Britain needs high speed rail but not on the HS2 route

 

The following letter was published in Planning magazine, Journal of the Royal Town Planning Institute, on 21 October 2011.

 

Britain needs high speed rail but not on the HS2 route

Gareth Giles reflects upon Tim Stanfield's helpful piece on High Speed 2 (HS2) and comes to the conclusion that "it's just a big idea with lots of local issues" and that it has no impact upon the country beyond the proposed route (Planning, 9 September, p18).

 

Perhaps he can be persuaded that it is indeed an issue of national significance that goes beyond narrow but valid concerns of counties along the proposed route.

 

The Guardian recently quoted North Warwickshire MP, Dan Byles, who helped secure a debate in the House of Commons about the proposed line, "it's such an important national project that, regardless of whether you as an MP are for or against it, you need to know the issues at stake. Every family in the land will end up paying for this."

 

The Institute for Economic Affairs have said there is no national business case for HS2.  The Economist wrote that it is "doubtful whether the proposed link would do much to address regional [economic] variations. The effect of such projects in other countries has often been to strengthen the competitive advantage of an already dominant city."

 

Professor John Tomaney of Newcastle University cites evidence that indicates Paris has gained the most from the creation of a [high speed] network in France that has its capital as the central node.

 

While the aim of HS2 is to rebalance the national economy away from London, it is becoming clearer that HS2 will merely cement London's dominance.

 

If HS2 is indeed a project of national significance then, as campaign group HS2 Action Alliance concludes what is needed to benefit the north and Midlands are “transport investments that improve the efficiency of their labour markets, not ones that expose them to greater competition from London."

 

Yorkshire Against HS2 believe that national infrastructure projects such as high-speed rail must first seek to redress regional disparities currently blighting the UK and damaging its future prospects. High-speed rail has a part to play in such corrective intervention by improving links between the northern cities, but the proposed north-south route does not.