Tom Anderson wrote:
On Wed, 5 Dec 2007, John Rowland wrote:

John B wrote:
On 22 Nov, 23:14, JL wrote:

What they should get rid of... are the Absolutely Stupid Short-Haul
flights.

This is why routing HS2 via LHR would be a Very Good Idea.

When you said that, did you know Arup were about to suggest exactly
that?
http://business.timesonline.co.uk/to...cle2982649.ece

Funnily enough, i was thinking about that myself last night. I was
pondering a variety of high-speed routes on from London, and was
thinking that one to the west, along the GWML, should go via
Heathrow, so you could do Cardiff - Heathrow - London - Europe. Plus,
with a route to the north along the WCML and a triangular junction
around Old Oak Common, you could do The North - Heathrow, which you'd
need to replace short-haul flights within the UK.

The tracks are already there for Heathrow to the WCML (although new flyovers
might be needed if you wanted to do it frequently).

It didn't occur to
me to actually run the north-south route through Heathrow, which is a
brilliant idea - simpler, allows trains from the North to serve both
Heathrow and London (and Europe!), means you can do it before you
build the western HSL.
I wonder if they're thinking about a station actually at Heathrow, in
which case i assume a new tunnel is called for, or a 'Heathrow
International' station on the GWML, where it's a bugger to get to.

How will they get from the GWML to the CML? Tunnel again? Hang on,
this is the proposed Central Railway route, isn't it? IIRC, there's a
plausible all-surface route, along the M25. Splendid.

I doubt if that route would be straight enough for high speed.