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A dairy farmer who won a fight to stop almost half of his land being seized for the scrapped HS2 rail line between Birmingham and Manchester says the family farm could be under threat again.
John Edge, 74, said further uncertainty now shrouds the future of his business after transport minister Heidi Alexander announced on Wednesday that a new north-south line between the two cities was being planned as part of investment in the northern rail network.
Two years earlier, in October 2023, prime minister Rishi Sunak axed the northern HS2 link in the wake of rising costs and huge protests in villages and towns along the intended 87-mile route.
Mr Edge’s farm in Wimboldsley, north of Crewe in Cheshire, was set to lose 300 of its 700 acres for the line and a rail siding – land which is still protected from development by the Department for Transport for possible future projects.
Now, with plans for a new line, Mr Edge, who has also been trying to sell his farmhouse for two years ahead of his retirement, said he and his son, who runs the dairy herd, had been thrust back into years of more uncertainty.
“It is another Damocles sword now hanging over our heads,” he told The Independent. “After all these years of uncertainty, from when HS2 was first announced, we have wanted this to end, to have a clear idea over the future.
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“But this news only brings it all back, and us hearing the line might not be built for another 20 years, you wonder when it will stop. It’s gone on for too long, it’s impacted many lives, including our own. It’s just not good enough.”
The family are among thousands of people living along the scrapped HS2 line who, despite an assurance that the new line will not be an “HS2 revival”, will be questioning its route and the potential impact on their lives.
Mr Edge and his wife, Ruth, had planned to retire and move to a bungalow in nearby Nantwich. But after their farm and outbuildings were put up for sale two years ago, only now does it appear they are close to selling.
“Whenever someone came round to look [at the property], you’d have to mention HS2,” Mr Edge said. “It was the uncertainty, and that impacts people’s decisions. It certainly didn’t help in selling the farm, which put our plans back.
“Now we’re wondering what will happen, if the line will follow the same route, and what will happen to our family dairy farm, which would be considerably impacted in terms of herd size and viability by any such loss of land.”
In the village of Wimboldsley, which has a population of around 140, Mr Edge said HS2 and the ongoing uncertainty over future projects had “knocked the stuffing” out of the community. Around 20 homes were bought by HS2, with several lying empty and in poor condition, he said.
As of last August, HS2 had spent more than £380m on 459 properties along the scrapped route from Handsacre, just north of Birmingham, to Manchester. Some cannot be rented back out due to their poor condition, an HS2 spokesperson said.
On Wednesday, the DfT told The Independent that none of the properties bought up between Birmingham and Manchester had been sold, and that safeguarding protections on land would remain between Crewe and Manchester, including on Mr Edge’s farm.
Further down the line, in Staffordshire, Ben Wilkes, who runs the Border Collie Trust on four and a half acres of land in the path of the cancelled section of the HS2 track, said: “It’s like a form of water torture. All we want is to come out of this uncertainty and be able to firmly plan for the future.”
Also in Staffordshire, in the village of Whitmore Heath, where some 35 of the 50 homes were sold for the scrapped HS2 line, Deborah Mallender, who founded Madeley and Whitmore Villages Stop HS2, said: “It’s [news of a new railway line] the worst nightmare for many residents. We’re back to square one again.”
With the plans for the north-south railway line still being developed, it’s not yet clear if its route will follow the scrapped part of HS2. No timescale has been provided for when it would open, but it will not be until after the completion of the Northern Powerhouse Rail line, a proposed high-speed link covering part of the route between Liverpool and Leeds.
In the Commons on Wednesday, some MPs raised concerns on behalf of residents living along the scrapped lines. Lichfield MP Dave Robertson said: “For 17 long years, constituents have had to deal with the complete failure of HS2 Ltd while ministers were asleep at the wheel, and the chaotic cancellation of the scheme did nothing to alleviate those problems, and instead replaced it with uncertainty. Unfortunately, all today’s statement does is confirm that uncertainty will last for another two decades.”
Mr Robertson urged Ms Alexander to commit to a quick redesign of the HS2 line to enable the release of land from safeguarding. The transport secretary acknowledged “there will be some people today who are dealing with more uncertainty”, adding that she wished to seek to reduce disruption to their lives.
But South Staffordshire MP Gavin Williamson told The Independent: “This is potentially the worst of all worlds. They promised a railway line, but without the funding behind it, meaning that communities continue to suffer the pain. The Labour government needs to get a grip and end this enormous white elephant.”
Ms Alexander said a long-term plan for a new north-south route from Birmingham to Manchester was needed to address congestion and overcrowding on the West Coast Main Line. “This won’t be a revival of HS2, and no decisions have been taken on the specification or timetable,” she added.
The Department of Transport has been approached for comment.
