Cheshire East Council has welcomed the recommendation that Crewe should be the site of a North West hub station for the HS2 high-speed rail network.
HS2 chairman Sir David Higgins today said he would be advising the Government that the new station should be built and operational by 2027, five years earlier than first expected.
Sir David said journey times between Crewe and London would be cut to just 55 minutes, 35 minutes quicker than the fastest current journey.
Councillor Michael Jones, Leader of Cheshire East Council, said the new station and the investment that goes with it would have a transformational effect on Cheshire East and the wider North West region.
Councillor Jones said: "The Crewe HS2 Superhub will produce 64,000 jobs and boost the North West's economic output by £3.5 billion per annum. It will act as a major gateway for the region, energising the northern powerhouse.
"Cheshire East Council is already working on a strong programme of local and strategic infrastructure Improvements to create a High Growth City around Crewe, but the Superhub will have a transformational effect.
"There are more than 800 acres of prime development land near to the Superhub station. Overall, we believe that HS2 will unlock development sites throughout Cheshire and North Staffordshire for new offices, factories, warehouses shops and new homes.
"The newly located station creates the opportunity for a well-planned, multi-modal station interchange, with new transit links into Crewe.
"We can also introduce new connectivity to other towns in Cheshire."
The leader stressed that this was not just about Crewe and the borough of Cheshire East but the wider region including Stoke on Trent and Staffordshire.
"I look forward to meeting with and involving Stoke and Staffordshire councils and the Staffordshire Chambers of Commerce in developing further plans to enable the people of Staffordshire to benefit from this exciting project.
"I agree with Sir David when he says in his report that Crewe has been a major railway intersection since Victorian times offering connectivity to North Wales, Merseyside, Staffordshire and the North West in general.
"He has said that the Stoke option would be too costly and would not provide the connectivity required.
"But we have every intention of engaging with Staffordshire County Council and Stoke City Council so that they can share in the benefit."
Sir David has further recommended that the Government considers asking HS2 to look at the possibility of running classic compatible high speed services to Stoke-on-Trent, Macclesfield and Stockport to link with HS2 via the West Coast mainline.
Comments
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Silence is not golden Cllr Jones.
Perhaps we do need it but after years of closing railways and reducing capacity and, crime of crimes, allowing rights of way to be abandoned to building, someone should at least say sorry. I'd rather reopen the Midland line to Matlock and Derby to provide a direct route to the East Midlands city of Leicester.
Note that at this time it is proposed to completely abandon all hope of reopening the Woodhead route to Sheffield by blocking the tunnel. Are we crazy?
Yes Crewe was to have been the Northern end of the Eurostar service and we were all to be in clover. I actually saw a Eurostar train pass thro' Crewe once; it had come from Preston and passed through on the fast line without stopping. There appeared to be at least six passengers on board; that "service" didn't last long.
Scrap HS2, scrap Trident: new hospitals anybody?
Privatisation removed BR, who were always last in the queue at the Treasury and therefore never got the funds they needed even to maintain the railway, never mind grow it. Since then we have seen the light, and realised that an effective rail system is vital for economic growth. This is a truth the rest of Europe, and many other countries such as China, have known for decades and we are, as a result, decades behind them with modern high speed rail. The only HS line we have is a branch of the French system into London via the channel tunnel.
But better late than never out rail system has undergone an amazing renaissance in recent years; closed lines re-opened (not [yet] Woodhead or Buxton - Derby) and many more re-doubled. The Trent Valley, Stafford to Rugby, was even quadrupled to give us sub 2 hour services Wilmslow to London with modern, reliable trains. And everywhere we see modern,
But the railway has become a victim of its own success. Passenger numbers are up to 3 times what they were in BR days. The main north-south link, the West Coast Main Line is almost full. Rail freight's vigorous growth is being curtailed by lack of capacity on the line, and passenger traffic is approaching saturation.
HS2 should have been built decades ago. It's a no-brainer. Just look overseas. A national railway system without HS rail is like a road system without motorways.
And yes, the Treasury is the main guilty party. It always was. But remember too that BR had nowhere near the subsidies that our so called privatised lines have today. Oh, wait a minute. Some are State run, it's just not our State!