HS2 should go ahead on merit despite the rising costs

As I sit typing this, I’m listening to Sky News with various experts and pundits telling me why it is variously a very good idea to scrap the Birmingham to Manchester leg of HS2 or why it is a very bad idea to scrap it.

As regular readers will know, I have long been opposed to HS2 for a variety of reasons. It was too expensive when it was first conceived and those costs have since spiralled out of control.

And being somewhat parochial, I could see no benefit for me of HS2. If I want to go to London, I have a West Coast Mainline station at Bank Quay a couple of miles from where I live. And the journey time of two hours or so is hardly a great hardship.

Getting to London via HS2 would have taken me longer, involving travelling to Manchester (or Manchester Airport) to get on the train.

I will concede HS2 was perhaps a good idea when the Labour government back in 2009 suggested it and I’ll even go along with the coalition government of 2010 giving the go-ahead. But times have changed since then.

Even before the pandemic, doubts were being raised about the validity of the project but when the Covid-19 outbreak forced many of us to work from home, things really changed.

From time to time in the past, I had to go to London for in-person meetings with a dozen or so other people who travelled to the capital from all over the country.

I don’t have to do that any more. Those meetings still take place but are successfully conducted over Zoom or Teams. And that new way of working is being repeated up and down the country.

So you would expect I would be delighted that (at the time of writing) it looks like prime minister Rishi Sunak is going to scrap the Birmingham to Manchester leg of HS2.

But I’m not, and that’s why I’m torn.

I have to admit there was one very persuasive argument in favour of a new rail link from the North West to London and that is one of lack of capacity.

The rail network in this part of the world is still based on Victorian infrastructure and anyone who has to take the train into Manchester will know the network is clogged up and at capacity.

HS2 would have allowed some express trains to be taken off the North West Mainline with the possibility of more local services with greater connectivity.

So while I’m not sure that a vanity project high-speed line was needed, there is little doubt that extra north-south rail capacity in some way was and is vital. Having gone down the high-speed route (no pun intended) simply pulling the plug leaves us in the worst of all possible worlds.

It’s hard to disagree with Mayor of Greater Manchester Andy Burnham who said: “Why are we always treated as second class citizens when it comes to transport?

“This is the Parliament when they said they would level us up. If they leave a situation with the southern half of the country is connected by modern high-speed lines and the north of England is left with Victorian infrastructure that is a recipe for the north-south divide to become a north-south chasm over the rest of this century.”

And as Mr Burnham said, the move seemed to be the ‘desperate act of a dying government’.

Which puts me and Andy Burnham in an odd group of people including former Prime Ministers Boris Johnson and David Cameron who believe HS2 is too far advanced to be scrapped and should go ahead.

Strange times indeed.

On another topic, after complaining recently about Manchester Airport, I can report that I have just returned from a late summer break in Spain and had to use MCR both ways.

I still don’t like it but I have to confess it wasn’t as bad as I feared, maybe because I travelled midweek.

But I do have a query. I parked my car at the airport and would be delighted if anyone can explain the difference (apart from the price) between its ‘Meet & Greet’ and ‘Drop & Go’ parking services.

I’ve used them both and I’m blowed if I can tell what’s different.