Carbon advantage of any high-speed rail would be trivial

Published: 6 May, 2010

• THE April 22 New Journal referred to the concerns of Primrose Hill residents regarding the risk of damage and loss of value of their homes along the route of the proposed tunnel for a  high-speed rail line to Birmingham.
These concerns are generated by what we believe to be a completely unproven judgment that the UK would benefit from extending such a network not only to Birmingham but, in due course, to Manchester and Scotland.
What this widely supported view critically overlooks is that it would represent a further costly, socially unjust and environmentally-damaging lurch towards a high-carbon future. Its provision would have an outcome that runs fundamentally counter to the far more important global objective of limiting the ravages of climate change.
The promoters are trying to obscure the fact that their strategy is ecologically unsustainable. Growth in long-distance journeys has arisen as a result both of the continuing geographical spread of personal travel and commercial activity, and of the consequent rise in the country’s transport investment to meet the demand. In turn this has generated further demand for these journeys.
It is obvious that the resulting environmental problems of more noise, air pollution and other damaging environmental impacts, especially the CO2 emitted and then remaining in the atmosphere for over 100 years, should not be subsidised but covered in the cost of travel.
The carbon advantage of high-speed rail, if any, would be trivial. The claim it would make a significant contribution to reducing Britain’s overall carbon footprint by transferring some air passengers to the train is nonsense.
These issues should be the ones on which the concerns of residents and everyone else should be focused rather than seeking to establish that the proposed high-speed line should simply be relocated.

MAYER HILLMAN
Policy Studies Institute
JOHN ADAMS
University College London
STEPHEN PLOWDEN
Independent Transport Consultant