HS2.

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greencol

greencol

Almost knackered radge.
Private Member
Joined
Sep 22, 2002
What a bargain!
Quoted at 32 billion quid.
Now heading for over 100 billion.
An estimate which will undoubtedly eventually cost a helluva lot more.
Oh, and its much , much shorter than originally planned.
Comical.
 
greencol said:
What a bargain!
Quoted at 32 billion quid.
Now heading for over 100 billion.
An estimate which will undoubtedly eventually cost a helluva lot more.
Oh, and its much , much shorter than originally planned.
Comical.
Click to expand...
And slower than planned . . . and fewer trains than planned. Couldn’t make it up.
 
greencol said:
What a bargain!
Quoted at 32 billion quid.
Now heading for over 100 billion.
An estimate which will undoubtedly eventually cost a helluva lot more.
Oh, and its much , much shorter than originally planned.
Comical.
Click to expand...
Will never actually happen.
 
Jack said:
How do other countries chuck up far superior rail lines much quicker and cheaper?
Click to expand...

I was listening to podcast a while back, I can't remember which one sadly, but it compared the UK to China on this front.

The gist was that the most common jobs people have before becoming MPs in this country are in the civil service, the law, corporate finance and media. Folk who are good at red tape, signing contracts and talking a good game essentially

China on the other hand (whatever you think about them, they're efficient) have a little of the above but they have a far higher proportion of engineers and scientists in their ranks. The mindset isn't about looking good on paper it's about getting shit done.

I'd imagine there is a sweet spot in-between the two where we can be more efficient without being quite as dodgy on the human rights front.

One of the few Trumpian/Reform type ideas I actually like in principle is a Department of Government Efficiency to weed out all the time and money wasting in the system. It's just unfortunate the type of folk proposing it I wouldn't trust to run a bath.
 
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Two Headed Boy said:
One of the few Trumpian/Reform type ideas I actually like in principle is a Department of Government Efficiency to weed out all the time and money wasting in the system. It's just unfortunate the type of folk proposing it I wouldn't trust to run a bath.
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Yeah, I've seen a lot of that.

When asked the DOGE types give some broad brush reply saying, for example they'd do away with QUANGOS. Which ones? All of them! As if that's any thought out response 😆

Well who would do the work, required by parliament, they're currently doing? Are we going to more or less allow the water companies to regulate themselves? Have an honesty box for income tax payments?

What about the private companies undertaking government work, like prisons, pensions and making a real arse of it. Your DOGE types would shit the bed if they knew the numbers involved.

Or is alright for private companies to run amok with government money?

The staff and monetary savings by DOGE are questionable as are where reform (mostly ex torys or worse) are running councils in England.

One might think all these government departments and agencies aren't already subject to strict auditing with regular reviews of staffing, not to mention political cuts where savings have to made irrespective of what actually needs to be done.
 
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Jack said:
How do other countries chuck up far superior rail lines much quicker and cheaper?
Click to expand...
The French build miles and miles of high speed rail. What they do differently is they don't try to build the fastest shiniest railway in the World - they build what they know using tolerances they understand. Sadly the politician in charge here at the time that we were deciding whether to green light HS2 was was a bloviating windbag who decided that this should be more than just a railway - it would be the fastest, smoothest, most advanced railway in the world. He was of course an idiot. But Boris Johnson has a trackrecord in spending other people's money on vanity projects - the cable car across the Thames, The new rRoutemaster buses, the Garden Bridge... And of couse what we've ended up with with HS2 is a white elephant with trains that are incompatible with the rest of the network and will never run at their top speed.
 
Two Headed Boy said:
I was listening to podcast a while back, I can't remember which one sadly, but it compared the UK to China on this front.

The gist was that the most common jobs people have before becoming MPs in this country are in the civil service, the law, corporate finance and media. Folk who are good at red tape, signing contracts and talking a good game essentially

China on the other hand (whatever you think about them, they're efficient) have a little of the above but they have a far higher proportion of engineers and scientists in their ranks. The mindset isn't about looking good on paper it's about getting shit done.

I'd imagine there is a sweet spot in-between the two where we can be more efficient without being quite as dodgy on the human rights front.

One of the few Trumpian/Reform type ideas I actually like in principle is a Department of Government Efficiency to weed out all the time and money wasting in the system. It's just unfortunate the type of folk proposing it I wouldn't trust to run a bath.
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Kind of what happened to Robert Owens who made a huge success of New Lanark, before trying to create a Utopia in America, only to find he had brought all the intellectual brains together, but few of the people who could actually build and maintain a community. Bit like a football team hiring bosses who know all the theory but never played the game
 
greencol said:
What a bargain!
Quoted at 32 billion quid.
Now heading for over 100 billion.
An estimate which will undoubtedly eventually cost a helluva lot more.
Oh, and its much , much shorter than originally planned.
Comical.
Click to expand...
See also - Scottish ferries and Edinburgh trams and council contracts. A plethora of brown envelopes.
 
Wishbone said:
See also - Scottish ferries and Edinburgh trams and council contracts. A plethora of brown envelopes.
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I know these things aren't good but they really do pale into insignificance when put alongside stuff like HS2.

I'd love to see a league table of long running fucked up government contracts, from all areas of the UK. I suspect we'd all be surprised.
 
Jack said:
I know these things aren't good but they really do pale into insignificance when put alongside stuff like HS2.

I'd love to see a league table of long running fucked up government contracts, from all areas of the UK. I suspect we'd all be surprised.
Click to expand...
I wasn't trying to set a pecking order, more to illustrate how widespread and all encompassing this problem is. The main worry is that it is a continuous trait all overseen by unqualified snout dipping politicians. The back handers/favours must be enormous.
 
I wonder how much of a fiasco this new tram line being proposed between Granton and Little France will be.

No doubt grossly over budget and it will cause disruption for years.

If there was only a bus service that took the exact same route. They could us the number 8.

🤔
 
No matter if it got completed on budget,under budget or over budget correct me if I'm wrong but did it not knock something like 15 or 30 minutes off the journey.
I mean its not like re instating the borders rail link to Edinburgh which is well used.Or the Queensferry crossing which arguably a good thing. It's like London to Manchester or Liverpool,. What's the actual benefit and if there is a benefit was even the original estimate worth it?
Just seems like a nonsense to me.
 
EH17 Jimmy said:
I wonder how much of a fiasco this new tram line being proposed between Granton and Little France will be.

No doubt grossly over budget and it will cause disruption for years.

If there was only a bus service that took the exact same route. They could us the number 8.

🤔
Click to expand...
Vanity project Jimmy. Trump said he pay it but only if we rename it Edinburgh Trum.
 
Wishbone said:
I wasn't trying to set a pecking order, more to illustrate how widespread and all encompassing this problem is. The main worry is that it is a continuous trait all overseen by unqualified snout dipping politicians. The back handers/favours must be enormous.
Click to expand...
I would love to see a pecking order 😆 maybe that's another story.

I suppose one answer to the snout dipping would be to ban political donations, both personal and party. But we all know that isn't going to happen.
 
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EH17 Jimmy said:
I wonder how much of a fiasco this new tram line being proposed between Granton and Little France will be.

No doubt grossly over budget and it will cause disruption for years.

If there was only a bus service that took the exact same route. They could us the number 8.

🤔
Click to expand...
I know tram part 1 was a farce and I was against it. I don't know many hours I wasted while Leith Walk was ripped up the first time.

Now we've got part 2 going and I don't know how Leith would cope without it!

It's busy, really busy. Even when I'm smoking outside the Windsor early to mid evening it's standing room only both ways. I try not to travel at peak 👀 time, it's rammed.

With a huge increase in housing all round the outskirts and therefore folk wanting to travel into and out of town I can't see any other way. It's not the bus, although that plays its part.
 
Jack said:
I know tram part 1 was a farce and I was against it. I don't know many hours I wasted while Leith Walk was ripped up the first time.

Now we've got part 2 going and I don't know how Leith would cope without it!

It's busy, really busy. Even when I'm smoking outside the Windsor early to mid evening it's standing room only both ways. I try not to travel at peak 👀 time, it's rammed.

With a huge increase in housing all round the outskirts and therefore folk wanting to travel into and out of town I can't see any other way. It's not the bus, although that plays its part.
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How many housing schemes get the benefit of the trams though Jack? The whole of South East, South West Edinburgh needs to get a bus or buses before they can get a tram.
 
Will they charge 3 quid for anywhere to anywhere on the route until Ocean Terminal for which the price will rise to 10 quid even if you get on the stop before?

[once_bitten_smilie]
 
EH17 Jimmy said:
How many housing schemes get the benefit of the trams though Jack? The whole of South East, South West Edinburgh needs to get a bus or buses before they can get a tram.
Click to expand...
Not if there's a line built out to ERI and/or beyond.

Upto 250 people getting moved around every 7 minutes. Taking that many people off buses or out of cars and all of a sudden everything moves more smoothly.

I can only go by my experience around Leith Walk and now it's settled down, like I said before, I can’t imagine life without them.
 
connerg said:
Yes, loads of buses go there but they take ages from where i stay (near Newhaven)
The Tram will be quicker. I work shifts too.
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Aha but what happens if a tram breaks down and there is no bus coverage.

Because I'm sure LRT will be loving taking buses out of service and sacking drivers.
 
Jack said:
Not if there's a line built out to ERI and/or beyond.

Upto 250 people getting moved around every 7 minutes. Taking that many people off buses or out of cars and all of a sudden everything moves more smoothly.

I can only go by my experience around Leith Walk and now it's settled down, like I said before, I can’t imagine life without them.
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Well a lad me and Stu know well was a foreman spark on the trams.

He's told me that the Granton to Little France route will happen in our lifetimes.

The route after that is meant to head out to Dalkeith and Eskbank.
 
Wasn’t the whole issue with the initial Edinburgh trams that ECC thought they knew best and could project manage the whole shebang themselves? 🤯 They set up TIE for this purpose I think then had contractual rings run round them by contractors like Bilfinger and Siemens.

The lack of engineering skills in the UK is a worry, we used to be a world leader. Still are to an extent in terms of oil & gas, go to pretty much any big oil & gas site in the world and you’ll likely find a few expat Scots running the show.

Re: Hinkley Point this seems to be an issue. When I was made redundant a couple of years ago I had an agency call me up asking if I could commission a swivel crane for one of the reactors 🙈 Way outside my skill set so obviously declined but a bit concerning I was even asked.
 
A while back, there was an interview with a (possibly former) French Cabinet Minister on some UK radio station.
Topic was, "Why has the UK built about half a mile of motorway in the last 20 odd years, while France has built 1,000+ kilometres?"
Perhaps showing an unusual sense of humour for a Frenchman, he replied, "If wish to drain the pond, we do not consult the frogs first."
 
Jack said:
A major part of it, when the thieving torys were at it, but there's more to it than that.

Hinckley Point is another huge overspend and years later.
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Less inclined to listen to NIMBY voices or eco warriors worrying about a fruitbat habitat etc rather than any corruption.
 
Two Headed Boy said:
I was listening to podcast a while back, I can't remember which one sadly, but it compared the UK to China on this front.

The gist was that the most common jobs people have before becoming MPs in this country are in the civil service, the law, corporate finance and media. Folk who are good at red tape, signing contracts and talking a good game essentially

China on the other hand (whatever you think about them, they're efficient) have a little of the above but they have a far higher proportion of engineers and scientists in their ranks. The mindset isn't about looking good on paper it's about getting shit done.

I'd imagine there is a sweet spot in-between the two where we can be more efficient without being quite as dodgy on the human rights front.

One of the few Trumpian/Reform type ideas I actually like in principle is a Department of Government Efficiency to weed out all the time and money wasting in the system. It's just unfortunate the type of folk proposing it I wouldn't trust to run a bath.
Click to expand...
Japan is similar

The Fukuoka Incident (2016)
In November 2016, construction for the local subway extension near Hakata Station caused a massive cave-in. Five lanes of the road were swallowed, severing power, gas, and water lines to the surrounding area.

Remarkably, Japanese engineers and construction crews managed to largely fill the chasm and secure the site within exactly 48 hours.

In the UK, engineers and consultants would still be estimating the cost before closing the road for months on end.
 
Bofahibee said:
The French build miles and miles of high speed rail. What they do differently is they don't try to build the fastest shiniest railway in the World - they build what they know using tolerances they understand. Sadly the politician in charge here at the time that we were deciding whether to green light HS2 was was a bloviating windbag who decided that this should be more than just a railway - it would be the fastest, smoothest, most advanced railway in the world. He was of course an idiot. But Boris Johnson has a trackrecord in spending other people's money on vanity projects - the cable car across the Thames, The new rRoutemaster buses, the Garden Bridge... And of couse what we've ended up with with HS2 is a white elephant with trains that are incompatible with the rest of the network and will never run at their top speed.
Click to expand...
There was also the small fact that his dad had a 5 million house that luckily needed to be compulsorily purchased.
 
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