Railways: Passenger Demand

Lord Berkeley Excerpts

Thursday 31st October 2013 Lords Chamber

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, I could not agree more with the noble Lord. I would also say that the benefit-cost ratio for HS2 assumes a growth in rail demand of 2.2% while, as he has said, the actual growth in demand over recent years has been much closer to 5%, which would significantly increase that cost-benefit case. Capacity is the issue; the alternatives just do not offer the scale. For example, HS2 will deliver over 13,000 peak hour seats to west coast destinations compared to just 3,000 for the alternatives.

[Lord Berkeley (Lab)]

My Lords, how many years of closure at weekends or at other times of the three main lines going north from London would be required to meet the demand of passengers and freight—and freight will double in the next 20 years—if that was to be a substitute for HS2? I declare an interest as chairman of the Rail Freight Group.

[Baroness Kramer]

My Lords, we would be looking at something like 14 years of weekend closures, which is extraordinary disruption. That assumes a very aggressive construction schedule of two simultaneous schemes on each route at any one time. If it was done in a more usual pattern, there would be even more weekends of closures. The question of freight is a serious one, because the alternatives would not add a single additional freight path on the southern section of the west coast main line, whereas, by transferring long distance passengers to HS2, there is a possibility of up to 20 additional freight paths on that same congested set of lines.