True to form Labour has responded to the dropping of the eastern leg of HS2 from the West Midlands to Leeds by accusing ministers of abandoning the ‘Red Wall’ seats that helped deliver the 2019 Tories’ landslide election victory.
The Opposition isn’t the only one. Many Tory MPs, local leaders and others criticized the Prime Minister last night for his betrayal towards the North.
Admittedly, the optics don’t look good for Boris Johnson, but the truth is that HS2 never was designed to help the former industrial heartlands of the Midlands and North. It was created to help regional centres and not poorer areas like Hartlepool or Workington.
Last night many Tory MPs and local leaders turned on Prime Minister Boris Johnson (pictured answering questions regarding HS2 in West Yorkshire on Thursday), accusing him of a great betrayal of the North after dropping of the eastern leg of HS2 from the West Midlands to Leeds
The Integrated Rail Plan, announced yesterday, attempts to correct this.
This slogan is rare: it looks just like what it promises. The new line will be integrated into existing rail systems, providing better service to cities and towns that were not part of the original HS2 plan.
The plus side is that the plan eliminates the most absurdity in HS2, the station planned between Derby and Nottingham, which would have meant passengers had to use a tram or tram to get to each city.
Now, HS2 trains can be used to serve Derby and Nottingham. It will take longer to travel from London to Leeds. However, HS2 trains are now more accessible.
For those who were concerned about the abandonment of plans to build a Transpennine line running 125mph from Manchester and Leeds, it is obvious that these two cities lie only 35 miles apart.
The more modest improvements proposed will still reduce journey times from 55 minutes to 33 minutes – the 125mph line would have shaved only a further four minutes off the journey.
The new Leeds tram system will make it easier for more commuters to link up with trains. It doesn’t make sense to speed from Manchester, England to Leeds within a matter of minutes when the return journey to Leeds by bus takes approximately 45 minutes.
Boris Johnson is the Prime Minister aboard a train going from Wolverhampton railway station to Coventry, where the government has announced a new Integrated Rail Plan.
Critics have claimed that upgrading existing lines will do nothing to increase capacity, but they’re wrong.
These plans call for the addition of tracks along existing lines. Additionally, new signalling will be used to maximize use of existing tracks. Transpennine’s services will increase by five percent.
That’s not to say there aren’t problems. The revised plans won’t pacify those who see HS2 as an extravagance from the start. Most of HS2 – the London to Birmingham and Birmingham to Manchester sections – are going ahead as planned.
The price tag for the Integrated Rail Plan is put at £96billion which, on top of the £8.3billion already spent on HS2, works out at £104.3billion.
That’s not far short of the £107.92billion price tag put on HS2 by Lord Berkeley’s report last year.
This figure does not include the Transpennine upgrade cost, which includes stretches of new rail between Manchester and Huddersfield as well as electrification on the East Midlands mainline, upgrades to the East Coast mainline, and new trams for Leeds.
According to the Department for Transport, the full HS2 scheme plus a high-speed Manchester to Leeds line and other electrification projects would have cost a staggering £185billion.
The more modest investment announced yesterday will raise objections from those who view building any new railways in Britain as too expensive at a time when the government is running a deficit of £234billion, and the move towards working from home has reduced demand for rail travel.
The revised plans should help Derby and Nottingham, but Bradford won’t get the Transpennine Line. Nor are there details of a proposed Leeds tram system (to which West Yorkshire taxpayers will have to chip in), so it is hard to say what difference it will make to that city’s transport.
As to whether HS2 trains will ever reach Leeds – the jury is still out. They could, in theory, either continue up existing lines north of Sheffield, or they could travel via Manchester – another option considered before the eastern leg of HS2 was chosen.
However, maps from the Integrated Rail Plan show Leeds being serviced by fast trains using the East Coast Line. It would take 113 minutes to travel from London to Leeds – 20 minutes quicker than now but far slower than the 81 minutes promised via the eastern leg of HS2.
The new plan proposes another study to explore the Leeds options further – but that is depressing in itself.
While other countries plan infrastructure schemes and then build them, in Britain we spend years producing plans, studies and revised plans, holding inquiries and setting up commissions – all before a single spade is put into the ground.
While the Integrated Rail Plan comes closer to what the ministers ought to have come up with, it’s unlikely that it will be the end of the story. Watch this space for yet more ‘improvements’ and ‘rethinks’ before the first HS2 train takes to the rails.