HS2 Manchester Route Not Sold Off Yet As Labour Weighs Up Rail Options
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on i.
This is the sub-heading.
The Government has a looming dilemma with climbing costs and pressure from supporters to bring back the Birmingham to Manchester line
These first three paragraphs explain the problems.
Labour faces a £500m decision on what to do with HS2 land which was not sold despite promises by Rishi Sunak, as Sir Keir Starmer braces for new calls to resurrect the cancelled Birmingham to Manchester line.
The £50bn rail line is likely to cause the new Labour government a headache as supporters push for the party to support the project which was initially launched by former Prime Minister Gordon Brown in 2009.
Within Whitehall, civil servants are currently thought to be calculating the value for money of Mr Sunak’s HS2 plan in comparison to the previous HS2 plan to Manchester, with the result expected to favour the longer route.
These are my thoughts.
The Appointment Of Lord Peter Hendy As Rail Minister
Two of the more unusual ministerial appointments by Sir Keir Starmer were the appointment of James Timpson as Minister of State for Prisons, Parole and Probatio, and Lord Peter Hendy as Minister of State in the Department of Transport.
But if you read their Wikipedia entries, they both have great knowledge of the area to where they have been appointed.
This picking of Ministers outside of elected MPs has happened before, with the most recent being Rishi Sunak’s appointment of David Cameron as Foreign Secretary.
This is a paragraph from the article in the i, gives some views about Lord Hendy and High Speed Two.
The appointment of Lord Peter Hendy as rail minister has been received positively by many supporters of the high speed rail line, given his previous work around the project and Euston’s redevelopment, where he pushed for a more ambitious project. One industry source told i that Lord Hendy was “one of the most respected figures in the UK rail industry”, and a “definite supporter of HS2 to Manchester”.
As the current Chairman of Network Rail, I suspect Lord Hendy has had endless thoughts on how he can get High Speed Two to Manchester, within an acceptable budget.
I also believe that since being appointed to be Chairman of Network Rail, the performance of that company has improved.
Has Lord Hendy improved the quality of the workforce or imposed better top down project management?
The Euston Station Problem
The article in the i has several paragraphs on the Euston station problem.
Lord Hendy has probably, the best directory of contacts of property developers, architects and engineers in the UK and with his background of economics, he probably know how to sort the wheat from the dross.
So could Lord Hendy somehow conjure a solution for Euston station out of the speculation?
I wonder if he could find someone to develop a multi-billion commercial complex over the station, that this could generate the cash to pay for Birmingham and Manchester section of High Speed Two.
Like Baldrick, I suspect Lord Hendy could have a cunning plan, but based on sound economic sense.
For instance, I believe, that the best way to serve Leeds by High Speed Two could be via Manchester.
- Leeds would have a choice of routes from London; King’s Cross and Euston.
- It could possibly have three, if St. Pancras and Leeds via Derby and Sheffield were to be improved.
- Birmingham and Leeds services would be greatly improved if High Speed Two to Leeds, went via Manchester.
I would suspect every idea will be on the table.
The Anonymous Widower 
Handsacre to Crewe was a reasonably cheap section to build, well relative to phase 1, and didn’t really save the sort of money they allege it was section upto Manchester that was more expensive. I believe they had potential constructors in the wings so should be easy to resurrect and has to be simplest thing to do as to spend years trying to redevelop another solution will just waste more money to come up with same solution.
Personally I would have never built any of it as the transport in our great cities outside of London & Liverpool is pretty ghastly and the money should have been invested in them first but we are where we are now so no point having a white elephant.
Comment by nickrl | July 14, 2024 |
I always feel the best thing to do, would be to first create proper Liverpool-standard Metros in Manchester and Leeds.
Then you build a high speed line in a massive tunnel from High Legh via Manchester Airport, Manchester Piccadilly/Victoria, Huddersfield, Bradford and Leeds, to emerge East of Leeds.
Leeds would develop, as a massive rail terminal with three high speed routes to London; via Doncaster and ECML, via Crewe, Manchester and HS2 and via Derby and MML.
HS2 should benefit all parts of the UK.
Comment by AnonW | July 14, 2024 |
A Pennines base tunnel is needed being overdue for 160 years. NPR needs to be right through the centre of cities, not taking a scenic tour of Cheshire through an airport which few use rail from the Liverpool City Region to get to anyhow.
NPR needs to be from Liverpool via an upgraded Ditton Junction and Fiddlers Ferry line to Warrington Bank Quay LL then a three mile tunnel to the east section of the CLC into an underground east-west station at Victoria.
For local: Manchester trams can terminate at Warrington Central interchange using some new track paralleling the CLC to Cadishead then a reused Cadishead to Altricham line then the Atricham line into Manchester.
Merseyrail battery hybrid Class 777s to serve Warrintgon Central from Liverpool.
Comment by John Burns | July 17, 2024 |
The correct name of the mentioned station is: Altrincham !
You have missed it even twice…
Comment by Wolfgang Maresch | July 17, 2024
In Manchester Rishi Sunak has announced that the route Birmingham – Manchester will be cancelled.
On that day at the latest it was clear to me that he has to leave
from no. 10 because as a PM he was not fit for purpose.
There is no doubt that England urgently is in need of that project.
Hopefully, the new PM will complete it.
Comment by Wolfgang Maresch | July 14, 2024 |
I believe that Rishi had a plan based on selling lots of energy to Europe.
Perhaps, the Germans played hardball and didn’t sign.
I’ve only ever signed one big deal with the Germans and it was a pleasure. It was also all done in England, in English and used English Law.
It concerned the Respimat inhaler, which is now made by Boehringer-Ingelheim.
Comment by AnonW | July 14, 2024 |
Some recommendations to keep costs down:-
A design must be detailed enough to draw up a a cost schedule and a construction schedule, this will allow a realistic project schedule to be drawn up. In my experience the tenency is to be too optermistic with the construction time and even reorganising, maintenance of equipment and redeployment can delay the schedule.
On HS2 the original design and schedule was thrown away to rely on the contractors, did any one review this?
Do not sign a cost plus contract. This type of contract is like handing a blank check book to the contractor. If the contractor builds something that is more expensive it make more money?????
Do not sign a design and build contract, again you have no control of costs. Remember the contractors aim is to maximize profit and any construction comes second. This is why “Construction Quality Assurance” has been developed to ensure quality of construction. Note it is essential that any design changes are documented and costed.
Every project small to large must have project engineers and clerk of works, these must be employed directly by the operator after completion. They must not be contractors or they will be influenced by the builders. Remember the Mayor of London was blamed for the over run and extra costs for the Elizabeth Line when he had no input or control of the construction. I knew the project was in trouble then the bosses started leaving before the project was complete. This is the time when project engineers earn their pay.
The Treasury must take responsibility for increasing costs of HS2 by doubling the time of construction, TIME IS MONEY. Do not forget the inflation rate. You can not cut the labor cost in half and you forgot the overhead costs which are at least 20%, I would not be surprised if it was nearer 40%.
My last project work, with 4 other engineers and geologists was with designing, scheduling and costing the reopening an old underground mine. This including quantifying the ore reserve, designing the stopes and mining the access tunnels & stopes, ventilation, rock support, mining equipment, services such as water pumps and electrical power, stope filling material and distribution, electrical supply and communications systems. The only area I was concerned about was the dewatering and pumping requirements. Pumping requirements for initial mining and steady state inflow was known but this is done over time. Pumping out a whole mine is completely different as the whole mined out area has to be pumped out at the same time.
Has any one redone the business case for the only section to be built from Old Oak Conman to Birmingham? thank to the Tories
Comment by Ben Oldfield | July 14, 2024 |
i) Labour has inherited a 1945 situation.
ii) The economy is in a shambles.
iii) We are 1.5 million homes short
iv) Three trillion pounds in debt
v) NHS severely underfunded
That is for starters.
When finished Manchester as it stands, by just connecting to Handsacre will be 1 hr 40 mins at most from London, more like 1 hr 30-35 mins. Very acceptable indeed. Services have not been announced for HS2 since ph.2 was cancelled. Nor has rolling stock been announced. That is fact.
Now some speculation. HMG has pressing needs. It would be highly unlikely that the new government will spend billions on a fast railway that goes to cities that already have a fast railway between them, and will be faster when HS2 is finished to Handsacre. Hendy can scream all he likes, he has to get money from the Treasury, who will be reluctant to spend on what is regarded by many as a rich man’s vanity rail line.
Now back to facts:
1) HS2 phase 2 is cancelled for sure;
2) Liverpool and Manchester metro mayors were in Downing St last week coming out saying HS2 phase 2 is dead.
3) Network Rail have three WCML options to bypass Stafford. This would make trains faster for sure.
So after a WCML Stafford bypass is built if t is built, safety levels and speed will rise. Have trains that run faster on the WCML speeds end to end will rise even more. So all we need is a Stafford bypass on the WCML, not a full 2a.
Asking for the expensive bit, full 2a, will probably get nowhere so best forget 2b entirely. Most is there in ph.1. All it needs is a WCML Stafford bypass.
Network Rail Stafford bypass options:
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5a804c0bed915d74e33f99d2/rail-alternatives-to-hs2-phase-2a.pdf
Comment by John Burns | July 17, 2024 |
On 17 July 2024 the government announced in the King’s speech reactivation of the paused High Speed Rail (Crewe – Manchester) Bill which additionally includes powers to build and operate rail projects aimed at improving east-to-west connectivity across the north of England. The cancelling of phase 2 of HS2 was not reversed.
The bill says High Speed Rail which does not mean HS2. The ECML, MML, GWR and WCML are all classed as high speed rail although just coming in at the lower levels.
Expect the WCML upgraded from Handsacre onwards. And most certainly a Stafford bypass. But do not expect it soon.
Hendy has previously mentioned upgrading the WCML north of Crewe even when HS2 was on the go. He mentioned heavier wires for freight to serve Liverpool’s port which is steadily increasing in traffic and also making it all 4-track. We shall see.
Comment by John Burns | July 19, 2024 |