Tory plans to build a high-speed rail link instead of a third runway at London’s Heathrow Airport would take ‘thousands of car journeys off our roads’, according to the shadow transport secretary.

Theresa Villiers, shadow transport secretary, this week announced the high-speed rail plans at the Conservative Party conference, where she also confirmed the Transport Innovation Fund would no longer ‘bully our towns and cities into congestion charging’.

A new high-speed rail line between Leeds, Manchester, Birmingham and London would cut journey times between Birmingham and London to 40 minutes, and between Leeds and London to less than an hour-and-a-half. It was claimed that such a move would cut Heathrow flights by 66,000 a year – about 44% of the planned capacity of the third runway.

The party says it would cost £1.3bn a year for 12 years, with a Tory Government spending £15.6bn on the project and the private sector contributing a further £4.4bn. The proposed 180mph rail link would run between St Pancras station in London – the terminus for Eurostar – and Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds. There would also be a high-speed link between St Pancras and Heathrow.

Villiers said: ‘High-speed rail could relieve nightmare levels of over-crowding by freeing up space for more commuter services on existing lines alongside more paths for freight, taking hundreds of lorries off our congested roads.’ She said the rail line would ‘leave a lasting legacy for the future – and it will lay the foundation for a high-speed network that I believe will one day stretch across the country’.

Welcoming the announcement, Stephen Joseph, executive director of Campaign for Better Transport, said: ‘In the absence of the necessary bold government transport policies to tackle climate change, the Conservatives have shown the way that is good for the economy and good for the climate.’ Construction would begin in 2015, with full completion by 2027.