Vocal Voices

HS2 looks set to be given the green light. What a disaster.
I will confess an interest. My village will be adversely affected. By disruption during construction, by a poorer service to London from Wakefield Westgate post-construction, by awful noise pollution, by the loss of countryside, visual pollution with ugly viaducts, loss of wildlife habitat, drops in property prices etc etc. There is no upside for us.
Most of all it is an act of quite staggering political stupidity.
Who wants HS2? Ego driven city mayors.
Who doesn't want it? The people in towns and villages who get all the negatives from it.
Which way do cities votes. In general, for Labour. Which way do towns and villages vote? In the last election, for the Tories.
So dump on your own supporters - great move.
And when the costs go above £200 billion? When the local trains are still crowded? When all the HS2 promises turn out to be rubbish.
In every possible way a bad decision.

When it was first mooted by Blair (@ £29bn not the oft quoted £33bn) I said it was unnecessary, expensive, and would triple in price.

It is still unnecessary, even more expensive, and could end up at nearly five times the price.

But no problem, we'll just plant a new money forest....

Won't be any use to me
Our northern rail service has just lost its owner ship mind its been awfull cancellation s all the time and striking over guard's on trains
HS 2is white elephant

I have just seen a brilliant quote.
"It would be cheaper to demolish Birmingham and rebuild it twenty miles nearer to London!".

How about we demolish London and disperse its ever so necessary bits and bobs around the country?

It's not as though everything has to be located in London for the whole country to operate, is it?

I think it's inevitable that they will go ahead with it now, at tremendous cost, but at least they might put the Crossrail 2 Project on the back burner for a decade or so. London's got enough urban railways.

The one thing I will say about HS2 though is that the likes of thee and me will probably not be able to afford to buy tickets on it. Goodness knows what the fares will ultimately be set at …...

I was thinking similar, Ossie. Only the upper echelons will be able to use it and as there are not enough of them even their tickets will need to be subsidised .... by the many.

They say HS2 will go from London to Birmingham.
It will actually go from a new station Near Euston station to a new station near Birmingham airport. To get to the center of Birmingham which most peopale will want you will have to get another train. So the actual travelling time from center of London to center of birmingham will NOT be reduced.

White Elephant is such a cliche, I know, but has there ever been a better example......

Houses of Lords and Commons... oh, hang on, that's two elephants.