HS2 Railway, UK – route development to hybrid Bill: Technical and operational requirements

The hybrid Bill for the first phase of the UK’s High Speed Two high-speed railway (London to West Midlands) was submitted in November 2013. This paper outlines the general principles and processes developed for the engineering design over a 22-month period that supported the Phase One HS2 hybrid Bill. The engineering design and construction planning undertaken during this period enabled the preparation of the environmental statement, the programme, the cost baseline and the land required for the construction and operation of the railway. In order to get a consistent and coherent design across the 225 km route from London to Birmingham a high-level set of design principles and guidelines were established.