PEOPLE differ in their opinions about HS2, some seeing it as an expensive government vanity project and doubt whether the costs and upheaval will be worth shaving off a few minutes from passengers' journeys to London.

However, the European Commission's transport plan, adopted in 2011, promises to get half of the continent's medium-distance goods transport off the roads and on to rail or water by 2050.

A quick look at the map of Europe shows that most of the routes to attain this end are already in existence, apart from the UK where most goods travel by road due to Mrs Thatcher's love of the road haulage industry and her antipathy towards the railways.

In order to comply with the EU's ambitions plans for haulage, new railways will have to be built whether we can afford them or not.

Mabel Taylor Knutsford