The £30 billion High Speed 2 rail project has rightly triggered a national debate about our railways. Is HS2 the right project to address the issues our railways face? Is it value for money?
Are there better alternatives? How does a new high speed rail (HSR) line fit into the UK’s overall rail strategy? Sir Rod Eddington in his 2006 rail study asked similar questions and concluded (as McNulty in 2011 also has) that we should generally prioritise getting greater use from our existing assets before building new ones. This document is intended as a contribution to this wider debate.
The business case for HS2 is very weak and has been based on a number of false premises. It fails to recognise that time spent on trains can be economically productive (so the boost to productivity it claims is overstated). It does not use a realistic comparator (so the benefit of
reducing overcrowding is exaggerated). The required sensitivity analysis has not been done (so it does not say what would happen if the growth in demand falls, for instance due to new
technology).
There is little evidence that a new railway would bring regeneration or significant job creation.
The claimed ‘regeneration’ jobs are unlikely to be new jobs and even the Department for Transport (DfT) say that most will be in London. Furthermore, HS2 will leave many areas with slower train travel, the Euston rebuild will cause chaos for 8 years and it costs £½ billion for
every minute saved to Birmingham.
Nor is there an environmental case: HS2 say 87% of passengers will be either new journeys or from lower carbon classic rail. Only 6% are expected to come from air travel – and BAA say any domestic slots made available will be replaced by international flights. The line runs through an
Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, sites of Special Scientific Interest, ancient woodlands and some of Britain’s most tranquil countryside.
It is therefore important to look at the alternatives to HS2. There are better ways to improve capacity and speed on mainline services between London and the North. These alternatives can meet forecast demand, and will benefit more people, more quickly and at a much lower cost.
The starting point, however, is to step back and look at key rail needs. Services between London and the North are already high speed and are not the most congested routes. This broader needsbased approach is picked up in Part 1. The specific issue of mainline capacity to the Midlands and
North is covered in Part 2.
But the debate is wider than just rail. Investment in roads tends to have much higher returns than rail. While motorists contribute 4p per mile to the Treasury, rail requires an average 21p per mile subsidy. And while road is part of everyday travel for most people, rail is for the few, and long-distance rail is for the wealthier few – with 47% of journeys taken by those with the top
20% of incomes.
The debate also includes the role of ultra-high-speed broadband. The internet has only been used by business for around 15 years. Applications and speed will continue to develop rapidly. Over 3 the last year, Skype has starting becoming a mainstream business alternative to physical meetings and webinars are also taking off. Meanwhile, the DfT is encouraging telecommuting.
Software for 3D teleconferencing is already available. This technology will be a game changer and will cut growth in expensive, high CO2 physical travel.
The debate is also about growth and jobs, on which HS2 scores badly. The proposals in this document are likely to do more to benefit the economy because they spread the benefits more widely and focus on gaining significant benefits at relatively low costs.
The bodies behind this document are in favour of higher speed rail but not the proposed HS2 project. In the debate it is important to recognise that we already have a rail system that compares favourably with the best in Europe. According to a recent Eurobarometer survey,
there is a 92% satisfaction with journey times in the UK, higher than all our main European competitors.
Furthermore, we need to avoid the expensive disasters that many of our competitors have faced in their high speed rail projects and look at the opportunity cost of HS2 and alternatives that are more beneficial and appropriate to the situation in the UK.
We also need to avoid investing in heavily in current technology when new rail technology may be on the point of adoption. Some say that Maglev offers greener, quieter, cheaper and faster rail systems. Given reliability issues at the UK’s first Maglev installation and given that the capacity
offered by HS2 is not needed for many decades, we would be wise to wait.
We have a genuine win-win opportunity: we can meet the objectives of HSR – supporting growth and solving capacity issues, as well as achieving faster speeds – but without the need for ultrahigh speed.
The many organisations across the political spectrum campaigning against HS2 and for better alternatives have been accused of being NIMBYs and Luddites. Personally, I am an entrepreneur, an innovator and a risk taker in the context of economic development. But the friend’s flat full of Concorde memorabilia and the former Maglev carriage languishing as a shed in a field in Burton Green, serve as reminders of what can go wrong when political vanity and misjudgment cloud sound analysis and decision making.


Jerry Marshall, Chairman, AGAHST Federation