COMMENT
What can the debates ahead of HS1 tell us about the current battle over the country’s second high-speed line? Railway campaigner and former councillor Chris Fribbins recalls the fi ght.
M
uch of the anger and concern ahead of the building of HS1 dissipated once construction work actually got under- way, people found.
Chris Fribbins, a former councillor on what was then Rochester-Upon-Medway City Council, who now sits on the manage- ment committee of RailFuture’s London & South East branch, explains the seemingly sudden route change that meant the line was going to come right past the Medway towns.
He said: “It was a very interesting time. In the early consultation, our area was hardly affected by the routes suggested at all; they were all to the south of the borough.
“Houses were bought up and land was put together, even, and there was talk about a Maidstone Medway Parkway station, but the railway seemed at fi rst to be outside of our scope. We did see a consultant’s study about moving the link away from the pro- posed routes and closer to the transport corridors, the M20 and M2, but nothing much happened until an announcement at the Conservative Party conference when they announced that as the preferred route.
“There had been three other alternatives being actively discussed, and all of a sud- den it changed and moved and locally there was a lot of concern about the impact of a
30 | rail technology magazine Apr/May 11
noisy railway on their local area, plus the construction noise. The route was going over the River Medway and there were al- ready plans for widening the motorway in the same location, so there were concerns over the impact of construction and the on- going impact of a wider motorway and rail.
“Also in the consultation there was talk of a Nashenden Parkway station, close to Borstal and the M2; there was some debate about whether that was a good idea or not. In the end, the council came to the con- clusion that the problems outweighed the benefi ts. I was one of the councillors very disappointed with that: in hindsight, I wish we had planned for some sort of parkway station in the Medway and Maidstone area, rather than relying on the current rail net- work, because obviously at that time we didn’t realise they’d be running high-speed trains at low speed on the traditional net- work which is what they’ve done.”
The area where Chatham Main Line cross- es the Medway Valley Line, near Strood station, would have been ideal for a trans- port interchange, Fribbins believes, add- ing: “However, there was concern about what a parkway station would do to traffi c volumes, and a concern about commuter parking: if people wanted to park outside, the streets would choke up.”
Campaigners, councillors and local council
offi cers became experts on the main issues surrounding the high-speed line, Fribbins said, in much the same way as is happening now with HS2.
He explained: “There was lots of investiga- tion: talking to noise consultants, getting an understanding of how noise works and how it affects people.
“We had a couple of visits to Europe to see the completed and under-construction TGV routes in France and high-speed Deutsche Bahn trains. We got to see the sound barri- ers, understood where the noise was being generated and how noise mitigation works.
“We got the clear message that railway noise is actually relatively easy to man- age, through earthworks and sound-proof fencing. Protecting people from the noise of where the wheel hits the rail is relative- ly easy as it a small, defi ned area, and so much easier than a motorway with four to six lanes either side.
“If these things were going to be built, we wanted them built at the same time. If the motorway or railway had been delayed, we could have ended up with a period of 15-20 years of constant, high-level construction.
“It was a major benefi t that they did build- ing at the same time, so disruption was minimised, and they used the river as
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