The UK Government has issued a ‘Notice to Proceed' for construction to the companies contracted to build High Speed 2 (HS2).
The ‘Notice to Proceed' sees the official approval for HS2, allowing the main works civil contracts, awarded to several firms, to begin stage two.
Proceeding with construction will come as a vote of confidence for every company involved in this stage of construction, also helping the overall UK Economy.
Each firm will follow Public Health England's advice for protecting the staff and public from COVID-19.
A list of the companies and the business which form these ventures, awarded in July 2017 with joint ventures can be found below:
- SCS Railways (Skanska Construction UK Ltd, Costain Ltd and STRABAG AG)
- Align JV (Bouygues Travaux Publics SAS, a subsidiary of Bouygues Construction, Sir Robert McAlpine and VolkerFitzpatrick, a subsidiary of VolkerWessels UK)
- EKBF JV (Eiffage Genie Civil SA, Kier Infrastructure and Overseas Ltd, BAM Nuttall, Ferrovial Agroman)
- BBV JV (Balfour Beatty Group Ltd, VINCI Construction Grands Projets, VINCI Construction UK Ltd, VINCI Construction Terrassement)
What did the officials say?
Andrew Stephenson, Minister HS2, said
“While the government's top priority is rightly to combat the spread of coronavirus, protect the NHS and save lives, we cannot delay work on our long-term plan to level up the country.
HS2 will be the spine of the country's transport network, boosting capacity and connectivity while also rebalancing opportunity fairly across our towns and cities.
Following the decision earlier this year to proceed with the project, this next step provides thousands of construction workers and businesses across the country with certainty at a time when they need it, and means that work can truly begin on delivering this transformational project.”
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Sorry, under the current circumstances I would have thoight a reappraisal of this project would have made sense. As a life time transport enthusiast and environmentalist I would like to have seen serious discussion around other means of comunication.
So much scope to upgrade the current infrastructure.
We seem to be faced with the Donkeys and Lions situation again. Smuggling this through while our minds are elsewhere!
HS2 will create new jobs, opportunities and housing development for the West Midlands, East Midlands and the North of England once it’s completed. And will connect cities in the North of England with London and Europe. Looking forward to seeing the completion of HS2 and new stations with links to nearby airports, towns and cities.
This is what the North of England really needs. A much faster quicker high speed rail service that takes less than 2 hours to & from London. And with Hitachi/Bombardier to manufacture new HS2 trains.