The media froth factor gets worse..

28 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Major Projects Authority, The Grauniad

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Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Major Projects Authority, The Grauniad

In the centre of the town I grew up in there was an ugly concrete fountain which was widely disliked except by the towns student fraternity who’d regularly fill it full of detergent. The suds & froth this generated would billow around the fountain until caught by the wind, when they would take off & be carried around the main street.

I’m reminded of this by the past few days media froth over Network Rails financial problems and Hs2, where some journalists have thrown fact & common sense to the wind in order to try & cobble together stories – and I do mean stories. The lazy journalists cliché lexicon has been dusted off and no description of the MPA analysis can be published without the word report being prefaced by ‘damning’..

Take this one for example, from the pen of Daniel Boffey, the Grauniad’s Policy Editor;

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/28/rairail-projects-financial-crisis-impact-hs2-high-speed?CMP=share_btn_tw

“New fears arise that UK rail financial crisis will hit HS2”

Really? These fears are based on what exactly? Nothing, other than the fact the DfT has spent money on financial revenue modelling & demand modelling. Boffey simply spins this as a bad thing!

Boffey then drags in the fact Network Rail has paused the MML & trans-pennine electrification as further “Concerns over the economic viability of HS2”. How so? Network Rails decisions had nothing to do with long term economic viability & everything to do with with controlling project costs. They’re also nothing to do with Hs2 which isn’t funded by Network Rail. It’s comparing chalk with cheese. Plus, as I’ve described in this blog, there’s a world of difference between rebuilding Victorian infrastructure and building a new railway (just look at Crossrail)

To add to scaremongering, Boffey throws in the MPA reports. The problem is, he doesn’t appear to have read them & is simply rehashing stuff mentioned by the Graun’s Transport Correspondent, Gwyn Topham.

There’s another rather large problem. The reason the MPA haven’t changed Hs2s rating from Amber/Red to amber has nothing to do with economic viability or costs. What the report says is:

“Delivery Confidence Assessment (DCA)

The delivery confidence of the programme/project at this point is:

Amber/Red

For a project of this complexity and magnitude, at this stage of development, the assignment of a meaningful DCA is difficult. The assigned DCA reflects the challenges of the ambitious target to achieve Royal Assent, but also the significant risks that are outwith the direct control of the Project Team. The review team believe that if the external risks that cannot be fully mitigated by the project team were
excluded, the underlying DCA would be Amber”.

Click to access 2012-hs2-mpa.pdf

So, the report blows out of the water Boffeys scaremongering on DfT spend on Hs2 financial revenue modelling & demand modelling as it makes it clear this is prudence called for by the MPA!

The report also makes it clear that the MPAs concerns about Hs2 have nothing to do with the projects finances & everything to do with the Parliamentary timetable & external factors.

If anything, reading through the MPA report gives more, not less confidence in Hs2 delivering the project. It also exposes some of the ridiculous lies the anti hs2 mob have tried to get away with, remember their claim that it was ‘rumoured’ (ie, they made it up) the report said Hs2 would cost £150bn?

Sadly, rather than doing any decent analysis. Boffey has cobbled together & rehashed a few stories & unconnected events (NR’s problems & Hs2) to produce this load of tosh, aided & abetted by a well known Transport Journalist who should know better but who’s pursuing his own agenda (step forward London mayoral candidate Christian Wolmar).

So much for the days of investigative journalism. Now it seems Fleet St’s finest spend more time rehashing each others copy & quoting one another.

Lets be clear. The problems Network Rail have are nothing to do with Hs2, which is unaffected – and no amount of scaremongering & spin from Fleet St trying to tar Hs2 with the Network Rail brush can change that.

Well, that was predictable…

25 Thursday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, CP5, Hs2

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Anti Hs2 mob, CP5, Hs2

Today’s media speculation over an announcement about Network Rail difficulties with the CP5 improvement & electrification programme has sparked a predictably ill-informed frenzy of speculation about Hs2 from the anti campaign.

Ignoring the fact the overwhelming majority of them have absolutely no idea how either Network Rail or Hs2 Ltd are funded and structured (or the relationship between the two) they fearlessly leap in with both feet. Here’s a couple of examples.

I wonder how long it will take before reality sinks in and they realise that, whatever difficulties Network Rail are having with CP5 delivery (and those difficulties are real) it will have absolutely no impact on the progress of Hs2?

As I type this, Transport Minister Patrick McLoughlin is talking about the problems in Parliament. I don’t expect any surprises. The industry & its commentators have known about Network Rails travails for a long time – even if it’s a revelation to the Hs2 antis. What will be interesting to see is not so much a reiteration of the problems as much as what solutions are on offer. Will MML & TPE electrification be delayed? Almost certainly. But what’s the recovery plan & where does this leave the rolling stock cascades? I’ll look forward to seeing what McLoughlin says & how both Network Rail & the ORR respond.

Whilst the announcement of a delay to Trans-Pennine electrification is frustrating it’s been talked about for months. In fact, it’s no bad thing as the reworked scheme will deliver far more than the original ‘plain vanilla’ plans.

So, what lessons should be learned. Consistency & continuity for one. Electrification schemes were like buses, they all came at once. What the industry needs is a consistent workflow & this has been sadly lacking. The blame for this lies at the door of Government & the DfT, not Network Rail. Add in the skills shortages caused by stop-start plans & its hardly surprising that trying to deliver so many major schemes at the same time was going to cause problems. The question is – will anyone learn from this, admit the problems, or are we going to see the blame game in full swing?

Whatever the answers, you can be sure of one thing. There’ll be no crumbs of comfort for the Hs2 antis.

“Why don’t we just invest in the existing network”

– is the mantra of the anti Hs2 mob. Well today has exposed why – although they’ll miss this point by a country mile!

Modernising or simply electrifying an existing line is a project fraught with difficulty, not least the fact you’ve got to do it whilst you keep the line open. This means working during possessions at night or at weekends. It’s a very expensive way of doing things and all the staff working on or about the line have to have PTS (Personal Track Safety) certification*. It requires specialist contractors too, with all the right disciplines. Also, the actual window for doing any real work is short. A lot of time (& money) is wasted getting men & materials to from the sight between each possession. Take a look at the picture below. All this kit is only on track for a few hours, the rest of the time it’s idle. Unless you’ve done a job like this you’ve no idea how much time is spent kicking your heels.

Building a new line is rather different. It’s mostly a straight civil engineering project that can be done in normal working hours. Only when the civils work is done do the specialists (the track workers, signal engineers & overhead line engineers) move in to lay the actual railway. None of this needs disrupt adjacent rail operation – as I’ve just seen at Norton Bridge on the Staffs Alliance. The only time major line possessions are needed is when you connect the interfaces between old & new. Here’s Norton Bridge where the existing line is kept open as the new one is built. When the builders have finished for the day, they turn the engines off & leave everything in situ till the next morning when work resumes.

What will be interesting to see is the comedown after all the anti Hs2 mobs hyperventilating over the announcement. They don’t understand what’s going on, they’re desperate for a scrap of good news – and they think this is it. How will they feel the morning after the night before? I predict a hangover of mammoth proportions..

* PTS doesn’t come cheap. It can cost anything from several hundred pounds to over a grand (depending who your sponsor is). It involves a medical, then 2-3 days training & is only valid for 2 years before you have to be re-certified. Add in any more competencies like Crane Controller, COSS etc & you’re looking at a lot more money. None of this is needed on a new railway as it’s a civil engineering site – until the track starts to appear…

Life’s little ironies.

24 Wednesday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, SAIP, Stafford

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Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, SAIP, Stafford

I’m on my way to Stafford to spend a day looking at the £250m project to increase rail capacity on the West Coast Main Line through a combination of resignalling, line speed improvements and building 6.5 miles of brand new railway around Norton Bridge. The project, known as SAIP (Staffs Area Improvement Programme) will create extra capacity for a few years & take some of the pressure off the WCML before Hs2 is commissioned.

Other media colleagues were meant to be traveling up from London to join us but signal failures on the Southern WCML mean they’re unlikely to make it. To think, we’ve only recently spent £10bn ‘modernising’ the WCML. It wasn’t enough. Too many projects were ‘descoped’ (Stafford resignalling was one) and the reliability of our rail spine is poor.

Ironically, those opposed to Hs2 claim we can make do with using the WCML forever without building any new line. They think we can get away with tinkering around with the Victorian network to provide a 21st century railway. Practical experience & events like today show how out of touch with reality they were. Luckily, they weren’t allowed to prevail & we’ll be starting building Hs2 from 2017 (or 2016 if you count the enabling works).

On Hs2, passengers won’t have to worry about signal failures. It won’t have any!

UPDATE. 17:10.

Only one of our three London colleagues made it and services are still disrupted this evening. Apart from that, it was a good day. The Staffs Alliance team gave us a very interesting presentation, then took us for a tour of the site. I’ll blog about it in detail another time, so here’s a quick taster. This is bridge 6a on the new Down line chord from the yet to be built Searchlight Junction through to Stone. The bridge is built over the course of a stream which has been diverted until construction’s complete. Once it is, the river will run underneath. The deck above consists of two parts. The deck in the foreground will carry the double track rail line whilst the rear deck will carry the new route of the B5206. The gap between is so that fish will still swim underneath it. If there was no light well the length of dark river would dissuade them. It’s a good example of civil engineering & ecology in action.

Meanwhile, to whet your appetite – here’s a few more photo’s..

The single line connection off the existing WCML, looking North.

Looking at the new cutting towards Stafford & the connection with the existing WCML at Chebsey

Constructing the new cutting Northwards. The track that’s been laid forms a railhead for works trains delivering materials to the site.

Building a retaining wall to protect an old Marl pit which is being preserved. The area above at the top of the embankment is being levelled as it will contain a drainage channel.

Crazy anti Hs2 campaigner of the week No 4 – special award..

21 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Gt Missenden, Vandalism

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Anti Hs2 mob, Gt Missenden, Vandalism

This week the Hs2 antis have excelled themselves & one Frances Cutler has merited a special award for providing evidence that the anti Hs2 mob will stoop to criminality.

Cutler, who lives at Great Missenden has published a series of pictures on Twitter which show the interior of the old Annie Baileys restaurant in Great Missenden which was closed & securely boarded up after it was bought out by Hs2 Ltd. Here are her Tweets;

Her stupidly crude attempt to try & use these as ammunition against Hs2 Ltd has backfired spectacularly as its extremely unlikely these photographs were acquired legally. In other tweets she complains that anti Hs2 graffiti that covers the pub has been painted out. Of course, graffiti is also criminal damage, so she’s highlighted the fact the anti Hs2 campaign includes people happy to break the law on several levels. I have to ask, if the place is ‘dangerous to humans’ – what was she doing there?

The irony is these are the people who complain about Hs2 ‘ruining’ villages like Gt Missenden. Yet they’re happy to cover it in graffiti & the countryside with unsightly placards. Talk about hypocrisy!

Perhaps Thames Valley police might like to talk to Cutler about how she acquired these photographs, who may have taken them & what she knows about graffiti attacks in Great Missenden?

UPDATE: 22 June.

Whilst they’re at it, Thames Valley police might like to ask Cutler about this claim (in which she admits the pictures are hers).

A ‘public footpath’? Oh, come on…

Clearly, the anti Hs2 mob think the laws of the land don’t apply to them. It didn’t take long for the anti Hs2 apologists to step in – although some of them managed to make things worse – like Stuart Fyvie, whose aerial shots confirms trespass at best!

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The anti Hs2 mob & social media. June’s ‘scores on the doors’

21 Sunday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Hs2aa, Scores on the doors, StopHs2

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Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Hs2aa, Scores on the doors, StopHs2

Here’s the latest social media monitor of the anti hs2 campaigns ‘scores on the doors’. The picture remains unchanged – their campaign’s a disaster that’s failing to reach more than a handful of people. Their best result is Stophs2 managing a *cough* massive 215 extra Twitter followers in 4 months. What’s telling is that Facebook (which reaches the most people) has the lowest increase or is even going backwards. Whichever way you look at it, these numbers are tiny compared to the population of the country or the size of the electorate. Their woes are compounded by the fact the mainstream media are pretty much ignoring them since the election.

The usual caveats apply. Not everyone following is actually a supporter..

The continuing disappointment in trying to appear like a national campaign come hot on the heels of last month’s election disaster when Hs2aa suffered another humiliation with their superbly ill-thought out social media ‘thunderclap’. This turned out to be little more than a wet fart. You can read about it here.

Crazy anti Hs2 campaigner of the week – No 6

20 Saturday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Politics

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Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Politics

As the anti Hs2 mobs social media campaign descends into farce its getting harder to single out one Tweeter as their whole campaign is reliant on the mad, bad and er,’eccentric’ who think ranting on Twitter actually changes anything.

But one Peter Deeley has managed to impress with his splenetic ranting & ability to live on another planet to ordinary people. Here’s a selection of his tweets;

In three tweets he manages to use just about every anti Hs2 campaign cliche (cost, corruption the NHS & polls). But there’s more…

Like most of the dwindling band of anti Hs2 folks, he can’t get his head around the fact they’ve got nowhere, so he clings onto their cherished belief they’re somehow a ‘majority’ & wraps himself in their Linus blanket, the opinion poll. His problem is, opinion polls don’t elect Governments, voters do – and the majority of voters aren’t really bothered about Hs2.

So, let’s have a look at the facts which Mr Deeley doesn’t mention.

He’s the Chair of a defunct anti Hs2 ‘action’ group who called themselves SNAG (South Northants Against Hs2). His problem is, South Northants is anything but against Hs2 & his group has effectively ceased to exist! Here’s a link to their website.

A browse through it reveals that they’ve not published meetings of any minutes since the 3rd March 2011. Nor have they held any events (or have any planned). Their ‘latest news’ is over a year old. They haven’t exactly got their finger on the pulse of the political scene either..

Philip Hammond left Transport way back in October 2011 & Theresa Villiers became the Minister for Northern Ireland in September 2012!

SNAG as an ‘action’ group has sunk without trace leaving Mr Deeley clinging to the lifebelt that Twitter offers him as a way of keeping his moribund campaign afloat. He’s had his day in front of Hs2 Hybrid Bill Committee (for all the good he did – see here).

With this level of opposition to Hs2, is it any wonder the Transport Minister has been able to assert that the argument has been won? It’s more and more obvious that the campaign against Hs2 is all over – bar the tweeting..

2023 Update.

Poor Deeley has learned nothing in 8 years. He’s one of a tiny handful of Nimbys still tweeting about HS2 and still recycling the same straw-grasping he did in 2015 about opinion polls. But, since then there have been THREE general elections that have shown the futility of his claims as in each one voters have chosen to elect a party committed to building HS2 – and now it’s being built past Boddington. Construction of Phase 1 in Northants is in fill swing. Deeley never stopped a thing – and never will…

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Richard Wellings caught out making it up again…

12 Friday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Richard Wellings

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Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Richard Wellings

Those opposed to hs2 form the usual right wing rag-bag of folks who are opposed to public spending, so it’s no surprise to find both the Taxpayers Alliance and the Institute of Economic Affairs amongst their numbers.

Prominent amongst them is Richard Wellings, the Deputy Editorial Director of the IEA. Wellings likes to pass himself off as a transport expert (solely on the basis of the fact he got a PhD in transport, his practical experience is zilch). Wellings also likes making things up – especially numbers. It was he who invented the ‘Hs2 will cost £80bn’ claim. He did this out by totting up costs of projects that have nothing to do with Hs2 (like Crossrail 2) and inventing railway projects no-one is actually planning to build (Hs2 to Liverpool).

These nonsensical figures play well in sections of the media but anyone with genuine analytical skills & transport knowledge (or even economics) knows what a load of old tosh they really are.

But Wellings has a problem. He has form for making up ridiculous claims for the cost of rail projects – and one of those claims is coming back to haunt him, which is making him very sensitive.

Back in 2008 he wrote a blog for the IEA in which he claimed Crossrail would cost between £20-30bn. Like his hs2 figure it’s a complete fantasy. Even a fag packet would resent having such calculations written on it. You can find it here

Here’s a copy of the claim;

It’s worth noting that this blog shows how crap Wellings is at predicting anything. Look at his comment about an interest rate rise!

Wellings big problem is that not only was Crossrail not cancelled, its also stayed well within the budget set for it. The project is 65% complete and all the (risky) tunneling is over. The bill is expected to remain well within the projected £14.8bn. That makes Wellings out by between £5.2bn to £15.2bn. That’s some fag packet!

So Welllings is starting to sweat. His credibility (never high) is on the line here.

He still insists on jumping in with both feet to the Hs2 debate on Twitter and today I challenged him on these figures. His response? He pretended he’d never made any such cost projections!

Not only is the man no good with figures, he’s no good with the truth either…

Crazy anti Hs2 campaigner of the week – No 5…

10 Wednesday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2

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Anti Hs2 mob, dailyprompt, dailyprompt-1896, Hs2

Well, not so much crazy as an outrageous liar really. Meet ‘Outoftweet123’;

Yes, like most of his ilk, he prefers anonymity. He claims that Trans-Pennine electrification has been ‘scrapped’ to pay for Hs2 & uses a MEN article as ‘proof’. Here’s a link to the MEN article. Note that it doesn’t claim the work is cancelled, merely delayed. How anyone can claim its been ‘cancelled’ & expect anyone with even half a brain to fall for it is beyond me but the anti Hs2 mobs media campaign is increasingly losing the plot as more & more folk are seeing the light & abandoning them. All they have left is the serial ranters & ravers which only damages their credibility even further.

Needless to say, this abject nonsense gets retweeted by some of their other anonymous fruitloops (although there is one person in the list who really should know better).

Will any of this Stop Hs2? Of course not. But it does provide more evidence of how far out of touch with reality their campaign has become. If they had a theme tune, perhaps it should be this..

And yes – the muppets do seem very appropriate!

2023 Update.

Like most anti HS2 tweets, this one really hasn’t aged well. In 2023 the Trans-Pennine route upgrade (TRU) is in full-swing. Now (3rd April) work to upgrade and electrify the route at Stalybridge is in its last few days after a long blockade. Meanwhile, work continues on the line from Huddersfield to Leeds with work compounds established and even whole stations being moved (such as the one at Morley). Cancelled my arse!

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Hs2 Ltd respond to the Petitioning Committees first report

09 Tuesday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Parliament

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Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Hybrid Bills, Parliament

On the 26th March the Hs2 Petitioning Bill Committee published its first interim report which contained a series of requests & observations generated by the petitioning process. You can find their report here.

Yesterday Hs2 Ltd published their response, which you can read here.

Both make interesting as they give an insight into the issues raised & the vast amount of detailed work that’s gone into progress so far. One thing in particular caught my eye, which was these comments regarding ‘template’ petitions;

Cut & paste petitions were a centrepiece of the anti Hs2 mobs tactics. They hoped that, if they swamped the Committee with petitions they could bog down the whole process & delay Hs2 long enough that a new Government would decide to cancel the project due to delays & costs. Like all the other anti Hs2 tactics, it’s failed. The Petitioning Committee have made it clear they aren’t going to let themselves get bogged down this way & neither are Hs2 Ltd.

Another interesting aspect of the Petitioning Committee’s report is that they are looking to make recommendations on the conduct & process of future Hybrid Bills (such as the Phase 2 bill). What’s the bet that one of those recommendations will be to close the loophole of ‘template’ petitions & prevent the threat of future bills getting bogged down in this fashion?

Anti campaigners claims that Hs2 won’t ‘rebalance the North’ are dealt another body blow.

02 Tuesday Jun 2015

Posted by Paul Bigland in Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Manchester Airport, Northern Powerhouse

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Anti Hs2 mob, Hs2, Manchester Airport, Northern Powerhouse

The anti Hs2 campaign’s claims that Hs2 will do nothing to help rebalance the economy & help the North were dealt another serious blow today when Manchester airport announced a £1bn expansion plan that is expected to more than double the number of passengers from 23m to 55m by 2050 and create an extra 20,000 jobs at the airport.

Construction Enquirer reports on the plans here:

Manchester Airport rolls out £1bn expansion plan

Plus, there’s more from the Manchester Evening News here:

http://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/manchester-airport-expansion-plan-security-9370929

CE reports that “The dramatic expansion scheme has been prompted by the second phase of HS2 and the Government’s plan to improve east-west rail connections of HS3 as part of the development of a Northern Powerhouse.”

This is good news for the North. It also weakens the case for a third runway in the South-East at either Gatwick or Heathrow as Hs2 will provide a fast connection between Manchester airport and many cities (including London). For example:

Manchester Airport – Birmingham will be cut from 1hr 44 to just 32mins

Manchester Airport – London will be cut from 2hr 24 to just 1hr 03 (quicker than getting to Heathrow on the tube!)

Manchester Airport – Heathrow will be cut from 3hr 24 to just 1hr 18.

In addition, the plans for Hs3 should bring many of the North’s cities within 30mins travelling time from Manchester airport, creating a true regional hub. At the moment many folks (like me) still find it more convenient to travel to Heathrow to catch certain flights. Manchester’s expansion plans should cut this need and also reduce the number of internal connecting flights to/from Heathrow.

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Paul Bigland

~ Blogging on transport, travel & whatever takes my fancy.

Tag Archives: Anti Hs2 mob

The media froth factor gets worse..

Well, that was predictable…

Life’s little ironies.

Crazy anti Hs2 campaigner of the week No 4 – special award..

The anti Hs2 mob & social media. June’s ‘scores on the doors’

Crazy anti Hs2 campaigner of the week – No 6

Richard Wellings caught out making it up again…

Crazy anti Hs2 campaigner of the week – No 5…

Hs2 Ltd respond to the Petitioning Committees first report

Anti campaigners claims that Hs2 won’t ‘rebalance the North’ are dealt another body blow.