HS2 - Fast Track to Oblivion

[skier-hughes]

or

This rail line will be 70 metres wide

There will be a 120 metre exclusion zone either side of the line

We are now up to 310m wide

 

[Flyfisher]

or

However wide it ends up, it will still require a huge taxpayer subsidy to operate, just like every other national railway in the entire world (intra-city transit systems excepted). I really can't understand the point of railways; they're uneconomic, require a huge infrastructure and rarely provide a complete end-to-end journey for passengers. They might have been a good system for an emerging transportation infrastructure in the 19th century, but they are surely well past their useful life in the 21st century.

I can understand that 30 minutes saved when travelling between Birmingham and London would benefit commuters, but I agree with Biff that it's a bit of a mad justification. Besides, the commuting costs alone would be horrendous. Surely it would be better to develop more industry and employment outside of the south-east? Or perhaps the economic 'power' of London is so strong that it's not really possible?

 

[skier-hughes]

Current cost of off peak ticket to London when my wife travels there for work, £9. Take money = energy she is very carbon efficient

 

[Gareth Hughes]

or

It will absolutely destroy and lead to further development of the unspoilt countryside it goes through.

But it's not going to stop in the unspoilt countryside is it? It'll stop in places where people already live

 

[Flyfisher]

Current cost of off peak ticket to London when my wife travels there for work, £9. Take money = energy she is very carbon efficient

Ah, but that's not really 'commuting' is it? :wink:

A weekday 7:30am Birmingham to London train, returning at 18:03, is £134.50.

The regular commuter get's a good deal though - it's only about five grand for an annual ticket, which is only about £7,150 gross earnings (at basic rate + NI). Thank goodness for public subsidy making it all so economical. :lol:

 

[Flyfisher]

The last government’s command paper contains a graph showing carbon figures for air, road, conventional rail and high speed trains(4).

This creates the impression that high-speed rail produces less than half as much carbon per passenger kilometre as conventional railways, and just a fraction of the emissions from cars.

How did it produce these results? By selecting Eurostar – and apparently only the French section – as its example of a high speed train. French electricity is mostly produced by nuclear power, so high speed trains there create much smaller emissions than ours would cause. It also appears to have ignored the carbon costs of construction.

Compare this to a paper commissioned by the Department for Transport in 2007. When construction is taken into account, high speed rail journeys from London to Manchester will produce 60% more carbon than conventional rail and 35% more carbon than car journeys. They will generate only 25% less carbon than plane travel(5).

Full article at: http://www.chilternsaonb.org/downloads/FastTraintoNowhere-byGeorgeMonbiot17May2010.pdf

All that practice creating dodgy dossiers didn't go to waste then. :roll:

 

[biffvernon]

The 'unspoilt' countryside will get bursts of 90db noise lasting several seconds fourteen times per hour.

High speed trains don't make good energy sense. The air resistance at speed makes them far less efficient than conventional trains. Such development sits ill with an energy-constrained future.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

Ok - dumb question alert.

Who does want HS2 then? What are the real strategic benefits?

Governments aren't entirely stupid, and (unless they are Labour :wink: ) don't relish the prospect of spending billions of pounds they don't have on building a railway against public opposition and then commit future untold billions in subsidies - unless there are tangible strategic benefits that make it worthwhile.

 

[CatherineB]

Ok - dumb question alert.

Who does want HS2 then? What are the real strategic benefits?

Good question, remind me to ask my dad, he's a railway buff... He's still bemoaning the decision not to reopen the Cambridge-St Ives railway line, and instead to replace it with a guided bus. We are still waiting for the guided busway to open, only 45 months into a 24 month construction project (and don't get me going on the costs!)... :evil:

I personally bemoan the fact that, with so much fantastic technology available to us all, so many people still have the need to commute long distances to work in the first place.

 

[FamilyWiggs]

only 45 months into a 24 month construction project (and don't get me going on the costs!)... :evil:

I think we're all familiar on here with that concept! :roll:

Personally I find video-conferencing quite difficult. We regularly run meetings via VC in the NHS across N Wales (and further afield). The technology is OK - but as a new organisation, it is much better to make relationships face to face. We have some pretty good kit, but VC is still a very poor relative to a real conversation. I don't think it will ever fully replace live interaction, no matter how good the technology becomes.

 

[JohnB]

I don't think it will ever fully replace live interaction, no matter how good the technology becomes.

If it replaces much of the live interaction, it will take a lot of pressure off the transport system.

I used to live in Berkshire, and then Somerset, and provided accounting services to a company in Yorkshire. I made one visit when I set up the system, and for a number of years all our interaction was by phone and e-mail, with an occasional (not very productive!) visit from a director who lived near me. It worked really well, we had a great relationship, and it was really productive. My client saved a lot of money in travel expenses too. We never got as far as video conferencing.

 

[Penners]

75m seems awfully wide for a railway.

I suppose the wide gauge helps to keep it stable on the bends. :wink:

 

[Flyfisher]

I entirely agree with Catherine about questioning the need to commute to the office everyday. I'd bet that providing every home and business with a high-speed optical connection to the web would be a far better investment than building an inflexible high-speed rail link between two cities.

The web has existed for just 20 years and in that time it has truly revolutionised modern life. Plus it involved practically no government spending or management (which is probably why it has been so revolutionary!).

In contrast, HS2 will only provide a 100 mile fast railway link between two cities with first trains being 15 years away - let's say 20 years to allow for the inevitable slippages and to put it conveniently in the same time frame as the world wide web. It's principal advantage seems to be a saving of 30 minutes on the journey time between London and Birmingham.

What do we think would be more beneficial to the UK? 100 miles of fast railway between two fixed cities or a country-wide communications infrastructure of almost unlimited speed?

 

[Penners]

What do we think would be more beneficial to the UK? 100 miles of fast railway between two fixed cities or a country-wide communications infrastructure of almost unlimited speed?

Unquestionably the latter. Although I confess to a sneaking worry that the more we develop the ability to communicate with each other electronically, the more we shall tend to isolate ourselves.

This attitude is probably influenced strongly by my age (70 is faintly visible on the horizon), but I have always believed in doing business face-to-face. Ultimately, no matter how much you reduce the process to bean-counting and box-pushing, business is still done between people. And I find myself instinctively wanting to look those people in the eye before I will commit myself to any deal with them.

The same applies to personal relationships. It's great to meet/chat/etc online, but it's ultimately a shallow experience in comparison with shaking hands, sharing a drink and reading facial expressions.*

But, as I said, I suppose this probably a 20th-century frame-of-mind.


*I suppose this is why many of us use emoticons. They're a (very poor) attempt to emulate the person-to-person experience - an admission, in fact, that electronic communication can never match the face-to-face experience.

 

[JohnB]

I have always believed in doing business face-to-face. Ultimately, no matter how much you reduce the process to bean-counting and box-pushing, business is still done between people. And I find myself instinctively wanting to look those people in the eye before I will commit myself to any deal with them.

The same applies to personal relationships. It's great to meet/chat/etc online, but it's ultimately a shallow experience in comparison with shaking hands, sharing a drink and reading facial expressions.

That's a good argument for re-localisation of businesses, so people don't need to travel long distances to meet.

 

[Flyfisher]

But, as I said, I suppose this probably a 20th-century frame-of-mind.

It may be, but it's one I also agree with, despite my possibly over-the-top enthusiasm for technology.

I can't imagine a time when people won't want to, or indeed need to, meet face-to-face - and long may it be so. My hope is that technology can minimise or eliminate all the waste of time, cost and effort of moving around unnecessarily - of which daily commuting seems the most wasteful. Online shopping is also a wonderful time-saving example, as far as I'm concerned.

Also, despite the obvious limitations of online interaction, it's a great way to supplement relationships rather than reduce the amount of face-to-face contact one would normally have.


Hmm. I must work on this uncharacteristic optimism otherwise my Grumpy Old Man image may be undermined.

 

[Pford75]

I'd bet that providing every home and business with a high-speed optical connection to the web would be a far better investment than building an inflexible high-speed rail link between two cities.

The web has existed for just 20 years and in that time it has truly revolutionised modern life. Plus it involved practically no government spending or management (which is probably why it has been so revolutionary!).

A subject close to my own heart. There is a strong correlation between the WEF GCI (Global competitiveness Index) and the WEF NRI (Network readiness index). My professional life is focused on expounding the ways in which the internet can transform developing countries (but this thinking has increasingly been lept on in developed world countries).

Bit of a shameless plug, but check out my papers here....

http://www.cisco.com/web/about/ac79/docs/pov/BVDA_WP_1207FINAL.pdf
http://www.cisco.com/web/about/ac79/docs/pov/Network_Powered_Growth_POV_FINAL.pdf


I take Penners point about the value of real personal interaction, but having used Telepresence very regularly in my job, I can attest that this is so good it is like being in the same room as the person. I 'meet' with my team every week via Telepresence and they are spread across 4 continents and 18 countries! The problem has always been cost. But now products such as Umi are making this experience affordable for domestic users.

http://home.cisco.com/en-us/telepresence/umi/

Our challenge in the UK, is that the areas which would benefit most from this technology are those with the slowest broadband connections!

 

[Penners]

having used Telepresence very regularly in my job, I can attest that this is so good it is like being in the same room as the person. I 'meet' with my team every week via Telepresence and they are spread across 4 continents and 18 countries! The problem has always been cost. But now products such as Umi are making this experience affordable for domestic users.

Our challenge in the UK, is that the areas which would benefit most from this technology are those with the slowest broadband connections!

Tell me about it! Ellen's little movie suffered from several buffering events while I was watching it.