Railways
One of my Christmas presents this year is a series of three maps, all covering the same area, but based on Ordance Surveys of the early and late nineteenth century and the nineteen twenties. It is immensly interesting to study these maps of a rural area in southern England and compare one period with another. In the earliest map before railways, there were many more usable lanes, but by the turn of the ninteenth century railways had become the main means of transport and the road network was significantly reduced to main trunk routes, with cross country minor roads neglected or no longer passable.
Later with the advent of cars there is something of a revival of the road network as motor vehicles began to compete seriously with rail. The most modern and current map is littered with markings of disused railways. What is most striking of all is the extent of the connections of communities offered by the branch railways round about 1900. One of the worst domestic decisions of the twentieth century, perhaps strategically the worst, was that absurd programme of closing down branch lines. Left in place it would today provide a rural tramway network with modern rail-cars which would transform the efficiency of cross country travel and contribute hugely to the reduction of carbon emissions. Serious thought needs to be given to reviving these lines, just as in the early twentieth century there was a revival of the roads.
We need to think, too, whether every form of transport can or should be profitable, or whether its contribution, like sewage treatment and drainage, is an indispensable element of civilised and eco friendly living. Business knows a good deal, but it does not always know best.
On one of my walls I have an enormous framed map of the United States of America, showing its entire continental rail network in the nineteen twenties. It is a staggering achievement. A revival there might be a very good thing indeed. Wherever in the world you go, railway travel is the most eco friendly and efficient ever devised.It must not be judged in its run down state, starved of investment, its trains dirty and out of date, its connections severed. If we breath new life into railways, we will breath new life into our planet and thus into us all.