Developing Rail in the Liverpool City Region …Supporting Growth in the Sub-Regional, Regional and National Economies


HS2 and the potential benefits for the Liverpool City Region



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HS2 and the potential benefits for the Liverpool City Region


The UK Government is pressing ahead with High Speed 2 (HS2), a visionary project to create a modern and efficient high speed rail network for mainland Britain. This network will provide much needed additional rail capacity connecting the main urban areas of the UK along with a new North-South fast connection. Constructed to the latest international standards for high speed rail technology it will transform the connectivity between Britain’s largest cities. But the project is far more than just about going faster to bring cities closer together. HS2’s rationale is also driven by a pressing need to release capacity in the residual ‘classic’ network. Following the rapid growth in rail travel experienced over the last two decades, this is now reaching saturation leading to commuters experiencing severe crowding and no room left to accommodate additional passenger services and an increasing demand for freight by rail.

The Strategic Case for HS2 highlights the acute problems created by the capacity constraints of the current network and the forecast growth in demand for both passengers and freight and, most importantly, the consequences for stifling economic growth. ‘Improved connectivity, through reduced journey times, can help deliver additional benefits and more economic growth than comes from extra capacity alone. It can help re-balance the economy by stimulating and strengthening regional economies and help to make Britain more attractive in the global marketplace'8


      1. HS2 – the project


While HS2 will be a new railway it will be fully integrated with the existing railway enabling through services to use the new lines and the existing ‘classic’ network and so serve a wide range of destinations. The project is being progressed in two phases with the first phase planned for completion by 2026 and the second phase following in 2033.

Phase One of HS2 will see a new high speed line constructed from Euston to north of Birmingham, where it will re-join the existing West Coast Main Line (WCML) allowing fast services to continue to destinations on the existing line including Manchester, Liverpool, Crewe, Preston and Glasgow. New high speed trains will also serve Birmingham city centre and an interchange designed to serve the wider West Midlands. At Old Oak Common in west London, a new interchange will be built connecting HS2 with Crossrail and the Great Western Main Line, providing a fast link with Heathrow Airport. Phase One will provide a hugely valuable addition to the national rail infrastructure.

The published proposals for Phase Two8 would see the Phase One line extended north to form a ‘Y’ network. One branch would reach the North West with a route into the centre of Manchester and a connection to the WCML north of Warrington. The second branch would be built from the West Midlands to the East Midlands and Yorkshire, to join the East Coast Main Line south of York. New stations are proposed in the city centres of Manchester and Leeds, with intermediate stations in the East Midlands at Toton and near Sheffield at Meadowhall. Liverpool would be served by trains that would use HS2 as far north as Crewe and then operate over the existing West Coast Main Line via Runcorn.

Following his recent appointment as the new Chairman of HS2, Sir David Higgins set out his findings of his initial review of the project in his report ‘HS2 Plus’9. In his review, Higgins cites two main transport challenges for the country, the lack of capacity, particularly, but not exclusively south of Birmingham; and the poor connectivity in the North, not just between the region and London, but also east-west between Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and Hull. He also concludes that the Government should accelerate Phase Two as soon as possible to take the line further north to a new transport hub at Crewe. This could be completed as early as 2027. He highlights that to fully exploit the unique opportunity that HS2 presents for the North, a regional approach is needed which will require more work on integrating HS2 into the existing rail network and the potential improvements to it. HS2 should be integrated with the plans that the region’s local authorities are making to regenerate their economies and communities and should form part of the effort to revitalise the northern economy as a whole.

HS2 will deliver significant journey time reductions. On completion of Phase One, current plans10 would see the journey time between Liverpool and London reduced from around 2hr 10min to 1hr 50min. By comparison Manchester would be within 1hr 40min of London and Leeds (served from Kings Cross) within around 2 hours. The plans for Phase Two8 would see further journey time reductions, but these would be larger for Manchester (1hr 08min from London) and Leeds (1hr 23min from London) than for Liverpool (1hr 35min). Whereas Manchester and Leeds would have a continuous dedicated high speed rail line between London and their respective city centres, Liverpool would continue to depend on the existing WCML route north of a connection with HS2 near Crewe. Furthermore, with the benefit of fully dedicated high speed rail infrastructure, Manchester and Leeds would also be able to benefit from the extended maximum train length of 400m permissible on HS2, allowing higher capacity trains to serve these routes. Clearly there is a risk that with a disparity between the service offer between London and Liverpool and that of some other cities such as Manchester and Leeds, Liverpool would be at a comparative disadvantage in the competition to attract inward investors and potential employers to its City Region.

However, implementation of the recommendation of Sir David Higgins for the early construction of HS2 Phase Two as far as a new hub at Crewe would help offset this disadvantage. LCR would be able to gain significant early benefits from HS2, whilst retaining competitive journey times relative to Manchester and Leeds. But even with a new HS2 hub at Crewe, the WCML north of Crewe would remain a capacity constraint and a critical impedance to growth in rail freight serving the ports and industries of the LCR.


      1. The value of HS2 to the City Region


Lord Heseltine and Sir Terry Leahy in their report ‘Rebalancing Britain: Policy or Slogan’11 pressed the need for Government to ensure that Liverpool will be firmly on the HS2 map if it is to enjoy the much needed economic benefit - an indirect, slower or later link could badly damage local growth.

The Liverpool City Region Growth Plan and Strategic Economic Plan1 recognises HS2 as a major economic opportunity but also highlights that the economic impact can be increased significantly if its implementation better reflects the LCR opportunity. The plan recognises that SUPERPORT will require increased rail capacity for its full economic potential to be delivered and this can only be achieved by the LEP working closely with Government to identify what needs to be done and to then co-invest with Government so that opportunities are fully grasped.


      1. Preparing for HS2


As the Bill for HS2 Phase One progresses under parliamentary scrutiny, the focus has shifted to HS2 Phase Two. In summer 2013 the High Speed 2 Growth Taskforce was created to advise the Government on how to maximise the return from the investment in HS2. The Taskforce recently published its findings and recommendations12. Their message was clear, HS2 represents much more than a railway. It presents an exciting and transformational opportunity, particularly for our cities in the Midlands and the North, to invest in our future economic growth. Government, local authorities, HS2 Ltd and UK businesses need to make the most of this unique opportunity and to be working together now in making the preparations necessary to realise the full potential of HS2. The Taskforce highlights the importance of ensuring that the HS2 Growth Strategy is integrated within the regional Local Plans and Strategic Economic Plans. They also emphasis the important interdependence between HS2 and the existing rail network and the need for a wider review of rail services to ensure effective connectivity with HS2 and to exploit released capacity including opportunities for growth for the rail freight industry.

The Taskforce also highlighted that extra capacity released by HS2 provides an opportunity to reconfigure services and better utilise the strategic location of Crewe to serve major centres in the North West such as Liverpool, Warrington and all the local stations which form part of the commute into the bigger cities, supporting regeneration in the process.

The LCR recognises the considerable potential of HS2 as an engine for growth, but with the detailed scope of the project still under development there is an opportunity for an integrated strategy where the development of the regional and national rail networks and HS2 are aligned with the objectives for the LCR. This approach will help to ensure that the economic opportunities for Liverpool are fully recognised in defining the final plans for HS2 Phase Two.

In preparing for deposit of the Parliamentary Bill for HS2 Phase One, the business case for the project was set out in a suite of documents that included a Strategic Case8 and an Economic Case13. However, the supporting analysis underpinning the business case included economic forecasts that drew on 2008 data for the LCR. As highlighted above, the economic outlook for the region has shifted positively in response to the recent transformational investments and evidenced by the 2011 census data which showed a somewhat more optimistic picture. In the light of this it was felt only appropriate to revisit the implications of HS2 for LCR as the case may have been considerably understated.

To take account of the latest economic forecasts and to help prepare that case, a recent study undertaken by Steer Davies Gleave examined the economic impact of HS2 on the LCR. The study considered a number of options that modelled different scenarios for HS2 service provision. These options included HS2’s current proposed service (for “Policy-On” and “Policy-Off” growth scenarios), an alternative service pattern that would omit calls at Stafford, and an extended high speed route into Liverpool.

The study found that HS2 services, as currently proposed by HS2 Ltd, should bring significant economic benefits to the LCR (estimated at around £1.2bn (PV 2010) over a 60 year period) and would be further enhanced should LCR realise its “Policy-On”3 growth aspirations. The study also found that the benefits of HS2 to LCR could be extended by operating both of the two Liverpool- London high speed services per hour via the HS2 route from Crewe, instead of via Stafford and the existing West Coast Main Line. These benefits would be further enhanced under the Higgins proposal for advancing the extension of HS2 to a hub at Crewe (adding £110m) and by bringing them sooner than currently proposed (adding £80m). Together these measures would add a further £0.2bn, bringing the total economic benefit to the LCR to around £1.4bn (PV 2010).

The study found that an extension of the high speed network directly into central Liverpool would bring further benefits (estimated at around £0.1bn (PV2010)), but further work would be needed to determine an acceptable value for money and affordability case for this option to be progressed.

The nature of the current HS2 proposition means that while it will release capacity on the southern section of the West Coast Main Line, it will not release rail freight capacity north of Crewe. The Strategic Case for HS2 is in part predicated on the benefits of the capacity released on the West Coast Main Line, including accommodating growing demand for intermodal freight traffic from the southern ports of Felixstowe, Thames Ports and Southampton. The development of SUPERPORT will increase the volume of inter-modal traffic passing through the LCR and if this is to travel by rail – the most economic and environmentally friendly way of moving containers throughout the country – attention needs to be given to the capacity and capability of rail links between the LCR and the capacity that will become available on the West Coast Main line.


      1. An integrated approach to developing HS2 and the existing rail network with for the Liverpool City Region


As highlighted by Sir David Higgins in his ‘HS2 Plus’ report9, there is a need for an integrated approach through developing regional strategies that ensure that HS2 is integrated with the existing rail networks and the potential improvements to those networks.

HS2 alone, will not address many of the key constraints and issues facing the rail network for the LCR. In fact, with additional HS2 services operating over the West Coast Main Line north of Crewe, capacity for accommodating the anticipated growth in rail freight on this strategically important corridor will be in short supply. Economic growth in the LCR will also be contingent on improved rail infrastructure, to provide better links to the Port of Liverpool, faster and more frequent commuter services, greater capacity of the Merseyrail network to service Liverpool City Centre and more services connecting the LCR with other economic centres. Therefore there is an urgent need to develop and deliver plans for the rail network that address the wider needs for rail, both passenger and freight.




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