Brexit and the waning days of the United Kingdom

[Gups]

Back to the actual topic of the brexit thread. Planning


Seen elsewhere.

"planning and associated processes like public inquiries that were often the focus of narratives of delay,...[but] it is often the time spent organising finance that is the major determinant of infrastructure project temporalities, especially for sectors such as nuclear power (Hatchwell, 2015) and major rail schemes where potentially controversial balances between public and private funding must be struck." [Marshall and Cowell 2016). In short it suits everyone to blame planning, and its not without blame, but solid research suggests first, its small beer when looked across the timeframe of design and delivery of major projects, and second its been the focus of large scale reform because its the visible bit of the delay [and it does no harm to politicians to kick planners]. Government flip-floppery on the other hand means endless consultants reports, absence of a secure skills base etc.

Linking off to https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0263774X16642768#bibr41-0263774X16642768

To which my thoughts are yes. Technically. But this financial divvering is an ideological choice from the way the tories try to avoid paying fir anything normally. It's not as inherently baked into the system as the broken way planning works.

Thoughts?

Major infra projects get planning first and finance later. HS2 phase 1 got planning (via an Act of Parliament) in 2017. The financing for construction contract not until 2020/21 (although land acquisition costs were financed earlier). So land is compulsorily purchased and people's lives disturbed without any certainty that the project will actually happen. I have several clients who have attempted suicide because of their treatment by HS2 which is by far the worst run project I have ever dealt with in 25 years of practice.

Its different for some energy projects (though not nuclear) and regeneration projects which are promoted primarily by the private sector and have to demonstrate financing/viability to get consent.

The time taken to get planning is more of a problem for house building than for infra because devolved to local government and therefore Nimbys. Which is why Sunak's abolition of targets has more or less halved housing consents.

[HVC]

Britain is a country in decline. Trains of the future will be slower, more expensive, and less comfortable than trains of today.
Thus is the tory way.

Cars are fast

[Sheilbh]

I like Angela Rayner
https://x.com/AngelaRayner/status/1711048836104216983?s=20

[Josquius]

Britain is a country in decline. Trains of the future will be slower, more expensive, and less comfortable than trains of today.
Thus is the tory way.

Cars are fast

Spoken like someone who has never tried the m25.

[HVC]

Britain is a country in decline. Trains of the future will be slower, more expensive, and less comfortable than trains of today.
Thus is the tory way.

Cars are fast

Spoken like someone who has never tried the m25.

I live in Toronto, land of the world's worse traffic.


Still faster then our inter city trains though

[Josquius]

Britain is a country in decline. Trains of the future will be slower, more expensive, and less comfortable than trains of today.
Thus is the tory way.

Cars are fast

Spoken like someone who has never tried the m25.

I live in Toronto, land of the world's worse traffic.


Still faster then our inter city trains though

I've no idea about Canadian trains. Maybe you're right and they're bizzarely disastrous running at 50mph.
But I have to question this claim.
For shifting the same amount of people?
One car driving A to B is quicker than a train.
A train full of people making this journey beats as many cars trying to get down a road with the same number of lanes.

[Tonitrus]

I like Angela Rayner
https://x.com/AngelaRayner/status/1711048836104216983?s=20

Ugh...I wouldn't want to be a snob...but that made me wish for some received pronunciation. 

[HVC]

Britain is a country in decline. Trains of the future will be slower, more expensive, and less comfortable than trains of today.
Thus is the tory way.

Cars are fast

Spoken like someone who has never tried the m25.

I live in Toronto, land of the world's worse traffic.


Still faster then our inter city trains though

I've no idea about Canadian trains. Maybe you're right and they're bizzarely disastrous running at 50mph.
But I have to question this claim.
For shifting the same amount of people?
One car driving A to B is quicker than a train.
A train full of people making this journey beats as many cars trying to get down a road with the same number of lanes.

Google says 94kph... which seems unlikely based on my experience (including Friday when I took it to Hamilton)

*edit* so like 55 miles per hour

[Savonarola]

I live in Toronto, land of the world's worse traffic.


Still faster then our inter city trains though

I've no idea about Canadian trains. Maybe you're right and they're bizzarely disastrous running at 50mph.
But I have to question this claim.
For shifting the same amount of people?
One car driving A to B is quicker than a train.
A train full of people making this journey beats as many cars trying to get down a road with the same number of lanes.

Toronto's regional train system has no automatic train control and relies on voice radio and conventional signaling (for the most part, there are some places that have no signaling, "Dark territory" in rail lingo); so trains are limited to civil speeds (79 MPH at maximum, that will vary in terms of track condition and crossings).  This also limits the distance trains can be from one another; and the line is shared with freight (which usually doesn't go much above 50 Mph, and freight is a much bigger deal in North America than it is in Europe) as well as long distance trains.  So the trains can be slow, and don't run all that frequently.

The highway system in the Greater Toronto Area (at least the parts I've driven on) are well designed and have a good amount of capacity, once you get outside the city.  Within the city, it's awful.  The highways (and the streets for that matter) were designed when Toronto was much smaller and the city planners couldn't foresee the relatively recent explosive growth.

The Toronto regional train corporation, MetroLinx, is working to improve both track and signaling for more trains and faster trains; but they don't own all the track in the Greater Toronto Area.  So, taking HVC's recent trip to Hamilton as an example, even if their current project is completed on schedule, in ten years the improved signaling will only go as far as Oakville, about half the journey.

[Josquius]

That's comprehensive

Sounds like a typical example of a big problem you often see when people compare cars and trains (or indeed public transport in general). Not comparing like with like.

Sounds like the railways there are basically the equivalent of a rural dirt road whilst the roads have been hyper invested to be the road equivalent of a shinkansen.

A imperfect analogy of course. Roads and rails have different purposes. A railway can only get so poor, into bamboo railway territory, before it stops working at all whilst a road has an upper limit at which just constantly adding more lanes is dumb and useless.

Usually roads are optimum for rural areas whilst for areas of any reasonable density railways are the optimum.

[Duque de Bragança]

Toronto's regional train system has no automatic train control and relies on voice radio and conventional signaling (for the most part, there are some places that have no signaling, "Dark territory" in rail lingo); so trains are limited to civil speeds (79 MPH at maximum, that will vary in terms of track condition and crossings).  This also limits the distance trains can be from one another; and the line is shared with freight (which usually doesn't go much above 50 Mph, and freight is a much bigger deal in North America than it is in Europe) as well as long distance trains.  So the trains can be slow, and don't run all that frequently.

The highway system in the Greater Toronto Area (at least the parts I've driven on) are well designed and have a good amount of capacity, once you get outside the city.  Within the city, it's awful.  The highways (and the streets for that matter) were designed when Toronto was much smaller and the city planners couldn't foresee the relatively recent explosive growth.

Don't worry Sav, the Dark Territory rail lingo is pretty common parlance thanks to, guess whom, Steven Seagal!



 

Thanks for the info. One of the reasons new high-speed lines are not just useful for passengers on a hurry, is it frees lots of capacities for (much) slower trains, even freight trains, assuming the old line is kept.

[The Brain]

In Sweden modern (post-1980s) passenger trains do 200 kph, old (1980s) passenger trains do 160 kph, and freight trains do like 100 kph. AFAIK & IIRC.

[Tamas]

Rachel Reeves says Labour will unleash more building by getting rid of 'obstacles created by antiquated planning system'
Good morning. It's a busy day at the Labour conference, with 12 members of the shadow cabinet giving speeches, with the highlight Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, at noon. In a speech in May, Keir Starmer put down what he hopes will be one of the big dividing lines in the next election when he declared that Labour were the builders and the Tories the blockers. Reeves will today give some indication as to how that might happen.

According to extracts from the speech released in advance, Reeves will say that Labour will take on the "obstacles presented by our antiquated planning system".

Here is the Labour summary of the reforms that the party is proposing.

Speeding up the planning for critically important infrastructure by updating all national policy statements – which set out what types of projects the country needs – within the first six months of a Labour government.

Fast-tracking the planning process for priority growth areas of the economy, such as battery factories, laboratories, and 5G infrastructure.

Ensuring local communities get something back by providing businesses and communities with a menu of potential incentives, which could include cheaper energy bills.

Tackling unnecessary, egregious, and time-consuming litigation by setting clearer national guidance for developers on the engagement and consultation expected with local communities.

Strengthening public sector capacity to expedite planning decisions by raising the stamp duty surcharge on non-UK residents to appoint 300 new planning officers.

In her speech, Reeves will say:

If we want to spur investment, restore economic security, and revive growth. Then we must get Britain building again.

The Tories would have you believe we can't build anything anymore. In fact, the single biggest obstacle to building infrastructure, to investment and to growth in this country is the Conservative party itself.

If the Tories won't build, if the Tories can't build, then we will. Taking head on the obstacles presented by our antiquated planning system.

Since 2012, decision times for national infrastructure have increased by 65%, now taking four years. Labour stands with the builders not the blockers.

So today I am announcing our plans to get Britain building.

Bolded part is: political suicide!

[Sheilbh]

The people I follow on this all seem pretty keen - apparently happy with some very specific ideas, slight concerns they're not going far enough in other ways but crucially think the mood music and rhetoric on this is right.

But they think the stuff from Reeves on national infrastructure etc is more positive than the stuff on housing which is a bit more of a mixed bag. But we'll see.

Edit: Although generally liking a lot of what I've seen from her speech - except for the stuff about the OBR

[Sheilbh]

Suank now describing the list of projects that would be funded by the HS2 money as "illustrative"