Today, following months of campaigning from Camden Town Unlimited, the transport secretary Patrick McLoughlin announced that he has taken the decision to remove the HS1-2 link from the High Speed Rail Bill.
Camden residents and businesses will, of course, breathe a sigh of relief that the government has seen sense and agreed to drop the link as it currently stands, which would have torn through the heart of Camden Town. The result? A decade of disruption and destruction of parts of our markets and creative economy.
As part of our campaign to stop the link’s devastating impact on Camden, CTU commissioned two in-depth reports into the disruption caused by the proposed link. They showed the impact that the link would have on Camden’s world-famous markets and creative economy – costing up to 9,000 jobs and £631m to the local economy, and the disruption and blight that ten years of construction would have on Camden Town. Clearly the government has been paying attention to our concerns, and we’re thrilled at today’s announcement from the transport secretary.
What is important now, and what we will continue to petition government on, is that the uncertainty that has been blighting businesses in Camden is removed as soon as possible.
The safeguarding of this section of the route has meant that businesses in Camden have been reluctant to invest or hire skilled staff; and the removal of this threat will open up new opportunities for our creative economy, which provides thousands of jobs in Camden.
We will continue to meet with MPs from all parties, businesses from up and down the country, transport officials and freight operators to ensure that any new proposals regarding links from the north to Europe have the best possible outcome for Camden. We’ll also be talking to HS2 and MPs about redeveloping Euston and making a real difference to the area.
We know that this is a project that will last for many different governments, so while we’ll be celebrating this victory, we’re focussing now on preserving Camden for the long term, and making sure that we get the best possible deal for residents and businesses in NW1.
3 thoughts on “HS2 link axed – and Camden’s markets saved. But what next?”
At last – coverage of an issue that genuinely affects KentishTowners – can’t believe you haven’t been on this sooner
Good news today, but the newly revised plans will still cause a lot of upset and disruption to KTowners due to the tunneling required.
This is a huge problem with the country in general, and London in particular. We have to have this investment in infrastructure. Tunnels have to go somewhere, track has to be built. We stand in the way of progress with this narrow-minded view. Yes, in the short term it’s quite annoying to have building works going on, and it’s not great that bits of Camden would have to change. But in the long term it’s better for the economy if the city can grow to a plan rather than having to make all sorts of alterations that hinder development for this NIMBY attitude. This leads to sub-par infrastructure and similar problems in the future – people will start complaining that there is an ineffective part of the journey from St Pancras to Euston where they have to change from HS1 to the tube, to HS2 – not to mention the spiralling costs of any infrastructure project as things have to be re-planned again and again.
But the problem with the HS2-HS1 link was that it was a sub-par plan anyway. It was single track and would have been built alongside existing London Overground services. The result would’ve been £700M spent on a service that could only run once an hour at best, whilst severely curtailing the expansion of a vital and expanding part of London infrastructure (both passenger and freight). Transport for London and the Mayor were dead against it too.
There was no business case for the link (the trains would likely be largely empty), meaning operators weren’t keen on what would be a loss-making exercise anyway. Perhaps when the whole HS2 system is built, we can think about a tunnel from Old Oak Common that’s double track and provides a proper link. But the scrapped plan offered a lot of cost and local hurt with little in return. The government were acting out of common sense as much as responding to the local campaign.