There’s no shortage of critics who will argue long into the night that London gets an unfair level of investment in its transport network compared to the rest of the country.
Representatives of other regions complain money is somehow found for infrastructure in the capital when other areas are told funds are too tight.
A clear example came in 2017 when Crossrail 2 – a plan to add another high-speed North London to South London line – received backing from the Department of Transport in the wake of a spate of cancellations for projects in the north of the country.
“On Friday, Tories say they can’t afford rail schemes in the North,” Mayor of Manchester Andy Burnham angrily posted on X at the time. “On Monday, they find billions more for London. Are these two things linked?”
Eventually, it was decided Crossrail 2 was far too expensive and the project was postponed indefinitely without a spade entering the soil. But it was a decision that was far from cheap, as trade title New Civil Engineer revealed in 2021 an incredible £115 million had already been spent, primarily on consultants.
There are many what-if questions when it comes to the global Covid-19 pandemic. Still, in the offices of Transport for London, more than most, staff must wonder whether projects like Crossrail 2 would be well under way had a series of nationwide lockdowns not occurred in Britain.
When Covid-19 struck in 2020 passenger revenue for the country’s busiest rail network collapsed overnight and plunged a previously functioning organisation into financial crisis.
Like most transport bodies across the UK TfL had to go cap in hand to Westminister asking for a bail-out.
But talks between Sadiq Khan and his predecessor Boris Johnson’s government were far from straightforward.
One of the concessions TfL had to make to get the cash needed to unction was Crossrail 2, with all work on the project being paused.
Given the difficult financial situation facing the London transport body, it looked like this was a near-fatal blow to the scheme, but those behind it wanted to make it clear; this was not the end.
“The team continues to support the work of refreshing the 2015 safeguarding directions in order to protect the route from future development. This will ensure that the crucial infrastructure can be delivered at a time when a long-term sustainable funding model is in place,” a spokesperson for TfL explained.
One of the problems Crossrail 2 had was its name was inextricably linked to an ongoing project that was years late and hundreds of millions over budget.
By 2020 when the axe fell on the new project the original Crossrail was two years past its scheduled opening date and construction had been mired in problems for years. All this was not exactly helping convince doubters similar projects would not see history repeating itself.
But, according to Dr David Crosthwaite, chief economist at the Building Cost Information Service, the problem in Britain is we spend too much time focusing on unrealistic cost estimates and not enough building the infrastructure the country needs.
“The appetite to spend money means what we tend to do is [build one] project at a time,” he told the Express.
“So we did the Channel Tunnel, then we did HS1 or Channel Tunnel Rail Link and then we’ve done Crossrail.
“Ideally we’d run Crossrail 1 and 2 at the same time. But there’s probably no political appetite to do that because of the costs.
“We tend to finish one thing and then start something else. So I don’t think it’s particularly joined-up thinking and, obviously, that starts costing us money.”
The passage of time between projects does allow for the new infrastructure’s benefits to be felt and gradually become what people think of when considering a new scheme rather than any earlier delays or high costs.
“When you ride on Crossrail now you’re probably not thinking it was massively overbudget and it’s been three years late, you’re just thinking ‘this is nicer than being on the Tube’,” Dr Crosthwaite added. “A lengthy period of time lets people forget all the bad press.”
The £115 million Crossrail 2 spent on consultants is enough to construct whole infrastructure projects in other parts of the country. But, as Dr Crosthwaite explained, it might have been in the unfortunate position where not enough money had been spent to pass the point of no return.
He explained: “[Sometimes] you get to the point where the project has already cost too much to be cancelled. So if you’ve already spent almost a billion quid on say designing, engineering and consultancy you get [to a point where] you can either throw it away or suck it up and build something.”
