Ministers are poised to unveil plans to build a new railway line running from Birmingham to Manchester as part of a major overhaul of rail infrastructure in the North – but it won’t break ground for roughly a decade.
Rachel Reeves will reveal the heavily delayed shake-up of east-west railway lines across the north of England on Wednesday in a speech that will confirm plans to plough ahead with the Northern Powerhouse Rail (NPR) project, first proposed when David Cameron was Prime Minister.
The announcement will feature a promise to build a new line between Birmingham and Manchester once the rest of NPR – a complex project of upgrades and new lines between northern cities and towns – is complete.
Until now, Labour had sought to resist pressure to reinstate or unveil a replacement for the northern elements of HS2, which were cancelled in stages by consecutive Conservative governments. The ill-fated line was originally meant to carry passengers from London to Birmingham before splitting off, with some trains heading west to Manchester while others went north east to Leeds.
Initially, Boris Johnson aborted the route to Leeds to pare back costs, before Rishi Sunak, his successor, cancelled the north-west leg during his speech at the 2023 Conservative Party conference.
Construction to begin in 2036
The moves provoked an outcry from metro mayors and politicians in the north of England, and compounded fears surrounding the chronic capacity issues that have long plagued the line running up the west of England.
The revival of NPR – often referred to as HS3 – is not expected to be delivered until 2036, and any new line between Birmingham and Manchester would not break ground before the wider overhaul is finished. Assuming no delays, construction on the new railway line between the UK’s second and third largest cities is highly unlikely to break ground before 2036.
Work on the NPR is expected to begin with upgrades to existing lines in Yorkshire, after which the government will kickstart construction on a new line between Manchester and Liverpool. The project, first reported by the Financial Times quoting two people familliar with the plans, also contains a major electrification push elsewhere across northern railway lines.
The Department for Transport and Treasury did not respond to a request for comment.