HS2 Action Alliance Blog

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Time is pretty central to the Government’s plan for HS2. Shortening journeys from Leeds, Manchester and Birmingham will supposedly increase productivity by freeing up the time of important businessmen and women. As Hilary Wharf recently pointed out at the Great Missenden rally, this productivity argument is at best debatable, and quite probably flawed: free wifi and good service during long-distance journeys make working on trains a productive experience, while video-conferencing and other technological advances reduce the necessity to travel. One also suspects more effective technology will exist by 2026 or 2032, when HS2 would be up-and-running.

But the point of this piece is not just to question the need for quicker journeys. Instead, new evidence suggests that the Government has not been fully truthful about how much quicker HS2 will be:

Leeds to London is the route in question. Page 30 of the Department for Transport’s HS2 Consultation Document clearly states that the current line from Leeds to London takes 2 hours 20 minutes, with HS2 knocking this down to 1 hour 20 minutes. That would be one extra hour of supposed productivity for business people.

However, on 22 May 2011, Great North Eastern Franchise announced a new timetable – their biggest revamp for 20 years. The first point to make is that the Leeds to London route has been reduced to 1 hour 59 minutes, only 39 minutes longer than the £30 billion HS2 plans. Numerous weekday services will set off at 7am from Leeds, arriving in London before 9am.

The second point is more under-hand. Major timetable revamps take months of consultation and fine tuning. With the HS2 consultation published less than 3 months ago, the DFT would probably have been aware of the forthcoming reduction in journey time on the Leeds to London line. Yet nowhere in the consultation was this mentioned. This reporter thinks up-to-date and important information ought to be freely available when people make up their minds on HS2!