Tilt, Decline And Fall

To London on business, by train, riding one of Mr Branson's Italian pendolinos. I should imagine that others who write on this blog will have a far better-informed view of this than I, but just outside Crewe we slowed down, as if to pay respects to the melancholy sight which drifted past. Standing in a siding these 20 years was a decaying hulk of a train, weather-stained and distressed, on whose side was writ large 'Inter City Advanced Passenger Train'. A few yards further on the Crewe signal-box bore a large sign: 'Heritage Centre'. I had thought that what you loved well was your true heritage, not our national failure to exploit science and technology commercially. Heritage is what we no longer have at our disposal. Once, the finest railways in the world: now, Italian design & offshore tax shelters. But privatised railways are not all smoke and mirrors: some things were reassuringly familiar. Mr Branson's breakfast buffet bacon rolls can only be described as a triumph of substance over style.