Thursday 25 March 2010

The three main parties' transport policies

Transport Extra has produced useful quick summaries of the three main parties' transport policies as we go into the general election:

Where the Tories stand on key transport issues

Where Labour stand on key transport issues

Where the Liberal Democrats stand on key transport issues

I am not very surprised to discover that my views coincide most with those of the Liberal Democrats, as on so many issues.

Of course, what none of this tells us is whether any transport projects will survive the budget cuts that everybody says are coming.

Monday 22 March 2010

Train of the day


It's the right kind of snow as the Hakutaka Express battles through the Japanese winter at Echigo-Yuzawa station.

Monday 15 March 2010

Fashion parade of the day



Why doesn't British TV have programmes like this?

Saturday 13 March 2010

Manhattan: Broadway traffic ban becomes permanent

Good news from Manhattan, where sections of busy Broadway have been experimentally car-free for nearly a year. According to this article in Business Week, the ban has been so successful that New York's Mayor Bloomberg is making it permanent. Pedestrian injuries are down by 35%. Taxi journey times are improved by 7%. The car-free zones are to become public plazas where outdoor events will be held.

Let us hope that, on his next visit to London, Mayor Bloomberg will have words with his pal Boris Johnson about this success. Quite aside from the ongoing kerfuffle over what to do about the nightmare that is Oxford Street, our own theatreland could also do with some radical thinking of this kind. Christian Wolmar has recently blogged about being stopped by an idiotic jobsworth of a policeman for walking in the road in Soho where the pavement is too narrow and there were no cars coming. Mentalities are going to have to change.

Wednesday 10 March 2010

Trams of the day


Double-decker trams in Hong Kong. For more, see Hong Kong's marvellous transit system.