Thou Shalt Not Drive…
Feb02

Thou Shalt Not Drive…

Seldom have our local representatives been more authoritarian; implementing road closures in the dead of night. And famously ignoring the results of public consultations.

Read More
Straight Line Crazy – A Review
May14

Straight Line Crazy – A Review

Written by David Hare, directed by Nicholas Hytner, and starring Ralph Fiennes, recounts the life and times of controversial urbanist Robert Moses

Read More
Olympic Meddles
Feb12

Olympic Meddles

Brave investigative journalism is essential for our understanding of what is happening in China. Unfortunately, factual accuracy can be drowned out by emotionally attached storylines and guesswork.

Read More
Not much COP
Nov14

Not much COP

If it really is one minute to midnight, then we really are in trouble because COP26 has achieved absolutely nothing… except contributing to the problem of C02 emissions.

Read More
DRAUGHT-STRIP BRITAIN
Oct27

DRAUGHT-STRIP BRITAIN

We, the self-appointed, unelected mob of right-thinking people who speak on behalf of the majority, demand:

Read More
Mobility matters: community ideals for a feudal society
Aug08

Mobility matters: community ideals for a feudal society

Basic choice is being undermined. Not only is our choice of transport mode being proscribed, but whether we should actually make the journey in the first place is being questioned.

Read More
Roadblock lockdown
Jul07

Roadblock lockdown

At the time of planning LTNs, councils had little or no evidence of the economic impact. How could they? There was no data available to base any decisions on.

Read More
Infrapenny Infrastructure
May31

Infrapenny Infrastructure

The relics of disused Victorian railway lines scattered across the landscape attest to a creative spark that demanded progress and bore no sentimentality, a recognition that reaching the future required risk, demolition, casualties.

Read More

Driving the world to destruction?

‘Two Billion Cars: Driving Toward Sustainability’ by Daniel Spurling and Deborah Gordon, Oxford University Press, 2010. 322pp Reviewed by Austin Williams | 10 April 2010 Musing about Easter Island, Jared Diamond famously asked “what were they thinking when they chopped down the last tree?” Diamond’s polemical book “Collapse”, written five years ago (but based on a 1995 article), argues against the unthinking exploitation...

Read More

Dan Dare or Dan Daren’t

Austin Williams | 3 October 2008 Whatever happened to the jet-pack; the monorail; the personalised Lear jet; Maglev taxis; automated highways; long-haul flights by space shuttle? All of these strange and wonderful transport ideas were commonplace Utopian ambitions for the future as seen by the Sixties’ generation. Most of them were even technologically possible back then. Today, if there is ever mention of anything so fanciful, it...

Read More