Australian Minister, Catherine King, is to visit Birmingham today with the UK’s Transport Secretary, Mark Harper, to see progress on HS2‘s new Curzon Street station.
The new station is creating 1,000 jobs and 100 new apprenticeships and in the next ten years will bring high speed services into Birmingham City Centre, with up to 9 high speed services running every hour – supporting even more jobs and business / educational opportunities.
Catherine King and Mark Harper will take a walk on the 300-metre long HS2 viaduct and will celebrate a milestone in that 15 of its 30 piers are now in place.
HS2 Ltd is now preparing to install a box structure under the West Coast Main Line near Lichfield – this will slowly be moved into place on the back of a transporter vehicle after being built over the last six months.
Transport Secretary Mark Harper said: “The fantastic city of Birmingham is a hive of construction, with HS2 supporting thousands of high-skilled jobs and apprenticeships, as we gear up to bring its services into the city centre over the next decade.
“As Europe’s largest infrastructure project, HS2 is being recognised globally and, alongside the Australian Transport Minister today, I take great pride in seeing this once-in-a-generation opportunity come to life, which will better connect our regions and grow the economy for years to come.”
Andy Street, Mayor of the West Midlands, said: “I am pleased to join Secretary of State for Transport Mark Harper – and Australia’s Minister for Infrastructure, Transport & Regional Development Catherine King – to showcase the progress underway at the Curzon Street Station site.
“HS2 is already delivering tangible benefits for our region – creating jobs, drawing in investment and helping to drive up the number of cranes dotting the skyline.
“So as we continue to work closely with Government, I’m sure that we will go on attracting global investment – including from our friends in Australia – to seize the HS2 related opportunities to the full, support our region’s economy and advance prosperity for local people in the months and years ahead.”
Responses
So what is the real reason for this Australian Minister to come and look at a giant building site in Birmingham?
If HS2 is ever finished, the RMT and ASLEF would have a field day. Because those 2 unions have no intention of stopping their strikes, until the Tories are OUT and Labour run the UK again.
HS2 should be scrapped!
HS2 isn’t going to be running in the next twelve months! I suspect that the General Election next year may be the end of the Tory Party as a potential party of government on current polling, and certainly a Labour or Labour/Liberal coalition is virtually inevitable.
What the new government does with HS2 is the more interesting question. Abandoning the London to Birmingham section half-built makes little sense but there could be a reason-think in Londin and north of Birmingham I suspect.