I see trees of green, red roses too
I see them bloom for me and you
And I think to myself, what a wonderful world
(Louis Armstrong)
Amid the world’s greatest disaster there is still much optimism, a credit to the human spirit. There is always someone airing their passion and telling us to build it better next time, from Prince Charles’s ‘great reset’ to a new, more caring society. We have sniffed the clean air and we like it. Post-Covid, post-Williams, post-decarbonisation, the UK railway has a chance for a great reset. We always seem to decide on electrification just as the money disappears, and here we go again. What the great re-setters seem to forget is that when this is all over there will be no money, and the world we had before was based on doing things the cheapest way. When there is no money why does that mean we will do better in future?
PRIORITIES
The future is not bright, but it is encouraging to see that the Government seems to realise that investment in infrastructure is a good way to power out of a recession. Hence HS2 continues and we are hearing the right noises about making electrification great again. It only fell from greatness because Network Rail decided on a ‘world-beating’ system…
