Build Pennine tunnel to improve rail links: Yorkshire Post Letters

IF the railways of Switzerland can build a new tunnel under the Alps for 57 kilometres through some of the hardest and most geologically difficult rocks in the world, I would like to suggest that a tunnel under the Pennines for some eight kilometres should not be beyond the capacity of British engineers.

This would avoid the endless disruption to train services of improvements to the existing network. For the same reason it would be a good plan for new city centre stations to be built on the model of New Street, Birmingham, where the rail lines are in tunnel and escalators take passengers from the platforms to the station concourse at street level.

This would be an opportunity for us to prove that major projects can be completed in this country though this needs to be achieved by the work being handed over to the builders without interference at every stage by government committees and Whitehall departments which have inflated the cost and timescale of every recent project.

From: Henry Cobden, Ilkley.

I’D be more willing to accept HS2 if someone – anyone – could explain how many extra local and regional services will be able to operate in West Yorkshire, and where, as a result of its construction.

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