Grant Shapps confuses East West Rail with the Leeds to Manchester TRU

[Edgeley]

It's Manchester-Sheffield that needs to really improve its links. There's not even a proper road.

There needs to be a continuous dual carriageway from the M67 at Mottram to the M1 at Tankersley.

Legislate to remove the strip of land concerned from the Peak National Park. Bits of the topography are challenging but we could hire some good consultants to advise on this. Under-road heating to be installed on the higher section.

 

[ExRes]

one that drives itself around impossibly sharp bends and is immune to speed cameras?

I semi regularly have to make that drive and I hate it, its tedious.

Ah, speed cameras, that particular plague hadn't descended when I used to drive that road, I should have known .....

 

[GWVillager]

I have not seen the footage. Was this genuinely confusing the two projects or a Biden-esque verbal slip up were he just said wrong name?

I don’t know. I’m inclined to say the former, as he repeatedly referred to EWR as being in the North or a project for it (he even implied that it would be an alternative to HS2).

 

[Spartacus]

Given he wanted to cut back East - West Rail I'd have thought he should know where it actually was more than most ministers!

 

[mike57]

I think the whole thing underlines that the current government are not interested in railways, dont understand them, and dont want to. They see them as a banana skin, and a drain on the treasury. When was the last transport minister who actually made an effort to understand the railways, I would suggest John Prescott.

The worry is that whatever lip service they pay I dont believe things will be any better if/when Labour are in power.

I actually think the current mess of DfT, ToCs and the DfT pulling the strings but blaming ToCs suits the government. The current industrial action which shows no sign of resolution is another issue, and then spiralling HS2 costs.

What actually worries me is that it indicates a 'dont care' attitude, I would never dream of going into a meeting without preparation so that I understood what was being discussed, That simple rule doesn't seem to apply to politicians making media appearances, and to be honest it just confirms my overall opinion of politicians, which is very poor (insert suitable stronger words)

 

[stuu]

"Man who doesn't know own name confuses rail projects"

 

[mpthomson]

This is the same man that said the RAF operated our aircraft carriers.

They certainly operate FROM our aircraft carriers, which I suspect was what he meant. Most of the Lightning carrier pilots are currently RAF as opposed to FAA to achieve interoperability in the fleet ie all Lightning B pilots should be able to fly land based or carrier based missions.

 

[Falcon1200]

Grant Shapps is the present day version of Joe 90; When he moved from Transport to Defence he was put in the big spinning machine and the transport information in his brain was replaced by defence (although the latter may not have fully downloaded....)

 

[mike57]

(although the latter may not have fully downloaded....)

And the memory structure was more akin to a 24Kb magnetic core memory than 8Gb DDR RAM

 

[uglymonkey]

They are just figurehead. They know nothing, the civil service just Carrie's on regardless.

 

[Purple Train]

I think the whole thing underlines that the current government are not interested in railways, dont understand them, and dont want to. They see them as a banana skin, and a drain on the treasury. When was the last transport minister who actually made an effort to understand the railways, I would suggest John Prescott.

Nigel Harris suggested Grayling in his final editorial for RAIL, saying he was "surprisingly knowledgeable about the industry".

Thankfully, I was not eating cereal at the time, otherwise I might not have lived to tell the tale!