East West Rail bridge near Calvert completed

[@shaunwest3612]

Incredible project and Engineering 👌

[@tommcmanamon8327]

32 miles of tunnels and vanity bridges through the home counties (nimby's) are the reason this project is way over budget, and the cancellation of the link to Manchester. The 20 million in the North have been ignored again. HS2 is only half a job now.

[@ds1868]

Less than half a job. About 30%.

[@thomaswykes3647]

Lots of money embezzled to mates of mates

[@EdgyNumber1]

'Vanity project,' 'white elephant..' nothing will ever get done if we listen to these luddites that love to casually throw around those lazy terms, just because they don't get it.

[@tmb8807]

Previously the Great Central Main Line passed over the Oxford-Cambridge line at this point. The fact this is reversed with HS2/EWR is curious (and gives an idea of the scale of the earthworks). Is it because of the different timetables for completion, and doing it that way around makes work easier on one or the other?

[@finnyoungman2674]

I'd assume it's also because high speed trains can't change gradient as sharply, and you can see that EWR goes up decently steeply to make it over HS2 before going back down under another bridge.

[@HywelapDafydd]

It should have been an interchange station

[@lordgemini2376]

Agreed, hopefully it will be one day. It'll give everyone living in the Oxford - Milton Keynes - Cambridge arc an easy connection to HS2 going north and south.

[@bobtahoma]

It really should!

[@nomadcarpenter8549]

The whole point of hs2 is fast trains. That won't happen if the train stops every 5 min

[@nevreiha]

if it was it would add an extra break to the journey over 5 miles from Bicester Buckingham and at a stretch Aylesbury, that's no East Midlands Parkway and would not be financially or timewise worth it even if it would be convenient for at most just over 100 thousand people via slow local rail, whereas EM pkwy covers a combined population over a million. I'm sorry but it wouldn't happen in any world unless it was names Regular Speed Rail 2

[@thomasgray4188]

makes 0 sense it's a high speed rail line not a mixed traffic mainline

[@frasermitchell9183]

Do I see track laying in progress on the HS2 main line ? So line opening is in sight, albeit some years to go yet.

[@DavidShepheard]

It would have been open a lot faster (and more cheaply) if the original staged development of London Euston had not been cancelled.

[@mikemclennan2909]

The expensive high vis jackets and the helmets are brand new without a mark on them. Is this where all the cost overruns are coming from?

[@TheRailwayDrone]

Such incredible engineering and construction. Sometimes I wish I worked in construction instead of IT.

[@JP_TaVeryMuch]

Please stay where you are and fight for us humans against the homogeneity of the machines! My dad was a high up in the building game and was eventually successful in putting me off, despite my love of it all. As he says, construction is the first business to slam to a halt in a recession and the very last and slowest to pick back up afterwards.

[@TheRailwayDrone]

@@JP_TaVeryMuch True, but look at what happens when it picks back up. Amazing things like this happen.

[@JP_TaVeryMuch]

@@TheRailwayDrone Watch out, you've got the bug!! One more thing, I am talking years not months. Everybody else was back going abroad for their summer holidays and we still were off to Devon... Good luck with whatever you decide.

[@TheRailwayDrone]

@@JP_TaVeryMuch Lol I'm not changing careers. Those were just wishful comments and praise for the construction community.

[@lkjadslkfjlaksj]

Yeah I do sometimes think it would be much more satisfying to build things that are more physical and tangible than software.

[@willhemmings]

I note the subtitle refers to the East West Rail which 'will carry local trains...' I thought East West Rail was an inter-city project, similar to HS2, but with greater likelihood of getting to its intended destinations

[@DavidShepheard]

I believe you are thinking of HS3, otherwise known as "Northern Powerhouse Rail". The Government didn't like people calling it HS3, as they were attempting to descope it to a midspeed line. They have more recently cancelled it in their "Cancel High Speed Rail and pretend that doing nothing is doing something plan" (otherwise known as "The Integrated Rail Plan".) The Integrated Rail Plan itself has also been cancelled and replaced by a new plan called Network North. Network North is an innovative plan to help rail passengers in the North of England by cancelling rail investment and building roads everywhere except in the North of England. If you are confused by this, join the club!

[@DavidShepheard]

Awesome work! But it is a shame that the UK government cancelled the electrification on East-West Rail. The rail connection here could have been used as a way to get HS2 trains off of the line and onto local tracks, in the event of an emergency.

[@simonroyle2806]

Great engineering and progress after so much paperwork. People recruited by HS2 should demonstrate being able to pronounce "H"!

[@mickb6285]

The sheer amount of land taken up by HS2 construction amazes me. Railway building in the 1890s barely extended beyond the routes final boundaries by using the railway being constructed to move excavated material from cuttings to embankments. Yet its being talked about in this video as if that is some sort of revolutionary idea. Today's contractors seem to have some sort of weird obsession with dump trucks and have to construct miles of temporary roads to use them. Then all that land has to be reinstated when the jobs finished. I also doubt that todays methods are quicker, which is shocking when you consider the Victorians did it with picks, shovels and barrows. No wonder its costing a fortune.

[@cedricrobertshaw]

What is the route ofHs2

[@scottpeacock5492]

London Old Oak Common to Birmingham so that The West Midland line.

[@Stand663]

@@scottpeacock5492 I live near old oak common. It’s been a construction site for the last 10 years.

[@scottpeacock5492]

​@@Stand663Yes and the station is taking shape, lot of demolition and ground work needs doing before the station starts getting built.

[@chriss2530]

I thought HS2 was cancelled?

[@scottpeacock5492]

No phase 2a and 2b to Manchester and Leeds have been scrapped. Phase 1 of the HS2 project between Old Oak Common and Birmingham is making progress and should be completed in 2028. The building of the new London Euston Station HS2 terminial is being transferred to private builders contractors.

[@NickyMitchell85]

I thought HS2 was canned/scrapped?

[@nevreiha]

the links north of bham were scrapped unfortunately, london to Birmingham is still going ahead

[@geecee310]

London to Birmingham and on to Lichfield (WCML connection) is all still going ahead.

[@CRIMSONANT1]

​@@geecee310.. London - Birmingham is all that's left of "High Speed 2" after the scrapping of the Eastern & Northern legs & the Golborne link & within a decade of opening (in about 50 years time at the current rate of progress), it'll be nothing more than a glorified cycle path. The WCML connection "on to Lichfield" & beyond to Manchester WON'T be high speed which makes this massive vanity project a total laughing stock. HS2 has proved to be an environmental disaster of epic proportions & Britain's biggest infrastructure mistake in half a century.

[@geecee310]

@@CRIMSONANT1 the Birmingham delta to Lichfield section is high speed, thus continuing to afford journey time savings for London to Manchester/Liverpool/Glasgow services. This will also free up capacity on the WCML from London to Milton Keynes and Rugby.

[@CRIMSONANT1]

@@geecee310 .. arguments about "freeing up capacity" on the WCML rely on a discredited, out of date forecasting model which overestimates long distance passenger growth & isn't used for anything anymore except to justify HS2. Network Rail's "New Lines Programme Capacity Analysis" shows that WCML capacity is kept artificially low by private operators wanting to maximise profits. A DfT analysis shows that in peak hours leaving Euston, WCML trains were loaded at just 52.2%.

[@philipareed]

AITCH!

[@Kevwendover12]

A few years ago residents in the Vale of Aylesbury where promised a link to the East - West Railway as a way of softening HS2 disruption. Well we now have little chance of that link and watch our beautiful countryside being destroyed.

[@lordgemini2376]

The "countryside" will be returned to how it was before with most of the worksites being replantes/greened. It is literally a construction site. All that willl remain is the railway which is a think sliver And hopefully Aylesbury will be connected to East West Rail at some point. There was a proposed Aylesbury - MIlton Keynes service and a fitire Aylesbury - Cambridge one.

[@Kevwendover12]

We can only live in hope but personally from what I have seen locally the loss of wildlife habitat will take a long, long time to recover if at all.

[@scottpeacock5492]

@@Kevwendover12 The fields wildlife habitat will recover, Motorways have destroyed more fields and habitat than a small railway.

[@Kevwendover12]

@@scottpeacock5492 Hardly a small railway, they brought land and homes where HS2 won't run now . Now its not being built to the North of England it's turned into a very expensive vanity project

[@geecee310]

Interesting to know who made such a promise - it's never been part of the HS2 proposals or the East West Rail proposals. Sounds like deliberately vague concept was put out by someone with no authority and little knowledge.

[@harrykay4710]

Congrats! After pissing away billions you’ve created a bridge! Good job and remember: keep dossing + keep Thurston’s pay sky high too! Bad jobs should always be rewarded!

[@LazerBenabba-w9o]

One of the most irritating aspects of HS2 or any other project related to it is the mispronounciation of its title....It is "Aitch" not the soft "H"aitch as is so commonly and incorrectly used. Hugo Rebel uses the correct enunciation as opposed to the lady.

[@Sam-uo8ki]

It’s actually pronounced “Hugo Rebelo”

[@briansr.5219]

Semantics ! Does it really matter ? I suggest no it doesn't.

[@1chish]

@@briansr.5219 No it doesn't you are right. I read that and had a 🤦‍♂ moment.

[@LazerBenabba-w9o]

@@briansr.5219 Semantics refer to the meaning of a word or words but in this instance it is the misprounciation that is the issue.

[@LazerBenabba-w9o]

Absolutely but not a mispronounciation just a left out letter due to my usual fat thumb problem,@@Sam-uo8ki

[@docker5468]

Waste of money

[@EdgyNumber1]

A project that has to last at least 100 years is hardly something I'd call a waste.

[@barryjatkinson]

I find these updates so depressing. The country is being destroyed.

[@alanrobertson7217]

I assume you would have said the same when the ribblehead viaduct was being built, or dare I say your house?

[@scottpeacock5492]

Oh you know motorways have destroyed more countryside than a small railway. Don't talk daft.

[@thomasgray4188]

literally both re using an old rail alignment hs2 is undoing motor industry vandalism

[@JohnSmith-xl8cb]

😂😂😂😂nice bike lane in ten years when it goes bankrupt because no one uses it, been a gravy train for thousands for ten years, think what that money could of done

[@DavidKnowles0]

They will be using it, as the current line will switch to being mainly a commuter line that stops at every station and railway cargo link.

[@lordgemini2376]

With a comment like this, I hope you're not seen riding it after it's open and succesful 👍

[@scottpeacock5492]

Said the man who is shut in the countryside with their 4X4 on their house drive way shut out of the real world. Too much country air gone to your head has it.

[@darrenknight5198]

British rail is operating over capacity. This line will be used extensively from day 1.

[@peterrobinson6872]

Such sweet ignorance, it's almost charming ...