Let's get this straight, Britain's railways are no longer the music hall joke which they were. We have a rail industry in growth with ongoing development and improvements like we've never seen since Victorian times.
OK, there are problems such as with fare increases, train operating companies not performing to the level of their profit, train orders not being placed in UK and freight being shifted away from wagonload traffic. However, I think we are in a true renaissance with our rail industry.
We've had a few periods when we nearly got there, first with British Rail under the astute leadership of Sir Peter Parker. The Intercity 125 project was a huge success and sets are still in front line service today. Sadly the APT was so close to being a revolution and despite the huge disappointment, the technology developments developed were vital to modern traction.
Privatisation was a new dawn, yet so flawed losing much knowledge, staff goodwill and technology development which British Rail excelled in. Despite this, safety and maintenance issues led to two tragic major incidents andccaused the fall of Railtrack. Also, delivery of major projects were at doubt. Having seen at first hand working on it, the disorganised overspend on the West Coast Route Modernisation, it was so positive that the Channel Tunnel Rail Link was such as success as a project, with related works such as the St Pancras modernisation, gave the rail industry the shot in the arm it needed.
The railways are responsible for some of Britain's most famous architectural statements and these are are added to with developments related to existing rail infrastructure, such as The Shard at London Bridge Station.
The High Speed 2 project has the potential to become the iconic civil engineering legacy of our age. This built on the now proven major project delivery of the rail industry with CTRL and Crossrail.
Let's be bold, lets be brave and go for HS2. The job creation, supply chain opportunities and GDP growth are vast, plus get the nation moving again.
Whilst the land take with any construction projects has an environmental impact, the benefits of lower carbon travel in getting people anf freight off roads is vital. The major offshoot would be increasing freight and local commuter capacity of the WCML.
The WCML is at full capacity and built on Victorian infrastructure. Despite the huge success of the Pendolino in service, sadly with the 125mph line speed as opposed to the 140mph original planned and scrapped due to construction overspend, without huge disruption in closing the line during the realignment of the curved track and resignalling, a further modernisation will not give much extra capacity.
The benefits to the ECML will be realised also if HS2 is extended to Leeds as well as Manchester and hopfully Scotland. The line has to be be extended past Birmingham, that is why the intial HS2 construction has got to be a success.
So, lets go for HS2 as it makes environmental, social plus short and long term economic sence.
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