Is it worth spending more to go faster, only to get there later?
Everyone wants to get to where they need to be as fast as possible, safely, in comfort, and affordably. Trains are a great solution to traverse across the United Kingdom, and if they can be made to go faster or the route from A to B shorter, well, all the better.
HS2 will be the second high-speed rail line in the UK after HS1 that itself connects London to the Channel Tunnel. Unlike HS1, there was going to be opposition against the planned routes, opposition about the unimaginable costs, and opposition to the minuscule amount of time it was actually going to save on an average journey. Was it really worth the expense of £37.5 billion?
As with most projects undertaken of this magnitude, detailed plans and cost analysis were conducted by experts, government officials, qualified contractors, and engineers. The interconnected rail links were planned meticulously so that they would create faster connections between 10 major UK cities, serve over 25 stations, and make all ends of the UK more accessible to more people.
An inspirational goal back in 2010, that was immediately mired in controversy.
Environmentalists protested against the loss of green land, activists disrupted work sites in any way possible and even house owners became demonstrators along the proposed routes, concerned that their houses might have to be demolished to make way for the railway lines. In anticipation, some of them accepted the government’s offer to buy them out, but many were determined not to lose farms and homesteads that had been in their family for generations.
The supporters of HS2 cite the job creations that the project has brought, that ultimately the increasing flow of travelers has to be anticipated before it overwhelms the current system, and that a faster, more economical rail system has to be good for the environment as it has the capacity to significantly reduce traffic on public roads.
Also, hundreds of trees are being planted along the routes, wildlife habitats are being created, hectares of new woods and ancient woodlands are being restored, and new woodland and habitat areas for wildlife are being preserved.
Despite the opposition, infrastructural work continued on the first phase between London and Birmingham as best it could under the frequent activist disruptions.
A 20-year time frame had been allotted to complete all the phases, with a quarterly review about every 5 years. In 2015, it was estimated, accounting for inflation and costs for rolling stock, that the revised costing would be £56 billion. Some jaws dropped, other heads nodded unsurprised, and activists ramped up their protests, chaining themselves to anything that was nailed down.
At this stage, many screamed for HS2 to be abandoned, that it should be written off as a white elephant, a bottomless money pit. But the tracks rolled on regardless, and even a further judicial review in 2019 couldn’t put the brakes on, despite the new revelation of future cost predictions of between £80 billion to £88.7 billion.
Delays, delays, delays, extended the projected finish time further down the line to around 2040. Some suggestions were that the other phases should be discontinued at least in part, replaced by upgrades to existing stations and lines. The logic was that in some rural areas a high-speed train that can go 250mph wasn’t going to enhance local lives significantly. But apart from that, doubts began to creep in that the project could be finished at all, so monumental was the task.
HS2 is without a doubt the biggest infrastructure project that Britain has ever undertaken. It will amount to thousands of miles of tracks to be laid, millions of trees and shrubs to be planted to preserve the environment, and countless man-hours invested.
Only time will tell if it will enhance the lives of its commuters, or if it will provide value for money with the new projected final ticket price of £106 billion.