This week, there was progress on all three phases of HS2, the
high speed rail line proposed from London to Leeds and Manchester.
It is divided into three phases: phase 1 is from London to the West
Midlands, phase 2a is from the West Midlands to Crewe, and phase 2b
is from the West Midlands to Leeds and Crewe to Manchester.
Phase 1
The news on
phase 1 is that contractors have been appointed to build it.
The route is divided into seven parts from Euston to the West Coast
Main Line near Lichfield in Staffordshire, and the seven contracts
have been awarded to four consortia of large companies. Three
consortia get three contracts (Skanska, Costain and Strabag;
Carillion, Eiffage and Keir; and Balfour Beatty and Vinci) and the
fourth gets one (Bouygues, VolkerFitzpatrick and Sir Robert
McAlpine). The first three consortia are unimaginatively named SCS,
CEK and BBV, but the fourth is called 'Align' – maybe
that's why they only got one contract.
