Christian Wolmar and The UK's Chaotic Railways
Rock & Roll Politics with Steve Richards
Podmasters
4.7 • 910 Ratings
🗓️ 3 February 2023
⏱️ 41 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
I speak to the the transport expert and host of the Calling All Stations podcast, Christian Wolmar, about the state of the railways, the all-important context going back to British Rail, and his hopes and fears for the future.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I'm I'm Hello and welcome to rock and roll politics, the twice weekly podcast with me, Steve Richards. |
| 0:34.7 | Thank you so much for tuning in, wherever you are, in the UK and indeed |
| 0:39.1 | the rest of the world. And this is the time of week where we have a conversation together |
| 0:46.6 | with somebody. And this week we're going to look at trains, one of the themes of our times together at the rock and roll politics cooperative, |
| 0:59.7 | because the state of the railways has so many layers to it as a theme to make sense of. |
| 1:08.5 | The lack of control, the poor delivery, the lack of accountability, |
| 1:15.9 | the kind of fractured levels of ownership. And yet it should be such a joy railways. |
| 1:24.2 | And we've explored many of the kind of themes in our time together over the months |
| 1:30.0 | and indeed years we've been examining the state of this bloody country anyway i thought uh it would |
| 1:38.0 | be great to speak to someone who is an absolute expert on railways in the UK now, the past, so we have a bit of context |
| 1:49.1 | to make sense of it all, to look at the wider implications. What does it tell us about |
| 1:55.3 | ownership, public ownership, private ownership, as well as just why the heck we can't get our act together |
| 2:02.8 | on this front. And of course it's been another week of strikes, but on so-called normal days, |
| 2:10.2 | which are pretty abnormal. You've got no idea whether you're going to get a train. Why is it |
| 2:14.8 | worse in the north of England? Yeah, so many themes, which as I say, |
| 2:20.3 | relate to much bigger questions about the condition of Britain in 2023. So who better to reflect on |
| 2:30.1 | these themes than Christian Warmer, who as I say, has been written writing about railways and all kinds |
| 2:36.6 | of different guises and outlets for many years. And his most recent outlet is he's got a podcast |
| 2:43.7 | called Calling All Stations, where Christian explores all aspects of transport. And yeah, he's got a blog and everything. So sit back or go |
| 2:56.7 | running or if you're listening on a train, you're lucky to be on a train. Here is our conversation |
| 3:02.3 | where we attempt to make sense of the railways and what it tells us about Britain. |
| 3:10.9 | Christian Warmer, thanks so much for coming in. We're obsessed on this podcast about trains |
... |
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