High speed train time comparison

I must disclaim, I have no real interest in trains, but this is my second nerdy train post on the blog in a year!?

With all this talk of a new HS3 line I thought I’d compare reported operating speeds against average speeds across some of the better known lines. The results are in:

I tried to keep the distances similar when calculating average speeds from stations, but didn’t do too well. The average speed is the length of track from Station A to B divided by timetabled route length.

From To Miles Hours
Tokyo Sendai 202 1.05
Paris London 306 2.06
London Birmingham 116.66 0.83
Paris Marseilles 466 3

So it would appear the proposed HS2 will operate at speeds of up to 225mph (25mph faster than the Shinkansen) but still be 76mph slower on average.