Posted 1st November 2010 | 3 Comments

HS1 buyer set to be named this week

THE identity of the new owner of High Speed 1 may be revealed this week, after bidding closed on Friday.
 
The government is selling the line, which was known for many years as the Channel Tunnel Rail Link, to help reduce the national debt.

The favourite contender is a consortium led by Eurotunnel, whose partners include the American investment bank Goldman Sachs and fund manager M&G.

Three other consortia are also understood to have made offers. One is a combination of the German insurance group Allianz, the BT pension fund and a Canadian pension fund.

Another group includes American investment bank Morgan Stanley, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority and 3i Infrastructure.
 
The fourth is a bidder backed by two more Canadian pension funds and Borealis Infrastructure.

It does not appear that the German state-owned operator Deutsche Bahn is included in any of the bidding teams, although this had been predicted.

DB is planning to run trains to London by 2013 at the latest. An example of its ICE-3 trains went on display at St Pancras in October.

Reader Comments:

Views expressed in submitted comments are that of the author, and not necessarily shared by Railnews.

  • H Harvey, Birmingham

    Hammond should be applauded and Eagle should see Adonis to get lessons on transport.

    It is impossible to appease the HSAntis with their Antifacts (a new word describing the misleading pessimistic half truths and lies propogated by the HS2Antis.
    .

    Their latest ploy is to show a video of a Eurostar on HS1 supposedly to demostrate the noise HS2 will generate.

    Surely they have sufficient knowledge to know volume can be turned up or down!!! or do they or is it yet another attempt to mislead. They do not mention Eurostar/HS1 is 20 year old technology and HS2 will be another decade in the future.

    The HS2Antis are now trying to establish a link between weather/traffic problems and HS2.
    Most problems on the roads are caused by poorly equipped drivers driving poorly maintained vehicles that block up roads- that includes HGV drivers) preventing gritting lorries doing their job.
    Where airports are concerned I thought they were private concerns let them pay the costs and not drag the Government into it.

    Odd really Network Rail nor TOCS are offered help by the transport Minister but Airports Are - funny old world.


  • Peter Davidson, Manchester, NW.England

    I've lost count of how many times I've seen negative remarks claiming that HS1 is being sold lock, stock and barrel at a seemingly huge loss (the £5.8billion vs £1.5billion figure) to the taxpayer when in reality it is simply a time limited leasehold, which will presumably either expire or come up for renewal (and attract additional revenues for the taxpayer?)

    The anti-HS2 brigade have latched on this nugget and are maximising its potential to confuse an already ill-informed public opinion in the fiercely contested debate surround planning and construction of new HS routes.

    On another related issue - anti-HS2 campaigners are fond of quoting the optimistically inflated passenger demand forecasts for HS1, which were expected to approach 20 odd million per annum but are of course currently closer to 9million?

    I was wondering whether or not these forecasts (presumably dating from 15 years or so back, when HS1 was at the planning stage?) included provisions for traffic originating from the UK provinces - remember that an array of direct services from various UK cities, Cardiff/Bristol, Birmingham, Manchester, Nottingham/Leeds, Newcastle, Glasgow & Edinburgh but of course these never materialised - the large shortfall between forecast and actual passenger demand for HS1 might be largely explained by this outcome.

  • Peter Hooper, Windsor., UK

    I do wish that articles like this would make clear that it is HS1 Ltd which is being sold along with a 30 year lease to operate and maintain the track; at the end of this time, unless the lease is extended, it is returned unencumbered to the government.

    I make this point as opponents of HSR latch on to articles like this to "prove their case" against the further development of a UK HSR network; they regularly claim that HS1 cost £5.8 Billion to build, but is only being sold for £1.5 Billion.

    Furthermore, I understand it is intended that proceeds from this sale will be used to extend the UK HSR network, subject to public consultation.