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Sam Shead
Reporter
The rail thing
According to Gil Howarth, project director of the Channel Tunnel rail link (CTRL) or HS1 as it has come to be known, all big rail projects need to be championed by a prominent figure in Westminster, City Hall, or both.
Howarth told The Engineer that a political champion in his mind is responsible for, ‘gaining cross-party support and backing from the Treasury, while publicly promoting the scheme and helping to secure support from all stakeholders.
‘The person who got the Jubilee Line extension built was Steve Norris when he was minister for transport and minister for London,’ said Howarth. ‘If you look at Crossrail then that’s been Boris Johnson, and Ken Livingstone before that. HS1 was originally Michael Heseltine and then taken over by John Prescott.’
‘There isn’t a champion for HS2,’ claimed Howarth at the HS2 press briefing London this week.
Meanwhile, Lord Adonis, secretary of state for transport from 2009-2010, told The Engineer that he believes both the current transport secretary, Justine Greening, and David Cameron are acting as HS2 champions.
However, he also claimed: ‘They need to get a move on in introducing the legislation for HS2. It is not scheduled to be introduced into Parliament until the end of 2013, which is nearly four years after I published the plan for HS2.’
But the prime minister and his transport secretary aren’t the only two dilly-dallying on HS2.
Elsewhere, Boris Johnson, the current mayor of London and the favourite to remain in power at City Hall, revealed to Camden voters that he is yet to be convinced by HS2; a statement likely to appease the residents who will be inconvenienced to one degree or another over the course of a decade due to Euston Station’s whole-scale demolition.
So why the hesitation and reluctancy to commit? Part of the reason HS2 is without a key backer at this stage is likely to be because it’s still early days. Even though a plan has been put forward and approved, no one wants to be seen ‘championing’ HS2 as there are still many concerns relating to the route, the trains, the cost, the integration with other lines, and the time frame it will all be completed in.
‘That’s why we need to get the debate properly matured because the worst possible outcome is that this could become political football in the next general election,’ said Jeremy Acklam, member of the Transport Policy Panel at the Institution of Engineering and Technology (IET).
‘We need to have a key supporter on side from each party by the time we get towards our next election,’ he stressed.
The IET is getting the debate started at the National Railway Museum in York on 7th June where the discussion will focus on what aspects of the proposals for HS2 could be changed so that the benefits of the population north of Birmingham can be significantly improved.
Projects of this magnitude are key to UK growth but without a committed champion they can also be susceptible to setbacks and delays. With the backing of the engineering sector and arguably more importantly, the British public, I’m optimistic a champion or two could emerge from under the covers in the near future.
An interview with the technical director of HS2, Prof Andrew McNaughton, will appear in the 28th May issue of The Engineer.
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Readers' comments (32)
Anonymous | 4 May 2012 12:32 pm
HS2 is a basket case and should be dumped.
What we need is a champion for common sense to stop those with vested interests in pushing HS2 when the public don't want it, need it and can't afford it
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Anonymous | 4 May 2012 1:00 pm
With the daily demolition of every single aspect of the HS2 project, critical mass, the tipping point, will soon will reached, and the whole HS2 fantasy, like an oddity in outer space, will suddenly disappear down a black hole, for eternity.
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Anonymous | 4 May 2012 1:31 pm
What is needed is the championing of alternative technology to bring business people together. ie: Internet conferencing. If the budget for HS2 was used to install super fast broadband for everyone, particularly businesses, then not only would the British public benefit as a whole rather than a minority it would also be much more environmentally friendly and ultimately it would not be a the huge 'white elephant' that HS2 will undoubtedly be!
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Stephen Green | 4 May 2012 2:03 pm
With a rapidly worsening cost benefit ratio (half the initial guestimate of 2.4) it is already looking like a very poor investment. By the end of the Y route, the cost is predicted by some to exceed £90,000,000,000, an unbelievably huge amount of money that begs the question, who will benefit from it, other than the developers themselves?
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Paul Armstrong | 4 May 2012 2:51 pm
Instead of a fast link to favour a few, why not put more, longer and more frequent trains on the existing tracks. Also make the ticket cost a lot less than the petrol cost. Surely this would cost a lot less than 90 billion pounds, would get a lot of people out of their cars and be advantageous to everyone.
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Anonymous | 4 May 2012 3:01 pm
We can only hope that this dying elephant will be swiftly put out of its misery. No one in their right mind would want to be seen as a champion for lost causes as this one certainly is.
FTTC, broadband fibre to every road in the built up areas and to the more rural parts would achieve so much more.
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John Killip | 4 May 2012 3:04 pm
Stop HS2, HS2 Action Alliance, 51M and many other groups have been saying all along 'No Business Case, No Environmental Case and No Money to Pay for it' for years but the government won't listen.
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Rob Hill | 4 May 2012 3:15 pm
As others have stated the problem with HS2 is the complete lack of a business case. The days of throwing lots of public money and extra energy consumption at a prestige project so that a few can travel faster have surely passed. If we really want to spend £34Billion on a rail infrastructure project (and there are good arguments to do that) then there are much better ways to spend it so that more people benefit. Why not improve local services so more of the general population can get to work by train?
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Anonymous | 4 May 2012 3:20 pm
HS2 is a chronic waste of taxpayers' money, an environmental travesty, is completely unnecessary as there is plenty of capacity on the West Coast Main Line now and 30 years down the line. It is utterly unjustifiable and should not be built!
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Steve Gardner | 4 May 2012 4:11 pm
Perhaps this project should be totally privately funded with the investors gaining their returns directly from "bums on seats".
All land required should be purchased at the going rate, once planning permission has been granted for each parcel! That should kill it!
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Vincent Nolan | 4 May 2012 4:21 pm
The trouble with political 'champions' for major projects is that they refuse to look at the specific details of what is being proposed. They prefer to deal in rhetoric. What is needed for HS2 is not more 'champions' but an indpendent and objective analysis of the costs and benefits, the environmental impact and the effect on the rail network as a whole. As the previous comments have demonstrated, the facts we have so far suggest that HS2 is a huge waste of public money which could be better spent on a wide range of alternative infrastructure investments
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Offa | 4 May 2012 4:56 pm
I think it would be near political suicide to become a champion of HS2. You would be supporting a project that has now failed so completely that it is classified as 'amber/ red' by the gateway process of the cabinet's Major Projects Authority; the chair of the Public Accounts Committee has torn the assumptions behind the case for HS2 to shreds; you would be spending upwards of £33 billion of UK tax payers money on a scheme that then - as a 'core' route – will be HANDED OVER TO THE EU to run, separated from Parliamentary over sight; you will be pushing a route where over 90% in a public consultation said 'no'; you will be pushing a route that will overwhelmingly benefit London and pretending it is in the national interest; telling desperate commuters all over the country that there is no money for them until after HS2 is completed (in 2050?); following in the footsteps of one UNELECTED champion (Adonis), another who referred to it unashamedly as 'a rich man's toy', and a third (Greening) who displays complete two-faced cheek when she makes identical arguments in relation to her opposition to Heathrow (protecting her constituents) and them rubbishes those same arguments in relation to HS2. What we ACTUALLY need is a champion that will commit to developing an integrated national transport strategy; and yes – commit to spending the same amount that HS2 will cost but right across the country, in relation to urgent passenger and freight needs, and with real impacts on greening our transport infrastructure. That’s what ‘the real thing’ is.
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M Cooper | 4 May 2012 5:18 pm
Anything that has a clear net benefit probably doesn't need a champion.
As Mr Nolan states above, we need objective analysis and not spin.
There are ways in which the existing transport infrastructure could be used more effectively. How about allowing anyone who can reasonably do so to telecommute, and to have flexible hours when they do need to go into work? This policy would have wide social benefits in addition to the congestion and pollution saved. For example it would bring people into active employment who may currently be unable to travel daily, because of disability, childcare commitments or any other reason.
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Richard | 4 May 2012 5:42 pm
this whole project is becoming a laughing stock - there aren't any benefits apart from to the people driving it through - time to kick it into the long grass and bring out some properly thought out alternatives for goodness sake!
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Padav | 4 May 2012 7:07 pm
I see the anti-brigade are out in numbers - this article is linked via the STOPHS2 website. The usual ill-informed claptrap masquerading as informed comment much in evidence.
For the record, there IS a clear timetable for HS2 - the Hybrid Bill will enter Parliament on 25th October next year and receive Royal Assent on or around early Feburary 2015, three months BEFORE the next general election.
The current legal nonsense going on behind the scenes is pure delaying tactics, nothing more and nothing less, a futile last ditch attempt to try and slow things down so the Hybrid Bill cannot complete its legislative passage prior to the planned election date, therefore suffering from the vagaries of political infighting during the election process. In this manner the nay-sayers (see above and all doubtless residing in close proximity to the approved phase 1 route) hope to sabotage the project.
Their efforts will fail and HS2 will proceed. A political champion will appear in due course but as the author points out - it's early days yet!
P.S. I live in Alderley Edge and yes, I will be in relatively close proximity to phase 2 of the new line (preferred route announced later this year)
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Anonymous | 4 May 2012 10:43 pm
You'd have to be sniffing glue to back the HS2!
Why not spend a fraction of the money investing in fibre optic technology so half the pointless 'monthly catch up meetings' can be cancelled & everyone can save the pointless journey to a pointless meeting...& do it via video link instead. At least the journey time will really be saved (by far more than 20 minutes) & we can all get some work done...
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Clive Green | 4 May 2012 10:46 pm
Money for rail transport would be better spent extending HS1 from St.Pancras to the north of England. BUT, before anything else the Country needs enough power generating plant to take over when the coal fired ones are closed in the present decade. HS2 comes well done the list of priorities.
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Anonymous | 4 May 2012 10:48 pm
Of course it needs a high level sponsor, because it's a ridiculous, criminal waste of money that will fuel the continuing ludicrous levels of overmanning, overpaying and subisidies in our farcical rail network, and as has been shown ,will subsidise businssmen's and banker's journeys to the tune of a couple of grand per ticket for the net benfit of saving mybe fifteen minutes on a journey that allowing for getting to and from stations is usually over three hours anyway.
A sad sick joke that needs to be buried.
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Dave666 | 5 May 2012 8:58 am
No it just requires lots of foreign workers.
Brits need not apply.
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Ed Deytrikh | 5 May 2012 2:01 pm
How can a government in such economically bad times ever justify a project on this scale that brings a small benefit to a very small minority of the population! I bet the ticket prices will be more expensive for HS2 than a 'normal' train so no one will even use it! Even when it was (only) about £34bn, as opposed to the £90bn that Stephen mentioned earlier I still think it's hugely unviable purely financially.
Speaking of using the money elsewhere in rail transport is all very well, but that still excludes a lot of people. You realise just how not down to Earth the politicians are when they drive round in thier Range Rovers that are all paid for through expenses when the workers (and students like me) who keep this country moving are having to fork out over £25/week for bus fares when even the services are not good at all. It's no wonder so many people don't go on to further and higher education when so much support has been taken out by the government.
Something to think about:
I read, earlier this year, that in London, the government spends £2700/person on public transport; in the North East (where I live) this figure is £5.
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