraced houses and grid iron street plans, toss away curvy lanes and cul-de-sacs.
 
#111 ·
The LHR rail link is overdue IMO -- think of all the space they could free up for long hauls if they took most domestic demand, Paris and Brussels onto the rails -- and its a much more pleasant journey too.

Its ridiculous that the UK is so far behind in rail terms ....even the lowly USA (progress in rail)will be way ahead of you soon with their new HSR link in california soon to be approved. I mean you are behind places like Taiwan, Spain, etc... much smaller economies.. Its only a matter of time or a matter of politican change IMO before HSR is built, conventional or maglev..
 
#112 ·
indeed if you want to see why it costs so much then look at my posts earlier in the thread where i actually work out how much of each ticket assuming it costs the average goes to the govt and gner as profit on the east coast mainline. over 50% of the cost is returned to the govt and company running the franchise... of course this money isnt spent on the railways - £26.34 out of every £51.50! sums generated are enough to literally pay for the entire line to be upgraded to TGV quality south of york entirely out of profits. so why dont they? if in ten years time the ECML alone makes almost £400 million to give back to the govt per year you can see that some railways arent really being subsidised at all.
the new rail franchises have been completely disasterous btw. i hear that FGW have had such problems that on one day 700 trains were cancelled!
 
#113 ·
The LHR rail link is overdue IMO -- think of all the space they could free up for long hauls if they took most domestic demand, Paris and Brussels onto the rails -- and its a much more pleasant journey too.
Sorry that would be hardly any space. There are relatively few flights to Heathrow from Paris, Brussels, and places like Manchester that could feasably be repaced by rail.
Its ridiculous that the UK is so far behind in rail terms ....even the lowly USA (progress in rail)will be way ahead of you soon with their new HSR link in california soon to be approved.
I'll believe the California HSR link when I see it. By contrast CTRL is up and running at 300km/h right now! I believe London's rail transit alone handles more traffic than all passenger rail in the US combined.
I mean you are behind places like Taiwan, Spain, etc... much smaller economies.. Its only a matter of time or a matter of politican change IMO before HSR is built, conventional or maglev.
Spain has the fastest high speed trains in the world - so everyone, not just Britain, is behind Spain. Taiwan's HSR track operates at the same speed as the CTRL and opened later.
 
#114 · (Edited)
Gothicform said:
indeed if you want to see why it costs so much then look at my posts earlier in the thread where i actually work out how much of each ticket assuming it costs the average goes to the govt and gner as profit on the east coast mainline. over 50% of the cost is returned to the govt and company running the franchise... of course this money isnt spent on the railways - £26.34 out of every £51.50! sums generated are enough to literally pay for the entire line to be upgraded to TGV quality south of york entirely out of profits. so why dont they? if in ten years time the ECML alone makes almost £400 million to give back to the govt per year you can see that some railways arent really being subsidised at all.
the new rail franchises have been completely disasterous btw. i hear that FGW have had such problems that on one day 700 trains were cancelled!
I don't fully think the problem is privatisation so much as a lack of it. At one point, at the start of privatisation the TOC's had reasonable scope to choose service frequency, routes, stops etc to maximise their profits etc (and so reduce the need for subsidy). Then, slowly but surely, the govt crept back in and started stipulating certain routes, certain frequencies even certain fares etc and any impetus to innovate was lost. TOCs came up with ideas for infrastructure improvement only to have them shelved and now and things like the WCML were delivered late and under specification. No wonder they don't innovate any more and no wonder they don't invest their profits in anything the govt has its finger in - the investment isn't seen as safe. GNER has little incentive to invest in infrastructure if its franchise is too short and if it has to pay huge premiums to the govt and has little scope to operate how it wants to and in a best-business-practice way. They need to give GNER and other TOCs a greater stake in the infrastrucutre and railways in general so long term progress can be made. If they ain't prepared to privitise properly then they should just renationalise IMO.
 
#116 ·
Plus when it was originally privatised the the system of having railtrack doing one bit and the tocs doing another, along with the fact that railtrack didn't do it's bit very effectively has led to a big delay in the whole exercise getting to anything like profitability which has in turn led less excitement in any kind of innovation. I think it is right that the government get involved in stipulating service levels - but mainly at the level that they review utilisation of routes. An example would be the idea of changing the Gatwick Express altogether as it is a horrendous use of resources and places strains on the other operators. But I agree with you - in that example I have just used I think that GoVia (or whoever has the franchise) should take over all services on that route (except marginal enroachments from First Great Western and Virgin XC) including Thameslink, and then be allowed to work out what they think is best to a much larger degree. (Thameslink's TOC should still be different from MML as north of london there is not that much operating conflict between them). There are many little tweaks that could be made like this and have been put forward by the DfT - but due to the franchise system implementation will require the expiration of contracts (I think Gatwick Express has not been reviewed for this reason actually).
The wider point of infrastructure and services - yes I think too they should be linked again. It would be more efficient use of resources if the TOCs could make a decision e.g. new stock - get these and lengthen platforms and put in this services or get those and implement that service and electrify this bit of track. TOCs could justify infrastructure upgrades with a new service proposal that they could work out just like the old days beofre nationalisation. TOCs would want a new express service and add loops or flyovers etc. This is still available as an option today of course, as Virgin's ECML bid, but the process involvs so much umming and aaghing from thousands of different organisations it is more costly to think about and slower to implement.
 
#117 ·
I'm not sure what the idealised structure of the railways is but I know it involves less govt than at present. I think Network Rail as a not-for-profit quasi-public infrastructure body is perhaps OK. It should have essentially long-term guardianship of the railways and it should perhaps be the one to decide on Franchises. Fees charged to operators could vary depending on the investment which those operators put into the railway infrastrucutre - eg Virgin charged less on the ECML if it funded the new HSL infrastrucutre - so Network rail might lose income but it gains an asset. Franchises of 25-30 years I think would be appropriate taking into account the approximate life-cycle of High Speed rolling stock and the time it would take to build infrastructure and recoup from it.

Roughly speaking without thinking too much about the ins and outs I think essentially there should be an infrastructure guardian who owns all stations and track etc and is relatively (if not wholly?) independent of govt. Operators on 25/30 year franchises then place bids to run services on bits of this network and this bid is negotiated with Network Rail on the basis of just two things -

*Firstly infrastructure, where operators decide what they would like built for their franchise and which, where possible, they largely agree to fund in return for lower or even zero access fees. Network Rail must give priority over this new infrastrucutre to the funder but may allow other operators to use it (for a fee) where its capacity is unused. In this way you may even get several TOCs in consortium to jointly fund new infrastructure on the basis that it is shared (though i suppose you then run into franchise timing issues). This puts planning largely in the hands of operators and takes it from govt. This might allow an operator to place a bid to run HSR on a yet unbuilt line which they build-operate and transfer in conjuction with NR???

*The second basis for negotiation is access fees, they negotiate over the price of the infrastrucutre. This price might reflect subsidies offered by the government (how these are decided I'm not sure about) and the amount they have invested in the infrastructure. If you really wanted to simplify things I guess you could have NR and the operators deciding what infrastructure to build, NR funds and builds it itself and then factors this into the prices/rents it charges the operator (all of which decided at the start of the franchise). I suppose this makes it a not-for-profit Railtrack but the partnership between it and the operators should be more substantial and thus operators will ensure safe operation and maintainance levels as safety is an important factor in their business.

Once all the fees etc for the infrastructure are paid etc then I think you let the operators do almost what they like, running the services for which demand and profit are greatest. Where there are gaps other operators can move in if a profit is there for them. This of course makes complex negotiation the crucial factor in things which is maybe a problem....

It needs looking at but there is definately scope and thats my two penneth..
 
G
#118 ·
So often the simplest ideas are the best, perhaps this would be the same.

Basically I'm advocating going back to the 'big four' private operations.

At the moment what we have is private companies being given management contracts.

I'd like to see full private operation where by companies own and run everything (rolling stock, depots, stations, tracks, signalling, etc). Whilst there would be some form of regulation these companies should be allowed to dictate how they are run and what they do.

This could free-up precious resources to be concentrated on subsidised regional services.

Infrastrucure could be divided up on the old boundaries - pretty simple really.

Each of which having their own London terminal.

I really think this would work well because private companies are more inclined to invest in what they own to make it better. Do you really think a private LMS/LNW would let Birmingham New Street stay in such an appaling state and therefore giving them a bad reputation?

I also think (as has perhaps been shown by Virgin and First) that a private company would be more willing to build a high speed railway line.

Agree or disagree?
 
#119 ·
Actually the biggest of the interwar 'big four', the 'Ell of a Mess' apparently specialised in economising by leaving its stations unpainted and uncleaned, and from my observations in the 1950s/60s the tradition looked to have survived nationalisation.

In the 1920's Leeds Chamber of Commerce wrote to the company bitterly complaining about the state of its stations and services, including re Leeds Wellington station: "....the station is utterly unworthy of a great Company like yourselves. It was so in the Midland time; it becomes doubly so under the present amalgamation. It is utterly unworthy of the Town and your great Company. it has the worst station facilities and comforts for passengers of any town with a population of over 100,000 in this Country".

The second biggest of the big four, the LNER, made a bit more of an effort, but on the other hand never paid a dividend on its ordinary shares and carried out the much-needed 4-tracking of the East Coast mainline between York and Darlington in the 1930s only with government funding.

So a bit naive to hanker after the days of the 'big 4'. In any case it can be argued that the rot set in for the British railway network when the big 4, all radiating from and headquartered in London (well away from their 'centres of gravity in at least 3 of the 4 cases) were forcibly created by govt decree as an unhappy 'compromise' between letting the market shake itself out or outright nationalisation. Then, when nationalisation did take place a quarter century later, the network in England and Wales was emasculated by being split into 5 watertight 'regions' of which 4 were on the same Londoncentric basis.

As for your suggestion that the various companies should each have their own London terminal (why just London?) that's what we've got now and have always had and it's an absolute pain. To quote again from that Leeds Chamber of Commerce letter to the LMS: "....some of your trains from Lancashire run into one station and some others into another which is nearly half a mile away. The result is confusion".
 
#120 ·
i was reading about FGW earlier. that graph i posted showing their increasing profits is the cause of the FGW service problems were some days as many as 700 services are cancelled! what FGW have done is withdrawn a large number of services so that they do not have to pay track and train leasing costs. the end result is the same number of passengers with half the trains, they are getting the same ticket revenue whilst the number of trains having been slashed so much seriously reduces their cost. the only problem for them is this - many people are unable to get to work. trains are so cramped people cannot board them. in one incident there were 2000 people stuck in a booking hall until it was emptied by the arrival of dozens of buses! FGW run busses as a substitute for the canclled services and guess what, they are one of the biggest bus companies.
it is cheaper and more profitable for them to cancel the train service and run a bus, the govt is still paying them to run a service, the passengers are still paying them .... all you have to do is consider the price difference between a bus trip from bristol to london and a train trip to see what is happening. you can charg epeople train levels, and suffer bus level costs. this is why they lease 255 fewer trains than a year ago.
 
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