Villagers near Lichfield are rallying round to fight proposals for a new high speed rail line.
A meeting at Kings Bromley Village Hall saw many residents find out for the first time that the revised HS2 route means the following HS3 stage of the project would take the 100m-wide tracks to within a mile-and-a-half of the village.
The meeting – the brainchild of local residents Guy and Diane Allsop, Joy and Barry Fielding, and Julia Allsopp and her partner Wayne – was the first in a series of events to raise the local profile of the Stop HS2 campaign.
And residents were urged to add their names to the 41,000 signatures on a petition against the rail line at www.stophs2.org.
Guy explained:
“Many villagers and residents share the view that there is as yet no justifiable economic case for this rail project. The campaign is all-about stopping what is the white elephant of all-engineering projects and ranks of the scale of the misconceived London Dome. What an investment disaster for tax payers that turned out to be; and HS2 is headed in the same direction.
“While those living near the intended route are growing in their vociferous opposition to HS2, it is essential to the success of the StopHS2 campaign that more of the population registers their concerns and disapproval.”
Cllr Ian Pritchard, the outgoing Chairman of the Parish Council, chaired the meeting and introduced Jerry Marshall, Chairman of Action Groups Against High Speed Two, AGAHST, whose 20-minute address highlighted the growing concerns and non-viability of this £33bn project.
Jerry explained:
“Currently, there is no demand for the extra capacity that HS2 will offer. Existing capacity on the East and West Coast Mainlines can be doubled before any HS2 lines are required.”
He was equally scathing about the job creation by HS2 noting that of the 40,000 forecast jobs, 1,500 will be operational jobs with HS2 Ltd, 9,000 are temporary construction employment, and 30,000 are in ‘re-distributed’ retail jobs in shopping malls near rail stations, that will be “sucked off” the nearby high streets.
The Kings Bromley Stop HS2 meeting was also joined by a 30-strong party of Whittington residents supporting their own Stop HS2 campaign which has gathered growing support and momentum.
