re Government data sharing.... In the last few years there's been work to enable data sharing across departments. The Cabinet Office only set up a team for it in (iirc) 2021. Post-Brexit border arrangements highlight the benefits - imagine trying to move food from here to there - you're likely involving DEFRA, HMRC, DFT, DBT, Home Office. And the recent introduction of a working identity tool will doubtless in time enable that single verified identity to percolate across departments.
& that there railway?
We should have started with HS3 - the T across the North. The time savings on HS2 are marginal, and making 'time' the rationale is an engineer's fallacy. It's not the only way people measure the value of train travel. They'll factor in everything from comfort, time to do something, carbon footprint, etc.
Yes, north/south rail capacity is an issue, but nothing like the challenge East/West.
Will
Many thanks for that update on data sharing, thank goodness they have started to grow up and manage/access/share data across various departments. It's long overdue.
Yes focus on East/West does make sense, but the North is not the main generator of wealth and taxes in the UK, so often a lower priority on capital spend. Having said that. about 20 years ago I had to get from Lytham St Annes to Petworth to pick up a car. So I caught a flight from Blackpool to Luton, then train into London, changed station via the Underground and onto the train stopping at Petworth, whilst it was a bit fragmented it all was on time. Then my surprise as we approached Petworth they announces we had to move to the first 12 carriages (not first class) to get off at Petworth as the station platform was too short for the size of the train! I dont think much has changed since in the intervening years, so ambitious projects like HS2 were necessary in part to increase capacity, but more probably could have been done to improve the current infrastructure to cope better.
Why couldn't the appropriate sections of the UK canal network be filled in for use as railways, whilst it does still cater for leisure traffic it is underutilised and passing thru major conurbations. This has happened in parts of the Midlands, with canals being filled in and recycled for other uses. I was born in Tipton, once known as the Venice of the Midlands as at one time you couldn't get out of Tipton without crossing a canal, not so today. We seem to ignore the obsolete infrastructure we already have in place that has had its time and should be repurposed.
