In the news

Re: costs
Don't these figures look expensive, but it costs something like £30million to build a mile of motorway which is a lot more.

30million to build a mile of motorway which is a lot more.

The M74 extension over Glasgow cost £138.4million a mile.

Maybe ‘populist’ would be more accurate than ‘right wing’, on reflection.

But basically, the argument that it’s ‘just a commuter train to London’ feeds into the whole ‘London elites in cahoots with the banksters’ trope and completely overlooks the intention of the project to free up capacity elsewhere on the network:

https://www.midlandsconnect.uk/publications/hs2-released-capacity/

Which means capacity to do all those local services that people are arguing the money should be spent on instead, without the massive disruption over many years that would be required to increase that capacity without HS2.

fire flood plague pestilence earthquakes volcanoes

it's the end of the world isn't it

#startsayingyourprayerspeople

I travelled on HS1 on Friday and it’s kinda jokes. It’s expensive, only part of the line is high speed and it’s not that fast.

It's not long enough (between St Pancras and Ashford) to be worthwhile for that journey,
it's real value is for the Eurostar. Previously it used to be stuck along the 2 track line through Maidstone and would then go fast from Ashford.

Its also prohibitively expensive for lots of locals. A single is £35 I think. The average hourly wage in Dover, for example, is about £8.

The coach is only half an hour longer and is only £11.

There's a weeny short section, where you travel alongside the A13, and you can really tell that you are travelling faster than some of the articulated lorries on that road.
The rest of the time when you are travelling at 'optimum speed' you are, for the most part, inna tunnel.
As fast trains go, it disappoints.
It did used to have the kudos of never being as crowded as the service which serves Victoria. But that seems to have disappeared, to be replaced by crowding, some time ago.

I watched this, this morning. Theres some good and unexpected arguments for HS2 taking a few faster non stop services off the general network.

https://youtu.be/Nf5avCUNP0M

The Trans-Pennine route upgrade business base got rejected recently and they've had to go back and have another think.

Did that business case have the same 400% error now apparent in the HS2 business case?

Really interesting points about HS2 not really being about the connections to Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds but more about freeing up capacity on all those lines + stations so that more local/regional routes can be added.

basically, what @h2o said further up ^^^^

Yep, that message is not being made clearly and strongly enough in our, usually totally fact based and transparent, political discourse.

Honestly, the last three years have pushed me aver closer to the grumpy, cynical cunt camp.

grumpy, cynical cunt camp

Hai. It's no so bad in here

Hai. It's no so bad in here

Yes it is, it's far too crowded and something smells funny.

This is just too delicious...

https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2020/jan/27/prince-andrew-jeffrey-epstein-us-prosecutors-fbi-seek-interview

Sorry, it’s pak choi, worse than sprouts.

He’s backed himself into a corner now. I’d love to see him in prison.

I'm sure he'd be backing himself into a corner then.

Clever, but not cool.

There would be something poetic about him being at Her Majesty's pleasure, yes.

Kylie!

I understand she has dual nationality...

Who are the Beetles?

.https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lo2Vi0_nEHU&feature=emb_err_watch_on_yt