There's been a lot of posturing and equivocation about HS2 (the rail project to create high speed rail links between London, Birmingham, Manchester, Leeds etc.) over many years. There are (rightly) lots of positions and opinions on this project, there's environmental, economic (local and macro), cultural, political and engineering dimensions to consider. I'm broadly in favour of the work. I look at the ongoing investments made by the French in their railway system and am always envious of the speed and comfort that's possible between major cities in France, for example you can get from Paris to Bordeaux in around two hours (2h 15m), a distance of roughly 600 km, the (roughly) same distance in the UK (say London to Edinburgh) would take you around double that time, not exactly something to shout about. The following chart shows the % of high speed track in the major European countries for comparison.
Time is money as they say, but there's also the question of capacity. Living the the South East of the UK as I do, I can testify to the crowdedness of the trains into London. From my local hub it's not unusual to have to stand (cheek by jowl) for the entire 60 minute journey and yet still pay a premium fare of roughly £55 per return journey, all this for a mere 30 miles as the crow flies! The train service for commuters around here is often bordering on inhumane (as well as being a rip-off!) the problem is that the providers know they have a captive market.
I feel that if our nation is serious about being a good place to do business then, like the French, we need to have top of the line infrastructure that doesn't add to our carbon emissions, and that takes forward planning, investment, compromise and risk, so honestly, I'm not holding my breath.
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