In article .com,
wrote:
wrote:
[snip]
I'm glad you agree that "It would be fine". But actually, all I am
suggesting
is that Birmingham - Manchester - Leeds be made EFFECTIVELY "one
city"
by
high-speed links. It is quite crazy that the links between them are
judged
and prioritised "cross-country".
That won't make them one city, and they still won't be as convenient
to
do business in as London, high speed links or not.
But it's a nice idea. Who would pay? Though birmingham is a bit far
from the others, a high speed S-Bahn linking Liverpool with Leeds, with
a hub at Manchester might be a nice idea.
It is CHEAPER to build NEW railways than to upgrade old ones. That is largely
because of the interruption to work caused by the need to keep trains
running. There is a down side of course: new railways are fine and dandy, but
in time they become old railways and even though the gap between the tracks
is wider to allow work on one track while still allowing traffic on the
other, there still has to be some connection with the old railway system to
allow for maintenance. The idea is that they are all strung together on the
same track which can be done, without largely separate routes, eg London-
Birmingham, London - Manchester, London - Anywhere, then you can shorten the
mileage of track to be built considerably, and with so much traffic
concentrated on one route, you justify spending a lot of money getting it
good, and providing good connections BETWEEN them, which the current layout
lamentably fails to do.
Michael Bell
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