Plan is off track

In disguising Tory desperation to hold key marginal seats in northern England, Chancellor George Osborne offers a bribe in the form of “HS3”, shortening the Manchester and Leeds connection from the present 49 minutes. No time scale is indicated, but the ultimate goal is to connect a cluster of northern cities to “take on the world”.

What he fails to define is exactly how the present situation prevents this happening, and how much faster rail travel alone will correct the perceived lack of progress towards the ultimate prize of a “northern hub” of cities to rival London.

I’ve rarely read such waffle, even from pompous politicians, as Osborne’s description of businesses wanting to form clusters where they can “learn from and spark off each other”. They do that from opposite ends of the world nowadays.

Hide Ad
Hide Ad

Looking at the country as a whole, instead of automatically putting London first as always, it is glaringly obvious that the proposed new northern railway should have been HS1; but it still wouldn’t make sense.

Robert Dow

Ormiston Road

Tranent, East Lothian