{"id":51245,"date":"2023-10-04T21:00:56","date_gmt":"2023-10-04T20:00:56","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=51245"},"modified":"2023-10-04T19:27:45","modified_gmt":"2023-10-04T18:27:45","slug":"could-hs2-northern-leg-cancellation-provide-a-boost-for-trams","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=51245","title":{"rendered":"Could HS2 northern leg cancellation provide a boost for trams?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>As had been widely predicted, Wednesday 4<sup>th<\/sup> October saw UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak confirm that the northern leg of HS2 between Birmingham and Manchester would be cancelled after the continued increase in costs. The rights and wrongs of this decision \u2013 said to be made because of the huge increase in costs for the construction of the line \u2013 are for others to comment on as it doesn\u2019t fit within the remit of this website but as part of the announcement there was the suggestion that the money saved from not investing in HS2 would be made available for other transport projects outside of London \u2013 including the possibility that the much vaunted Leeds tram system may be back on the agenda.<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Following the announcement \u2013 which was made during Rishi Sunak\u2019s keynote speech at the Conservative Party Conference which ironically took place in Manchester \u2013 a document was released unveiling the \u201cNetwork North\u201d plans. As well as confirming the new plans for HS2 it also detailed \u201cOur new plan for cities\u201d which includes some detail but as with everything of this type much of the detail is still to come and possibly the key message is that money will be made available and it will be responsibility for local Mayors and authorities to decide which projects should be funded.<\/p>\n<p>In total \u00a336 billion is said to be being made available for transport projects outside of London with the suggestion that hundreds of projects could be funded. As we\u2019re interested in trams and light rail on these pages, projects mentioned as possibilities include:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>A fully funded \u00a32.5 billion mass-transit metro in West Yorkshire. This could create a network of up to 7 lines which could eventually connect Leeds with Huddersfield, Wakefield, Bradford and Halifax. This has been widely reported as being a tram system but the report does not give any mention of the mode this metro system would use.<\/li>\n<li>Manchester Metrolink extensions to Heywood, Bolton, Wigan and Manchester Airport<\/li>\n<li>Sheffield tram extensions<\/li>\n<li>More trams for Blackpool<\/li>\n<li>Extension of Nottingham Express Transit to serve Gedling and Clifton South<\/li>\n<li>West Midlands Combined Authority to receive \u00a3100 million of additional funding to deal with ongoing Metro and Arden Cross cost pressures as well as \u00a3250 million of revenue support over the next five years to accelerate local transport projects<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>Apart from the fact that some of these suggestions have no detail whatsoever (\u201cmore trams for Blackpool\u201d and \u201cSheffield tram extensions\u201d), many of the above have long been considered but have not got much further than the initial planning stages. But considering how long many large-ish projects seem to be get off the ground we wouldn\u2019t go holding our breath that any will get going within the next few years.<\/p>\n<p>More details and reaction to these plans are bound to follow in the next few weeks, months and years (so far most of the reaction has been related to the headline HS2 cancellation rather than what the money could be used for instead).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>As had been widely predicted, Wednesday 4th October saw UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak confirm that the northern leg of HS2 between Birmingham and Manchester would be cancelled after the continued increase in costs. The rights and wrongs of this &hellip; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/?p=51245\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[7,13,17,20,24,18],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51245"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=51245"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51245\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51246,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51245\/revisions\/51246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=51245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=51245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.britishtramsonline.co.uk\/news\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=51245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}