MIPIM UK NEWS: The man responsible for the biggest hits in British pop music, including Kylie Minogue’s I Should Be So Lucky, presented ambitions for the Crewe high-speed rail hub to a throng of conference-goers.
Pete Waterman, who is chairman of the Cheshire and Warrington Local Enterprise Partnership, and is a known railway enthusiast, appeared on the stand for the Northern Gateway Development Hub, the regional partnership that aims to deliver on the potential of HS2 investment.
He was emphatic about driving forward plans to establish Crewe as the North-West interchange for HS2, the high-speed line linking London and Birmingham.
Waterman pointed to his famous hits to express the ambitions around the northern hub.
“You will be expected to know this is the tune to Never Gonna Give You Up, it is not I Should Be So Lucky…”
Waterman said it would be “just nuts” not to have Crewe as a major interchange, considering it was the original purpose of the city.
The Crewe interchange was not part of the initial route for HS2, but a government paper published recently endorsed revised plans for the line to be built as far as Crewe by 2027 – six years before the full network is completed.
It would open up new journey opportunities, including Manchester Airport to the East Midlands, via Stoke and Derby, and Liverpool to Cardiff. It would also deliver economic growth, said Waterman, who was presenting alongside HS2 board member Duncan Sutherland.
Waterman said: “The area is so vast, the potential is as vast as the opportunities,” he said.
Speaking later to Estates Gazette, Waterman said: “I am fascinated by railways but not because of the trains themselves. It is what they enabled. And Crewe’s original purpose was as an interchange town – that purpose was as good today as in 1830.”
Waterman joked that despite HS2 slashing journey times he could fit 24 tracks in a two-hour train ride and always “starts with a belter”, such as Dire Straits’ Sultans of Swing.
The Northern Gateway development zone is a partnership between two LEP areas, Cheshire & Warrington and Stoke-on-Trent and Staffordshire, and seven local authorities. It aims to pool the strengths of the areas between the Greater Manchester and Birmingham conurbations. Regeneration guru Jackie Sadek was this week named the chairwoman.
IMAGE CREDIT: Joel Goodman/LNP/REX/Shutterstock
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