The A11 Missing Link Goes Ahead
Or that’s what it looks like after the government’s cost cutting according to this report on the BBC.
I know you could have argued that in our current state all road projects should go, but this is one that will pay for itself in lives saved because of the dangerous Elveden village.
The upgrading of the A14 through Cambridge has been scrapped, but if the Felixstowe to Peterborough rail freight mprovements kick in as they should, then the congestion caused by heavy lorries may decrease. Remember too, that a lot of the cars on this section of the A14 are commuters working in the high-tech businesses in the Cambridge area and these are just the commuters that might use alternative technological alternatives.
So if it was the A14 or the A11, then the A11 is the more iportant. It’s just a pity though, that there appear to be no plans in place to improve the links between Great Yarmouth and the rest of the country. The A11 Missing Link will be a great help, but work on the Acle Straight would very much be welcomed.
An Exhilirating Ride
The full video of my cab trip from Edinburgh to Inverness is just too long, so here’s a shortened version of just a few minutes as the HST runs northwards from Perth at 90 mph, through the trees.
I’ve also selected this section, as it shows how the journey brings the conversation out of the two drivers in the cab.
Where Have All the Hitch-Hikers Gone?
A letter in The TImes today asks this question and even ponders where drivers carrying trade plates have gone.
When I drove, I always gave people lifts and so did C.
In fact we were of an age, where many more people hitched than have ever since. In one case, C and I actually htched to London from Liverpool to tell her parents, that we were going to get married. Little thanks we got for being up-front and honest, as I was accussed if getting her pregnant. Not that she was as we just got married in time before she was! Or else it was a very long pregnancy!
But I used to enjoy hitching and I must admit, I’ve thought about it lately, as public transport is so bad round here. But then public transport was always bad in East Anglia and I can remember that you had to have a car as as eighteen-year-old as there were no buses or trains from Felixstowe to anywhere interesting. I suppose there were ones that got you there, but the last bus into the town was about seven in the evening.
But even in those days of the 1960s, hitching was not very productive in East Anglia and I can remember spending a whole day getting from the M1 to Felixstowe. Or on another occassion, when C was a mother’s help in the summer before we married in Norfolk with the Wright family, having to hitch or almost walk back to Felixstowe from Hingham.
But these days, there is usually some form of transport, so people don’t give lifts as they feel you must be some sort of low life to hitch. And because no one gives lifts, no-one tries!
Bury Town 2 – Staines 2
I think that was the final score, but I left soon after half-time with Staines in the lead, as the match was a bit of a struggle for Bury and I needed to get the bus back to Newmarket.
Ram Meadow is a pleasant little ground that holds about 2,000.
It was interesting to see James Scowcroft enjoying himself and showing no mean skills. Players like him seem to continue playing, just because it’s such a good thing to do.
Will I follow the winner of this tie towards the final. I’m not sure, but I think I might go to Staines!
Bury St. Edmunds Abbey Gardens
The abbey at Bury St. Edmunds was one of the largest in England. Litt;le remains today except for the ruins, although part of it is now the cathedral.
These are some pictures of the ruins and the Abbey Gardens,
Mary Beale was Disappointing
I mentioned Mary Beale in Suffolk Art and it says in the Public Catalogue for Suffolk, that there at least twenty of her portraits in the care of St. Edmundsbury Museums . Only four were on display in a rather dark corner and although I’m no expert, they looked like they needed some restoration. They certainly needed better labels.
If Ipswich can create a proper gallery for their collections in Christchurch Park, surely St. Edmundsbury can do the same. And they charge for entry, whereas Ipswich does not!
Perhaps, this is why none of my artist friends had ever heard of Mary Beale.
Are There Fewer Container Trucks on the A14?
Today was the first time, I’d been along the A14 during the day and especially on a Saturday for some months. I may have been in a bus, but I couldn’t help thinking that there were very few container trucks on the road. It could either be the recession or perhaps more and more are going by rail to and from the Midlands and the North. After all the latteris what the work in Boxing Clever is all about. When I returned, between Bury St. Edmunds and Newmarket, we only saw three in pehaps twenty minutes!
The Cambridge Busway Approaches the Station
As I retirned to the station on the top deck of the bus, I was able to get a good view of the busway as it approached the station from the south, alongside the railway lines to London.
Cambridge Busway to the South of the Station
If it ever gets finished it will make getting to Addenbrooke’s from the station a lot easier.
But then they have to finish the bridge, which should have been completed months ago.
More Delays for the Busway
The sign says that there will be delays until well into the New Year!
It’s not just the quality of the planning on this important project that worries me, it’s the attention to detail in the design and the defects that seem to keep arising. As I said before this project was designed for the lawyers.
Suffolk Art
Suffolk is a county that has been either the birthplace or home to numerous artists; John Constable, John Duval, Thomas Gainsborough, Alfred Munnings, Philip Wilson Steer and George Stubbs, to name some of the more famous. In the present day there is Maggi Hambling. But she is not the only successful woman artist to come from the county. There was the sculptor, Elizabeth Frink and in the seventeenth century, the successful Mary Beale, who was born near Bury St. Edmunds.
There is more on Suffolks public collection of art here.
The Anonymous Widower 