UK Politics Thread III: Thready McThreadface (+ Jo Cox)

[Imperializt Russia]

Yeah, I'm quite surprised in the complete absence of its mention in the last like eighteen months.

I think its been overshadowed by the EU referendum and Corbyn's Labour. Maybe everyone is waiting for Boris to become PM, he loves spending money on transport.

I'd like to imagine Boris, who basically made his name in being about transport, would have the sense to go for a more beneficial overhaul of the national infrastructure than an incremental improvement to, for several years, literally one route.

But with what Brexit has brought out of him...

[Dooom35796821595]

I think its been overshadowed by the EU referendum and Corbyn's Labour. Maybe everyone is waiting for Boris to become PM, he loves spending money on transport.

I'd like to imagine Boris, who basically made his name in being about transport, would have the sense to go for a more beneficial overhaul of the national infrastructure than an incremental improvement to, for several years, literally one route.

But with what Brexit has brought out of him...

Considering he was the face of Borris island, I think he's more for HS2 and an overhaul.

[Anywhere Else But Here]

I think its been overshadowed by the EU referendum and Corbyn's Labour. Maybe everyone is waiting for Boris to become PM, he loves spending money on transport.

I'd like to imagine Boris, who basically made his name in being about transport, would have the sense to go for a more beneficial overhaul of the national infrastructure than an incremental improvement to, for several years, literally one route.

But with what Brexit the Tory leadership contest has brought out of him...

ftfy

[Questers]

I grew up and went to school in a thousand-year old parish town in East Yorkshire.

"Crime" is something that happens on TV.

My mother is a Liverpudlian.

I used to leave the front door unlocked when I went out and she would get ultra raged at me. Why? I said. If somebody wants to rob the house they'll do the front door in either way, it hardly matters if I lock it.

Being a child was great.

[Valaran]

My personal view is we should be spending more on infrastructure regardless, however I'm not a proponent so HS2 - I'd much prefer rail lines in the north to be upgraded (and a general shake up of the rail system, given the post-privatisation issues), in addition to road construction & repair, new runways at both Heathrow & Gatwick (and a chosen few other airports), starting work on Crossrail 2, and so on. Even if we can't get all that, upgrading existing rail lines is a much cheaper method of spreading benefit and increasing connectivity rather than the concentrated and uncertain benefit that would be gained from HS2.

But with what Brexit has brought out of him...

I'm somewhat ashamed at how much I used to support Boris. Can't exactly call myself a fan anymore...

[Questers]

build a maglev from ldn to edinburgh

[Vassenor]

Actually hasn't Boris been against HS2 ever since it forced his father to sell his house?

[Questers]

Seriously though I am very pro spending in infrastructure but I am not sure we actually need HS2 or any major infrastructure projects. Unless the rail network has collapsed in the last five years it seems to be working just fine to me. Perhaps the state should take over the railways, and:

• Subsidise costs for fares in commuter routes
• Maybe build track where it would be financially viable (sort of assume rebuilding what was lost with Beeching)
• R&D

I'm not convinced we need a huge overhaul of the rail system though. If one day we want to seriously curb car use the problem will be getting people from towns to cities, not from city to city; this is, realistically, a problem for buses to solve. And trams, in conurbations.

[Valaran]

build a maglev from ldn to edinburgh

hovercraft are the way forward!

[Questers]

Im actually somewhat interested in building a maglev somewhere in Britain as a tech demonstrator. The Chinese did it. That means we can do it.

Maglevs cost about £40 million a mile. Not including R&D costs. This is from the figure the Chinese offer to other countries, so that likely does include some R&D costs incorporated into it. We should do it ourselves if we were gonna do it, though.

It takes ages to get from Heathrow to KX. I wonder if there was a way to build a maglev to a close point in London...

[Valaran]

Im actually somewhat interested in building a maglev somewhere in Britain as a tech demonstrator.

In that case, I think it should be Edinburgh-Glasgow, or Manchester-Birmingham, personally favouring the latter. They could benefit most from such a connection.

It takes ages to get from Heathrow to KX. I wonder if there was a way to build a maglev to a close point in London...

Yeah, that's an awkward place to get to, but I imagine its quite hard to find/level a clear path in London, and whatever route they could find might impact speeds (sort of reducing the point).

[Souseiseki]

our railways are a disaster and there is little to not chance we will ever fix them

[Vassenor]

Won't the ETCS implementation allow for 140mph running on the West Coast, East Coast and Great Western Mainlines anyway?

[Questers]

our railways are a disaster and there is little to not chance we will ever fix them

why are they a disaster

[Souseiseki]

our railways are a disaster and there is little to not chance we will ever fix them

why are they a disaster

as said they are a victorian relic. guys just built shit wherever they wanted it. as a result of this they are a mess of differing standards and types. some trains only work in certain places, certain places only accept certain trains, etc. we really needed a centralized building system but we didn't have one, like, at all.

[Vassenor]

why are they a disaster

as said they are a victorian relic. guys just built shit wherever they wanted it. as a result of this they are a mess of differing standards and types. some trains only work in certain places, certain places only accept certain trains, etc. we really needed a centralized building system but we didn't have one, like, at all.

...Hasn't every train since the 1950s been built to a standard loading gauge?

Although I am aware of the Route Availability classification and that whole thing on the Isle of Wight.

[Imperializt Russia]

why are they a disaster

as said they are a victorian relic. guys just built shit wherever they wanted it. as a result of this they are a mess of differing standards and types. some trains only work in certain places, certain places only accept certain trains, etc. we really needed a centralized building system but we didn't have one, like, at all.

They're all of Standard Gauge, because it'd be impossible to have a train network if it weren't the case.

Platform heights and gaps differ due to being built for a stock that was eliminated five changes ago etc.
Northern Electric for example had an overhaul programme with an all-electric conversion, resulting in much taller trainers that were a good few inches above the platform.
A London Underground overhaul programme increased the platform gap which led to instances of people falling down said gap increasing about fourteenfold.

[Great Kauthar]

Nicola is refusing to form a coalition with them
thank god

Link?

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-36230416

[The Nihilistic view]

why are they a disaster

as said they are a victorian relic. guys just built shit wherever they wanted it. as a result of this they are a mess of differing standards and types. some trains only work in certain places, certain places only accept certain trains, etc. we really needed a centralized building system but we didn't have one, like, at all.

You sound like you never travel on the railways.

[Lamadia]

The railway system in this country isn't broken. It isn't 100% quality, needless to say it functions well, generally on good time, efficiently- especially around London. Likewise, in comparison to other countries, such as in Europe, Britain's rail is safer & more comfortable.
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j ... 1273,d.ZGg

[Philjia]

The railway system in this country isn't broken. It isn't 100% quality, needless to say it functions well, generally on good time, efficiently- especially around London. Likewise, in comparison to other countries, such as in Europe, Britain's rail is safer & more comfortable.
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j ... 1273,d.ZGg

That doesn't alter the fact that tickets are catastrophically expensive, to the extent that it is cheaper to travel from Essex to Sheffield via Berlin.

[Frank Zipper]

Cecil Parkinson and the tories screwed the railways with the most fuckwitted privatisation. Bring back British Rail and simplify the ticketing system. Let the stations be privatised, like motorway service stations.

[Lamadia]

The railway system in this country isn't broken. It isn't 100% quality, needless to say it functions well, generally on good time, efficiently- especially around London. Likewise, in comparison to other countries, such as in Europe, Britain's rail is safer & more comfortable.
https://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j ... 1273,d.ZGg

That doesn't alter the fact that tickets are catastrophically expensive, to the extent that it is cheaper to travel from Essex to Sheffield via Berlin.

The market determines these prices, as there is so little competition, and rail is so important for commuting.
It is a shame, but it is affordable to most. It is the job of the government to keep inflation down, however interfering with the rail market may decimate the industry. I use my experiences often enough; Virginia Water is a commuting town in Surrey. Prices for train tickets are huge, however most can afford them, so it has little effect. Likewise, the level of affluence around the 'worse hit' areas is generally larger, which lessens the effect it may have.

[Vassenor]

Cecil Parkinson and the tories screwed the railways with the most fuckwitted privatisation. Bring back British Rail and simplify the ticketing system. Let the stations be privatised, like motorway service stations.

It really says something that even Mrs Thatcher didn't want the railways privatised.

She also didn't want Royal Mail sold off either, for that matter.

[Questers]

That doesn't alter the fact that tickets are catastrophically expensive, to the extent that it is cheaper to travel from Essex to Sheffield via Berlin.

The market determines these prices, as there is so little competition, and rail is so important for commuting.
It is a shame, but it is affordable to most. It is the job of the government to keep inflation down, however interfering with the rail market may decimate the industry. I use my experiences often enough; Virginia Water is a commuting town in Surrey. Prices for train tickets are huge, however most can afford them, so it has little effect. Likewise, the level of affluence around the 'worse hit' areas is generally larger, which lessens the effect it may have.

Being able to afford a train ticket does not make it affordable. The problem with train prices are that while sometimes they are cheap, sometimes they also are not -- and commuting can be expensive (not always). Train travel for commuting is not an inferior good -- people do not do less of it when it becomes more expensive, and this is the problem. Neither can you replace rail transport with some other kind of substitute good: people aren't in a position to use a car or a bike or walk instead of a train since if they could do that, they would be doing it already.

Commuter transport is really a public good. We all benefit from people being able to take up jobs because its affordable for them to commute there.

There is also not a free market in trains in Britain. The state owns rail track. It chooses to lease the track to train operating companies or freight operating companies. Those companies bid for franchises to run on state owned lines. After tendering, one is chosen and given a franchise for seven years. Rail franchises receive government subsidy: in FY 12-13, this was £4.2 billion, representing just under a third of the railways income. Even the state owned railways of foreign countries can compete for tenders. There are a whole list of British rail firms which are owned by ... foreign countries.

Arriva.

Transpennine.

Scotrail.

CrossCountry.

These "British" rail franchises are in fact owned by the state railways of Germany, the Netherlands, and France (there are more, but I can't be bothered to list them.) They extract profits from their rail operations in Britain which go directly to the state railways of those countries. We subsidise our rail track in order for German, Dutch and French firms to make a profit -- for their taxpayers, not for their stakeholders.

Is this what you call a free market?