A not very prominent story in yesterdays local press repeated the fact that the government has blocked a move to get extra coaches on the mail line train route between Liverpool and London.
Now I know this suggestion was partly to do with Virgin wanting to make sure they got the franchise again when it's up. So it's not an altruistic act!
But by blocking this the government has made sure it will continue to be difficult to travel on that route. Put quite simply it is overcrowded and you sometimes end up standing or sitting on the floor.
We keep hearing that people should be encouraged to swap to public transport - but this means nothing if every time the government makes a decision it pushes people the other way.
(Incidentally another story in the press yesterday talked of extra carriages in a few years time for trains to Manchester - plus ca change)
UPDATE: and now it seems virgin is refusing to co operate with the new carriages scheme anyway. This is what you get when we have a mad rail system like this. BR may have had its faults, but I can't see that this lot of squabbling companies and organisations are delivering the transport service we need.
