This week there are to be two HS2s. The first is a truly rotten infrastructure project. The second is a political icon of awesome potency. They have absolutely nothing in common.
From its conception in 2009, HS2 was a dud: a Labour government glamour project revived by the Cameron government in the hope it might counterbalance its plans for extreme local austerity. The coalition eventually landed on a proposal bizarrely linking two dead-end terminuses, Birmingham’s Curzon Street and London’s Euston. It failed to link with Scotland or with Eurotunnel and the continent through St Pancras. The chief beneficiaries would be Midlands commuters and Manchester executives travelling to London. It would do next to nothing for the north, whose need for investment in local railways and particularly roads was, and remains, chronic.
