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The Department for Transport (DfT) has revealed that "significant elements" of the original design work on HS2's Euston station "can no longer be used" after the decision was taken for the station to be scaled back from 11 to 10 platforms.
As a result HS2 Ltd has had to discard large parts of the original design on which it has already spent £105.6M, according to the DfT's latest six monthly project update.
The six monthly update, published yesterday (27 October), adds: "Following confirmation of the move to the more efficient 10-platform station design and single-stage build at Euston Station, significant elements of the design work on the original 11-platform station can no longer be used. As the cost of this earlier design work has ceased to be of future benefit to HS2 Ltd, the related costs were reported as an ‘impairment’ in HS2 Ltd’s published annual report and accounts for 2021/22."
In the annual report, this "impairment" is listed as £105.6M.
Grimshaw and Arup won the Euston concept design job in 2012 but were replaced by WilkinsonEyre with WSP in February 2017. The original team was brought back for the detailed design work a year later, with the latest designs drawn up by a consortium made up of Arup, WSP and Grimshaw Architects. Refreshed designs for the station were revealed in March, seven years after initial drawings for the London terminus were first tabled.
The six-monthly report, submitted by new transport secretary Mark Harper, says that the move to a smaller, less complex 10-platform single-stage delivery strategy at Euston "is now the basis for ongoing design work and other activities".
It adds: "The department anticipates that this will assist in addressing some of the cost pressure at Euston as the updated station design is developed over the coming months. This work will also consider and address the appropriate level of contingency that should be held to manage risks that are likely to arise during the construction of an asset of this complexity. I will provide further updates as this work progresses over the course of the next 18 months."
At Euston, HS2 Ltd and its construction partner, Mace Dragados, are continuing to optimise design and construction efficiencies. Work progressing on site includes demolitions, piling of the station box structure, the construction of a relocated London Underground traction sub-station, the creation of a new utility corridor and construction of a new six-storey site accommodation block.
A DfT spokesperson said: “The delivery of HS2’s Euston station – as with any major infrastructure project – is constantly re-assessed to ensure we are delivering the most efficient and cost-effective design.
“The new design will be delivered quicker than previous plans, reducing costs to the taxpayer and disruption for local residents.”
Overall, the six-monthly report confirms that phase 1 (West Midlands to London) remains within the budget and schedule range and is hitting construction milestones.
Phase 1 remains within its overall budget of £44.6bn, but the report says that "if unmitigated, the final delivery cost is likely to exceed its target cost of £40.3bn based upon its forecast of future spending". As a result, in September, the Department for Transport commissioned HS2 Ltd "to develop and implement actions to bring projected costs back in line with the target cost".
HS2 Ltd is also progressing key activities for phase 2a to support the next stage of delivery, and since the last report the phase 2b Western Leg Bill had its second reading in June 2022 and is progressing through the legislative stages.
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Pathetic and incompetent. But since it’s only taxpayer’s money we can waste as much as we please. I wonder how many new schools could be built for that. It’s disgusting
The abortive design costs need to be seen in context.
According to the 27/10/22 report to the House of Commons “ HS2 Ltd is projecting around £1.9 billion of net additional cost pressures on phase 1 [and have been] commissioned to develop and implement actions to bring projected costs back in line with the target cost…. [their] key pressures are:
An estimated £1.1 billion for potential additional main works civils costs stemming largely from lower than planned productivity and additional design costs.
A pressure of £0.4 billion on the cost estimate for the HS2 Euston station. The move to a smaller, less complex 10-platform, single-stage delivery strategy at Euston,.. will assist in addressing some of the cost pressure at Euston as the updated station design is developed over the coming months.”
HS2 was conceived several decades ago and now belongs to the era of “vanity projects”, when cost and cost-benefit didn’t particularly matter. The world has moved on since then, both technologically and economically, and it appears that such such projects no longer have any validity. Better to spend the huge amount of public funds being consumed (wasted?) on HS2 on far more essential and economically viable projects, particularly in the northern half of England, an area that has been severely neglected for decades by successive Governments. Whilst Billions of pounds of public money are spent on transport subsidies and projects in the southern half of England, in the northern half bus operations are fast disappearing, rail services reduced and fares rising to the point where many people cannot afford to travel to work. This situation needs to be reversed urgently.