CITY AND SUBURBAN
What a nice set of Eurostars to play with all they need now is a railway
CHRISTOPHER FILDES
It is no fault of London and Continental Railways that they do not at present have a railway. What they have is a train set. They were given that by way of an incentive, to encourage them to build a track to run it on. Unfortunately the trains do not make any money as yet, which makes it harder to see when the track will make money — or would, for it is still a dotted line on a map and a gleam in the eye of faith. Other than in the ordinary course of management, not a sod has been turned. The trains are the Eurostars, people-movers by appointment to the Euro-presidency, which now whizz across Belgium and France and through the Channel Tunnel and then slow down to take the lines rented for them from Rail- track. The eye of faith sees them whizzing across Kent, then under the Thames, and then under mile after mile of east London before reaching journey's end at St Pan- cras, where their owners have been given a goods yard by way of another incentive. All that this railway company has to do now is to raise the money. Its owners (eight of them including Virgin and London Elec- tn. chY) had vainly hoped to tap the investors and bankers who had such an interesting time with Eurotunnel. Now a high-stakes game of misere is in progress, involving Railtrack and John Prescott but Without an obvious winner. Intent on resolving the impasse and speeding the trains, I called upon my railway correspon- dent, I.K. Gricer, and his report follows:
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