1. Background
Back in 2020, we wondered whether EWR Bedford to Cambridge was a Boondoggle. Google it! Four years on, that question just hasn’t gone away has it?
Readers of this blog will perhaps be familiar with some of the flaws we see in the case for EWR set out in the May 2023 Economic and Technical Report especially Appendix 4. Appendix 4 arrives at the conclusion that EWR to Cambridge would lead to 28,200 new Cambridge commuters daily. 20,000 of these are non-rail (thus clogging up the roads). The 7,990 rail commuters come from, in their words, a “very optimistic” set of model assumptions. With assumptions based on behaviour actually reported in the 2011 census, it would be only 2,090 commuters. Furthermore, those 2,090 depend on large scale new developments at the Cambridge Biomedical Campus, Cambourne and Tempsford which are beyond any local plan, indeed specifically rejected by local plans. We calculate, using their model, that without the new EWR dependent housing and using the EWR 2011[1] census based model, the number of Cambridge Rail commuters would be only 472. A capital cost of £17million each.
The National Audit Office (NAO) put it politely in December 2023 that “it is not yet clear how the benefits of the project will be achieved nor how it aligns to other government plans for growth in the region”.
Nearly a year later, it’s still not clear and yet EWR have sent out around 4,000 Land Information Questionnaires telling people that their homes are likely to be affected by the project, but they cannot say why.
East West Rail say that “East West Rail is at the early stages of project development”[2] However, the company was formed 6 years ago in 2018 and that came after many years of previous study dating back to at least 2013. How can it still be at an early stage?
2. So How much have they spent?
It is interesting to see how much public money has been spent on the development of EWR plans for CS2 and CS3. The NAO reported that it was £185million. We decided to have a look.
| Financial Year | Spend (£millions) | Financial Year | Spend (£millions) |
| 17-18 | 0 | 21-22 | 74.4 |
| 18-19 | 8.2 | 22-23 | 65.8 |
| 19-20 | 22 | 23-24 | 96.6 |
| 20-21 | 35.6 | 24-25 | 143.5 |
Table 1 shows what we found. The figures up to financial year 22-23 come from annual reports on Companies House. None of this includes the £1.2billion capital spend on building CS1 from Bicester to Bletchley.
The figure for 22-24 is from §2.1 of the DfT Supplementary Estimate dated 6 March 2024. EWRCo. were 17% over their earlier estimate for FY23-24 due to “Re-baselining of the programme and the impact on timescales for subsequent decisions.”[3]
The FY24-25 number comes from a DfT forecast to the end of 24-25.[4]
Adding up these figures it seems that by 5 April 2025, EWRCo. will have spent £446.1 million of public money on planning CS2 and CS3.
How has this project been allowed to get this far when there are still fundamental questions unanswered about its viability and route choice?
[1] EWR chose not to use the 2021 census date, probably because the commuter numbers were much reduced by COVID lockdowns.
[2] https://eastwestrail.co.uk/planning/our-business-case
[3] https://committees.parliament.uk/publications/43713/documents/216921/default/ §2.1
[4] https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/66968ec1fc8e12ac3edafdca/HMT_Main_Supply_Estimates_24-25__print_.pdf, p.242
10 replies on “Is EWR CS3 a Boondoggle? -Update”
It’s easy to see why we have the highest taxes since WWII and still have poor public services. Money being wasted on a colossal scale without a viable business case. How many more EWRs are there in the UK
It’s clear that this vanity project is not economically viable. The Government should scrap the whole thing and put the funds into more local transport. The people who would be most affected by the construction work and subsequent disruption are not the ones who would benefit from the railway. As for the resulting development of business parks and new residential areas, Cambridge is already swamped with new towns such as Northstowe, Waterbeach, Trumpingon Meadows, Cambourne, some still under construction, and the services are struggling to cope. Rail freight going north and west should not be looping round the south of Cambridge. Look again for the most logical route for freight – via Cambridge North station.
Hi JB I totally agree with your opinion here but who will listen and have the authority to scrap or even reroute the current proposal and how ? We cannot hope this will just happen and we have already seen how EWR acts on ‘public/ stakeholder consultation’, they just do what they want to satisfy future development. Laughable really I would guess that very few future residents will be able to use or want to the EWR link to Cambridge !
I wonder how the arrival of a Universal Studios theme park at Kempston Hardwick would change the overall business case for E-WR?
According to the info provided at the recent consultations in Bedford, Universal Destinations estimate of up to 8M visitors of annum arriving by train, for which a new four-platform station would need to be built next to the park on the EWR line, must surely change the argument from an (apparently majorly) commuter railway to a longer distance (maybe including Oxford and Cambridge) leisure and tourism journey provider?
Of course that change is not necessarily route E dependant…
A true mind-boggle of a boon-doggle! With all the government’s current dark messages on financial black holes and the need for Departments to cut spending, when will it see the no-brainer of a massive £8 bn saving for the Department for Transport – scrap EWR CS3 and stop this astonishing waste of public money! Indeed, spend just some of that money instead on properly thought-out and joined-up local transport improvements.
It’s a very obvious ‘gravy train’ for a clique. Britain helped win WW2 in
half the time they been thinking about it and spending huge sums for something Not Needed.
The day “Failing Grayling” announced that the link would enter via the South, the matter was no longer up for discussion. Irrespective of all the hard work, by many including this group and many experts. From 2016, after first discussed before the turn of the century, many reports, many consultants, later, the final decision was taken some 7 or 8 years ago. No surprise about the costs really, the more people complain the more EWR make doing consultations. We have not even reached the first statutory consultation yet.
Either of the two route into Cambridge now occupied by the world beating and highly successful, longest Guided Busway, COULD have been used and protected back then. But all sorts of behind the scenes skulduggery, which we mere mortals will never get to the bottom of, simply have to pay. And pay we will, as we shall see next month.
Our only hope is that the new government realise that this is an overpriced, nonsense as listed in these pages for the last 4 years. AND there is a real crisis and Black Hole. DFT (or Daft as PE calls them) is usually a law unto itself, generally what the electorate want is irrelevant.
The only good news I can see is that most of us old folk will pass on before this project is built (if it ever is that is).
I have been told I should have put “World beating and highly successful, longest Guided Busway” in quotes like this, to indicate I was quoting some of the idiots that no doubt are still working (and being well paid) on the total cock up that local, regional and even national transport is generally and especially around Cambridge. The mantra was stop the guided Busway and rethink – now more than ever, surely it is time to stop and re-think our local and regional transport plans.
Our University could have a big influence, but they are caught up in the conflicts of interest and behind the scenes privileged lobbying. If this madness is allowed to continue, 20 years past completion, this will be another white elephant too and not fit for purpose, without massive and expensive modifications. Who cares, its only taxpayers money from the magic money tree. £10bn, half the reported “Black Hole”
The Potemkin consultations held so far, where many of those supposedly representing the company turned out to have been hired in for the event, the so-called planners & environmentalists knew nothing about the answers to ‘surveys’ (which I assume EWR simply binned) nor even the relationships between villages whose link roads might be cut, the local wildlife or the chalk stream environment, beyond that the area is short of water, shows where at least some of the extra £260,000 has been spent.
Well, small crumbs I suppose, another non-statuary consultation has been advised by East West Rail. At least electric traction will be used, in more sensitive parts of the route battery operation will be applied. It was often written by some that by the time this is actually running technology will come to the rescue with regard to Diesel traction, which was always a red herring to divert peoples anger and frustrations.
This has been going on so long that people have given it their all and have been worn down to acceptance that there will be a railway, on the wrong route and serving few, if any, who are directly affected.
Little people , like myself, have been drip fed minimal information, inaccurate at that and subject to changes, whilst the power brokers behind the scenes carry on their dirty deeds unaccountable to democracy. Sure there has been the lots of noise and expense on open days, press releases, news letters, non statuary this and thats, with much more to follow. Who cares, the money will come from the Magic Black Hole, not us surely?
To date this has been a massive cynical physiological campaign with techniques learnt from the HS2 event.
Good luck all , I won’t be here to enjoy the benefits of this latest transport cockup in East Anglia.