The Joke Over Our London to Edinburgh Railway Broken Up into a multi mix up, a mish mash of slow changes between Heavy Rail trains, Light Rail trams, Very Light Rail trams, tram-trains - and even cycle hire between Walsall and Lichfield on the forgotten Two Capitals Railway!! Soon, cycles, walkers and horse riders, but not trains, will be seen on the 21st century railway bridge (photo below) over the M6 Toll on our London to Edinburgh Railway:
Looking towards Lichfield. One track nicked by metal thieves over the 21 years since the opening of the motorway:
BACKGROUND
One third of the railway network was very properly closed as loss making.
Because we gave up train travel and took to driving cars - a lot.
The closed railway lines were turned into roads, and used for every kind of building imaginable.
In about 1980, Manchester led the way in turning many of its remaining railway lines and some bus routes into tramways.
This was to give people the choice of either bus, tram or train - multi-modal transport - to solve all our road congestion/
No wonder lack of funding (having gone to trams) means Manchester - Leeds - Hull is one of the worst cross country railways in the world!
More public transport of different kinds (modes) was bound to reduce road congestion - but ...
IT WAS A LIE!
Roads have become full as railways have been destroyed and the first tram network also destroyed.
HISTORY
200 Kms of the new tram network was expected by the year 2000. However, only 20 Kms were open on the first mainline railway by 1999 when commuter trains would have been much cheaper, more responsible and easier to achieve.
23 Kms of tramway have been achieved by 2024.
That has taken 43 years - a world record, costing £100s million of public money!!
No wonder the nation is so heavily in debt and there is so much poverty.
But never fear! 150 miles of underground and overground tramways in the W Midlands will be in place by 2040.
The experts have been slaving away on it, with new enthusiasm, since 2020 when the cost was £15 billion!
THE DUDLEY TRAM, of all things, IS ON THE TWO CAPITALS RAILWAY!
But, there is much confusion over how to get the tram or tram-train or train on the railway
from Flood Street, Dudley to Stourbridge Jct station on our Two Capitals Railway.
INSTEAD, SENSIBLE ACTION:
Keep it simple and cheaper and use all our remaining railway lines for railway trains NOT trams!
Stop repeating the lie that "bus on rails" trams (UK Tram promotion group) of all kinds are the best way to reduce road congestion and pollution.
Make more road space by giving car commuters regional Fare-Free Public Transport for all but, penalties for car commuters who defy accepting that reward and carry on driving.
This map, from 2003, shows what must be done, especially where I have written, in pen on the London to Edinburgh Railway through the heart of the Black Country:
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