Lichfield MP has called for trains from the city to have an additional stop near the new HS2 station in Birmingham.
The high speed rail line terminal at Curzon Street will run alongside the cross city line as it heads into Birmingham New Street.
Michael Fabricant made his comments after using a House of Commons debate to urge Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin to look into an additional stop for services from Lichfield City and Lichfield Trent Valley.
“Although it will always be quicker and more convenient for my constituents to travel to London direct from Lichfield Trent Valley, there could be huge advantages to a link with Curzon Street in the years to come,” he said.
“The present unconnected design of HS2 is a nonsense. But if eventually HS2 links directly with the continent, and to Heathrow Airport and Scotland and the north, a co-station with Curzon Street makes huge sense given that the cross-city line passes alongside the HS2 station.
“And there are shorter term advantages too. Birmingham City University and the area around Millennium Point are growing in importance to Lichfield and a direct link from Lichfield as well as from other stations up to and including Redditch makes good sense for the future.
“I will continue to pursue this option with the Government in the months and years to come.”
Unless they completely remodel Proof House Junction, you have no chance of that. It’s far too busy a junction to do that unless you remodelled it and had a slow passenger up and down loop alongside the existing track. There just isn’t the lead time to put a station there without causing delays and it would probably lead to a reduction in service due to longer path times.
Connecting hs2 to Lichfield would be the best to to ever happen to the City. It would attract higher earning commuters to London, Birmingham and Manchester to live here. The east side of Lichfield is already spoilt so another line would make no difference in those terms.
How about investing just a tiny percentage of money that HS2 is costing into reopening the Lichfield Walsall line, it’s all there, the land, even the rails that have not been stolen for scrap. Have a passenger connection that runs from Birmingham – Sutton Coldfield – Lichfield – Alrewas and the National Memorial – Burton through to Derby, a line which would connect Brownhills to Lichfield, make it all electric, clean non polluting and really works for Staffordshire residents, instead of turning Lichfield into a London commuter backwater with stupidly priced houses and adding to London the independent state, where business goes to happen, but nobody lives.
There was talk of this some time ago, but then it seemed to have got wiped out by the abomination that is “HS2”.
Perhaps we might consider an airport also. That might well offer us growth in the coffee market sector and estate agency sector.
I would make Lichfield different from all other cities, for example a cycle only city. Better for health, better for environment. It’s no.good competing over the same ground, someone will always do it better. Build Park and rides, attract cycle outlets, construct miles of cycle paths with the aid of European grants and then give Lichfield the name ” Britain’s First Vehicle Free City”
I take it your’re into cycling then Mat?
More of a walk everywhere person to be honest. I’m a bit nervous, truth be told, of being knocked off.
I personally would like to see sports grounds such as Lichfield cricket club, rugby club, tennis club and possibly even the football club miced into the centre rather than be pushed out to the outskirts. Lichfield has a tiny centre with a huge urban sprawl of 2 and 3 bed semis. There’s little else as soon as you step out of the centre. Seems a shame.
I like the idea of more cycling in the city but with such a small centre i don’t know where people would cycle ‘to’.
Interesting comments about cycle ways, before we get a head of ourselves maybe Mr Fabricant could consider a footpath from Burntwood to Lichfield.
What savings will HS2 bring to the people of Lichfield?
We already have a service that gets us from Trent Valley to Euston in 1hr 20mins, if only there was access to the platform for the disabled, less mobile and pushchairs users.
It would be a unique selling point. Buses could collect from land near Waitress, Hepworth Site etc. Supermarkets are outside the main area. Multistorey could be developed. Not necessarily thinking of leisure cycling but as a means of travel like Amsterdam and Bruge.
Cycle ways in Denmark & Holland also benefit the disabled and physically impaired massively, as it allows them to transit safely on even level surfaces, thereby opening access to those that really need it, and in an ever increasing aged population this sort of initiative should be taking priority when considering planning applications.