On Monday last week a new fast train service between north and south Wales was launched, taking just under 4 hours to travel from Holyhead to Cardiff (180 miles for crows) - brilliant (or it would be brilliant if the service hadn't failed the day after its launch).
Yesterday the SNP announced* support for a fast train service from Glasgow to London (414 miles) that would take just two and a half hours!
If the same type of train was used to link north and south Wales as is being mooted to link Glasgow and London (335 mph top speed) it would take less than three quarters of an hour to go between Cardiff and Holyhead nonstop - that would be fast!
*HT Jeff @ SNP-TV
Showing posts with label north-south. Show all posts
Showing posts with label north-south. Show all posts
23/12/2008
13/10/2007
Own Gaol?
One of the most vociferous proponents for the need of a prison in North Wales when the Welsh Affairs Committee discussed the matter last year was Hywel Williams the MP for Caernarfon. Martin Eaglestone suggests that Hywel is getting cold feet over the proposal having discovered that one of the sites proposed is in his own back yard!
I can understand Hywel's trepidation - I too believe that there should, in theory, be a prison somewhere in the north, but I don’t want an institution full of murderers, rapists and robbers built in my village thank you very much!
Having seen the list of proposed sites, I don’t think that any of them are really suitable. The best of the bunch is Bryn y Neuadd for access purposes. But Bryn y Neuadd is a former hospital for people with learning difficulties. Those of us who have worked in former institutions like Bryn y Neuadd have spent two generations trying to prove that living with a learning difficulty doesn’t equal bad.
Building a new institution for criminals on the site of an old institution for people who use to be derided as subnormal would undo a lot of the work that has been done over the past fifty years into normalising people who live with learning difficulties into mainstream society.
If one considers the needs of an ideal site for a north Wales prison, accessibility to courts, visitors and legal reps; the ability to take prisoners from south Wales and the north West of England to make up the numbers (there aren’t enough baddies in the north to justify an exclusively north Wales prison) etc. The site that stands out (for almost the same reasons) is the former Hotpoint site in Llandudno Junction - earmarked for National Assembly Offices.
How about a compromise, Hywel and Martin - Jail in the Junction and Assembly Offices in Ferodo?
Of course, if Assembly Members or Officials were serious in their desire to see a prison in north Wales they would, themselves, have spotted the Junction site as eminently suitable. The fact that they didn't proposes it as a possibility is proof that the north of Wales will never, ever have its own gaol!
I can understand Hywel's trepidation - I too believe that there should, in theory, be a prison somewhere in the north, but I don’t want an institution full of murderers, rapists and robbers built in my village thank you very much!
Having seen the list of proposed sites, I don’t think that any of them are really suitable. The best of the bunch is Bryn y Neuadd for access purposes. But Bryn y Neuadd is a former hospital for people with learning difficulties. Those of us who have worked in former institutions like Bryn y Neuadd have spent two generations trying to prove that living with a learning difficulty doesn’t equal bad.
Building a new institution for criminals on the site of an old institution for people who use to be derided as subnormal would undo a lot of the work that has been done over the past fifty years into normalising people who live with learning difficulties into mainstream society.
If one considers the needs of an ideal site for a north Wales prison, accessibility to courts, visitors and legal reps; the ability to take prisoners from south Wales and the north West of England to make up the numbers (there aren’t enough baddies in the north to justify an exclusively north Wales prison) etc. The site that stands out (for almost the same reasons) is the former Hotpoint site in Llandudno Junction - earmarked for National Assembly Offices.
How about a compromise, Hywel and Martin - Jail in the Junction and Assembly Offices in Ferodo?
Of course, if Assembly Members or Officials were serious in their desire to see a prison in north Wales they would, themselves, have spotted the Junction site as eminently suitable. The fact that they didn't proposes it as a possibility is proof that the north of Wales will never, ever have its own gaol!
06/09/2007
One Hospital in the North!
A few years ago my wife use to attend an out patients clinic in Morriston Hospital Swansea. The trip from Conwy use to take about six hours each way. Because of the distance we would have to go down the day before the appointment and come back they day after. Our children would have to come with us, causing them to miss three days school. The cost was extortionate, the inconvenience was worse.
The outpatients visits were sort of pre-operative, one had to attend the clinic in order for the doctor to juggle where one was on the op-list. The inconvenience of the trip was just too much for my wife, the kids and me. My wife elected to come off the list and to die with the condition that she was being seen for.
A triumph for the Labour Party - another one off the waiting list - hooray! A long drawn out tragedy for my family and me.
My wife is off the waiting list but she is still seriously ill and still severely disabled by her health problem, she just isn't one of the statistics any more!
The idea that people can travel from the north Wales coast to the south Wales coast for treatments, of any sort, is ridiculous. But treatment in Liverpool isn't the answer either. It may be convenient for David Jones' MP's constituents to go to Liverpool from Prestatyn, but Liverpool is as difficult to get to from Aberdyfi as is Swansea!
The problem that the Health Service in north Wales has is too many small coastal hospitals, none of which can give a decent provision in the modern world. Bangor, Bodelwyddan, Aberystwyth and Wrexham are tiddler hospitals. What the north needs is one major league hospital in a central location, Bala, Dolgellau, Denbigh, Blaenau or Llanrwst, that is the equal too, if not better than, Cardiff's University Hospital.
Unfortunately no AM or MP would agree to support the closure of their local tiddler hospital in order to create one major league hospital in central north Wales. Any movement towards creating a Super Hospital in central north Wales would be opposed by the selfish brigade who want to keep their hospitals in their community.
But unless we give up our parochial attitudes and accept the need for one centre of excellence hospital in central north Wales, the trips to Swansea, Cardiff, Liverpool, Birmingham and even London are going to continue.
The outpatients visits were sort of pre-operative, one had to attend the clinic in order for the doctor to juggle where one was on the op-list. The inconvenience of the trip was just too much for my wife, the kids and me. My wife elected to come off the list and to die with the condition that she was being seen for.
A triumph for the Labour Party - another one off the waiting list - hooray! A long drawn out tragedy for my family and me.
My wife is off the waiting list but she is still seriously ill and still severely disabled by her health problem, she just isn't one of the statistics any more!
The idea that people can travel from the north Wales coast to the south Wales coast for treatments, of any sort, is ridiculous. But treatment in Liverpool isn't the answer either. It may be convenient for David Jones' MP's constituents to go to Liverpool from Prestatyn, but Liverpool is as difficult to get to from Aberdyfi as is Swansea!
The problem that the Health Service in north Wales has is too many small coastal hospitals, none of which can give a decent provision in the modern world. Bangor, Bodelwyddan, Aberystwyth and Wrexham are tiddler hospitals. What the north needs is one major league hospital in a central location, Bala, Dolgellau, Denbigh, Blaenau or Llanrwst, that is the equal too, if not better than, Cardiff's University Hospital.
Unfortunately no AM or MP would agree to support the closure of their local tiddler hospital in order to create one major league hospital in central north Wales. Any movement towards creating a Super Hospital in central north Wales would be opposed by the selfish brigade who want to keep their hospitals in their community.
But unless we give up our parochial attitudes and accept the need for one centre of excellence hospital in central north Wales, the trips to Swansea, Cardiff, Liverpool, Birmingham and even London are going to continue.
18/04/2007
Flying South
In the business section of today's Daily Post there is a profile of Basil O'Fee the commercial director of Highland Airways. Highland Airways is the company that will run the new air link between Valley and Cardiff.
As one can imagine Mr O'Fee is very exited about his new project and enthuses about the huge difference the service will make. He believes that the service will "finally link" north and south Wales and unite the country.
There is no doubt that one of the difficulties that the Assembly has faced from its inception is that Wales is not perceived to be a cohesive nation by many of its citizens, and that one of the reasons for that lack of cohesion is the difficulty in travelling from north to south or south to north.
Unlike Mr O'Fee I can't see the new air link playing a major role in resolving this difficulty. The air service doesn’t link north and south Wales - it just links one point in the north with another point in the south. Great if you want to go to Cardiff from Holyhead, but just as awkward as any other form of travel to somebody who wants to go to Merthyr from Llanrwst or to Porthmadog from Carmarthen.
The much lauded and heavily subsidies north to south rail link suffers from the same problem. It serves the north Wales coast and the south Wales coast but because the actuall north-south part of the journy is through England it provides nothing for the rest of the country.
The only real answer to the problem of north south travel is to grasp the nettle that all parties are too faerfull of the anti-road lobby to propose - to upgrade the A470 to dual carriageway / motorway standard. All other proposals are just money wasting sops that tinker at the edges of the problem.
As one can imagine Mr O'Fee is very exited about his new project and enthuses about the huge difference the service will make. He believes that the service will "finally link" north and south Wales and unite the country.
There is no doubt that one of the difficulties that the Assembly has faced from its inception is that Wales is not perceived to be a cohesive nation by many of its citizens, and that one of the reasons for that lack of cohesion is the difficulty in travelling from north to south or south to north.
Unlike Mr O'Fee I can't see the new air link playing a major role in resolving this difficulty. The air service doesn’t link north and south Wales - it just links one point in the north with another point in the south. Great if you want to go to Cardiff from Holyhead, but just as awkward as any other form of travel to somebody who wants to go to Merthyr from Llanrwst or to Porthmadog from Carmarthen.
The much lauded and heavily subsidies north to south rail link suffers from the same problem. It serves the north Wales coast and the south Wales coast but because the actuall north-south part of the journy is through England it provides nothing for the rest of the country.
The only real answer to the problem of north south travel is to grasp the nettle that all parties are too faerfull of the anti-road lobby to propose - to upgrade the A470 to dual carriageway / motorway standard. All other proposals are just money wasting sops that tinker at the edges of the problem.
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