Do you want to discuss boring politics? (25 Viewers)

[Brighton Sky Blue]

The day north western took over they reduced the number of carriages they put on.
Avanti relied on the good will of drivers doing overtime to keep their trains running and had to cancel trains left right and centre when that goodwill was withdrawn.

There's easy fixes to some of the issues out there but we seem incapable of implementing them so I'm not sure HS2 will improve our lot.

Where I do agree with shmmeee though is the execution of projects is always late and over budget. Still amazed me how the Italians managed to install high speed rail connections across the whole country years ago but we can’t build even one between Birmingham and London, never mind the other links.

It now won’t even stop at Euston. Time to cut our losses personally.

 

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[clint van damme]

Where I do agree with shmmeee though is the execution of projects is always late and over budget. Still amazed me how the Italians managed to install high speed rail connections across the whole country years ago but we can’t build even one between Birmingham and London, never mind the other links.

It now won’t even stop at Euston. Time to cut our losses personally.

Yeah, I appreciate Shmmeee is commenting on the value of the project rather than its delivery but its going to be over budget by an eye watering amount, that much is clear.

 

[CCFCSteve]

As I said, higher capacity on local routes. Which is what’s needed. What’s your answer for improving the rail network?

Should’ve started it North down as has been said. Also we just don’t build stuff quickly in this country. Think we’ve already spent 200m moving swampy and his mates

 

[SBT]

Sunak really gunning for that 3% of the vote Lozza Fox has got.

I think one of his SPADs has been looking through the Things that annoy you thread for inspiration. It’s almost every post!

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

Where I do agree with shmmeee though is the execution of projects is always late and over budget. Still amazed me how the Italians managed to install high speed rail connections across the whole country years ago but we can’t build even one between Birmingham and London, never mind the other links.

It now won’t even stop at Euston. Time to cut our losses personally.

The fact that it won't link up with the Eurostar line is stupid IMO. It should go to St Pancras. I admit that's not the easiest logistically but given the overall cost of the project and the long term effect they want it to have it's something that needed to be sorted out.

 

[skybluetony176]

Time for this colossal waste of money, resources and land to be scrapped

HS2: Rail link rated 'unachievable' by infrastructure watchdog

An infrastructure watchdog gives the project a "red" warning, raising issues over budgets and schedules.

www.bbc.co.uk

Unfortunately I think we’ve passed the point of no return on that one.

 

[skybluetony176]

And this is exactly why we have shit infrastructure in this country. The problem is delivery not the project itself, which is needed for the capacity boost elsewhere.

The way it was sold too. It was sold as this exciting fast way to get to London that would be the envy of the world isn’t Britain great. The free capacity on existing lines is actually the best reason for building it and I think if they’d sold it on that basis in the first place it would be seen as necessity not vanity and more accepting by the public.

 

[fernandopartridge]

And this is exactly why we have shit infrastructure in this country. The problem is delivery not the project itself, which is needed for the capacity boost elsewhere.

Correct, anybody who is keen on infrastructure spending campaigning for projects to be cancelled is just a turkey voting for Christmas.

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[fernandopartridge]

As a local example of how HS2 can help to unlock capacity. There is currently no direct Coventry to Leicester train because there isn't capacity for a train to cross the West Coast Mainline at Nuneaton because of the fast trains to London that come through at fairly high frequency. With HS2 some of those fast trains will be on HS2 potentially leaving some capacity on the WCML.

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[shmmeee]

Fact is if we didn’t have watered down over budget infrastructure we’d have no infrastructure at all.

 

[Sky_Blue_Dreamer]

The way it was sold too. It was sold as this exciting fast way to get to London that would be the envy of the world isn’t Britain great. The free capacity on existing lines is actually the best reason for building it and I think if they’d sold it on that basis in the first place it would be seen as necessity not vanity and more accepting by the public.

I remember it being sold as a 'levelling up' sort of deal - connecting the north better and so making it more enticing to investment. Personally I thought that was horseshit and it was a way of allowing BHX to be used as extra airport capacity to London. I never expected anything other than Stage 1 to be built. I also expected it to be wildly overbudget (I predicted £80bn from a, I think, £30bn initial expected cost) but even that seems to have been massively optimistic.

It can' be cancelled now as so much work has already been done and money spent. It's not like we cancel this and suddenly the best part of £100bn will become available to upgrade the existing rail infrastructure.

The thing is Britain is quite different to many other countries - it's small and it's destinations are closer together. Plus the tracks tend to be windy*. So the focus should be on acceleration as much as speed.

And it is worth remembering the only reason we got the original railways built was cos people were promised they could make a mint out of it.

*windy as in not straight, not as in are in a gale.

 

[fernandopartridge]

And as for the cost, the problem is that due to politics more than anything else, the original stated budget is usually optimistic to say the least. It's not a problem in any case, it is literally billions of pounds being paid into the British economy, we need a lot, lot more of it not less.

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[Grendel]

It’s all good - forget the traffic and the destruction of land - we got a new village hall

New state-of-the-art Burton Green Village Hall opens, funded by HS2

HS2 Ltd hands new Burton Green Village Hall to the local community after funding a £2M rebuild. State-of-the-art building includes an expansive main hall with exposed wooden beams, a professional kitchen, outdoor BBQ space, reception, dedicated office space and parking with vehicle charging...

mediacentre.hs2.org.uk

 

[clint van damme]

Fact is if we didn’t have watered down over budget infrastructure we’d have no infrastructure at all.

The problem is when it's watered down to the extent it doesn't achieve much of what it's supposed to is the huge overspend worth it?

 

[Sick Boy]

Where I do agree with shmmeee though is the execution of projects is always late and over budget. Still amazed me how the Italians managed to install high speed rail connections across the whole country years ago but we can’t build even one between Birmingham and London, never mind the other links.

It now won’t even stop at Euston. Time to cut our losses personally.

The UK train service is very poor compared to the Italian one, especially when it comes to ticket prices.

 

[shmmeee]

The problem is when it's watered down to the extent it doesn't achieve much of what it's supposed to is the huge overspend worth it?

We need to fix the fact it takes decades and billions to so much as dig a hole in the ground in this country. And the political cowardice that means it gets watered down.

There’s no magic other rail project that’s going to get funded instead. This is just more austerity.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

The UK train service is very poor compared to the Italian one, especially when it comes to ticket prices.

I was able to go from Rome to Naples in an hour for less than £20. An equivalent distance in this country would be nearer £60-70.

 

[Sick Boy]

I was able to go from Rome to Naples in an hour for less than £20. An equivalent distance in this country would be nearer £60-70.

Presumably that was on a high speed train? I went from Bologna to Ravenna the other month for something like €8.

 

[Deleted member 5849]

I know someone who’s a project manager on the section between London and Birmingham. Like the literature on this he is shall we say unconvincing. Public transport in NI is even worse but like most things there we’ve given up trying.

The work done will ultimately just help people get to London quicker from a few select places. I fail to see how that improves capacity in places like Scotland and Wales or even to be honest places nearer to London like East Anglia. I would support something that makes more routes available within these areas, not something that at best makes more carriages available.

Wait until they cut the frequency of services from Coventry, Warwick, Leamington and rugby too, expecting people to first go to Birmingham...

 

[clint van damme]

We need to fix the fact it takes decades and billions to so much as dig a hole in the ground in this country. And the political cowardice that means it gets watered down.

There’s no magic other rail project that’s going to get funded instead. This is just more austerity.

I 100% agree with your first paragraph.

But costs can't be far off quadruple what they were originally and with stage 2 or whatever it was called cancelled its not going to deliver huge chunks of what it was supposed to, is it right to just carry on because we need more infrastructure spend?

 

[shmmeee]

I 100% agree with your first paragraph.

But costs can't be far off quadruple what they were originally and with stage 2 or whatever it was called cancelled its not going to deliver huge chunks of what it was supposed to, is it right to just carry on because we need more infrastructure spend?

Yes because we really need infrastructure spend.

 

[clint van damme]

Yes because we really need infrastructure spend.

But do we need to spend on infrastructure that doesn't deliver? Seems crazy.

 

[shmmeee]

But do we need to spend on infrastructure that doesn't deliver? Seems crazy.

In what way doesn’t it deliver? Is it as good as it could have been? No cos it’s watered down. Is it better than nothing? Surely?

We’ve got no high speed rail compared to most countries our level. We’ve got a rail network that’s one of the oldest in the world. We cancel this and then what? Another 50 years to do the same thing again?

 

[clint van damme]

In what way doesn’t it deliver? Is it as good as it could have been? No cos it’s watered down. Is it better than nothing? Surely?

We’ve got no high speed rail compared to most countries our level. We’ve got a rail network that’s one of the oldest in the world. We cancel this and then what? Another 50 years to do the same thing again?

I read that the average cost of new rail lines in Europe is 25 million per KM, HS2 is on course to cost 200 million per KM.
It won't deliver much of what it was supposed to and the costs are likely to keep increasing, I can't see the logic in ploughing on regardless.

I've been sceptical since the start but there's something in what you say about the necessity for infrastructure spend but surely it needs to ne done right?

As for having one of the oldest rail networks in the world there are countries with older that still piss all over ours in terms of reliability and pricing.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Presumably that was on a high speed train? I went from Bologna to Ravenna the other month for something like €8.

Yes it was. We went Bologna to Rome also high speed for a similar price, just 2 hours travel time.

 

[skybluetony176]

I read that the average cost of new rail lines in Europe is 25 million per KM, HS2 is on course to cost 200 million per KM.
It won't deliver much of what it was supposed to and the costs are likely to keep increasing, I can't see the logic in ploughing on regardless.

I've been sceptical since the start but there's something in what you say about the necessity for infrastructure spend but surely it needs to ne done right?

As for having one of the oldest rail networks in the world there are countries with older that still piss all over ours in terms of reliability and pricing.

Was reading an article about light railways and it’s the same in the UK. We’re paying more per km for light railways too, anywhere between £50-75M per km. we only have 9 in the whole of the UK, way below the European average. But then again we’ve invested about 40% less over the last 75 years in transport infrastructure so we’re probably just paying the cost of catch-up.

 

[fernandopartridge]

If I wanted to ask you something mate it'd be about mortgages



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[Ian1779]

GB News - the home of top tier exclusives.
Next week, the McCanns on babysitting tips.

 

[skybluetony176]

If I wanted to ask you something mate it'd be about mortgages



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A man who would turn up for the opening of a packet of crisps posing as a banking expert.

 

[fernandopartridge]

A man who would turn up for the opening of a packet of crisps posing as a banking expert.

Even more of these

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[shmmeee]

Sunak going to force councils to have high speed residential roads, for … reasons.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

Sunak going to force councils to have high speed residential roads, for … reasons.

Drag racing in Mike Gove’s constituency?

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

World leading climate change

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/uk-politics-66357043

 

[shmmeee]

You got to admire the brazenness. Policy after policy that’s not only a terrible idea but unpopular too. His paymasters really squeezing the value out of Sunak before he goes.

 

[Brighton Sky Blue]

You got to admire the brazenness. Policy after policy that’s not only a terrible idea but unpopular too. His paymasters really squeezing the value out of Sunak before he goes.

It’s one thing staying in government when you can’t be arsed anymore and just want to keep power, it’s another to just start going full windmill.