As I said back in June (http://northeastbuses.co.uk/forum/showth...hp?tid=341&page=2), the Government need to realise there are other cities, people and businesses beyond Leeds and Manchester.

The current line between Leeds and Manchester isn't good enough - but a lot of that, is to do with the geography and victorian engineering.
The current line between Doncaster/York and Newcastle isn't good enough - but a lot of that is not to do with the geography and more the lack of track upgrades or loops.

No matter how much money is spent improving links to Manchester and Leeds, the bottleneck north of York will still exist.

I often look out of the train window when heading north on an East Coast at Doncaster and/or York to see what (if anything) is pulling ahead of us.
Sometimes a late running Cross Stinky gets in the way and the East Coast is held back, held up and stuck - potentially all the way to Edinburgh.

Added to that, are the lack of passing loops on the two track stretch.
If a freight train happens to have issues - it leads to the whole stretch grinding to a halt.

HS2 and HS3 isn't going to fix any of that.