Utilitas publica
KEN Livingstone still wants to keep Lon- don Underground free of private risk and public usefulness. As the next best thing, he is bringing in Robert Kiley, who comes from New York with the reputation of having sorted out the subway there. I find that it takes me to Wall Street predictably, without the exciting announcements familiar at home. No one tells me that the next train has been delayed by a shortage of drivers, or that services are non-stopping Grand Cen- tral because of a suspect packet of sand- wiches, or that customers for the Manhattan Transfer should use alternative routes, or that Lexington Avenue trains are blocking back to Harlem, owing to a signal failure. Most of the escalators work, too. Having made its great effort to carry us all to the Dome, London Underground has fallen back on Just Not In Time management. I do hope that Mr Kiley does not disappear into the black hole in the Aldgate area.
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