Transport, the Cambridge Way
Transport in Cambridge is always a controversy. As in any small place in the UK, the council constantly comes up with silly ideas to try and improve things. Some recent examples are:
- Congestion charges (I think that one is an attempt to make people think they are living in a large place). Of course that couldn’t work since one of the ways that people pay the congestion charge is by mobile ‘phone and the cell reception is so lousy in Cambridge that you’d never be able to get a signal.
- Guided bus – we are in the process of having a guided bus from some random place in the countryside (where people choose to live) into the centre of Cambridge. Yet another example of people who choose to live outside Cambridge getting a better deal than those who actually live in it. My big gripe about this is the carnage the traffic works has created in the process- Hills Road resembles Beirut right now.
Of course the tabloid press and television news love to pick up in these things – the latest title I saw in a paper yesterday was “No need for road toll with space age pods” – nonsense (writer watching too much of Buck Rogers I fear).
I really can’t understand why they don’t build trams. They are silent, nice to look at, and very efficient to get on/off from (in place of some lousy driver giving you cheek for not having the right money).
On the media side, Anglia News and BBC Look East always make me laugh due to their complete nonsense approach to media (I’m sure a random red-brick University media club could do much better). Pointless stories about lost dogs, new transport systems, and various random members of the public in difficulties (like not able to play the radio when visiting a garage). Of course maybe I’m just cynical coming from Glasgow (where the news always covers people being killed !).