HS2 diggers go to work as boss heralds track as transformation for commuters

Britain’s 225mph answer to Japan’s bullet trains will transform commuting into London while cutting lorry pollution, the project’s boss has said.

The Standard was invited to a vast “portal” site the size of 80 football pitches being cut into meadows near Denham in Buckinghamshire, which are being cleared before tunnelling work next year.

Pile-driving rams, diggers and tipper trucks are excavating the chalk rock for giant tunnelling machines to start drilling out twin 10-metre wide bores.

HS2 could slice about half an hour from Euston and Old Oak Common hubs to Birmingham and around an hour off Manchester, Leeds and Scotland.

This first stretch is expected to cost up to £45 billion and runs from London to Birmingham. It is meant to open by 2033.

The entire project is forecast to cost over £100 billion — more than double the first estimate — and could take 20 years to build.

Speaking at the site, HS2 chief Mark Thurston said the link could make a “profound” difference in opening up London jobs to people from other parts of the country.