Having sabotaged the economy and ruined the public finances that way, what better way to continue the damage by hosing huge amounts of money at a bad value infrastructure project?
I take your point. But I would only oppose a major infrastructure investment that had cross party support in the following 2 circumstances, neither of which apply - (i) I disagree as a fully clued up expert.
(ii) It goes through my house.
Those who oppose it need to reflect on why there has been such a broad cross-party consensus on this for such a long time, why most people in the rail industry recognise it’s needed, and why northern businessman and politicians are so desperate for it.
I'd like a citation please on most northern businesses and politicians being desperate for it. Its not even going to reach the North for decades.
My concern is the opposite of NIMBYism. I want more in my own backyard. I'm not not seeing why electrification of northern railways was cancelled, why there is such overcrowding and terrible services on local roads and rail, with little done to solve it due to a lack of funds but there is a blank cheque for dealing with overcrowding between Birmingham and London.
Why is a hundred billion pounds better spent dealing with just a single line dealing with Birmingham to London overcrowding and not better spent locally dealing with many problems of intercity and intracity road and rail overcrowding?
From the Lords' report: 4. Representatives from the north were clear they require both High Speed 2 Phase 2b and the Northern Powerhouse Rail Programme. Given the integration of the projects, the Government should consider Phase 2b and Northern Powerhouse Rail as one programme, rather than two separate programmes. A combined programme would allow investment in rail infrastructure in the north to be prioritised where it is needed most. (Paragraph 39) 5. In any case, funding for the Northern Powerhouse Rail needs to be ringfenced and brought forward where possible. Investment in rail infrastructure in the north is required urgently, and we do not see why High Speed 2 and Crossrail 2 are being prioritised over Northern Powerhouse Rail. (Paragraph 40)
That's not an answer to my question. Northern businesses want Northern rail issues dealt with according to those paragraphs. From the snippet you quoted they don't seem to care about overcrowding between Birmingham and London, they care about overcrowding in their own areas...
It's actually the opposite incentive they have been following - spend as much as possible as quickly as possible, so that when someone suggests cancelling it they can point to all the money that would be wasted if it doesn't go ahead.
Apparently sunk costs are not well understood by politicians/the public.
Nor by me, if you are suggesting that there should never be any debate about writing them off. The paradigm case is watching the rest of a film after you have decided it is shit, but few other cases are like that. Watching the film has zero utility, completing hs2 has greater than zero. So there is a plausible argument: if hs2 looked value at cost-of-hs2 it must look value at cost-of-hs2-minus-sums-already-spent.
No, the money that has already been irretrievably spent, ie the sunk costs, should be ignored when deciding whether to proceed. The question is are the benefits worth the money we still have to spend, because that is the choice we have now - nothing we do can bring back the money already spent.
What you're missing is that the budget has been rapidly increasing. HS2 needed fudging to make it appear value for money at £40ish billion - there is no way it is value at £100 billion. Also, if you believe that it will come in at today's budget you're a fool - if we proceed it will continue to increase as it has been doing for however long the farce has been running.
The problem with sunk costs is that politicians don't want to be accused of wasting money, so will tend to throw good money after bad, as I fear we are going to see hear. Just another reason why giving politicians power and money is a bad idea.
I would have thought that at £40bn, the benefits would have been pretty obvious.
A quick back of the fag packet calculation shows that it increases revenues by c. £1.5-3bn. Now, there will be operating costs, but it should hopefully be cheaper to operate than existing lines (being more modern), so let's chuck it in at a 50% EBITDA margin. We therefore generate - off fares revenues alone - around £1bn in cash flows. This excludes any ancillary benefits to freeing up space for other services on the old line, or adding additional services, or anything like that. Or indeed, economic benefits from adding new infrastructure.
With the government able to borrow at 0.75% for 10 years, this means the cost to the government would be £300m/year.
Now, if the number is £100bn+ (and the fear, surely is that £100bn becomes £150bn or more), then the maths become very different. But at £40bn, I think the economics seem pretty self evident.
Indeed. The economic justification for £100bn+ is not based on cash flows, of course.
The issue here is not the spent 40 but that 100 > 80 so the "from here" view is it is still worth it.
Yes. My point is that sunk costs ARE relevant (indirectly) because the higher they are the lower is the future spend. And it only the future spend that should be compared against the benefits when deciding whether to carry on. This is the rational reason why projects are less likely to be canned the longer they have been running. As opposed to the irrational sentiment of "in for a penny in for a pound".
...15. Our 2015 report recommended that the Government should review the cost saving from lowering the maximum speed of the railway. This work has not been carried out and it is disappointing that the Government’s rejection of the idea remains based on an assessment from 2012. (Paragraph 127) 16. We do not see why High Speed 2 is being built to accommodate trains operating at 400 kilometres per hour when the initial maximum operating speed will be 360 kilometres per hour, which itself is faster than the maximum operating speed of any railway in the world. The differences in journey times between a railway operating at 360 kilometres per hour, and one operating at 300 kilometres per hour, are minimal. (Paragraph 128)...
If capacity, not speed is the justification for the new railway, have they looked at this ?
Yes, that is a crucial question. I've no idea whether reducing the top speed would make a big difference to the costings, but I suspect it might (although it might be too late). I believe Lord Berkeley's minority report makes this point amongst others. Given the relatively short distances we are talking about here, reducing the top speed might not make much difference to journey times. Perhaps @Casino_Royale could comment on whether it might save much money?
I think (FWIW) that it would save quite a lot (and the top speed seems to be very much a vanity thing). I'm not convinced anyone has done any real figures, and would also be very interested in Casino's comments (if he is permitted, of course).
ATLEE CORBYN WILSON SMITH EICIPM CALLAGHAN GAITSKELL LANSBURY BLAIR MCDONALD
War Criminal would have been 2 or 3 if he hadn't gone to war in Iraq
Curious that you give the top rating to the PM who gave the go-ahead to the UK developing nuclear weapons and who was responsible for Indian partition, an even bigger disaster than Iraq in terms of the UK's responsibility.
I think one of the reasons London works so well is the frequent bus, tube and local rail services. Inter-City services are also needed but I suspect the inter-city journeys are a small fraction of the local commuter journeys.
I would invest in local connectivity (bus, tram, light railway and if possible tube) in the Northern and Midland conurbations before investing in inter-city services.
It might have been from a podcast i listened to. I'm not sure he said that in isolation. More ridiculous was not that there werent Sikh soldiers in the fighting of WW1, there was huge numbers, it was the collective delusion that the Devonshire Regiment (the regiment he was looking for) in 1914 seemed to have about 20% black soldiers.
Actually he might have a point if he was intellectually capable of making one. The recent turgid World on Fire on BBC had an SOE major of Indian heritage, which though not impossible, I would think would be extremely unlikely in England in 1940.
It also focused on a two gay men one black one white having an illicit affair in paris. It's the ridiculous of it. We are supposed to just put up with it.
Not quite as ridiculous as the two guys who escaped the Nazis in Danzig, who then walked (with their rifles) across half of Poland, right across Nazi Germany and across France to arrive at Dunkirk. Good effort, chaps!
I find it incredibly frustrating that we don't just get on with things in this country. We have been arguing about an additional runway at Heathrow for more than 20 years. It feels like we might end doing the same with HS2. The (non) dualling of the A1 north of Morpeth is absolutely ridiculous and was highlighted in Cummings famous advert as a job needing done quickly. The M8 is still 2 lanes only for most of its distance and frequently resembles a slightly scary car park. It must impact on Livingston which is one of the fastest growing parts of Scotland.
We see the same ineptitude in public sector IT systems, everything the MoD ever touches and in so many public sector building contracts. In Scotland we wince about the Parliament building and the trams.
I accept my attitude is being driven by frustration as much as by a detailed cost benefit analysis and no doubt (if you ignore another 20 years of planning delays) there might be better uses for the money if we look hard enough. But just f****** do it. Now.
It's hard to disagree with this. We as a country are a like a rabbit in the headlights whenever an investment decision has to be taken. We're so scared of making the wrong decision, that we end up making no decision. And so our infrastructure remains in the (mid) 20th Century, while around us the French and Germans and Spanish continue to improve theirs.
Cancelling HS2 will not immediately see the breaking of ground on a new trans-Pennine Express. It will simply see the country again enter into an extended planning period. And yet another opportunity to invest in infrastructure will have been wasted.
The problem is that we seem to have tied ourselves in knots with planning, inquiries etc, so that everything takes far longer than it needs to and costs far more than it should. The Chinese are at one end of the spectrum and we are at the other - I don't think China is a model to aspire to, but somewhere nearer the German/French/Spanish position on that spectrum might be better.
It does prove the abject stupidity of the idea of spending our way out of a recession though with infrastructure projects- the recession will be over before there is anything built.
The problem is most of our land is owned by someone or other and people live there. It would be far easier if planners could draw straight lines on a map without hitting anything. Then we could get straight down to the decades of arguing about how much it will cost.
Those who oppose it need to reflect on why there has been such a broad cross-party consensus on this for such a long time, why most people in the rail industry recognise it’s needed, and why northern businessman and politicians are so desperate for it.
I'd like a citation please on most northern businesses and politicians being desperate for it. Its not even going to reach the North for decades.
My concern is the opposite of NIMBYism. I want more in my own backyard. I'm not not seeing why electrification of northern railways was cancelled, why there is such overcrowding and terrible services on local roads and rail, with little done to solve it due to a lack of funds but there is a blank cheque for dealing with overcrowding between Birmingham and London.
Why is a hundred billion pounds better spent dealing with just a single line dealing with Birmingham to London overcrowding and not better spent locally dealing with many problems of intercity and intracity road and rail overcrowding?
The railway solution is HS2 but the northern bit between Birmingham and Manchester / Leeds with HS3 between York and at least Manchester if not Liverpool and Hull.
The road overcrowding is a different matter as it's nowhere near as easy due to landscape..
The real question is what can you start now and have finished by the mid-2023 as that is what Boris needs.
Is HS2 the best solution for dealing with northern commuter rail issues, or is it a solution looking for a problem?
Road overcrowding may not be easy, but I suspect £100bn could find quite some bang for buck if spent on roads.
The problem is an almost religious dislike of roads and cars despite that being how most transport is actually done on spurious "environmental" grounds - and I call it spurious because we are not looking at an active service in the North until the mid 2030s and by the mid 2030s we'll likely all be driving electric vehicles anyway so the environmental concerns from cars will largely have gone by then. We should be planning our roads based on cars no longer being an environmental problem but we are doing the exact opposite.
Probably the best single argument for HS2, is that it frees up sufficient rail freight capacity elsewhere to get 10-20,000 lorries a day off the M6 and M1.
Oh, and the Northern Powerhouse rail improvements and trans-Pennine intercity-grade tunnel also need to go ahead, alongside tactical road bottleneck improvements.
I find it incredibly frustrating that we don't just get on with things in this country. We have been arguing about an additional runway at Heathrow for more than 20 years. It feels like we might end doing the same with HS2. The (non) dualling of the A1 north of Morpeth is absolutely ridiculous and was highlighted in Cummings famous advert as a job needing done quickly. The M8 is still 2 lanes only for most of its distance and frequently resembles a slightly scary car park. It must impact on Livingston which is one of the fastest growing parts of Scotland.
We see the same ineptitude in public sector IT systems, everything the MoD ever touches and in so many public sector building contracts. In Scotland we wince about the Parliament building and the trams.
I accept my attitude is being driven by frustration as much as by a detailed cost benefit analysis and no doubt (if you ignore another 20 years of planning delays) there might be better uses for the money if we look hard enough. But just f****** do it. Now.
It's hard to disagree with this. We as a country are a like a rabbit in the headlights whenever an investment decision has to be taken. We're so scared of making the wrong decision, that we end up making no decision. And so our infrastructure remains in the (mid) 20th Century, while around us the French and Germans and Spanish continue to improve theirs.
Cancelling HS2 will not immediately see the breaking of ground on a new trans-Pennine Express. It will simply see the country again enter into an extended planning period. And yet another opportunity to invest in infrastructure will have been wasted.
The problem is that we seem to have tied ourselves in knots with planning, inquiries etc, so that everything takes far longer than it needs to and costs far more than it should. The Chinese are at one end of the spectrum and we are at the other - I don't think China is a model to aspire to, but somewhere nearer the German/French/Spanish position on that spectrum might be better.
It does prove the abject stupidity of the idea of spending our way out of a recession though with infrastructure projects- the recession will be over before there is anything built.
For a concrete example, if Dubai airport’s Terminal 3 had been announced at the same time as Heathrow T5’s legislation was passed (similar projects - extra buildings within the existing field with a couple of access routes outside), DXB T3 would have opened before LHR’s planning enquiry was finished, and not a single spade was in the ground in London.
UK doesn’t need to go the full China, but massive planning reform is needed, especially for major national infrastructure projects.
I find it incredibly frustrating that we don't just get on with things in this country. We have been arguing about an additional runway at Heathrow for more than 20 years. It feels like we might end doing the same with HS2. The (non) dualling of the A1 north of Morpeth is absolutely ridiculous and was highlighted in Cummings famous advert as a job needing done quickly. The M8 is still 2 lanes only for most of its distance and frequently resembles a slightly scary car park. It must impact on Livingston which is one of the fastest growing parts of Scotland.
We see the same ineptitude in public sector IT systems, everything the MoD ever touches and in so many public sector building contracts. In Scotland we wince about the Parliament building and the trams.
I accept my attitude is being driven by frustration as much as by a detailed cost benefit analysis and no doubt (if you ignore another 20 years of planning delays) there might be better uses for the money if we look hard enough. But just f****** do it. Now.
It's hard to disagree with this. We as a country are a like a rabbit in the headlights whenever an investment decision has to be taken. We're so scared of making the wrong decision, that we end up making no decision. And so our infrastructure remains in the (mid) 20th Century, while around us the French and Germans and Spanish continue to improve theirs.
Cancelling HS2 will not immediately see the breaking of ground on a new trans-Pennine Express. It will simply see the country again enter into an extended planning period. And yet another opportunity to invest in infrastructure will have been wasted.
It's a fair point. I'm not on the HS2 bandwagon, but nothing much will happen if it's not taking place.
Not quite as ridiculous as the two guys who escaped the Nazis in Danzig, who then walked (with their rifles) across half of Poland, right across Nazi Germany and across France to arrive at Dunkirk. Good effort, chaps!
That does sound ludicrous.
I guess an interesting question is to what extent one finds that irritating? And would the irritation be materially greater if one of them was a Sikh?
Having sabotaged the economy and ruined the public finances that way, what better way to continue the damage by hosing huge amounts of money at a bad value infrastructure project?
I take your point. But I would only oppose a major infrastructure investment that had cross party support in the following 2 circumstances, neither of which apply - (i) I disagree as a fully clued up expert.
(ii) It goes through my house.
Those who oppose it need to reflect on why there has been such a broad cross-party consensus on this for such a long time, why most people in the rail industry recognise it’s needed, and why northern businessman and politicians are so desperate for it.
There was consensus from all of those for remaining in the EU too...
Is HS2 the best solution for dealing with northern commuter rail issues, or is it a solution looking for a problem?
Road overcrowding may not be easy, but I suspect £100bn could find quite some bang for buck if spent on roads.
The problem is an almost religious dislike of roads and cars despite that being how most transport is actually done on spurious "environmental" grounds - and I call it spurious because we are not looking at an active service in the North until the mid 2030s and by the mid 2030s we'll likely all be driving electric vehicles anyway so the environmental concerns from cars will largely have gone by then. We should be planning our roads based on cars no longer being an environmental problem but we are doing the exact opposite.
Taking the town and transport planners I know, they hate cars more than they hate Tories. And don't bet on that changing when they're all electric, that's more of an excuse. It's ideological.
I travelled from Birmingham to London on the WCML a couple of Friday's ago at 9am and had the carriage to myself. I'm sure there are more innovative ways of sorting out the capacity issue rather than spaffing billions on another line.
I travelled from Birmingham to London on the WCML a couple of Friday's ago at 9am and had the carriage to myself. I'm sure there are more innovative ways of sorting out the capacity issue rather than spaffing billions on another line.
So on 3rd Jan whilst most people were still on holiday? Hardly representative. The actual data shows a chronic lack of capacity.
I know we're all talking in semi-ironic terms, but I can't think of another country in the world where people talk about what class they're from with such keen interest. There is ample polling and actual voting evidence that the electorate doesn't care (cf. B. Johnson). What they want is someone who appears to understand and care about them; whether they come from a similar background is not the point.
The same applies to their religious views (unless applied to policy), their sex lives (or absence thereof, cf. Ted Heath), where they go on holiday and numerous other personal choices.
Talking in semi-ironic terms in reference to stuff about which they care deeply is a very English trait. Chuck in railways and you have peak PB.
Comments
ATLEE
CORBYN
WILSON
SMITH
EICIPM
CALLAGHAN
GAITSKELL
LANSBURY
BLAIR
MCDONALD
War Criminal would have been 2 or 3 if he hadn't gone to war in Iraq
The economic justification for £100bn+ is not based on cash flows, of course.
I'm not convinced anyone has done any real figures, and would also be very interested in Casino's comments (if he is permitted, of course).
Angela was his daughter.
https://twitter.com/annaturley/status/1219632787189379077
Apologies for use of wrong tense for Lansbury's daughter. @philiph
I would invest in local connectivity (bus, tram, light railway and if possible tube) in the Northern and Midland conurbations before investing in inter-city services.
Oh, and the Northern Powerhouse rail improvements and trans-Pennine intercity-grade tunnel also need to go ahead, alongside tactical road bottleneck improvements.
UK doesn’t need to go the full China, but massive planning reform is needed, especially for major national infrastructure projects.
I guess an interesting question is to what extent one finds that irritating? And would the irritation be materially greater if one of them was a Sikh?