Wednesday, January 02, 2008

from bad to worse

way back in 1999 I applied for a few London-based jobs, thinking that I would be able to commute in, as the trains could only get better. Since then, they have become worse, and worse, and worse still. And they keep increasing the prices at 2-3 times inflation every year, just to add insult to injury. I believe that under Thatcher (when they were still state-owned, British Rail), there was an official policy of "pricing off demand", i.e. raising the prices to turn people away from the overcrowded trains. Now it seems to work very similarly, only that nobody admits it. Here's today's bad news, but I'm sure we'll hear tomorrow that more lines have to be closed because the wrong type of snow has fallen onto them.

On the plus side, am I glad I never got a job in London. It's already a challenge to go there once a month ...

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