A GRAVEYARD cleared of 50,000 bodies to make way for HS2 is to remain a wasteland for at least a decade.
It comes as the doomed high speed rail project begins to lay off or redeploy hundreds of staff and contractors amid soaring costs and delays.
Work has been paused on the London Euston terminus for which St James’s Gardens burial ground was cleared.
It follows five years of effort by 200 archaeologists and specialists to dig up and study the bodies at Camden, North London.
The remains, which date from as far back as the 1600s, have been transferred to Brookwood Cemetery, Surrey
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Among them was Royal Navy Captain Matthew Flinders, who charted much of the coast of Australia.
The massive project was chronicled in a BBC documentary two years ago called HS2 – The Biggest Dig.
Ministers have announced the bungled new line to Birmingham will not reach its central London terminus for nearly two decades amid crippling inflation blowing a hole in its budget.
So the ancient burial ground that saw the largest ever grave digging will not now be used as part of the new station for at least another ten years.
But HS2 bosses insist the site will still be used for a scaled-back Euston expansion one day.
Yet the project has been laying off staff amid soaring costs.
A spokesman said: “Some works will be deferred, like Euston Station.
"We’re assessing the next steps.”
