The 2024 conference debate on hs2
Watch the edited highlights of the debate on 8th September 2024 at the Green Party conference in Manchester on our motion E01 “Green Rail Strategy for the Midlands and the North”.
Greens4HS2
Our conference motion – E01 Green Rail Strategy for the Midlands and the North
<update – the motion passed! Look out for new posts real soon now explaining what this means for the party. And check the Green Party’s press release> Greens4HS2 have proposed this motion to the 2024 conference expressing the party’s support, with important conditions, for the building of HS2 in full… Read More »Our conference motion – E01 Green Rail Strategy for the Midlands and the North
108 ancient woodlands destroyed?
As Greens we share with all our party colleagues a huge respect for the natural world and a love of our country’s woodland and the wildlife it supports. We mourn the loss of ancient woodland wherever it happens. HS2 sadly causes the loss of some of this woodland. However, one… Read More »108 ancient woodlands destroyed?
The carbon numbers: what is the full potential of HS2?
All transportation infrastructure projects emit CO2 when being built, but only trains earn that CO2 back, because when people switch from high-CO2 modes like cars and planes, the only question is “how long” until it’s all earned back and we start getting gains. Carbon Brief wrote a brilliant piece showing… Read More »The carbon numbers: what is the full potential of HS2?
“An analysis of carbon emissions following modal shift on to HS2 services”
This piece of original research by Mark Brewer MEng shows how the 120-year myth about HS2’s carbon payback is exactly that.
Reference: Green Party’s High Speed Rail Briefing Note, 2011
Below is a copy of the Briefing Note reproduced at http://stophs2.org/news/1562-green-partys-high-speed-rail-briefing-note, retrieved February 11th 2021. We cannot currently verify it is identical to the briefing note actually issued at the GPEW Spring Conference in 2011 and relied upon to pass Conference motion TR11.3. If anyone does have an authoritative link… Read More »Reference: Green Party’s High Speed Rail Briefing Note, 2011
Stimulate air travel?
Some objections to HS2 are because people have heard that it will stimulate air travel. After all, it’s supported by, and has stations near, Birmingham and Manchester airports. Of course we Greens want much less air travel, not more, so how can we support HS2? HS2 is not about airports.… Read More »Stimulate air travel?
RIS2: The real enemy is roads
We know many very committed Greens are involved in these protests against HS2, concerned about the loss of habitat and woodland. We respect their dedication, but they’re protesting about the wrong thing. The real enemy is the government’s vast RIS2 road-building programme. Unlike RIS2, HS2 is an investment in a… Read More »RIS2: The real enemy is roads
Chalk streams and drinking water
HS2’s drilling and tunnelling into the chalk rock below its route has many people worried about drinking water supplies, and chalk streams such as the River Misbourne. This is an engineering challenge, but there isn’t a reason to be alarmed. It’s not a venture into the unknown. A few words… Read More »Chalk streams and drinking water
“Just for 20 minutes quicker to Birmingham”
“All this, just to get to Birmingham 20 minutes quicker”, people say. Nope: on the day that HS2 starts, in 2029, its trains will also serve Liverpool, Manchester and Glasgow. Here’s the service pattern. Each line = one train per hour both ways: The trains run on the new railway… Read More »“Just for 20 minutes quicker to Birmingham”