Will the train take the strain...?

The UK has a suspiciously pro-rail Secretary of State for Transport in the Cabinet. His name is Lord Adonis and he wants to spend ₤20 billion on a new high-speed rail line from London to Scotland. The good Lord is a kind of Lord Beeching in reverse, if you like. (For readers born after 1963, Beeching was the man who closed down large chunks of Britain's rail network). Some aviation pundits have said over the last week that a high speed rail line would be bad news for the nation's airlines. I disagree. They may whinge a bit, but secretly I suspect that they will be relieved to see the domestic travel market become rooted to the rails. The payback is that lots of domestic airport slots will be freed up for more lucrative long-haul services. This is what happened when the Channel Tunnel rail link opened up, leading to the collapse of the London to Paris air market. So why wouldn't the same thing happen again?

But rail projects of this magnitude can only succeed if their supporters, and critically, their financiers, are in it for the long haul. But, as we all know, political cycles are somewhat - shall we say - frequent. So, Lord Adonis ought to get his skates on and wrap everything up before an election throws him out of a job. I'd say he has until Christmas.