Alternatives to HS2
SIR – John H Brook (Letters, February 3), who defends HS2, is obviously not aware of all the practical alternatives which have been suggested over the years.
For example, Arriva, Tesco and others submitted a proposal to rebuild the Great Central Railway from Manchester to Marylebone – via Sheffield, Nottingham, Leicester and Rugby – under the name Grand Central Railway to increase capacity. This is an attractive scheme, as most of the infrastructure exists and most of the route is laid out for high speed.
The route from Marylebone to Ashendon Junction beyond Princes Risborough was a joint scheme with Great Western Railway, which gave GWR a fast route to Birmingham Snow Hill. The latter route is open today and would be a very fast route to Birmingham if the remaining parts of double track were quadrupled.
All this work could surely be carried out with far less disruption, and at far lower cost, than HS2.
Michael Simmons Chepstow, Monmouthshire
SIR – The North consists of West, East and North Yorkshire; Durham; Northumberland; Westmorland; Cumberland; and Lancashire.
In the west, HS2 terminates at Manchester and Liverpool, which borders on Cheshire. In the East it terminates at Sheffield, which borders Derbyshire, and Leeds, which is 40 miles into Yorkshire and a little over half way from London to Berwick.
HS2 may create a powerhouse in the Midlands, Cheshire, South Yorkshire and south Lancashire but it will have little or no effect on the North.
Bill Greenwood Cowton, North Yorkshire
SIR – A few months ago, the boss of HS2 said that its funding should be raised to £100billion to provide transport links from its stations to town centres, admitting a glaring lack of forethought in the planning.
Now he is struggling to keep HS2 within its current budget. Also, some years ago, a geophysicist warned that the vibrations from the high speeds would, in some areas, cause the ground beneath the track to destabilise – a serious safety issue.
With so much of the current railway system in poor condition and needing electrification, the priorities of the powers-that-be seem dreadfully skewed as they persist with HS2.
Sally Lawton Kirtlington, Oxfordshire