ABTA broadly welcomes government's high speed rail announcement

05-Oct-2010 ABTA broadly welcomed the Secretary of State Philip Hammond’s announcement today at the Conservative Party conference that the Government had given the go ahead for the financing of a high speed rail link from London to Birmingham and onwards to Manchester and Leeds. ABTA however stressed that the Government must recognise that high speed rail offers a unique opportunity to create a more integrated transport infrastructure; high speed rail is only one part of this infrastructure and should not come at the cost of air travel, especially as the Government does not expect the new link to begin service before 2025.