The EU has defined strategic corridors, and earmarked fixed percent support for projects in those corridors, but indeed it doesn't seem enough.

It's taken nearly 25 years to get CTRL I+II built.

After Maggie Thatcher's insistence on a private-financed project (wqhich the Major government at least turned into a PPP scheme). I submit that if a new high-speed line would be built in the West Coast corridor, there would be a lot of protests, but I would bet it would cause delays of significantly less than 25 years. (Also, with the use of some tunnels, maybe the bulk of potential protests could be avoided.)

The Tories are raring to go, and even talking about Maglev.

Heh, I missed that :-) My personal opinion is that when non-German politicians talk about Maglev, they aren't really serious (and the German ones only want it as prestige).

_{*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.}