Image copyright Siemens/ PA
The government will give the go-ahead for the entire High Speed 2 (HS2) rail line to be built, the BBC can confirm.
An announcement on the rail project linking London to Birmingham, and then on to Manchester and Leeds, is expected by the prime minister on Tuesday.
While the whole line will be built, the government will seek a review of the second phase covering the North.
It hopes it will identify cost savings as well as integrating these lines into the existing railways.
‘Crucial’ project
The entire project is expected to be completed by 2040.
Supporters say it will cut overcrowding on the railways and help to rebalance the UK’s economy.
“We need a better backbone for our public transport services,” Adam Marshall, director general of the British Chambers of Commerce, told the BBC.
“The capacity HS2 is going to deliver is absolutely crucial.”
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- What is the HS2 route and how much will it cost?
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But HS2 has faced criticism from both Labour and Conservative MPs for being over budget and behind schedule.
Labour peer Lord Berkeley – who was deputy chairman of the independent review of the project – said HS2 would not ease problems for commuters in the North.
He said the project would be good for people travelling between London and Birmingham.
But he added: “That’s a small number of people compared to those who try and commute into New Street every day – or the same in Manchester or Leeds.
“It’s those not very sexy, but really important, commuter lines that need the finance.”
‘Level up’
A source close to the project has confirmed that Boris Johnson will also announce a series of other transport projects on Tuesday.
Some of them will be situated in the north of England and the Midlands as part of the government’s manifesto promise to “level up” the UK by investing more in regions outside of London.
In 2015, it was estimated that the cost of HS2 would be £56bn, but a review has warned that it could rise to as much as £106bn.
Work to prepare the ground for the first phase of HS2 linking London and Birmingham has been going on for years. But a green light from the government means construction of the railway will begin relatively soon.
It is also expected that work on the line between Birmingham and Crewe will be rolled into the first phase. It had originally been slated to begin at a later stage.
Construction on the second phase of the project, originally planned to link Crewe to Manchester and Birmingham with Leeds, is at a much earlier stage.
The BBC has been told that the government will commission a further review of this part of the line to find ways of making it more affordable.
It also wants to ensure that these lines can be better integrated into the existing railway network along with other planned upgrades such as Northern Powerhouse Rail, which aims to improve east-west links across the north of England.
What is the HS2 route?
The initial plan was for a new railway line between London and the West Midlands carrying 400m-long (1,300ft) trains, with as many as 1,100 seats per train.
The line would enable trains to reach speeds of up to 250mph and would run as often as 14 times an hour in each direction.
This would be followed by a V-shaped second phase taking services from Birmingham to Manchester and Leeds.
Image copyright HS2 Ltd
The Department for Transport (DfT) has said that the project will triple the capacity of trains across the entire route.
According to the latest estimates, the first stage would be completed between 2028 and 2031 – long after the original opening date of 2026.
Meanwhile, the second stage would be ready in 2035-2040.
The announcement on High Speed 2 broadly mirrors some of the main recommendations from the government’s still unpublished review into the project.
I’ve read the full report and it emphasises that any significant changes to the first phase of HS2, linking London to Birmingham, would have caused further delays.
No-one in government wanted that.
The Crewe to Manchester and Birmingham to Leeds phase will undergo another review because it is at such an early stage, and ministers believe savings can be found. They also want the high-speed lines to be better integrated with our existing rail network and future infrastructure projects.
Politics and pledges to voters in the north of England and the Midlands was a big part of this decision. But so too was the amount of work which has already been done on the first phase of the project.
Ultimately, the government felt that turning back wasn’t an option.
Its much higher price tag has made HS2 politically toxic, so the government is also announcing a massive cash injection for buses and cycling in England.
I’m told that figures within government who weren’t sold on HS2 wanted those other transport pledges at the same time.
Why have the costs and timetable slipped so far off track?
Essentially, because they were over-optimistic in the first place.
The National Audit Office has warned in successive reports over a number of years that HS2 had an “unrealistic timetable”.
In its most recent analysis, it said that the risks of the project were never properly assessed when initial costs were estimated.
HS2 began under the Labour government in 2009, but the cost has continued to balloon under subsequent administrations.
What are the proposed advantages of HS2?
Once it is built, journeys will be shorter. London-to-Birmingham travel times will be cut from one hour 21 minutes to 52 minutes, according to the DfT.
And while it is being built, it is expected to create thousands of jobs and provide a stimulus to economic growth.
Darren Caplan head of the Railway Industry Association. told the BBC that the line would also “increase capacity on the East Coast Main Line, the Midlands Main Line and the West Coast Main Line. There are benefits all round”.
Who are its detractors and what do they say?
They are a mixture of MPs and eco-activists.
Some Conservative MPs oppose the project because the route will pass through their constituencies and they think the money should be spent on better local transport links instead.
Former Conservative cabinet minister David Lidington, the ex-MP for Aylesbury, said he feared HS2 was “20th Century technology and infrastructure for a 21st Century economy” – because people won’t have to travel to do business in the future.
He said the money would be much better on local infrastructure, such as new Metro lines, to aid the “joining up” of cities in the north of England and the Midlands – places, he said, that “will not benefit directly from HS2”.
At the same time, environmental groups say HS2 will boost carbon emissions and spoil areas of natural beauty.
Original Article : HERE ;
from MetNews https://metnews.pw/government-to-give-high-speed-2-the-go-ahead/
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