Brexit uncertainty for UK’s involvement in TEN network

FUNDING

The UK Government has said that no decision has yet been made on whether Trans-European Transport Network (TEN-T) designation will continue to apply to UK routes – including HS2 – after Brexit.

The designation is not dependent on membership of the European Union. The Rhine-Alpine TEN-T corridor passes through Switzerland, and in 2015 the EU said it was placing more attention on connecting to third countries such as Turkey and Norway, opening up funding possibilities. Iceland was included in the 2016 update of TEN-T maps.

A UK Government spokesman told LTT that future partnership with TEN-T was subject to the UK’s wider future partnership negotiations with the EU.

HS2 is aligned with the section of the North Sea-Mediterranean TEN-T corridor from central Scotland to Birmingham and London. HS2 phase one features in the core network map and in the “comprehensive network” due to be in place by 2030. In 2015 the EU awarded €39.2m for HS2 phase one ground investigations.

The DfT’s outline business case for HS2 said that TEN-T was probably the most relevant EU funding channel for HS2.

“Rail projects, and specifically high-speed rail, have traditionally been well viewed, and a number of projects have been delivered with funding from the European Union,” said the DfT. “The HS1 project was awarded €256.5m funding from the TEN-T programme, which covered all phases of the project from feasibility studies in 1996 to improved access to the King’s Cross St Pancras transport hub in 2007.”

Welsh first minister Carwyn Jones said last week that TEN-T routes in Wales connected to Ireland and to the Continent. “So there’s no reason at all, rationally, why we shouldn’t form part of that network,” he said. “Only the most UKIP Brexiteer and flag-waver could possibly think that being part of an integrated programme to improve transport links is some kind of European plot.”