HS2

[corneliuslundie]

Sir Daniel Gooch. He was an MP for Cricklade and is recorded as saying, when asked why he so rarely spoke in the House, that Parliament would be a much better place if other MPs followed his example. 

Jonathan

[rockershovel]

10 hours ago, Pacific231G said:

Indeed. I'm afraid there are plenty of people on the right of politics who believe in the  ability of the "Free Market" to solve all problems with the same blind faith that Soviet aparachniks had for "The Five Year Plan". Neither has ever been capable of pragmatism or seeing either the market or rational planning as a useful servant but an apaliling master.

I came across this a lot in my career (in public service) but also as an FE College Governor. The mantra was that educational institutions should be run not in a business like way, i.e efficiently and with goals,  but as businesses where the bottom line was far more important than fulfiiling our actual mission. So, though Britain is notoriously short of engineers we had to close our expensiive engineeting courses (we were in an area with no major industrial employers) but our hairdresing courses thrived. 

There's nothing wrong with having fixed-term goals.... provided they are achievable and useful.

 

The problem comes when you start taking real-world decisions for ideological reasons. 

 

Britain underwent the world's first industrial revolution. By doing so, it unlocked the gates of a whole new level of wealth creation. 

 

But this wasn't new. The Saxons are often regarded as hairy, violent Barbarians but actually, once they had displaced or marginalised the more primitive indigenous culture they transformed this country. They created wealth through agriculture; stabilised the country, ending the constant tribal warfare of the British and replacing it with a system of Monarchy and currency which was state-of-the-art for the time. 

 

They started the process of assarting (forest clearance) and the enclosure of land for agriculture. They started hunting the wolf and other dangerous predators to extinction and began the process of sheep farming which would pay for the great Cathedrals. 

 

The Normans wanted England because of its prosperity. They didn't know HOW it worked, so they seized control, drove out the Saxon aristocracy and co-opted the "middle classes" of yeomen and bankers who did understand it - hence the origins of our ruling class in varying degrees of thrall to the financial class, unlike the Saxons who drew their rulers from the wealth creators.

 

Shakespeare's "John of Gaunt" speech described this clearly. Its latter part - "made a shameful conquest of itself, bound in by rotten parchment bonds" couldn't be more different from the elegaic opening.

 

This continues to the present. We STILL have members of our political class who trace their ancestry, with varying degrees of credibility to the Normans. David Cameron, the epitome of Orwell's "fourteenth possessor of a foolish face", is about as English as it gets - but he would rather "steal from the poor-box in Church than admit it" (Orwell again) 

 

So, we now have a political leadership whose only remaining talent appears to be achieving election. We have a banking system which appears to be dependent upon self-defined criteria and cannot create growth, and appears to have mastered the art of bending the politicians to their will.

 

A propos closing "hard" courses, my old college has lately closed its mining and mineralogy courses by stealth - by "pausing recruitment" and never re-starting. These are courses whose graduates literally have employers queueing to employ them, at a time when rare earth minerals are a top-tier issue. Staff are leaving - most are on secondment from industry. Soon there will be little or nothing left, with no actual decision to close down being taken but an obvious trend of actions. 

Edited August 23, 2023 by rockershovel

[jjb1970]

It's too easy to blame privatisation, financiers and rapacious profiteers for the things people don't like about the modern railway.

 

The ownership criticism ignores the fact that NR is a nationalised entity and many of the less sensible decisions are down to DfT. If the network is state owned and almost all the important decisions are made by DfT then I don't really see why more nationalisation might be the answer.

 

Similarly on financiers, it wasn't purse string holders that bungled electrification and squandered £££££££s and I suspect that if TOCs and leasing companies had been left to specify their own train and deliver it we'd have saved a fortune relative to the IEP.

 

I was a strategic development engineer in electricity and observed a similar dynamic of inept government policy making and intervention. And contrary to many perceptions we weren't treasure island, I worked for a German company and it was getting more and more difficult to secure investment for British projects because they could get better returns elsewhere. Of course you might say it should be British companies or the government which generates and sells electricity, tip top, you'll need access to finance meaning you'll need those financial people.

 

If people feel that strongly then engage in political and policy processes and do something to improve the situation.

[jamie92208]

Meanwhile away from politics and economics the TBM's are still doing their stuff.  Caroline is picking up speed after a slow start and both Florence and Cecilia seem to be goi g a little slower.  Possibly some tricky geology at the 12km mark.  Stilno update from Lydia, last heard of on 7th June.

 

As to the hard courses, I've recently read the Strategic minerals review and it appears that the UK has the potentialto do well with Tin, Lithium and other minerals but there is real concern as mentioned above about the future training of mining engineers. 

 

Jamie

 

 

Edited August 23, 2023 by jamie92208

[Pacific231G]

I've just had a leaflet inviting me to vote for one of a list of names for the Northolt TBMs. Thankfully Moley McMole Face isn't one of the options. This lis obviously a rather pathetic attempt to garner "local engagement" and therefore support for HS2 during what will inevitably be local disruption. I am actually very much in favour of HS2 (and no the money wouldn't have been spent on other railways) but I couldn't give a monkey's what the TBMs are called. TBM N1 and 2 would be fine with me.   

 

I'm not actually sure if I'll ever actually get to travel on it  and even if I do it looks like being about as scenic as the Channel Tunnel given the hideously expensive measures to hide it away in tunnels and cuttings. I was at the French Railways Society Summer rendezvous in Lenham on Sunday which meant travelling alongside then under HS1. I barely noticed it and I look for railways.

[rockershovel]

1 hour ago, jjb1970 said:

It's too easy to blame privatisation, financiers and rapacious profiteers for the things people don't like about the modern railway.

 

The ownership criticism ignores the fact that NR is a nationalised entity and many of the less sensible decisions are down to DfT. If the network is state owned and almost all the important decisions are made by DfT then I don't really see why more nationalisation might be the answer.

 

Similarly on financiers, it wasn't purse string holders that bungled electrification and squandered £££££££s and I suspect that if TOCs and leasing companies had been left to specify their own train and deliver it we'd have saved a fortune relative to the IEP.

 

I was a strategic development engineer in electricity and observed a similar dynamic of inept government policy making and intervention. And contrary to many perceptions we weren't treasure island, I worked for a German company and it was getting more and more difficult to secure investment for British projects because they could get better returns elsewhere. Of course you might say it should be British companies or the government which generates and sells electricity, tip top, you'll need access to finance meaning you'll need those financial people.

 

If people feel that strongly then engage in political and policy processes and do something to improve the situation.

It would greatly improve the standard of public debate if people in general, and the Press in particular, refrained from emotive, pejorative terms like "stupid" and "rapacious"

 

Stupid people do not get to be MPs. Venal, deceitful ones might; ideologically obsessed ones certainly do; ruthless one frequently do; but stupid? Nope. 

 

Most of the problems with railway privatisation stem from the ideological nature of that decision. The process involves stroking a balance between opposing goals. This was conducted, on one side by people lacking the necessary expertise and driven by a deadline which had no bearing on the goal - specifically, that the Conservatives expected to lose the next election. 

 

Financiers exist to make a profit. The problem is therefore to align the twin objectives as closely as possible, in the recognition that both sides will happily sacrifice the other to their own purpose. 

 

 

[DenysW]

9 hours ago, jamie92208 said:

Still no update from Lydia, last heard of on 7th June.

Worth reporting this to the police? Either as a missing person, or as a missing (allocated as a ) British Museum exhibit

[Ron Ron Ron]

.....and while we're back talking about TBM's....and desperately trying to keep this thread on topic....

 

The cutting head and shield for the next TBM, the first of 2 that will bore the eastern Northolt tunnels, can be seen being assembled at Victoria Road, in West London.

Located next to the ventilation shaft, adjacent to the cross-over box, being constructed at this site.

 

At 2 mins 36 secs, you can see the cutting head (blue in colour), waiting to be fitted.

 

(note: only one of the railway tunnels will penetrate this ventilation and access shaft, which lies offset to the side of where the tunnels will run.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

.

Edited August 26, 2023 by Ron Ron Ron

[Ron Ron Ron]

Different music this time and a different type of tunnel.

 

Another tunnel under nothing.

We can all speculate with a high degree of confidence, that this is the sort of thing that has ballooned the HS2 budget.

 

The Copthall tunnel, which was not part of the original detailed design for the route and was added at a very late stage, after initial HS2 construction work had commenced.

 

For whatever reason, a decision was made to change this short stretch of line, between the West Ruislip tunnel portal and the Colne Valley Viaduct, from a cutting, into a "green tunnel".

It isn't immediately adjacent to any housing or sensitive areas.

It isn't in a national park or specially protected bit of countryside

 

As you can see, it's a huge, spectacular piece of engineering, all of its own.

Goodness knows what the final bill for this will be?

 

 

 

 

 

 

.

Edited August 23, 2023 by Ron Ron Ron

[rockershovel]

I have to say, that emphasises the sheer scale of the earthworks involved in open cutting. 

 

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings....

[jamie92208]

Florence and Cecilia have just posted updates again today only a day after the last one.   They have obviously both got new measuring tapes as they have both supposedly done over 100 metres in a day.   Cecilia has now passed the 12km mark at 12.036 and Florence is at 12,645m.  I have averaged them over the past 8 days and they are both progressing at over 20m per day so with only 2,300 to go for Florence it should be at the north portal round about Christmas day if they keep up that rate with Cecilia getting there around the end of January.

 

Lydia is still missing in action.  Perhaps they are going to link up with the old Post Office Railway.

 

Jamie

 

 

 

 

[ruggedpeak]

17 hours ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

Different music this time and a different type of tunnel.

 

Another tunnel under nothing.

We can all speculate with a high degree of confidence, that this is the sort of thing that has ballooned the HS2 budget.

 

The Copthall tunnel, which was not part of the original detailed design for the route and was added at a very late stage, after initial HS2 construction work had commenced.

 

For whatever reason, a decision was made to change this short stretch of line, between the West Ruislip tunnel portal and the Colne Valley Viaduct, from a cutting, into a "green tunnel".

It isn't immediately adjacent to any housing or sensitive areas.

It isn't in a national park or specially protected bit of countryside

 

As you can see, it's a huge, spectacular piece of engineering, all of its own.

Goodness knows what the final bill for this will be?

 

 

 

 

 

 

.

Contract is cost plus fixed % markup?

 

Also if things go wrong in a tunnel they are far harder to resolve than in a cutting. Wheel failure on a freight train has created major problems in the Gotthard Base Tunnel, can't just lift the wreckage out with a crane.

[melmerby]

Panorama of Curzon street as at about 1400 today

Old Curzon St at left, Selfridges at right:

 

[melmerby]

A couple of pictures of the approaching piers:

 

From a different viewpoint

 

[Ron Ron Ron]

The Curzon St. station site has been cleared and lies ready for construction to commence, but as Keith's photos show, there is still no sign of anything happening.

 

Maybe there'll be an announcement of a further pause in Phase1, delaying the building of the Birmingham terminus.

In the interim, when services commence, passengers to and from OOC, will board and alight from the HS trains, up on the approach viaduct, using long ladders to climb up and down to/from track level ?

 

 

 

 

p.s. For goodness sake, don't mention this to anyone at the Treasury, DafT or in the government.

 

 

.

[melmerby]

10 minutes ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

The Curzon St. station site has been cleared and lies ready for construction to commence, but as Keith's photos show, there is still no sign of anything happening

Even the piers for the incoming viaduct seem to be advancing at snail's pace.

If it's compared to those being built at the southern end, there's no contest.

[chris p bacon]

Could some of the personal and equipment move from the Southern end to Birmingham in the future to increase progress?

[phil-b259]

23 minutes ago, chris p bacon said:

Could some of the personal and equipment move from the Southern end to Birmingham in the future to increase progress?

I doubt it…. As far as I can tell the Government is trying to do as little as possible as slowly as possible as regards HS2.

[phil-b259]

11 hours ago, Ron Ron Ron said:

 

p.s. For goodness sake, don't mention this to anyone at the Treasury, DafT or in the government.

 

More like “we don’t need to finish the line into Birmingham at the start - passengers can use the automated people mover at the Birmingham Parkway station to transfer to Birmingham International and use existing services from there to New Street. After all trains are running round empty so there is plenty of space……”

[APOLLO]

A bit gobsmacked last night, reading on a rail forum that the contractor responsible for the civils etc for the electrification of the Wigan North Western to Lostock Jcn (Bolton) line has gone into administration, all personnel and plant off site a couple of days ago. The firm involved is Buckingham Group.

 

https://www.buckinghamgroup.co.uk/latest-news/company-status-and-next-steps-17-august-2023/

 

What has this got to do with HS2 ? - Read this

 

https://www.constructionenquirer.com/2023/08/22/hs2-contractor-promises-to-pay-buckingham-subbies/

 

Buckingham have completed / are work in progress for many large projects - all now stopped. The new station at Headbolt Lane Merseyside being another rail project local to me, though this work may complete.

 

https://lbndaily.co.uk/headbolt-lane-remains-on-schedule/

 

Liverpool FC affected also

 

https://www.building.co.uk/news/buckingham-ceases-trading-and-seeks-sale-blaming-escalating-losses-on-stadium-jobs/5124745.article

 

Brit15

 

 

 

[Ron Ron Ron]

Bromford tunnels.....

 

TBM "Mary Ann" is reported as having completed 74 metres in just under 7 days.

It should be picking up speed in the next couple of weeks.

 

 

 

.

[Ron Ron Ron]

HS2 completes first giant pier for Water Orton Viaducts.

 

 

 

 

 

.

[lmsforever]

1 hour ago, APOLLO said:

A bit gobsmacked last night, reading on a rail forum that the contractor responsible for the civils etc for the electrification of the Wigan North Western to Lostock Jcn (Bolton) line has gone into administration, all personnel and plant off site a couple of days ago. The firm involved is Buckingham Group.

 

https://www.buckinghamgroup.co.uk/latest-news/company-status-and-next-steps-17-august-2023/

 

What has this got to do with HS2 ? - Read this

 

https://www.constructionenquirer.com/2023/08/22/hs2-contractor-promises-to-pay-buckingham-subbies/

 

Buckingham have completed / are work in progress for many large projects - all now stopped. The new station at Headbolt Lane Merseyside being another rail project local to me, though this work may complete.

 

https://lbndaily.co.uk/headbolt-lane-remains-on-schedule/

 

Liverpool FC affected also

 

https://www.building.co.uk/news/buckingham-ceases-trading-and-seeks-sale-blaming-escalating-losses-on-stadium-jobs/5124745.article

 

Brit15

 

 

 

Is this the first of many company collapses  I can see the whole project grinding to a halt worrying for the electrification work this needs to be finished as soon as possible feel very sorry for workers and families ,worrying times.

[woodenhead]

17 minutes ago, lmsforever said:

Is this the first of many company collapses  I can see the whole project grinding to a halt worrying for the electrification work this needs to be finished as soon as possible feel very sorry for workers and families ,worrying times.

Depends how they bid for the work and what reserve they left themselves with - given all the projects they were working on including outside of rail work which is where they indicate the problems lay, it looks like the impact of inflationary pressures and a lack of cash that has done them.  This isn't a HS2 or Network Rail issue, it's a general finance problem outside the cocoon of government backed infrastructure works.

[The Stationmaster]

On 23/08/2023 at 08:44, melmerby said:

 

Wrong gauge, needing a hefty outlay to correct

Loco designs pathetic.

I have documentary evidence - in the shape of a request for post completion additional funding for certain S&T work - that there was at least one overspend during the GWR's final gauge conversion weekend.  So going back for additional financial authority on a project definitely isn't a modern invention.