Melissa Kite has narrated this article for you to listen to.
When I drive to see my parents in the once-peaceful farming country where I grew up, it is a strange, bittersweet experience. The car journey takes me through places I ought to recognise but I don’t any more, because the green fields of Warwickshire, the villages and the farms, are scarred by the tortuous works of HS2.
The distinctive red earth is laid bare for mile upon mile as the bulldozers do their worst. Rows of cottages and entire villages lie deserted, testimony to the billions already spent. As I drive along the main Banbury to Coventry road, I see mountains of earth piled high as flyovers take shape. I stare at this curiously outdated project – old hat both in terms of the controversy and the purpose it was meant to have. It seems to me that the works advance only about a few inches every time I drive up there.
Crackley Crescent became Area 18 in the HS2 plans
A high-speed line has, for many years, been yesterday’s answer to yesterday’s problem.
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