Just another reason to ban Liebor party

[swamp]

The journey times to Manchester, Liverpool and Glasgow would also come down by similar amounts, and a later HS2+ extension further north would cut journey times to other major cities.

And how much will an HS2+ ticket to Glasgow cost? Right now flying is usually cheaper (and quicker) than the train, and any future HS rail will be ludicrously expensive, as evidenced by HS1.

[Freamon]

And how much will an HS2+ ticket to Glasgow cost? Right now flying is usually cheaper (and quicker) than the train, and any future HS rail will be ludicrously expensive, as evidenced by HS1.

So your argument against HS2 is that nobody would use it?

[TimberWolf]

Trains are a nightmare unless you live next to a train station. The journey itself is probably the shortest part of the journey, or should I say epic adventure. It might take me an hour to get to my local train station at rush hour by car, and then I've still got to park and wait for the train. Or two or three buses and then allow 2 or 3 hours. And at the destination, time spend getting where you are wanting to go would probably be worse. And then you've the return journey to contemplate. All at ridiculous high prices and standing up. Horrific.

[swamp]

So your argument against HS2 is that nobody would use it?

The devil would be in the detail, in particular how much public subsidy it received, and therefore how much the tickets would cost. Domestic services on HS1 are underused because it is too expensive (and it also goes to the 'wrong' station). HS2 to Birmingham would be at the right station (for those in the city centre), but you're buggered if you live in Rugby, Northampton or Milton Keynes. And would anyone pay £1500 a month, say, to commute from Birmingham standard class? (Does London need more commuter towns, for that matter?!)

Edit: just found this: http://www.kentnews.co.uk/p_12/Artic...rain_companies

Door-to-door journey times [on HS1] are longer and the fares are higher.

[Freamon]

The devil would be in the detail, in particular how much public subsidy it received, and therefore how much the tickets would cost. Domestic services on HS1 are underused because it is too expensive (and it also goes to the 'wrong' station). HS2 to Birmingham would be at the right station (for those in the city centre), but you're buggered if you live in Rugby, Northampton or Milton Keynes. And would anyone pay £1500 a month, say, to commute from Birmingham standard class? (Does London need more commuter towns, for that matter?!)

Edit: just found this: Kent News :: Article :: Even Dick Turpin would be amazed by the gall of the train companies

Door-to-door journey times [on HS1] are longer and the fares are higher.

How exactly has the £33bn figure been arrived at? Has the govt asked major contractors how much they would need? Or is it just a finger-in-the-air which they will then take forward to contractors and say "here you go, this is how much you have to spend"?

[AtW]

It's important to remember that the £33bn quoted is the up-front cost, but the overall economic impact in terms of future improvements to GDP (and therefore tax receipts) would probably bring this down quite a bit.

It's the cost over 10 years or so - can this country afford spending £3 bln on proper 21st century high speed railways?

FFS, if anything QE (aka money printing) should have been used for such infrastructural projects - at least something will remain after it that can be used, rather than buying/selling hot air!

[AtW]

And how much will an HS2+ ticket to Glasgow cost?

Higher speed helps reduce cost of tickets because same train can be used more times a day to carry paying customers, also more carriages - I'd estimate efficiency in carrying customers would at least double for the same number of trains, however given this line won't be shared by tulipy slow local services it has got potential to have more trains thereby increasing capacity further.

[AtW]

Last time I went to New Street, the platforms were huge.

New Street is near capacity in terms of number of trains it can handle, too many bottlenecks on coming in/out - when you build high speed line you simply can't afford 15-20 mins delays when whole journey should take 50 mins.

You have to build new railway because existing one is not straight enough - you also can't share it with tulipy local trains, it needs dedicated line - it's like having ADSL over copper is ok-ish, but if you want proper stuff you need fiber optics.

[OwlHoot]

There is no need for HS2. Just make the current service a bit better. The Javelin train on HS1 has been a bit of a failure. It's too expensive for most commuters, and it goes to the 'wrong' station.

High Speed 2 - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

It's 1 hour 24 minutes to Birmingham right now. HS2 will cut this to 49 minutes.... £33,000,000,000 so that a few Brummies can attend a meeting in London 35 minutes quicker. I'd rather have an aircraft carrier or two.

A friend of mine knows a rich old lady, living on her own in a vast rambling mansion (a bit like Miss Haversham, but not quite as dotty, apparently). It's right in the path of this planned high speed line, near Nottingham somewhere, and she was offered half a million less than the market value of her property, which IMHO is a monstrous injustice, even if it hasn't been decorated since about 1860.

If compulsory purchase is a significant part of the cost then why not do a cut-and-cover (or partial cover) tunnel along the line of an existing motorway like the M40, with ventilation holes along the central reservation, and opposite lines stacked one over the other?

Trouble is I suppose the up and down gradients might be a problem, and even the sideways bends could get a bit sharp at 200+ MPH (unless the whole track could be tilted), and the odd river here and there wouldn't help. But one advantage is that the lines would be beyond the reach of young scrotes with paving stones. ..

If the trains go fast enough, I'd have thought their momentum could carry them up quite considerable slopes, albeit at the cost of some slowing down and therefore slightly increased travel time.

[AtW]

If compulsory purchase is a significant part of the cost then why not do a cut-and-cover (or partial cover) tunnel along the line of an existing motorway like the M40, with ventilation holes along the central reservation, and opposite lines stacked one over the other?

It's not significant.

What's significant is desire of some of those affected NOT to have line at all regardless of any compensation.

You have to have this line straight for high speed - a lot of effort and money went into it and it is impossible to keep everyone happy.