UK: New high-speed rail terminus for London?

[John Ashworth]

High-speed rail link could have new central London terminus

* Abhinav Ramnarayan
* guardian.co.uk, Sunday 27 December 2009 20.16 GMT

A new rail terminus could be built in central London under plans submitted to ministers as part of the proposed high-speed rail connection to replace short-haul flights in the UK.

The station would cater for commuters travelling to the West Midlands on the 250mph trains that form part of the government's plan to get domestic air passengers a year to switch to the north-south rail line. If approved, the line aims to open towards the end of 2025.

Under the plan, to be submitted this week by High Speed 2, the company charged with identifying possible routes and stations, the new London station would handle up to 18 trains an hour, with each train capable of carrying more than 1,000 passengers.

The proposals are part of the initial plan to build a link to the West Midlands, and then to extend the line to Scotland. HS2 also aims to link the station to Heathrow airport and to the channel tunnel rail link, now known as High Speed 1 (HS1).

HS2's chief executive, Alison Munro, said: "The proposals will include running trains from the HS2 on to the west coast main line. The final report will also look at how the line will help housing and regional economic development."

The HS2 team looked at 35 possible sites in London for the high-speed terminus and have settled for a site in central London. Ministers will be presented with a detailed route for the line up to the Midlands.

The high-speed rail connection was proposed earlier this year, when the government made the demise of domestic air travel an explicit policy target for the first time.

The idea was to cut journey times from London to Manchester by a third, London to Scotland to within three-and-a-half hours, and to construct the first new terminus in London for more than 100 years.

The transport secretary, Lord Adonis, said at the time: "For reasons of carbon reduction and wider environmental benefits, it is manifestly in the public interest that we systematically replace short-haul aviation with high-speed rail. But we would have to have, of course, the high-speed network before we can do it."

He added that building it would be an important part of Labour's election manifesto.

The plan was immediately criticised by environment campaigners as well as the aviation industry.

The government has since tried to calm environmental campaigners' fears that the new line would cut through swaths of countryside and disturb ecosystems along the way, while accusing airline chiefs who also objected to it of having their "heads in the sand".

The report by "impartial evaluators" HS2 will be published in the spring by Lord Adonis, and if approved the government will publish a white paper by the end of March 2010. This will set out detailed plans for new high-speed rail lines and services, including route proposals, time scales and associated financial, economic and environmental assessments.