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HS2 high-speed London-Birmingham route rail project - discussion

paolo999 said:
Hmmm. Well, a typical 8 lane (6 + hard shoulders) motorway takes up a shed load more space than twin track HS, or even quad track fast + local.
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I'm not disputing that, and nor am I advocating more road building. I'm just musing on why some people seem to assume that a road bridge (or other construction, fr that matter) is hideous simply because, well, it's a road.
 
Roadkill said:
I'm not disputing that, and nor am I advocating more road building. I'm just musing on why some people seem to assume that a road bridge (or other construction, fr that matter) is hideous simply because, well, it's a road.
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Ah ok, no dispute there.

As an example, The Millau Bridge, imho, is quite spectacular.
 
milbrid1.jpg


The Millau Bridge.
 
The trouble is HS2 is simply not ambitious enough. 240mph or whatever is simply not fast enough.

In Japan half of modern new lines are put underground, why not simply go the whole hog and put the whole beast in a tunnel? If you don't go to deep the build will be in soft rock/subsoil rather than hard rock. At is peak the Channel Tunnel was dug at half a kilometere a week and the record is 700m.

In other words London to Birmingham in 340 weeks, with a single boring machine. Now have at least four headings with faces located one quarter and tree-quarters along the route and that becomes a dig time of less than 2 years.

Make sure the line follows existing road/rail infrastructure but is straightened up. Put a maglev track in each tunnel, lightly vacuum it. Bit of innovation needed there, but not impossible. Put air out of the tunnel and the 1000mph railway is a possiblity.

London to Birmingham in 10 minutes. Every developed country in the world will be knocking at the door for the technology.

It can work here, because our transport needs are for short distance links with very intense usage.

Let's see the vision!
 
Charles Norrie said:
The trouble is HS2 is simply not ambitious enough. 240mph or whatever is simply not fast enough.

In Japan half of modern new lines are put underground, why not simply go the whole hog and put the whole beast in a tunnel? If you don't go to deep the build will be in soft rock/subsoil rather than hard rock. At is peak the Channel Tunnel was dug at half a kilometere a week and the record is 700m.

In other words London to Birmingham in 340 weeks, with a single boring machine. Now have at least four headings with faces located one quarter and tree-quarters along the route and that becomes a dig time of less than 2 years.

Make sure the line follows existing road/rail infrastructure but is straightened up. Put a maglev track in each tunnel, lightly vacuum it. Bit of innovation needed there, but not impossible. Put air out of the tunnel and the 1000mph railway is a possiblity.

London to Birmingham in 10 minutes. Every developed country in the world will be knocking at the door for the technology.

It can work here, because our transport needs are for short distance links with very intense usage.

Let's see the vision!
Click to expand...

Ooo stop, you're getting me all worked up. :oops:

If I was a billionaire I would fund this myself. Cardiff to London though. :)
 
Charles Norrie said:
The trouble is HS2 is simply not ambitious enough. 240mph or whatever is simply not fast enough.

In Japan half of modern new lines are put underground, why not simply go the whole hog and put the whole beast in a tunnel? If you don't go to deep the build will be in soft rock/subsoil rather than hard rock. At is peak the Channel Tunnel was dug at half a kilometere a week and the record is 700m.

In other words London to Birmingham in 340 weeks, with a single boring machine. Now have at least four headings with faces located one quarter and tree-quarters along the route and that becomes a dig time of less than 2 years.

Make sure the line follows existing road/rail infrastructure but is straightened up. Put a maglev track in each tunnel, lightly vacuum it. Bit of innovation needed there, but not impossible. Put air out of the tunnel and the 1000mph railway is a possiblity.

London to Birmingham in 10 minutes. Every developed country in the world will be knocking at the door for the technology.

It can work here, because our transport needs are for short distance links with very intense usage.

Let's see the vision!
Click to expand...

I'd love to see the risk assessments around that!
Ok, so the trains would be fully sealed, because it's a (partial) vacuum in the tunnel yes?

What happens if there is a fire on the train whilst it is in the tunnel?
 
The vac train is an old idea. Has it ever been seriously costed?
You wouldn't want a complete vacuum anyway - too hard to achieve. Just get the pressure down enough to reduce the air resistance.
 
Charles Norrie said:
The trouble is HS2 is simply not ambitious enough. 240mph or whatever is simply not fast enough.

In Japan half of modern new lines are put underground, why not simply go the whole hog and put the whole beast in a tunnel? If you don't go to deep the build will be in soft rock/subsoil rather than hard rock. At is peak the Channel Tunnel was dug at half a kilometere a week and the record is 700m.
Click to expand...

Different geology. Comparing the two is pointless. There are also water-table issues that mean an all-tunnel construction would be prohibitively expensive.

In other words London to Birmingham in 340 weeks, with a single boring machine. Now have at least four headings with faces located one quarter and tree-quarters along the route and that becomes a dig time of less than 2 years.
Click to expand...

IIRC, one of the issues with the borers is that of availability. Several are being used for other projects such as CrossRail.

Make sure the line follows existing road/rail infrastructure but is straightened up. Put a maglev track in each tunnel, lightly vacuum it. Bit of innovation needed there, but not impossible. Put air out of the tunnel and the 1000mph railway is a possiblity.
Click to expand...

Except that tunnel bore would need to be even greater than present, even less amenable to leakage, and creating even a non-perfect vacuum would require a hell of a lot of power to sustain.

London to Birmingham in 10 minutes. Every developed country in the world will be knocking at the door for the technology.

It can work here, because our transport needs are for short distance links with very intense usage.

Let's see the vision!
Click to expand...

It's fine having flights of Sci-Fi whimsy, but to make them reality, you actually need the technology. :)
 
Crispy said:
The vac train is an old idea. Has it ever been seriously costed?
You wouldn't want a complete vacuum anyway - too hard to achieve. Just get the pressure down enough to reduce the air resistance.
Click to expand...

The original Crystal Palace one lasted a whole couple of months. :)

Then again, we've got slightly better seal materials nowadays than greased leather. :D
 
just bringing this back to the top.

there will almost certainly be a campaign of civil disobedience round this issue and it could potentially be as big as the newbury bypass demos in the 90s.
 
frogwoman said:
just bringing this back to the top.

there will almost certainly be a campaign of civil disobedience round this issue and it could potentially be as big as the newbury bypass demos in the 90s.
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What, a load of hoorays sitting up trees with their Daily Mails?
 
No, it's going to be organised by among others my local SP branch. if you think that HS2 is just going to be opposed by daily mail reading twats then you are wrong. it's going to go through parkland on an estate in some cases hundreds of metres from people's houses. I actually do think we need high speed rail but just not this one tbh.
 
frogwoman said:
No, it's going to be organised by among others my local SP branch. if you think that HS2 is just going to be opposed by daily mail reading twats then you are wrong. it's going to go through parkland on an estate in some cases hundreds of metres from people's houses. I actually do think we need high speed rail but just not this one tbh.
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Can you suggest a route that doesn't go "hundreds of metres from people's houses", or through some parkland? I don't think there is one.

Surely if you live in a house with a railway line a few hundred metres away and really can't cope, you can always move?
 
do you know how long it takes to get a council house round here? not as simple as that.

bi0boy said:
Can you suggest a route that doesn't go "hundreds of metres from people's houses", or through some parkland? I don't think there is one.

Surely if you live in a house with a railway line a few hundred metres away and really can't cope, you can always move?
Click to expand...
bi0boy said:
Can you suggest a route that doesn't go "hundreds of metres from people's houses", or through some parkland? I don't think there is one.

Surely if you live in a house with a railway line a few hundred metres away and really can't cope, you can always move?
Click to expand...
 
frogwoman said:
do you know how long it takes to get a council house round here? not as simple as that.
Click to expand...

Well then they'll have to put up with a railway line a few hundred metres away for a while. Are their objections anything other than pure NIMBYISM?
 
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