HS2 bat tunnel... £200m for 1km
Discussion
What do you think of the HS2 Bat tunnel in Buckinghamshire costing £100M and 1km long, because the trains are too fast for Bat sonar to detect the on coming train. Apparently normal trains traveling slower do not pose a problem.
What an absolute load of nonsense.
All they have to do is lower the Train speed limit for the 1km of conservation area to a speed that the Bats can cope with. The train time table will hardly be affected.
The government is all to keen and quick lowering road speed limits. For eg on the M74 at the moment there is now a stretch of road works with specs cameras and the speed is 30 mph ( thirty)!
What do you think?
How much would it cost to slow the HS2 train for 1km, save £200m and the Bats in one go!
What an absolute load of nonsense.
All they have to do is lower the Train speed limit for the 1km of conservation area to a speed that the Bats can cope with. The train time table will hardly be affected.
The government is all to keen and quick lowering road speed limits. For eg on the M74 at the moment there is now a stretch of road works with specs cameras and the speed is 30 mph ( thirty)!
What do you think?
How much would it cost to slow the HS2 train for 1km, save £200m and the Bats in one go!
Edited by Sunnysidebb on Tuesday 11th February 12:39
Edited by Sunnysidebb on Tuesday 11th February 12:40
Edited by Sunnysidebb on Tuesday 11th February 12:42
Sunnysidebb said:
What do you think of the HS2 Bat tunnel in Buckinghamshire costing £100M and 1km long, because the trains are too fast for Bat sonar to detect the on coming train. Apparently normal trains traveling slower do not pose a problem.
What an absolute load of nonsense.
All they have to do is lower the Train speed limit for the 1km of conservation area to a speed that the Bats can cope with. The train time table will hardly be affected.
The government is all to keen and quick lowering road speed limits. For eg on the M74 at the moment there is now a stretch of road works with specs cameras and the speed is 30 mph ( thirty)!
What do you think?
How much would it cost to slow the HS2 train for 1km, save £200m and the Bats in one go!
How do other countries with fast trains deal with this situation?What an absolute load of nonsense.
All they have to do is lower the Train speed limit for the 1km of conservation area to a speed that the Bats can cope with. The train time table will hardly be affected.
The government is all to keen and quick lowering road speed limits. For eg on the M74 at the moment there is now a stretch of road works with specs cameras and the speed is 30 mph ( thirty)!
What do you think?
How much would it cost to slow the HS2 train for 1km, save £200m and the Bats in one go!
Edited by Sunnysidebb on Tuesday 11th February 12:39
Edited by Sunnysidebb on Tuesday 11th February 12:40
Edited by Sunnysidebb on Tuesday 11th February 12:42
How much added cost is the bat tunnel actually causing?
The figure for the tunnel (via the HS2 chairman) is £100m for a 1km structure - not the £200m that is in the title and all but one mention in your post.
The average cost of HS2 is about £250m/km, but that includes kms in urban areas and deep fills/cuts and bored tunnels, which will have much higher costs than a 'regularly section through open flat countryside.
Now, is the £100m for the km of bat tunnel the cost of that km of railway all-in? Or the added cost to that km for the structure itself?
I think there are genuine questions to be asked about the costs heaped on civil engineering and infrastructure projects in the UK (for many reasons and from many sources) given that the international average for building a km of HSR is about an eighth of what HS2 cost (and even excluding China from that equation leaves HS2 ahead by a factor of nearly four). And there are, I believe, specific questions about the Sheephouse Wood tunnel and how necessary it is (and if it is, how effective it will be) which raises questions about the influence and quality of QUANGOs like Naturaln England.
But let's start by getting the numbers under discussion right, shall we?
The effects of motorways and railways on bats seems to have been badly studied until HS2 was in the planning stages. It was a University of Sussex study indicating that bat populations suffered from disrupted feeding patterns and lower breeding rates when alongside routes that were busy at night (as UK railways increasingly are due to the lack of capacity) that seems to have underpinned the case for the bat tunnel.
The figure for the tunnel (via the HS2 chairman) is £100m for a 1km structure - not the £200m that is in the title and all but one mention in your post.
The average cost of HS2 is about £250m/km, but that includes kms in urban areas and deep fills/cuts and bored tunnels, which will have much higher costs than a 'regularly section through open flat countryside.
Now, is the £100m for the km of bat tunnel the cost of that km of railway all-in? Or the added cost to that km for the structure itself?
I think there are genuine questions to be asked about the costs heaped on civil engineering and infrastructure projects in the UK (for many reasons and from many sources) given that the international average for building a km of HSR is about an eighth of what HS2 cost (and even excluding China from that equation leaves HS2 ahead by a factor of nearly four). And there are, I believe, specific questions about the Sheephouse Wood tunnel and how necessary it is (and if it is, how effective it will be) which raises questions about the influence and quality of QUANGOs like Naturaln England.
But let's start by getting the numbers under discussion right, shall we?
Biker 1 said:
I should imagine no other place on earth bothers with this sort of thing...
Sweden is also putting in bat tunnels/covers/barriers on its planned HSR routes, such as the North Bothnia Line.The effects of motorways and railways on bats seems to have been badly studied until HS2 was in the planning stages. It was a University of Sussex study indicating that bat populations suffered from disrupted feeding patterns and lower breeding rates when alongside routes that were busy at night (as UK railways increasingly are due to the lack of capacity) that seems to have underpinned the case for the bat tunnel.
Edited by 2xChevrons on Tuesday 11th February 13:09
It'll be exactly the same as the bat bridges or whatever they put over certain roads.
Without any proof that it would work or that it does work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdPZ4z1OS0E
Without any proof that it would work or that it does work.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tdPZ4z1OS0E
Who cares? It is a few tunnels on a single line between two cities. Must be around 0.0001% of the UK bat habitat. A few less bats? Tough. There is a few less frogs on the Thames since London was built on it.
Modern infrastructure or pre Roman landscape, wildlife, and life expectancy etc? Build baby build!
If bats are so precious how is it wnd farms are OK?
https://www.engineering.com/the-realities-of-bird-...
Modern infrastructure or pre Roman landscape, wildlife, and life expectancy etc? Build baby build!
If bats are so precious how is it wnd farms are OK?
https://www.engineering.com/the-realities-of-bird-...
irc said:
Who cares? It is a few tunnels on a single line between two cities. Must be around 0.0001% of the UK bat habitat. A few less bats? Tough. There is a few less frogs on the Thames since London was built on it.
Modern infrastructure or pre Roman landscape, wildlife, and life expectancy etc? Build baby build!
If bats are so precious how is it wnd farms are OK?
https://www.engineering.com/the-realities-of-bird-...
Ok, so you just encase each turbine in a dome. Modern infrastructure or pre Roman landscape, wildlife, and life expectancy etc? Build baby build!
If bats are so precious how is it wnd farms are OK?
https://www.engineering.com/the-realities-of-bird-...
swisstoni said:
irc said:
Who cares? It is a few tunnels on a single line between two cities. Must be around 0.0001% of the UK bat habitat. A few less bats? Tough. There is a few less frogs on the Thames since London was built on it.
Modern infrastructure or pre Roman landscape, wildlife, and life expectancy etc? Build baby build!
If bats are so precious how is it wnd farms are OK?
https://www.engineering.com/the-realities-of-bird-...
Ok, so you just encase each turbine in a dome. Modern infrastructure or pre Roman landscape, wildlife, and life expectancy etc? Build baby build!
If bats are so precious how is it wnd farms are OK?
https://www.engineering.com/the-realities-of-bird-...
Nature England have a better idea - shortening or removing the turbine blades to reduce the risk of bat and bird injury.
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