Land owned by same family since 12th century was bought up by HS2 just DAYS before Rishi Sunak scrapped rail project’s northern leg – as compulsory purchases continued despite mounting speculation over scheme being axed
- Quarter Whitmore Hall estate farm in Staffs bought by HS2 before cancellation
The HS2 project bought up land that was owned by the same family as far back as the 12th Century just five days for the Prime Minister scrapped its northern leg.
A quarter of the dairy farm at the Whitmore Hall estate in Staffordshire was bought by the Department for Transport through a compulsory purchase order just before Rishi Sunak announced on Wednesday that the line would not run between Birmingham and Manchester.
Edward Cavenagh-Mainwaring’s family have owned the estate since the time of the Normans, and he was not happy with the projects cancellation as he said he was ‘bereaved’, and still worried he could not get his land back from the government.
Mr Cavenagh-Mainwaring, 61, said that on the day before the DfT took the land he had worked it for the last time, and he had ‘shed tears for it’.
The sale of his land shows that despite accurate reports that the northern leg of HS2 was to be scrapped, the project still pressed on with CPOs – with one property worth more than £1.5million being sold fewer than 24 hours before the PM’s speech.
A quarter of the dairy farm owned by the Whitmore Hall estate in Staffordshire was bought by the Department for Transport through a compulsory purchase order just before Rishi Sunak announced on Wednesday that railway would not run between Birmingham and Manchester
Currently the only leg of the government’s ambitious plan to bring high speed rail access to all of England set to go ahead is the London Euston to Birmingham line
Mr Cavenagh-Mainwaring told The Guardian that weedkiller had been sprayed by HS2 contractors on one of the wildflower meadows so they could build two ponds for great-crested newts.
READ MORE: Who’s had the last laugh on HS2? We faced losing our farms, homes and villages… now we’re picking up the pieces after fatal blow to the high speed line
The paper said he received his first tranche of payment from HS2 last Friday for the 105 hectares (260 acres) of land – but if HS2 decide to sell him the land back he will be given first option, but it could be a struggle as he will have to pay capital gains tax.
It may not be too late for Mr Cavenagh-Mainwaring to buy his land back – but it is for others including the Barnes family who had lived and worked their farm at Packington Moor near Lichfield before HS2 making a CPO in 2017.
The family were forced to sell and move to Gloucestershire, The Times reports, which John and Rosemary Barnes said was ‘genuinely heartbreaking’.
The couple had spent 30 years making the estate a prime wedding venue and farm shop but they said HS2 ‘ripped up’ their lives, homes and businesses.
The cancellation follows the decision in November 2021 to cancel HS2’s eastern leg from Birmingham to Leeds to save between £30 billion to £40 billion amid fears the cost of the project would exceed £100 billion.
Currently the only leg of the government’s ambitious plan to bring high speed rail access to all of England set to go ahead is the London Euston to Birmingham line.
Overall spending on HS2 to date, including land and property, stands at £24.7 billion – but the line is not set to be fully operational until 2033.
Thousands of Brits living in hamlets, villages, towns and cities across the spectral remains of the country’s faltering High Speed Two route in Staffordshire, Buckinghamshire, Cheshire and Derbyshire are reeling from the shock and uncertainty of the government’s decision to shutter the Manchester leg.
The ambitious infrastructure project – which was intended to bring high speed rail to the North of England- has been essentially all but cancelled this week due to mounting costs despite years of planning and the gutting of communities along its length.
Originally designed as a ‘Y-shaped’ network, it was envisioned that the line would link a number of routes across London, Birmingham, Leeds, Manchester, Sheffield and the Midlands.
Under current plans, Phase One of HS2 involves the railway being built between London and Birmingham, with the line being extended from the West Midlands to Crewe under the now cancelled Phase 2a.
Phase 2b would then have connected Crewe to Manchester and the West Midlands to the East Midlands and a further eastern leg which would have ran from Birmingham to Leeds.
Staffordshire farmer Bernard Kettle has seen great expanses of his farm wrecked and repurposed by HS2
40 acres of Mr Kettle’s farm was bought out from under him via a compulsory purchase order
In order to get their route plans off the ground, successive governments bought up land across the country decimating communities who saw their neighbourhoods shuttered and cutting up thousands of acres of farmland.
The Department for Transport has now confirmed that land earmarked for the HS2 routes now scrapped will not be protected for potential future expansion of the high-speed railway – meaning anything can now be built on them.
For those living along the ghost route like Staffordshire farmer Bernard Kettle, the news has been hard to take. Mr Kettle’s farm has been wrecked by HS2. Before planners decided that a tunnel would need to go under his land and a compound built for where it exited the earth, he had 500 cattle and crops galore.
Now, he has been left with nothing other than a mud bath.
An HS2 spokesperson said: ‘We understand that people did not choose to live in the path of a high speed railway, and recognise that every property is unique. At all times we endeavour to be understanding and to provide appropriate support and guidance.’
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