HS2 isn't worth it

[Globules]

I'm having a holiday in the Midlands.

I know the area pretty well, so have been appalled at the way HS2 has carved up the landscape. It looks awful.

Now that I've landed in my hotel, I've been reading up on HS2.

The minimum projected cost is £87.7 BILLION.

This is an absolutely shocking amount. What is the benefit? Is it that important that people arrive in Birmingham about 10 mins earlier?

Do you think we should cut our losses now and stop throwing cash that our country doesn't have at this money pit?

YABU - it'll be of huge benefit to the country
YANBU - we need to stop the work now and try to repair the damage already caused.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cz6e0vplgldt?app-referrer=search

@Persephonia1966 They should have started in the North and built south.

^This. Sums up the kind of 'thought' (for want of a better word) behind HS2.

@Persephonia1966 Exacerbated by the fact that we left the EU which, for it's faults, did have schemes designed to help poorer regions.

Yes, ironic isn't it. The most pro-Brexit areas have lost the most and, guess what, we knew this would happen before the referendum.

The SE earns the tax though. It’s not the fault of the SE that HS2 wasn’t started in the north. Bigger fool the northern politicians. We don’t want it here I can assure you. Most of us cannot get on it!

The original plan was not for the terminus to be in Birmingham. It's saddening that they scrapped the North project, as the population would have benefited from it tremendously.

@BlueFahrenheit I think we all know that! However what I don’t get is why northern politicians didn’t fight harder to get the work started in the north and build south? It would have been sensible to attach it to northern powerhouse schemes but they didn’t make enough effort.