...is the average length of one side of those old fashioned LP thingys, or it is the time it takes to get dressed, or it is the length of time of your average knee-trembler, or it is the time it takes to fry some bacon and make a bacon sarnie, amongst a host of other things.
It is also the journey time saved, if, as looks likely the new high speed rail link between London and Birmingham gets the nod next week. At a cost of £17,000,000,000 that works out at £850,000,000 per minute or £14,166,667 per second of time saved for the few thousand who make the journey between the two cities every year. Or, to put it another way, £170,000,000 a mile, or £96,591 per yard to build. Even footballers don't get paid that much per yard!
That's not to mention the horrendous environmental cost as the proposed route carves its way through many currently quiet and naturally beautiful parts of the countryside, nor does it account for the human cost making currently valuable country des res' in The Chilterns unsellable. OK maybe that last bit won't have you shedding tears, but you get the point. It also renders Shoesville even more redundant than it is now as the main rail link bypasses our town yet again. I have seen no evidence of our perennially useless council lobbying for the route to go through our town, which may have tempered my rantings, but their apparent lack of action does not surprise me in the slightest.
The Government would be well advised to spend the money improving the existing network and by plugging the financial holes in an NHS hospital or ten. I strongly suspect that there are more than a few MPs and local councillors who are on the boards of companies set to make a killing from this dreadful white elephant. It could be the cue for the middle class uprising that brings down Cameroon. We can only hope.
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