marcb wrote in message ...
Cheeky wrote:
Originally it was about £500m with £300m coming from central
government. Now it is up to about £1000m with £500m coming from
central government with costs still rising...


My question is why costs keep rising for schemes that I feel shold be
capable of being costed pretty accurately. After all we are not building
anything that hasn't been done before.

Its not really the building costs that rise its the cost of financing
the building as under PFI/PPP the builder is responsible for the cost
of raising money and factoring in risks like if the government
suddenly deceide to nationalise the system as in the case of
Railtrack. The figure will also contain an element for operation and
maintenance, somthing you rarely see in the capital costs for non
PFI/PPP contracts. ie. the £450M? or so for the scottish parliament
probably doesnt contain the ongoing costs of running the thing. Also
the PFI/PPP contract will be over a set period (Ten years?)and the
builder will have to make sure they pitch at a price that recoups all
their costs plus whatever profit they trying to get within that
period.

This is what makes me so annoyed; the government make tram projects
jump through a series of increasingly costly hoops until it reaches a
point where they say its too expensive and abandon it. London does
come out better usually but watch Crossrail constantly being put off
for more consultation or retuning or even more reports and enquiries
by the great and good. I predict another year of that before they
cancel it again, maybe less if the Olympic bid goes bad.