Articles
The government’s decision to go ahead with the HS2 high-speed rail link between London and Birmingham has provoked a lively national debate about investment in our railways. And not before time. It’s been decades since there was any serious spending on capacity improvements, and we are now paying for that with overcrowding and delays.
HS2 has polarised opinion like few other engineering-related projects. The debate starts from a point that surely most of us would agree with: Britain needs better railways, as passenger numbers keep climbing year-on-year and we cannot simply squeeze more services on to existing tracks. But that’s where the consensus ends. HS2 is still creating rancour over funding, the route and ultimately the benefit it brings. That could even result in legal action, delaying the start of the project.
Opposition groups deserve to be listened to – and the consultation process on HS2 was indeed exhaustive, eliciting some 55,000 responses from individuals, businesses and organisations across the country. But it’s fair to say that most of the dissenters are driven by local self-interest, centred around the noise and disruption that a high-speed railway near their towns and homes will cause. The No argument is often dressed up as concern about HS2’s value for money or its cost-benefit ratio, when in fact it’s primarily about the geographical inconvenience that it brings for a vocal but relatively small minority. Is that disruption good enough reason to stall a project of national importance that will bring huge benefits for generations to come?
I’m also not convinced by the argument that the project represents poor value for money, based as it is on the arcane calculations of bean-counters. Can cost-benefit projections on such a huge project, being carried out over such a long period, ever have any meaningful accuracy? Surely it depends on so many varying parameters and factors that eventually the numbers become meaningless. What, for instance, would happen if road fuels doubled in cost over the next 10 years? It’s not likely, but it is possible. How would that affect demand for rail travel and any subsequent economic benefit that new national infrastructure might bring?
Other better-informed people share similar opinions. Professor Rod Smith, a hugely respected and experienced railway engineer, and current president of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers, says on page 27 of this issue that we risk using statistics and projections to tie ourselves up into knots, eventually ensuring that nothing of note ever gets built. It’s lucky that our Victorian forefathers didn’t follow such a timid approach to the railways. The real debate, says Smith, should not be over whether HS2 needs to be built, but how its construction underpins a truly long-term integrated transport policy in this country.
I personally believe there is a strong groundswell of support for HS2, among business groups, trade unions and most of the public at large. The truth is that, when it comes to national infrastructure, sometimes we just have to take a leap of faith and go with our convictions, even if there are concerns about project cost and timescales. If we want to be considered a modern, forward-looking country, then we need a 21st century railway – not a 19th century one that we have now outgrown. That means being bold and making firm decisions for future generations. We should therefore get on with building HS2 as soon as possible.