Why not build a new freight-only line, instead?
The DfT, in the July 2007 Rail White Paper, explicitly ruled out building a separate route for rail freight in order to solve the railway’s capacity problem. This is because little freight travels on the network during peak periods when capacity relief is needed, so diverting freight to other routes would not help. Unlike passenger travel which can be (and already is) concentrated (on city centres), freight movements by rail are, and will continue to be, dispersed. It is not easy to configure a freight route that would serve the channel tunnel, the major ports and the various rail freight terminals of the Midlands and the north. If a spine freight route were to be created, then there will have to be new mega-terminals and each of these will attract large scale lorry movements. That is partly why there was so much opposition to the Great Central proposals. It makes more sense to free up capacity on the existing main lines for rail freight to expand, which is what a high-speed line would
