Crossrail
Politics as Ripping Yarns: the breathless brio of Boris Johnson’s memoir
Like a cross between Aeneas and Biggles, our intrepid hero travels the world, endures a thousand ordeals and makes himself father of the world’s greatest city
How we did the locomotion: A Brief History of Motion, by Tom Standage, reviewed
Audi will make no more fuel engines after 2035. So that’s the end of the Age of Combustion, signalled by…
The Nicola Sturgeon effect on house prices
Nicola Sturgeon depresses me and seems to be having the same effect on Scottish house prices. In a housing market…
Ruthless Ryanair could show us the future of aviation
Aviation, nuclear power and public transport — along with good restaurants, golden retrievers and hand-knitted bed socks — are, as…
In favour of nationalisation? Take a look at Network Rail
We don’t hear enough about Network Rail these days. By that I mean that the entity recently described by the…
We need an inquiry into the Elizabeth Line farce
If you know my personal history with Barclays, you may be wondering whether I’m for or against Edward Bramson. To…
Who’s really to blame for the Crossrail fiasco?
There’s been a strong sense of pre-Christmas turkeys coming home to roost in this week’s news, as stories I’ve written…
Why can’t Britain hang on to its best new companies?
Costa, in my opinion, sells a decent cup of coffee. It employs polite youngsters who seem happy in their work.…
We might be plunging towards Brexit chaos – but at least everyone has jobs
It’s heartening to see an authentic British entrepreneur heading this year’s Sunday Times Rich List, the industrial-ist Jim Ratcliffe, who…
Forget a Channel bridge and celebrate Crossrail
This column has long been a sucker for a grand projet. ‘Time for a trip to Boris Island,’ I gushed…
Don’t believe the Tory grumbling: HS2 is on the way
There’s a lot of negativity around HS2, and I sniff a Brexit connection. You might think Leave campaigners whose aim…
Portrait of the week
Home David Cameron, having continued talks through the night in Brussels, announced that he had achieved a ‘special status’ for…
This London mayoral race will feature something new: boredom
London, 2012. It’s Olympic year, and east London is sprouting anew, and our city feels like the capital of the…
Jonathan Coe’s raucous social satire smoulders with anger
When Rachel, one of the unreliable narrators of Number 11, wants to ‘go back to the very beginning’, she starts…
Heathrow and the strange, far-off days when Britain actually built things
Heathrow. The whole British story is there. Reading up around that debacle last week, I came across the eye-watering —…
Britain has the lowest percentage of women engineers in Europe. Why?
‘It’s hard to know how to tell this story,’ she said as she began. ‘Because it’s so loaded. It’s so…
