I think that it was wrong not to integrate the old building into the structure of the new station. Instead, it will stand alone next to the new, with no obvious use. Many people using the new Curzon Street will probably be unaware of the significance of the old building. It could, perhaps, have become a museum of the railways in Birmingham.
Unfortunately, it was always outside the scope of the HS2 station project, although it was originally intended to be refurbished during the works using a separate pot of money. Work started, however within a few months, it was deemed the structural issues were more severe than they thought and all work was halted pending a full structural survey and another large pot of cash from central government (which, unsurprisingly, still hasn't materialised).
The old building was demolished 50 years ago. What is left was the original station hotel, which was rarely used and very soon converted into railway offices.
Birmingham Curzon Street HS2 station once it’s completed will be very big. Probably bigger than Birmingham New Street station that is near to Birmingham Curzon Street. Which I can’t wait to see HS2 finished in 2030.
Curzon Street, New Street and Moor Street are in such close proximity that, had they been an airport, there would have been travellators between the platforms. Curzon St. will be useless on its own. Through passengers will have to walk to one of the other stations no matter where they are going, and the tram connection will be so slow and circuitous that you might as well walk.
Why will people have to walk betwen Birmingham New Street and Curzon street as if you are going to any place served by Avanti West Coast Trains from Birmingham you will go straight to Birmingham Curzon Street, any one on a train going through Birmingham New Street and wanting to use HS2 services will change trains at Birmingham International, catch a driver less people carrier train that will take you to Birmingham Interchange Station via Birmingham Airport where they will catch HS2 services from there and no Curzon Street Station will not be useless when it opens plus the trms will not be slow but fast and straght forward
The original Curzon Street station failed because it's stupid to have a terminus in a city that's right in the middle of England. The HS2 station has repeated this mistake.
No it hasn't because unlike the Old Curzon Street station being two seperate stations, one for the London and Birminghm Railway and the other side for the Grand Junction Railwy which went though Duddeston, Aston, Witton and Perry Barr/Gret Barr to Wolverhampton and the North, about 8 miles from Curzon Street will be a Delta Junction at Water Orton allowing HS2 trains to freely travel from Birmingham to London, Manchester, Liverpool and Scotland, so the new Curzon Street station will be far superior to the old Curzon Street Station
@@andrewhotston983 Well it will be connected to London, Manchester, Liverpool and Scotland which is what HS2 and Curzon Street is being built for, plus HS2 trains would not of fitted into Birmingham New street being far to long for the platforms plus New Stret is totaly congested now, by moving Avanti West Coast Hi Speed services out of Birmingham New Street to Birminghm Curzon Street nd HS2 it will allow othe train services to flourish at Birmingham New Street
@@peterwilliamallen1063 That's not correct. Both the London & Birmingham and Grand Junction stations were terminal stations. Trains from London to Liverpool and Manchester had to reverse at Birmingham, and often had to be shunted from one station to the other. The Trent Valley line, through Tamworth and Lichfield, was built so that trains from London to the north didn't have to reverse. New Street station was built so that trains could pass through and onto the newly-built Stour Valley line to Wolverhampton. Later, the Midland Railway trains from Derby were diverted through New Street so that they could continue along the newly-built West Suburban line in the direction of Bristol.
Sorely the Grade 1 listed building would have served a better purpose by being a working part of the new terminal. Instead, I see it being left out in the cold. Why not incorporate it within the proposed new structure? Somewhere inside and beneath the planned roof span?
Like your previous documentaries, the narrative and the video are out-of-sync. It's as though you've just put a new narration over an old video. Some of the facts were incorrect. And, as far as HS2 is concerned, what's the point in knocking 20 minutes off a trip from Euston, when passengers for the north will then have to lug their bags over to New Street to continue their journey, probably on the same train that they could have caught from Euston? The building that they will be incorporating into the new structure is NOT the original front entrance. That was to the left of the building, and, together with the historic train shed, was demolished in the early 1970s, The building with the columns was the station hotel, which never attracted customers and became railway offices almost as soon as it was opened. You don't mention that for many years after closure to passengers, it was often used as a passenger excursion terminal, especially for holiday-time trains to Sutton Coldfield.
Have you read anything on HS2, it will actually cut 40 mins off the journey from Birmingham to London and any one from Manchester and the North will not have to change trains at Birmingham New Street and as you put it lug their luggage across to Birmingham Curzon Street as every one travelling on service to do with HS2 will go to Curzon Stret only, any other services passengers will change trains at Birmingham International and catch an automated driverless people crrier train to Birmingham Interchange station on HS2 and continue their journey and will not catch the same train to Euston as all hi speed trains from Birmingham to London Euston will travel from Birmingham Curzon Street and not Birmingham New Street. That was the original ticket office building for the original Curzon Street Station the gates either side were for horse carriages.
@@samharv8076 The existing lines between London, Birmingham and Manchester are nearing full capacity - there's little room to add new services, especially with express trains, local trains and freight trains all sharing the same tracks. Quad-tracking the existing lines can't be done as there's no extra space in the alignment and even in sections that were previously quad tracked (particularly through stations), the space previously used by the outer lines has frequently been either developed on or used for station car parks. The bulk of the cost over-runs are due to a combination of the arcane process for granting Development Consent Orders, which requires multiple rounds of public consultation, in the case of HS2 requiring far more bored tunnels and viaducts than most other high speed lines across the world, and bespoke designs for each viaduct to make them architecturally interesting or blending into the landscape rather than a standard design; and that major projects are subdivided into several smaller contracts, of which a lot of what's required to fulfil those contracts subcontracted out. Add on a company to project manage the whole thing and you have an entire hierarchy of contracting and subcontracting, with every company in the hierarchy seeking to make a profit. As if that wasn't bad enough, UK government (Central and local) typically doesn't have any in-house experience of infrastructure projects, so we're relying on the companies to give honest estimates (when in reality, they're likely to quote far below the actual costs to get the contract, then "discover" "unexpected" issues which need another cash injection to solve); then in the case of HS2 costs were further raised by Ministerial meddling, progressively pruning bits or pausing other bits, at least partially as budgets are set annually, so action has to be taken to prevent one year's costs exceeding the allocated budget, even if doing so substantially pushes up the overall contract cost. So the current entire process of major UK infrastructure projects seems almost designed to leach as much money from The Treasury as possible.
@@peterwilliamallen1063.. speaking of a lack of passengers, HS2 Ltd have stated that to "break even" with a subsidy of 50/60%, they require 600,000 passengers travelling between London & Birmingham DAILY! Given that passenger numbers on this route have been declining by 4% per year for the last decade & now average 96,000 per day, perhaps you could explain where the extra 504,000 are suddenly going to materialise from?
@@CRIMSONANT1 James you still don't get it do you, HS2 ltd is the construction company and have not stated anything on numbers of passengers so I don't know where you keep getting these ridiculouse ideas and numbers from, just accept it, it does not matter if one passenger or 900,000 passengers are planned to use HS2, the fact of the matter it is being built and if you lived in Birmingham like me and not Newcastle on Tyne you would see the construction work on HS2 progressing daily. Train Services on the HS2 line will be operated by the incubent WCML Inter City train operator which at the moment is Avanti West Coast trains so there will not be, as you put it "lack of Passengers" as 95% of existing WCML hi speed services operated by Avanti West Coast Trains will be taken off the WCML route south of Crewe from Liverpool, Manchester and Scotland plus all Birmingham to London Services operated by Avanti West Coast Trains will when HS2 opens operate on the HS2 route to LONDON EUSTON, so all the passengers who use those services now on the WCML will be using trains operating on the HS2 route. Next the Pendolino trains will be nearing the end of their operating life with Avanti buying the new 805 and 807 non tilting IET trains as when HS2 opens there will be no requirement for tilting trains with Avanti. This then just leaves trains from Hollyhead, Wolverhampton and the odd Scottish Service of Avanti West Coast that will operate through Birmingham New Street
Why is it on the wrong side of the City, if you lived in Birmingham like I do you would realise that where the new Birmingham Curzon Street Station is being built is the only place in Brum it could of been built and is on the correct side for London services from Birmingham
Birmingham, a city already well served by rail lines will get another, but this one, unlike the others, doesn't go to the centre. It goes to Curzon Street, a good 20 minute walk from the centre. Precisely the reason why the original station here closed back in 1854! Still, politicians must have their toys, even those which come at an eye watering cost in a country which is crying out for real investment for the benefit of the general population, not vanity projects for the minority. HS2 is an environmental disaster of epic proportions & Britain's biggest infrastructure mistake in half a century.
What utter Rubbish James Monks, as a Birmingham Citizen I can catogorically tell you the main entrance to Birmingham Curzon Street Station is right in the City Centre on Moor Street Queenswy next door to Birmingham Moor Street Station over the road from the Bull Ring Shopping Centre and Primark and the main shopping area, it will have a frequent tram service from Digbeth passing Curzon Street Second entrance in Curzon Street, the main entrance on Moor Street Queens way and then wither via the rest of the City Centre to Birmingham New Street Station to Edgebaston Villiage or to Wolverhampton High Level Station and plenty of National Express West Midlands Bus Services stopping outsideand it is not 20 mins from the City Centre at all you are getting mixed up with the old Curzon Street Station mate typical of some one who does not know what they are talking about, so stop talking utter rubbish on some thing it seems you know nothing about apparently. Just accept that it is being built full stop and when it is operting it will be a total success
@@peterwilliamallen1063 .. * CATEGORICALLY .. not "catogorically". *SOMEONE .. not "some one". *OPERATING .. not "operting". Read this from the i newspaper .. "The decision to scrap the northern leg of HS2 will see the construction of a vast £460m new Birmingham station that will sit largely unused, a major new report from the spending watchdog has shown. An analysis by the National Audit Office (NAO) into the cost of the previous government’s decision to axe Phase 2 of HS2 reveals that the project will plough ahead with building a seven-platform station at Curzon Street, despite just three being required for the reduced HS2 line.
@@peterwilliamallen1063 .. excellent article in the Spectator today .. I quote:- Choose your expression: "stuck between a rock & a hard place", "I wouldn’t start from here if I were you" or simply "this is the biggest omnishambles in history". All these apply to HS2 as Louise Haigh, the Secretary of State for Transport, attempts to come up with a coherent strategy for a project that has now run for 15 years & has worked its way through around £35 billion - but is still only less than half-completed. Worse, on its way it has shed most of its sections, such as running to Manchester & Leeds or connecting with HS1, that would at least have made the end product a worthwhile addition to the country’s railway infrastructure. Certainly, completing these two sections will at least invest some ultimate purpose in this deranged project Instead, we now have a 135-mile-long line that has been dubbed the Acton to Aston shuttle, starting some five miles from the centre of London & ending up a mile from Birmingham’s New Street station, necessitating a tram ride to connect with it. In this form, few people will use the service, given it will cost more & not save any time when travelling between the two city centres. The cost is now accepted to be in the order of £100 billion & according to my sources, will not open until at least 2033 rather than the originally planned mid 2020s - & that’s if no new problems arise. There are already rumours that major, previously undiscovered gas & water mains on the site marked for the initial terminus at Old Oak Common will severely disrupt progress there.
@@CRIMSONANT1 Well James Monks my man, it proves you are totaly desperate about trying to find facts on HS2 which are totaly wrong, living in Newcastle on Tyne you do not know the geography or areas of Birmingham and HS2, so lets get started, first try reading the News Papers and looking at You Tube, HS2 will not be running from Acton as it has now been anounced in the press that the Labour Government has given the go ahead to rebuild London Euston Station and run the HS2 line from London OOC through the tunnels that are being bored at the moment into London Euston as they now relise that OOC is not and could not operate as a terminal station as it is classed as a through sttion and the relise tht the HS2 line could not operate successfuly with out running into London Euston. The next one about Birmingham and HS2 iyou state a load of crap as you know nothing about Birmingham, let me put you striaght as Brummie, the HS2 line does not go any where near ASTON, it runs from Water Orton, through the Bromford Tunnel emerging at Washwood Heath, it then runs through Saltley and Duddeston and then terminates at Birmingham Curzon Street Station right smack bang in Birmingham City Centre with it's main entrance on Moor Street Queensway next door to Birmingham Moor Street Station which is being enlarged and connected to Curzon Street Station to make a new Midland Rail Hub and next what has Birmingham New Street Station got to do with HS2 and Birmingham Curzon Street as when Curzon Stret Station is open it will be 3 times larger than New Street Station in area and Curzon Street Station will become the main Birmingham Inter City Station with New Street becomming a secondary station, if passenger require to transfer from WCML service through Birminghm to HS2 services they will do that at Birmingham Internationl station next to Birmingham Airport by going on a fast driverless people carrier train from Birmigham Internationl Station to Birmingham Interchange Station and transfer onto HS2 services there, as for the tram service, mate you do not live in Birmingham so do not know what you are talking about, the Midland Metro in zone 1 of Birmingham City Centre near where Curzon Street Station will be is very cheap and frequent and gets absolutely packed and HS2 is now at least half constructed with major work going on and the Spectator of which hardly any one reads is a load of London Commic Rubbish, so James my boy, stop knit picking and accept HS2 is firing on all 4 cylinders and will be finnished completely and the bit about a gas main and water main at OOC is rubbish as the station box is now complete and is in the process of being fitted out and as I said earlier OOC is not going to be a Terminus Station.
@@CRIMSONANT1 So who reads the Spectator James, are you their sole reader and what do they or you know about HS2, and I have told you before the HS2 line DOES NOT GO ANY WHERE NEAR ASTON in Birmingham so it shows how much reserch they and you have done, the line runs 2 miles away from Aston through, as I have already told you as a Brummie it follows the Birminghm to Derby line through Bromford, Washwood Heath, Saltley and Duddeston befoe crossing both the Birmingham to Derby Line and the X City line into Birmingham Curzon Street Station
I entirely agree, If the railway system has insufficient capacity, then what it needs is the restoration of the lines which should never have been closed in the first place.
What has Birmingham City Council being bankrupt got to do with building a new Hi Speed Railway, and living in Birmingham things are going just fine with no sighns of bankruptsy
@@alanfbrookes9771 open your eyes and do some reserch, HS2 is being built due to the failure of twice trying to upgrade the existing WCML Trent Valley Route, and even though Birmingham City Council was declared Bankrupt, it has nothing to do with HS2 plus there are other Towns and Cities in the UK that are near or are bankrupt, the only reason Birmingham City Councils bankruptsy was known to every one is that Birmingham is the UK's second City and Second Largest City and Largest City Council in Europe that is all
I think that it was wrong not to integrate the old building into the structure of the new station. Instead, it will stand alone next to the new, with no obvious use. Many people using the new Curzon Street will probably be unaware of the significance of the old building. It could, perhaps, have become a museum of the railways in Birmingham.
Unfortunately, it was always outside the scope of the HS2 station project, although it was originally intended to be refurbished during the works using a separate pot of money. Work started, however within a few months, it was deemed the structural issues were more severe than they thought and all work was halted pending a full structural survey and another large pot of cash from central government (which, unsurprisingly, still hasn't materialised).
@@mittfhI am aware that it was outside their remit, but that does not lessen the fact that it should have been.
I agree, it looks a bit ridiculous the way it stands on its own now.
The old Station will be a part of the new station in being offices and a Cafe for the New Curzon Street Station
The old building was demolished 50 years ago. What is left was the original station hotel, which was rarely used and very soon converted into railway offices.
Birmingham Curzon Street HS2 station once it’s completed will be very big. Probably bigger than Birmingham New Street station that is near to Birmingham Curzon Street. Which I can’t wait to see HS2 finished in 2030.
I liked this dive into 19th century history and have subscribed for more of the same! Thanks.
Curzon Street, New Street and Moor Street are in such close proximity that, had they been an airport, there would have been travellators between the platforms. Curzon St. will be useless on its own. Through passengers will have to walk to one of the other stations no matter where they are going, and the tram connection will be so slow and circuitous that you might as well walk.
Why will people have to walk betwen Birmingham New Street and Curzon street as if you are going to any place served by Avanti West Coast Trains from Birmingham you will go straight to Birmingham Curzon Street, any one on a train going through Birmingham New Street and wanting to use HS2 services will change trains at Birmingham International, catch a driver less people carrier train that will take you to Birmingham Interchange Station via Birmingham Airport where they will catch HS2 services from there and no Curzon Street Station will not be useless when it opens plus the trms will not be slow but fast and straght forward
The original Curzon Street station failed because it's stupid to have a terminus in a city that's right in the middle of England. The HS2 station has repeated this mistake.
No it hasn't because unlike the Old Curzon Street station being two seperate stations, one for the London and Birminghm Railway and the other side for the Grand Junction Railwy which went though Duddeston, Aston, Witton and Perry Barr/Gret Barr to Wolverhampton and the North, about 8 miles from Curzon Street will be a Delta Junction at Water Orton allowing HS2 trains to freely travel from Birmingham to London, Manchester, Liverpool and Scotland, so the new Curzon Street station will be far superior to the old Curzon Street Station
@@peterwilliamallen1063 But nowhere near as well connected as New Street is now!!!
@@andrewhotston983 Well it will be connected to London, Manchester, Liverpool and Scotland which is what HS2 and Curzon Street is being built for, plus HS2 trains would not of fitted into Birmingham New street being far to long for the platforms plus New Stret is totaly congested now, by moving Avanti West Coast Hi Speed services out of Birmingham New Street to Birminghm Curzon Street nd HS2 it will allow othe train services to flourish at Birmingham New Street
@@peterwilliamallen1063 That's not correct. Both the London & Birmingham and Grand Junction stations were terminal stations. Trains from London to Liverpool and Manchester had to reverse at Birmingham, and often had to be shunted from one station to the other.
The Trent Valley line, through Tamworth and Lichfield, was built so that trains from London to the north didn't have to reverse.
New Street station was built so that trains could pass through and onto the newly-built Stour Valley line to Wolverhampton. Later, the Midland Railway trains from Derby were diverted through New Street so that they could continue along the newly-built West Suburban line in the direction of Bristol.
@@peterwilliamallen1063 We'll see.
Sorely the Grade 1 listed building would have served a better purpose by being a working part of the new terminal. Instead, I see it being left out in the cold. Why not incorporate it within the proposed new structure? Somewhere inside and beneath the planned roof span?
Because the old station building and the new Curzon Street Station are on different levels
Like your previous documentaries, the narrative and the video are out-of-sync. It's as though you've just put a new narration over an old video. Some of the facts were incorrect. And, as far as HS2 is concerned, what's the point in knocking 20 minutes off a trip from Euston, when passengers for the north will then have to lug their bags over to New Street to continue their journey, probably on the same train that they could have caught from Euston?
The building that they will be incorporating into the new structure is NOT the original front entrance. That was to the left of the building, and, together with the historic train shed, was demolished in the early 1970s, The building with the columns was the station hotel, which never attracted customers and became railway offices almost as soon as it was opened.
You don't mention that for many years after closure to passengers, it was often used as a passenger excursion terminal, especially for holiday-time trains to Sutton Coldfield.
Have you read anything on HS2, it will actually cut 40 mins off the journey from Birmingham to London and any one from Manchester and the North will not have to change trains at Birmingham New Street and as you put it lug their luggage across to Birmingham Curzon Street as every one travelling on service to do with HS2 will go to Curzon Stret only, any other services passengers will change trains at Birmingham International and catch an automated driverless people crrier train to Birmingham Interchange station on HS2 and continue their journey and will not catch the same train to Euston as all hi speed trains from Birmingham to London Euston will travel from Birmingham Curzon Street and not Birmingham New Street. That was the original ticket office building for the original Curzon Street Station the gates either side were for horse carriages.
White elephant.
Money could be much better spent on reviving services now lost.
@@samharv8076 The existing lines between London, Birmingham and Manchester are nearing full capacity - there's little room to add new services, especially with express trains, local trains and freight trains all sharing the same tracks.
Quad-tracking the existing lines can't be done as there's no extra space in the alignment and even in sections that were previously quad tracked (particularly through stations), the space previously used by the outer lines has frequently been either developed on or used for station car parks.
The bulk of the cost over-runs are due to a combination of the arcane process for granting Development Consent Orders, which requires multiple rounds of public consultation, in the case of HS2 requiring far more bored tunnels and viaducts than most other high speed lines across the world, and bespoke designs for each viaduct to make them architecturally interesting or blending into the landscape rather than a standard design; and that major projects are subdivided into several smaller contracts, of which a lot of what's required to fulfil those contracts subcontracted out. Add on a company to project manage the whole thing and you have an entire hierarchy of contracting and subcontracting, with every company in the hierarchy seeking to make a profit.
As if that wasn't bad enough, UK government (Central and local) typically doesn't have any in-house experience of infrastructure projects, so we're relying on the companies to give honest estimates (when in reality, they're likely to quote far below the actual costs to get the contract, then "discover" "unexpected" issues which need another cash injection to solve); then in the case of HS2 costs were further raised by Ministerial meddling, progressively pruning bits or pausing other bits, at least partially as budgets are set annually, so action has to be taken to prevent one year's costs exceeding the allocated budget, even if doing so substantially pushes up the overall contract cost. So the current entire process of major UK infrastructure projects seems almost designed to leach as much money from The Treasury as possible.
@@alanfbrookes9771 And how would that help, there was a reason these services were lost, lack of passengers.
@@peterwilliamallen1063.. speaking of a lack of passengers, HS2 Ltd have stated that to "break even" with a subsidy of 50/60%, they require 600,000 passengers travelling between London & Birmingham DAILY!
Given that passenger numbers on this route have been declining by 4% per year for the last decade & now average 96,000 per day, perhaps you could explain where the extra 504,000 are suddenly going to materialise from?
@@CRIMSONANT1 James you still don't get it do you, HS2 ltd is the construction company and have not stated anything on numbers of passengers so I don't know where you keep getting these ridiculouse ideas and numbers from, just accept it, it does not matter if one passenger or 900,000 passengers are planned to use HS2, the fact of the matter it is being built and if you lived in Birmingham like me and not Newcastle on Tyne you would see the construction work on HS2 progressing daily. Train Services on the HS2 line will be operated by the incubent WCML Inter City train operator which at the moment is Avanti West Coast trains so there will not be, as you put it "lack of Passengers" as 95% of existing WCML hi speed services operated by Avanti West Coast Trains will be taken off the WCML route south of Crewe from Liverpool, Manchester and Scotland plus all Birmingham to London Services operated by Avanti West Coast Trains will when HS2 opens operate on the HS2 route to LONDON EUSTON, so all the passengers who use those services now on the WCML will be using trains operating on the HS2 route.
Next the Pendolino trains will be nearing the end of their operating life with Avanti buying the new 805 and 807 non tilting IET trains as when HS2 opens there will be no requirement for tilting trains with Avanti. This then just leaves trains from Hollyhead, Wolverhampton and the odd Scottish Service of Avanti West Coast that will operate through Birmingham New Street
It still be on the wrong side of the city !!
Why is it on the wrong side of the City, if you lived in Birmingham like I do you would realise that where the new Birmingham Curzon Street Station is being built is the only place in Brum it could of been built and is on the correct side for London services from Birmingham
Birmingham, a city already well served by rail lines will get another, but this one, unlike the others, doesn't go to the centre.
It goes to Curzon Street, a good 20 minute walk from the centre.
Precisely the reason why the original station here closed back in 1854!
Still, politicians must have their toys, even those which come at an eye watering cost in a country which is crying out for real investment for the benefit of the general population, not vanity projects for the minority.
HS2 is an environmental disaster of epic proportions & Britain's biggest infrastructure mistake in half a century.
What utter Rubbish James Monks, as a Birmingham Citizen I can catogorically tell you the main entrance to Birmingham Curzon Street Station is right in the City Centre on Moor Street Queenswy next door to Birmingham Moor Street Station over the road from the Bull Ring Shopping Centre and Primark and the main shopping area, it will have a frequent tram service from Digbeth passing Curzon Street Second entrance in Curzon Street, the main entrance on Moor Street Queens way and then wither via the rest of the City Centre to Birmingham New Street Station to Edgebaston Villiage or to Wolverhampton High Level Station and plenty of National Express West Midlands Bus Services stopping outsideand it is not 20 mins from the City Centre at all you are getting mixed up with the old Curzon Street Station mate typical of some one who does not know what they are talking about, so stop talking utter rubbish on some thing it seems you know nothing about apparently. Just accept that it is being built full stop and when it is operting it will be a total success
@@peterwilliamallen1063 .. * CATEGORICALLY .. not "catogorically".
*SOMEONE .. not "some one".
*OPERATING .. not "operting".
Read this from the i newspaper ..
"The decision to scrap the northern leg of HS2 will see the construction of a vast £460m new Birmingham station that will sit largely unused, a major new report from the spending watchdog has shown.
An analysis by the National Audit Office (NAO) into the cost of the previous government’s decision to axe Phase 2 of HS2 reveals that the project will plough ahead with building a seven-platform station at Curzon Street, despite just three being required for the reduced HS2 line.
@@peterwilliamallen1063 .. excellent article in the Spectator today .. I quote:-
Choose your expression: "stuck between a rock & a hard place", "I wouldn’t start from here if I were you" or simply "this is the biggest omnishambles in history".
All these apply to HS2 as Louise Haigh, the Secretary of State for Transport, attempts to come up with a coherent strategy for a project that has now run for 15 years & has worked its way through around £35 billion - but is still only less than half-completed. Worse, on its way it has shed most of its sections, such as running to Manchester & Leeds or connecting with HS1, that would at least have made the end product a worthwhile addition to the country’s railway infrastructure.
Certainly, completing these two sections will at least invest some ultimate purpose in this deranged project
Instead, we now have a 135-mile-long line that has been dubbed the Acton to Aston shuttle, starting some five miles from the centre of London & ending up a mile from Birmingham’s New Street station, necessitating a tram ride to connect with it. In this form, few people will use the service, given it will cost more & not save any time when travelling between the two city centres. The cost is now accepted to be in the order of £100 billion & according to my sources, will not open until at least 2033 rather than the originally planned mid 2020s - & that’s if no new problems arise.
There are already rumours that major, previously undiscovered gas & water mains on the site marked for the initial terminus at Old Oak Common will severely disrupt progress there.
@@CRIMSONANT1 Well James Monks my man, it proves you are totaly desperate about trying to find facts on HS2 which are totaly wrong, living in Newcastle on Tyne you do not know the geography or areas of Birmingham and HS2, so lets get started, first try reading the News Papers and looking at You Tube, HS2 will not be running from Acton as it has now been anounced in the press that the Labour Government has given the go ahead to rebuild London Euston Station and run the HS2 line from London OOC through the tunnels that are being bored at the moment into London Euston as they now relise that OOC is not and could not operate as a terminal station as it is classed as a through sttion and the relise tht the HS2 line could not operate successfuly with out running into London Euston.
The next one about Birmingham and HS2 iyou state a load of crap as you know nothing about Birmingham, let me put you striaght as Brummie, the HS2 line does not go any where near ASTON, it runs from Water Orton, through the Bromford Tunnel emerging at Washwood Heath, it then runs through Saltley and Duddeston and then terminates at Birmingham Curzon Street Station right smack bang in Birmingham City Centre with it's main entrance on Moor Street Queensway next door to Birmingham Moor Street Station which is being enlarged and connected to Curzon Street Station to make a new Midland Rail Hub and next what has Birmingham New Street Station got to do with HS2 and Birmingham Curzon Street as when Curzon Stret Station is open it will be 3 times larger than New Street Station in area and Curzon Street Station will become the main Birmingham Inter City Station with New Street becomming a secondary station, if passenger require to transfer from WCML service through Birminghm to HS2 services they will do that at Birmingham Internationl station next to Birmingham Airport by going on a fast driverless people carrier train from Birmigham Internationl Station to Birmingham Interchange Station and transfer onto HS2 services there, as for the tram service, mate you do not live in Birmingham so do not know what you are talking about, the Midland Metro in zone 1 of Birmingham City Centre near where Curzon Street Station will be is very cheap and frequent and gets absolutely packed and HS2 is now at least half constructed with major work going on and the Spectator of which hardly any one reads is a load of London Commic Rubbish, so James my boy, stop knit picking and accept HS2 is firing on all 4 cylinders and will be finnished completely and the bit about a gas main and water main at OOC is rubbish as the station box is now complete and is in the process of being fitted out and as I said earlier OOC is not going to be a Terminus Station.
@@CRIMSONANT1 So who reads the Spectator James, are you their sole reader and what do they or you know about HS2, and I have told you before the HS2 line DOES NOT GO ANY WHERE NEAR ASTON in Birmingham so it shows how much reserch they and you have done, the line runs 2 miles away from Aston through, as I have already told you as a Brummie it follows the Birminghm to Derby line through Bromford, Washwood Heath, Saltley and Duddeston befoe crossing both the Birmingham to Derby Line and the X City line into Birmingham Curzon Street Station
What a colossal waste of money hs2 is in a bankrupt city
I entirely agree, If the railway system has insufficient capacity, then what it needs is the restoration of the lines which should never have been closed in the first place.
What has Birmingham City Council being bankrupt got to do with building a new Hi Speed Railway, and living in Birmingham things are going just fine with no sighns of bankruptsy
@@alanfbrookes9771 The WCML has not got sufficient capacity and is the reason for building HS2
@@peterwilliamallen1063 You think so? Not to provide business for contractors?
@@alanfbrookes9771 open your eyes and do some reserch, HS2 is being built due to the failure of twice trying to upgrade the existing WCML Trent Valley Route, and even though Birmingham City Council was declared Bankrupt, it has nothing to do with HS2 plus there are other Towns and Cities in the UK that are near or are bankrupt, the only reason Birmingham City Councils bankruptsy was known to every one is that Birmingham is the UK's second City and Second Largest City and Largest City Council in Europe that is all