London Banter - View Single Post - Will Brexit lead to the abandonment of Crossrail2 and Turning SouthLondon Orange?

Someone Somewhere · June 30th 16, 10:51 AM posted to uk.transport.london

On 30/06/2016 11:17, d wrote:
On Thu, 30 Jun 2016 10:41:27 +0100
Someone Somewhere wrote:
On 30/06/2016 10:01, d wrote:
On Thu, 30 Jun 2016 09:47:41 +0100
Someone Somewhere wrote:
In terms of capacity, I realise there is freight and local services, but
is there really no scope for increasing the number of InterCity trains
north from Euston beyond 9/hour?

Obviously not or they'd have probably done it. AFAIK the real reason for HS2
is to free up paths on the WCML for freight though I guess this wouldn't play
too well with the public: "We need you lot to pay for this fancy train so
we can shift more containers. Soz"

--
Spud

And I presume that all paths are currently in use 24x7 (excepting
maintenance requirements) as most freight is only time-sensitive to the day.

Or are there further agreements not to upset the beauty sleep of those
who live next to the WCML for which we're now committing to building a
whole new railway?

Beats me. Personally while I think there is a case for improvements to rail
links to the north, it certainly doesn't warrant 50 billion and counting. I
think the money would be better spent improving cross country routes and
building proper metro systems in Brum & manchester and more tram systems in
smaller cities like the one in nottingham.

If the government is really serious about its "northern powerhouse" then you
need serious public transport in major cities. They figured this out in europe
decades ago - most large french and german cities have metros.

I also don't understand the slwoing down of projects "to save money" -
surely one thing that everyone agrees on is that railway inflation is
somewhat higher than other traditional measures - look at the difference
in cost between the Channel Tunnel and Crossrail as a good example.