The UK government is apparently planning a Spring launch of its new plans for a high speed rail network in the country. The British transport secretary, Lord Adonis, said on December 14^th, that he hoped to publish detailed plans for new high speed rail lines and services, including route proposals, timescales and associated financial, economic, and environmental assessments by next March.

The proposals would be published in a White Paper and followed by a public consultation process starting August 2010. Lord Adonis was actually speaking at the first full service on the UK’s only high speed rail line called High Speed One. The line in Kent serves the Eurostar service to and from the continent.

Lord Adonis went on to say at the launch that the potential for high speed rails to regenerate and reinvigorate the rail service is now a reality for the people in Kent. However, the size of Britain’s high speed network still lags very far behind that of many other European countries, and it still does not connect to any major cities.

He went on to note that he expects to receive, later this month, the report by High Speed Two, which is the company that was set up to advise on the development of a high speed network linking London and Scotland. This is a report that has the potential to change Britain’s rail services forever.

Although Britain’s rail service does lag behind other countries, the government is taking steps to fix this. Thus, Britain is getting a jump start on other countries that are likely to follow suit later on down the road.