OPINION: Time to see rail as regenerator for the regions

There should be a health warning on this: "Old Hall is rabbiting on about trains again." But the point about trains is that they can work wonders for regeneration - or not, if they aren't there. In 1957, the economist Colin Clark wrote a famous paper, Transport - Maker and Breaker of Cities, and half a century has proved him right. Investors react to new transport links like Pavlov's dogs. They love heavy fixed stuff, like railways - it shows that the public sector is serious.