{"id":10969,"date":"2011-09-02T08:12:30","date_gmt":"2011-09-02T12:12:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/?p=10969"},"modified":"2012-05-24T13:20:06","modified_gmt":"2012-05-24T18:20:06","slug":"doubts-about-britains-next-proposed-high-speed-rail-line","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/2011\/09\/02\/doubts-about-britains-next-proposed-high-speed-rail-line\/","title":{"rendered":"Doubts about Britain’s next proposed high speed rail line"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Economist<\/em> is usually pretty gung-ho about high speed rail development in general, so this article expressing some serious doubts<\/a> is noteworthy:<\/p>\n

\n

\"\"Earlier this year the coalition government announced details of a \u00a332 billion ($52 billion) super-fast railway line from London to Manchester and Leeds via Birmingham (see map). Philip Hammond, the transport secretary, claims it will be a \u201cfast track\u201d to prosperity. If the project goes ahead\u2014and there is still, just, time to reconsider\u2014the final route, and Stoke\u2019s transport fate, will not be decided until 2012 at the earliest. The first trains won\u2019t reach Birmingham until 2026, and Leeds and Manchester until 2032-3.<\/p>\n

There are practical reasons to favour a new north-south line. Good infrastructure lasts a long time: Britain is still enjoying the fruits of Victorian railway investment. At some point in the next 20 years the existing west-coast main line will face a capacity crunch. Upgrading lines is disruptive and expensive, so constructing a new one appears sensible. The vision of a futuristic train scything across Britain at 250mph (400kph) is appealing.<\/p>\n

But although the plan has cross-party support, the British public is not entirely convinced. Objections have so far focused on two concerns. First, the environmental damage, particularly to the Chilterns, an area of \u201coutstanding natural beauty\u201d and home to many well-off voters. Second, the business case for the line: the projected doubling of long-distance rail use by 2043 seems ambitious.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Economist is usually pretty gung-ho about high speed rail development in general, so this article expressing some serious doubts is noteworthy: Earlier this year the coalition government announced details of a \u00a332 billion ($52 billion) super-fast railway line from London to Manchester and Leeds via Birmingham (see map). Philip Hammond, the transport secretary, claims […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,25,65,15],"tags":[185,350,816],"class_list":["post-10969","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-britain","category-economics","category-environment","category-technology","tag-highspeedrail","tag-london","tag-manchester"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2hpV6-2QV","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10969","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=10969"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10969\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":10973,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10969\/revisions\/10973"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=10969"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=10969"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quotulatiousness.ca\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=10969"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}