Clever investment, cool stuff and why bigger isn't better

I use this when I want to get out of doing the dishes.

There are times when one despairs of sensible investment in the UK. The talk of throwing over £40 billion into HS2 and the ongoing debate as to the best location for airport expansion in South East England can easily lead one to think that all politicians are obsessed with big dumb investments and value posturing in front of vast steel and concrete white elephants above prosperity and opportunity for all. Then you read about some under reported but very clever investments HMG has made in UK high tech industries. Like the £36m various bodies like the office of the Mayor of London and SE development agencies put into Inmarsat ( read more here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23380147 ) or the £60m HMG Treasury put into the SABRE engine ( more here http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-23332592 ) which are two or three orders of magnitude smaller than the grand gestures proposed for UK transport infrastructure, but have the potential to deliver vast benefits for the UK in terms of wealth, opportunity and advancement.

New taxi rank @ Paddington

How exciting, well in a small way, a new cab rank at Padders. Alas my vague hopes for a return to the elegance and utility of the old platform nine "through"rank are quickly dashed after the new-bridge-hidden-street moment. It's badly designed, windy and miles away from the main platforms. God knows how it will cope with any significant usage. What a damn shame.

Am I boring you?

its like engineering meets art... and misses completely.

I'm in engineering geek mode today, screw IT, let’s move a mega-tonne of silt and slap concrete all over it. That’s a real job. Back in the day, when I actually knew how to do things, I was going to be a civil engineer. It turned out that it doesn’t pay very well and standing waist deep in mud and shouting at people whilst wearing a hard hat didn’t appeal very much so I drifted into IT and information theory but part of me is always going to love civils and tunnelling in particular.