In message
,
Adrian writes
On Mar 24, 3:26*pm, The Real Doctor wrote:
On 24 Mar, 20:15, Adrian wrote:

On Mar 24, 12:52 pm, Stimpy wrote:

On Mon, 24 Mar 2008 18:35:40 +0000, Adrian wrote

To bring this back on topc: Whatever the cost, Crossrail is essential.

*Whatever* the cost??

Wouldn't you like to actually derive some benefit from those
extortionately high UK taxes?

The people Crossrail is supposed to benefit - the international
financial community
- by and large pay bugger all in taxes.

Ian

Their employees pay considerable taxes. And, many of them commute.

And if those employees lost their jobs, then that would take several
billion pounds out of the local economy of the south-east and, by
extension, Britain.
--
Jane
British OO, American and Australian HO, and DCC in the garden
http://www.yddraiggoch.demon.co.uk/railway/railway.html

On 25 Mar, 08:47, "Lüko Willms" wrote:

But there may be a lot of utility lines ond other uses of the
underground to be removed before one can go on boring; also London
Crossrail is planned to have more stations, and underground stations,
which in itself would be more expensive than the one Stratford Int'l
box, plus interchanges with existing underground and train stations.
That is a lot of extra work, which makes the London Crossrail tunnel
more expensive to build than the London HS1 tunnel with the one open
station in its middle.

I thought about the cost of stations - then remembered that the
Jubilee Line extension included four new underground stations,
interchanges with three existing underground stations (plus 2 new and
2 altered surface stations) and it /still/ only (sic) £3.5bn.

That's not just a bit less than Crossrail - that's one fifth of the
predicted Crossrail cost.

Remember, Crossrail = HS1 + Jubilee Line Extension + WCML upgrade.

Ian

On 25 Mar, 08:47, "Lüko Willms" wrote:
Am Mon, 24 Mar 2008 22:26:35 UTC, schrieb The Real Doctor
auf uk.railway :

The people Crossrail is supposed to benefit - the international
financial community

I think that London Crossrail will benefit much more people than
just the "financial community".

It will be a faster way to get _thru_ London, instead of just _into_
London.

Well, it would be if it was designed to take long distance trains. But
it's not - just stoppers from Maidenhead to Shenfield. Long distance
travellers (Bristol - Norwich?) wanting to travel across London will
still have to change twice, just as now.

Ian

On 25 Mar, 09:05, The Real Doctor wrote:
I thought about the cost of stations - then remembered that the
Jubilee *Line extension included four new underground stations,
interchanges with three existing underground stations (plus 2 new and
2 altered surface stations) and it /still/ only (sic) £3.5bn.

That's not just a bit less than Crossrail - that's one fifth of the
predicted Crossrail cost.

But Crossrail includes 8 underground stations, most with two entrances
(doubling many of the costs), the rebuilding of several miles of Great
Western Main Line including two grade-separated junctions (Heathrow
and Acton Yard), the electrification of 11 miles of GWML (requiring
the rebuilding of about ten bridges in Slough), rebuilding a of a fair
bit of GEML, rebuilding of ca. 30 stations (about half will be
completely demolished) and so on. It's a much larger project.

U

--
http://londonconnections.blogspot.com/
A blog about transport projects in London

Am Tue, 25 Mar 2008 09:07:25 UTC, schrieb The Real Doctor
auf uk.railway :

It will be a faster way to get _thru_ London, instead of just _into_
London.

Well, it would be if it was designed to take long distance trains.

I did not think about that, but rather about someone lifing e.g. in
Romford and looking for a job at the Heathrow airport. Or similar
setups.

Have a look at the RER network in and around Paris.


Cheers,
L.W.

Adrian wrote:
On Mar 24, 3:25*pm, The Real Doctor wrote:
On 24 Mar, 20:13, Adrian wrote:

On Mar 24, 12:46 pm, The Real Doctor
wrote:

On 24 Mar, 18:35, Adrian wrote:

To bring this back on topc: Whatever the cost, Crossrail is essential.

Essential to /what/?
It is essential to London's ongoing function as a financial center.
Crossrail will also be useful in helping London's quality of life.

It can't be essential to London's ongoing function, because that's
ongoing without Crossrail. Perhaps you meant "future development" -
but even then, I'd like to see some convincing proof that it's really
going to be worth spending £16bn on.

Ian

If you believe that Europe's financial center should be in Germany,
then you should oppose Crossrail.

Adrian

It'll take more than Crossrail to save London. It is gradually sinking, in a
century or two it will be under the water.

The Real Doctor wrote:
On 24 Mar, 23:10, Adrian wrote:
On Mar 24, 4:00 pm, Dan G wrote:

Anyone seen a more detailed costing of the scheme? *Why* is it costing
so much more than other, not dissimilar, projects?

In part it will cost a lot because it will be (or should be)
engineered to a very high standard. The Jubilee Line extension is a
pointer in that respect.

But it is predicted to cost more than five times as much as the
Jubilee Line extension ...

You have clearly never lived in a city where good spacious (1,000 sq
ft per person) affordable housing is available to middle class
workers. Or, enjoyed one where a normal comfortable journey to work
is 40 minutes or less.

And how many people do you think will find good, spacious, affordable
housing as a result of this line. It'll knock quarter of an hour,
tops, off the journey onto London - are those fifteen minutes really
deterring millions from moving to good, spacious, affordable housing?

Ian

The only way to get good, spacious, affordable housing in Britain is to have a
smaller population. It's gone up 50% in the past hundred years.

The Real Doctor wrote:
On 25 Mar, 08:47, "Lüko Willms" wrote:
Am Mon, 24 Mar 2008 22:26:35 UTC, schrieb The Real Doctor
auf uk.railway :

The people Crossrail is supposed to benefit - the international
financial community

I think that London Crossrail will benefit much more people than
just the "financial community".

It will be a faster way to get _thru_ London, instead of just _into_
London.

Well, it would be if it was designed to take long distance trains. But
it's not - just stoppers from Maidenhead to Shenfield. Long distance
travellers (Bristol - Norwich?) wanting to travel across London will
still have to change twice, just as now.

Ian

All the more reason to pull the plug. Thameslink, by contrast, will accommodate
long-distance services, will it not ?

On Tue, 25 Mar 2008 08:58:47 +0000, Jane Sullivan
wrote:

And if those employees lost their jobs, then that would take several
billion pounds out of the local economy of the south-east and, by
extension, Britain.

But why would they lose their jobs if Crossrail didn't happen? The
existing lines are by and large adequate (if not always pleasant) for
getting everyone to their current jobs - if they weren't, they
wouldn't get there!

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.

On Tue, 25 Mar 2008 09:53:10 GMT, "Grumpy Old Man"
wrote:

The only way to get good, spacious, affordable housing in Britain is to have a
smaller population. It's gone up 50% in the past hundred years.

There is that. The other option would be to become more like Germany
and less London-centric. Serious tax breaks for locating employment
in a city other than London would be a good start, and the Government
should seriously look towards any new civil service jobs that don't
*have* to be in London being somewhere else instead.

The other problem (the "affordable" bit) is that houses should be to
live in, not to invest in.

Neil

--
Neil Williams
Put my first name before the at to reply.