UK infrastructure costs AREN'T important | #Railnatter 188

The cost of the motorway was never an issue. If it can be done it can be afforded. Melbourne didn't give up trams it is now building a subway. West Yorkshire needs to cut to chase and build a subway.

Would the HSUK plan help to resolve the problem of connectivity to regenerate the economy. Has HSUK proposals been hijacked by the rentier establishment

As you correctly point out the UK is a rentier economy extracting money from not doing anything, e.g., the ROSC's

....and how much would it cost to complete the electrification to Sheffield and Doncaster, via Penistone?
Just like parents the government should correct itself for the sake of the children.

It would be interesting to know how much it cost to convert the Manchester to Hadfield from 1500V DC to 25kV 50Hz?

Comptroller is not a typo - its a very old job title, using "computer" in its original meaning - i.e. someone counting up the budget, or "computes" it.

Why has the Trampower LR55 block grider rail which is polyurethane grouted into a prefabricated concrete beam ~180mm deep not been used when more height is required under bridges or in tunnels?
Used for 27 years on an entrance to a an industrial site on Sheffield tram. Sized and designed for heavy rail use.
see
https://image.slideserve.com/1477068/lr55-network-rail-tunnel-enlargement-l.jpg
https://bathtrams.uk/appendix-d-details-lr55-easy-install-tram-track-report/

Interesting, as always.
Just a few comments.
In Spain we certainly do city bypasses, like in France, but since our regular network uses the wide Iberian gauge and our high speed network uses standard gauge we still need to build the access in and our of the cities so it only speeds up direct journeys, it does not lower construction costs.
Your anger about the conclusions of the projects cost comparison is understandable but a new recent and wider study of the cist of such projects by NYU not only confirms those differences but also shows things in the UK are worst. Canada, on the other hand, has improved significantly.
As for the Elizabeth line. I m sure you know that it's not a metro line (as in underground/subway) but a heavy rail RER type line and cost comparison with the RER won't improve things.
I hope you'll manage to get back on tracks and manage to hold on to the land until after the elections so Labour can, hopefully, get things started again.

There is so much burocrasy soory if l spelled that wrong but even planning cost so much

Excellent points on metro systems, electrification without infrastructure improvements, and rentier extraction from apprx 1:05.
The HS2 hub at Meadowhall was never explained as necessary because of lack of capacity in Sheffield station.
Apparently many millions have been spent on the Edale valley to improve capacity on that line, but we will have no more trains cos there is no extra capacity in Sheffield and Stockport.

No need for the "dog sh*t references, and "sh*t can" in 187, HOW CAN (YOUNG) PEOPLE IMPROVE THEIR PRESENTATION SKILLS WITH YOUR EXAMPLE?

Why!😢

I've not been working for very long, just temporary positions while studying at uni, but it's astounding to me how difficult it is in both road and rail industries to work with UK government agencies as clients. In roads the budget is never enough to provide comprehensive repairs, so all issues are met with cheap but short-lived patches, while in rail the projects are so strictly managed that employees are rapidly shifted between projects with little preparation because Network Rail "needs" deliverables by specific times but cannot provide enough funding to give people the time needed to produce them, leading to budget overrun or underpaying of workers.

HS2 plans for two tunnels to head eastward from OOC to a Euston-lite station that may never be built, so instead increase the number of trains that can run on HS2 by using these same tunneling resources to build a loopback line at OOC.



After stopping at OOC trains would loop straight back towards Birmingham. This would turn OOC from a terminus to a through station, making much more efficient use of the six platforms available at OOC, which in turn increases the number of trains that can run on HS2.

43:30 It's surprising to see that the UK has a very high density of railway. Is it just not used effectively? I could believe that, what with the amount of stations I've encountered that are on the outskirts of the town they supposedly serve (or in some cases, are basically unreachable).

Looking for stats online, one of the top results puts the UK high-ish for density but well below Switzerland and on par with Netherlands and Slovenia. But that site seems to be measuring it differently because its figure is far from the number given in the report.

Cost of ONW at Euston was heavily inflated by constant change to how they were going to build it

Sidings were put in to enable materials delivery then removed without ever being used because the design was changed and the sidings were in the way of the new design.....

On gareth's comment that the Whitehall institutions are set up to do the bare minimum, to see this dramatised all you have to do is listen to the 4 stage strategy from Yes Minister. Applies to every facet of UK public policy

Doing a study on why we're so bad at building infrastructure and comming to the concluding "it expensive..." is a bit like studying how to best build a dam and comming to the conclusion "the waters still moving 😢" like... Yes..

I feel like if I had submitted an essay like that in school it would have been sent back as a fail saying 'you've identified the topic matter but forgotten the actual essay / analysis"

I’m sure funding, resourcing and incurring delays to the programme of Works to allow there to be 38 separate archaeological dig sites didn’t contribute to HS2 cost overruns at all. 🤦🏼‍♂️

I think that one of the problems with how the UK government assesses "value for money" is they look at how cheap the project can be to delver, instead of looking the other way and say:
• Can we create cross-platform interchanges, if we pay for a couple of flyovers?
• If we improve the design of a station, can we build in better connectivity via something like an integrated bus station?

I think the most awkward parts of HS2 is the idea that both London Euston and Birmingham Curzon Street should be terminal stations and that multiple other HS2 stations should also be terminal stations.

London Euston could have had track that came in on a similar alignment from Old Oak Common to the Crossraiil. The high speed station could have been build sideways under Euston, St Pancras and King's Cross with escalators and lifts up to all three stations. The track could then have gone on to HS1, so that both the Javalin trains and Eurostars could have been extended to Birmingham in Phase 1.

If the HS1 route followed the Crossrail route, we could also have had another underground high speed station at Paddiington. This could have provided GWR passengers with a direct London connection to Eurostar services and high speed trains to Scotland. Old Oak Common could have been replaced by Paddington. Meaning that there would be no significant change to the dwell time of trains going north from London Euston.

A thing should have been built, somewhere west of London Euston to facilitate a tricorn hat junction between HS2 and a high speed line to Wales and South West London. (This should have initially tied into the GWR mainline, so that high speed trains could start to replace InterCity trains and run from Scotland to Wales and Cornwall over high speed and mainline tracks.)

Birmingham Curzon Street should have been dropped into the ground, with lifts and escalators linking the high speed rail station to both Biirmingham Moor Street and Birmingham New Street. The line should have passed through the station and continued north, so that Eurostar trains, Javelin trains from Kent and high-speed trains that run over GWR mainlne tracks would pass through Curzon Street on their way to Scotland.

If Birmingham Moor Street was rebuilt, at around the same time as Birmingham Curzon Street, the services that currently pass through Moor Street could continue on to Birmingham Moor Street, meaning that Moor Street passengers would all be able to continue on to change to high speed rail.

Looking at the disused railway froom Icknield Port Road to Harborne, if that route is still free, a tunnelling project under Birmingham could have reused the TBMs to provide a metro line through to that track. And that track could be extended out to Birmingham Newman University, giving university students easy access to Scotland, Wales and Europe.

Going the other way, the metro line could go to Birmingham Heartlands Hospital, Birmingham Airport, Birmingham International (which would need to be renamed Birmingham NEC) and Birmingham Interchange. This would create a simple (Victoria Line style) metro route that connects the airport and the NEC to trains to Wales, Scotland, London and Europe. The line would be an immediate success.

We have such a short sighted approach to infrastructure in this country. Costs a spoken about as if it is money down the drain with nothing to show for it whilst ignoring the fact that if we spend £100bn on HS2 we will be left with a nationwide high speed rail network not to mention the benefit along the journey to completion of massive job creation, high skilled workers building careers and a massive pool of talented construction workers who dont need more costly training to be moved onto their next project. All the media talk about is spending money when it is in fact an investment in people and places.

On the point they raise on the hypothetical that if projects were cheaper we’d deliver more of them. Is that not objectively correct?

In the UK where Treasury is so strong, lower costs mean better BCRs and better business cases. Your points on those costs and their source still stand but if we could deliver at closer to European costs then it feels pretty self evident that large scale infrastructure investment would be more common, politically easier and would commence the virtuous cycle of longer term planning horizons