It would've been cheaper to move Birmingham closer to London: Slow collapse of HS2 dream

Transport Secretary Heidi Alexander’s announcement in Parliament on Wednesday that there is "no route" to being able to complete High Speed 2 (HS2) either on time or within budget and has become an “appalling mess”, as well as being honest will have come as no surprise to many.

In making her announcement, Alexander, in admitting that she took no please in stating "Billions of pounds of taxpayers' money has been wasted by constant scope changes, ineffective contracts and bad management."

That there have been allegations of fraudulent payments to subcontractors only adds to the perception that HS2 is literally a vast sinkhole for public money.

Alexander stressed she would collect more information and provide an update to Parliament on costs and deadlines before the end of this year.

Read more: HS2 Birmingham-London: Something has gone hideously wrong with HS2 – and it feels personal for Birmingham

As such she will continue the tradition of a succession of, mainly Conservative, Transport Secretaries, who’ve been confronted by the enormity of what’s the largest infrastructure a project currently being undertaken and, most especially, the fact that the costs of building HS2 line is turning out to be eye-wateringly expensive.

In January 2009, the then Labour government led by Gordon Brown, created High Speed Two (HS2) Limited to be led by Sir David Rowlands with the objective of examining the case for high-speed rail lines to supplement HS1.

Running between St. Pancras Station in London and the Channel Tunnel, HS1, built on time and within budget and, significantly, successfully generating additional economic activity along the route, led the government to conclude adding more high-speed lines going north of London would be equally advantageous.

For the vast majority of those outside the rarefied air of government knew about the intention to add more high-speed lines to Britain’s network was when Lord Adonis, Labour’s transport secretary, proclaimed the government would seek Parliament’s authority build HS2.

Stating that HS2 would connect London to Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds with high-speed track, and that Glasgow, Liverpool, Newcastle upon Tyne and Sheffield would be linked by a combination of high-speed lines and conventional track, Adonis notably claimed the cost of constructing what would add a total of 330 miles to the network was estimated at £30 billion.

Infamously, in what now seems like foolhardy optimism in the extreme, Adonis was happy to state that the first phase of HS2, linking London’s Euston Station to Birmingham’s redundant Curzon Street Station would cost up to £17.4 billion and be operational by 2026.

For good measure, Adonis happily explained that the journey time between London and Birmingham would be reduced from 84 minutes to 49 minutes.

Well, that, of course, was the plan.

I’m reminded of the quote credited to nineteenth century German military strategist named Helmuth von Moltke who stated that “No battle plan survives contact with the enemy.”

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HS2 is a clear example of plans, and costs, having to significantly alter to the extent that minister of the Crown Heidi Alexander acknowledges that the project is now an expensive mess.

The original plan for high-speed lines north of Birmingham were ditched in October by then Conservative Prime Minister Rishi Sunak to save money.

However, the original estimate that construction of the London to Birmingham high speed line would only cost just over £17 billion is now seen as ludicrous.

According to the Department for Transport which reported last year, the cost for this line is estimated to be between £45 and £54 billion though, it should be stressed that’s at 2019 prices.

Contrast this with a report leaked last December following the appointment of chief executive of HS2 Mark Wild who was hired to ‘review and reset’ the remaining construction work for HS1 which accepts that completing the high-speed line between London and Birmingham will cost £80 billion.

Some commentators, such as independent rail expert Michael Byng, whose methodology has been used for major infrastructure costing, believe the cost of the line is likely to be even higher.

Given that Heidi Alexander accepted that the putative completion date of 2033 for the line is not achievable, it’s suggested that the final cost could exceed £100 billion, which would be almost six times Adonois’ estimate back in 2010.

Crucially, another of Adonis’ claims, that the journey time between the UK’s second city – I can hear gnashing of teeth in Manchester – and the capital will be significantly reduced is far from assured.

There’s no certainty that HS2, assuming it is ever completed – I’ll examine that possibility shortly – will ever reach Euson and may terminate at Old Oak Common where it will link to the Elizabeth underground line which opened a couple of years ago and from which passengers can make connections to all other parts of the capital including Heathrow and, of course, St. Pancras for HS1 to the continent.

For those who’ve never heard of Old Oak Common, a former sidings yard and close to Wormwood Scrubs Prison, is most definitely not Central London.

Even from the outset the notion that such a station would be regarded as a credible connection to Heathrow was ridiculed by some including the then Conservative Shadow Transport Secretary Theresa Villiers who called it Wormwood Scrubs International station.”

So, what should happen now?

One option would be to stop all work on the remaining line which would appeal to critics of high-speed rail who’ve accused the government of ploughing on regardless of the concerns about cost, destruction of the environment and emotional turbulence caused to those who’ve lost their homes or land because of HS2.

Anyone who’s been into Birmingham in the last year or so will be struck by the amount of work being carried out in constructing the huge concrete supports to carry the line into the new station that’s yet to be commenced.

Similarly, work has been carried out along the line including the notoriously expensive tunnels under the Chiltern Hills believed necessary to assuage concerns amongst local – widely assume to be Conservative supporting – residents.

Abandonment, though attractive to HS2’s many vociferous critics, would represent abject failure and mean the many billions already spent, have been wasted.

As the old adage goes, when in the proverbial hole, it’s usually wise to stop digging.

Stephen Cresswell, a risk management consultant specialising in modelling and forecasting the price and schedule of infrastructure projects and was employed in this capacity on HS2 before being sacked whistleblowing on the waste and inefficiency he witnessed, believes that mothballing is an option:

“Brick up the tunnels and come back in 10 years and see if it makes sense to start again. At some point in the future, we might have alternative uses for that infrastructure.”

Like many, Cresswell believes lessons should be learnt from HS2 about how to manage large infrastructure projects and the need to have greater accountability by the large contractors who manage subcontracts to ensure money is better spent and to avoid the allegations of malfeasance made recently.

Most likely, is there’ll be the usual handwringing by government about the fact HS2 will produce a new line between some part of London and Birmingham that’s horrendously expensive.

There’ll be emphasis on the potential for economic growth in Birmingham as a consequence of the line.

Unfortunately, given the timetable for completion will mean that no trains are likely to run much before 2040, we’ll all be waiting a very long time to see any discernible benefit.

Anecdotally, there are reports of landlords in Digbeth being approached by property developers to buy their properties which would potentially be demolished and replaced by more of the ubiquitous apartments we’ve seen built in Birmingham in recent years.

How this will affect the fast-emerging cultural ecosystem in Digbeth can only be guessed at but, it must be said, is hardly likely to be conducive to those wishing to locate there, resonant with what’s been happening in the Jewellery Quarter for the last decade or so.

Ultimately, there are really big questions to be posed as far as the continuance of HS2 is concerned.

Assuming she doesn’t decide to be really radical and abandon the project, Heidi Alexander should think very carefully about how HS2 should be managed in the future to control spiralling costs.

If HS2 is ever completed there will be much brouhaha about the impact it’s likely to have for Birmingham’s future economic prospects, particularly its citizen, by making the journey between the two cities faster.

As to how much tickets will cost on HS2 is unknown but will surely be far more expensive than travelling on the existing West Coast and Chiltern lines.

As one wag put it when HS2 was first announced in 2010, travelling on the line would be like Titanic without steerage!

In conclusion, I’m reminded of a witty line uttered by impresario Lew Grade about the astronomical costs he was bearing to fund the film ‘Raise the Titanic’:

“Raise the Titanic? It would have been cheaper to have lowered the Atlantic!”

Perhaps amusing witticism could be adapted to HS2:

“HS2 to make the rail journey between Britain’s largest two cities faster?

“It would have been cheaper to have moved Birmingham closer to London!!”

Dr Steven McCabe

Steve is Professor and Pro Vice Chancellor, DoctorateHub.

Previously, having worked for Birmingham City Council, he spent the last 35 years as an academic at Birmingham City University teaching and researching economics, management and business. Additionally, he has written extensively for edited texts examining economics and politics.

He regularly writes and comments regularly in the national and international media on politics and the economy and has published texts on quality management, benchmarking, ‘Brexit’ and its economic and social impact, the green economy and manufacturing, house prices and India’s progress since independence.