Great, but it's also a goods corridor; the only way around both of those at the same time (absent massive depopulation) is to move the people, would mean building loads more houses.

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crinkly 2 days ago | parent [-]

The WCML is perfectly adequate for that. HS2 is a vanity project for business and general passenger travel, none of which is certain or impossible on the WCML already.

	▲	appointment 2 days ago \| parent [-]
		But the WCML is at capacity, so it is not in fact adequate. "There is no available capacity without significantly impacting performance and causing a reduction in timetable resilience due to the resulting requirement for successive services to run on minimum headway" https://www.orr.gov.uk/sites/default/files/om/wcml-capacity-...