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Boston Globe
3 days ago
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Less red tape, more trains: SCOTUS boosts the ‘abundance' agenda
Whether that's a good or bad thing divides progressives. Advertisement Some environmentalists decried the ruling. 'This disastrous decision to undermine our nation's bedrock environmental law means our air and water will be more polluted, the climate and extinction crises will intensify, and people will be less healthy,' Wendy Park, an attorney for one of the environmental groups that challenged the railway, told Reuters. But the more interesting story here was the dogs that didn't bark — the liberals that a decade ago probably would have lambasted the ruling, but were notably silent. It's also interesting that the court's three liberals joined the 8-0 ruling (one justice recused himself). Advertisement Broadly speaking, the abundance theory is that Democrats need to show they can do stuff and build things if they are going to win the trust of voters. For too long, progressives have said they believe in the power of government to help people — to build housing, transit lines, clean energy, etc. — but then hobbled the ability of either the government or the private sector to actually do any of those things. Now voters just don't believe their promises — and they're right to be leery, since progressive rules too often turn progressives priorities like the California High Speed rail project into quagmires. Indeed, parts of Kavanaugh's ruling sound eerily like the words of a Democratic policy wonk. Because of overly onerous reviews, he wrote, 'fewer projects make it to the starting line. Those that survive often end up costing much more than is anticipated or necessary… And that also means fewer jobs, as new projects become difficult to finance and build in a timely fashion.' The original 1970 environmental-review law was never intended to work this way, he said. 'A 1970 legislative acorn has grown over the years into a judicial oak that has hindered infrastructure development 'under the guise' of just a little more process,' he wrote. 'The goal of the law is to inform agency decision-making, not to paralyze it,' he wrote. A rail overpass being built in Hanford, Calif., that may or may not carry high speed trains at some point. IAN C. BATES/NYT The gist of the ruling is that projects can't be expected to analyze every imaginable environmental impact. It's one thing for backers to study the immediate, predictable environmental impact of a construction project on wildlife, for instance. But environmental groups also wanted the Utah review to include an analysis of the extra greenhouse gas emissions the project could lead to if it led to more global oil production and use that pushed up emissions, something that was outside the control of either the railroad or its regulators. Advertisement It's easy to see how that thinking can lead to absurd outcomes. The further from the actual project, the more an analysis of environmental 'impact' is built on speculation and conjecture. At an extreme, it's like asking the butterfly to study its environmental impact on the hurricane. There has to be some limiting principle on the scope of reviews to avoid the kind of paralysis that Kavanaugh warned about — and that California's rail project in fact experienced. You probably won't find a Democrat willing to say it, but Kavanaugh and the court did them a big favor. They can spend less time fighting among themselves now that the decision has been made for them to narrow the scope of environmental review. And the next time progressives run on promises to build transit lines or green energy, the ruling makes it a little bit more likely they'll actually be able to deliver. This is an excerpt from , a Globe Opinion newsletter about the future of transportation in the region. Sign up to . Alan Wirzbicki is Globe deputy editor for editorials. He can be reached at
Yahoo
03-04-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Gordon Pettitt, creator of Regional Railways and BR executive at the time of the Clapham rail crash
Gordon Pettitt, who has died aged 90, was one of British Rail's most visionary and effective leaders in the years leading up to privatisation, as the last general manager of BR's Southern Region and managing director of its Provincial sector, which he relaunched as Regional Railways. Gentle-mannered but decisive, with a first-rate mind and unruly hair, Pettitt was a key lieutenant of BR's reforming chairman Sir Robert Reid in transforming the railway's component parts from quasi-military fiefdoms into hard-nosed businesses. After three Southern Region trains collided near Clapham Junction in 1988, killing 35 people and seriously injuring 69, he offered Reid his resignation, but his chairman refused it. He trusted Pettitt – who had just given a series of dignified television interviews – to prevent a recurrence, and restore staff and passenger morale. Pettitt, notably, withstood media pressure to sack individual signalling engineers he felt were being scapegoated for a systemic failure. Working alongside Chris Green, the buccaneering sector director of Network SouthEast (NSE), Pettitt at the Southern pushed through the electrification of several lines, improved service quality, and prepared for the Channel Tunnel Rail Link. Politically astute, he personally signed every letter to the 62 MPs in his patch. In 1990 he took charge of BR's heavily loss-making Provincial sector, with more than half its route mileage and stations and 37,000 staff. He was tasked with reinventing Provincial – whose offering had already started to improve – as a self-contained business responsible for its own infrastructure. Pettitt launched Regional Railways in April 1991, with an emphasis on 'congestion-busting' in Birmingham, Glasgow and Leeds and driving down costs. But a year later, John Major was re-elected on a manifesto commitment to privatise the railways, and with another upheaval in prospect, Pettitt left. Gordon Charles Pettitt was born on April 12 1934, and brought up at Hatfield, Hertfordshire, by adoptive parents, Charles and Annie Pettitt. His father drove local trains for the London & North Eastern Railway. Father and son sang together in the choir of Hatfield's parish church, until Charles Pettitt suffered a fatal heart attack during an evening practice. Gordon developed a passion for the railways, and leaving St Columba's College, St Albans, at 16 joined what was now British Railways as a junior clerk at Knebworth station. Either side of National Service with the Army in Germany – where he met his wife – he worked in operating posts in BR's King's Cross division, being selected for management training in 1960. Pettitt became BR's Sheffield divisional commercial manager in 1974 and regional freight sales manager in 1977. Next year he was transferred to the Western Region as chief passenger manager, just as the High Speed Train fleet was introduced. He returned to the Eastern Region in 1979, as divisional manager at Liverpool Street, a demanding role in operating and industrial relations terms. He was heavily involved in planning the redevelopment of Liverpol Street station, preparing and presenting BR's evidence to Select Committes of both Houses of Parliament. The creation of BR's sectors alongside the regions in 1982 brought Pettitt's appointment as deputy director, London & South East and deputy general manager of the Southern Region; two years on, he was promoted to general manager. The Clapham disaster, during the morning peak on December 12 1988, overshadowed his eight years of achievement on the Southern. The 07.18 from Basingstoke to Waterloo was approaching Clapham Junction when the driver saw the signal ahead of him change from green to red. Unable to pull up at that signal, he halted at the next and urged the signaller to set all signals at danger and contact the emergency services. Shortly afterwards, the 06.30 from Bournemouth ran into the back of the Basingstoke train. Then a third, empty, train passing in the other direction ploughed into the wreckage. The driver of a fourth train managed to pull up. Pupils and staff from the adjacent Emanuel School were first on the scene, being commended for their help by Margaret Thatcher. The rescue operation was hampered because the railway is in a cutting, with a metal fence at the top and a wall at the bottom. Hurrying to the scene, Pettitt met key staff, then briefed the media. He said more work was needed to establish the exact cause of the accident, but the fault appeared to be with how BR had installed the signalling equipment, rather than the system itself. Accepting responsibility on behalf of BR, Pettitt said: 'You can rest assured that no trains will run until we are satisfied with the safety.' He then rallied his shell-shocked management team, reminding them that they still had a railway to run. The collision turned out to have been caused by a wiring fault. New wiring had been installed, but the old wires had been left in place and loose. The work had been done weeks before, but the previous day equipment had been moved and the loose, uninsulated wire had created a false feed to a relay. An inquiry, chaired by Anthony Hidden QC, heard that the technician responsible was working his 13th consecutive seven-day week and his work had not been independently inspected, as it should have been. In particular, a wire count that would have shown a wire had not been removed was not carried out. Hidden was critical of the health-and-safety culture within BR, and among his 93 recommendations were that a senior project manager be responsible for all aspects of any major, safety-critical project such as re-signalling. BR was fined £250,000 for violations of health and safety law in connection with the crash. As Reid made way to a second Bob Reid (from Shell) as BR chairman, in May 1990 Pettitt took charge of the Provincial sector. A month later, the BR Board announced the abolition of the regions from April 1992, with each sector gaining full responsibility for the infrastructure and safe operation of its railway. Pettitt covered 15,700 miles by rail getting to know his territory – being most concerned at BR's 'awful' offering between Birmingham and Manchester. Setting out to 'run Regional Railways like a company', he moved its headquarters from London to Birmingham, split it into five geographical profit centres – one for ScotRail – and recruited finance and planning directors from industry. Chris Gibb, later chief executive of Virgin and ScotRail, says: 'Gordon had been given a lot of railways that didn't make financial sense, and he turned them into something we could be proud of.' Closures – of the Settle & Carlisle line and in Lincolnshire – were still on Whitehall's agenda, but despite having himself pushed through closures in the past, Pettitt held the line against more. Commissioning research that showed the worst lossmakers were rural lines recommended for closure by Beeching in 1963 but reprieved, he concentrated investment on getting commuter traffic off the roads. When BR's workshops put up the price of new electric trains Provincial was expected to buy for Birmingham and Manchester, Pettitt found a private-sector supplier. When the Government vetoed new trains for newly-electrified lines into Leeds and Bradford, he secured redundant units from NSE to plug the gap. Regional Railways increased its income despite the economy going into recession, and opened or reopened 25 stations and three branch lines. Regional Railways operated for just 374 days before Major was re-elected and privatisation came in prospect. By the time Pettitt put his 'congestion-busting' proposals – plus plans to electrify the trans-Pennine route – to the transport minister Roger Freeman, the government's mind was on other things. Pettitt was prepared for the possibility of privatisation, but assumed that Regional Railways would be sold off as a whole. When it became clear this would not happen, he retired. For the next three decades, key figures in the railway industry queued to pick his brain, on a commercial basis or informally. Asked by the Department for Transport for his opinion on the structure of privatisation, Pettitt suggested separating Glasgow commuter services from the rest of ScotRail, but was told that this was politically unacceptable. He worked as railway adviser to the first rail regulator, John Swift QC; contributed to the development of High Speed 1 and the railway to Heathrow Terminal 5; and was involved with French-owned Connex as it bid for franchises. From 2003 to 2006, he served on Network Rail's property advisory board. In 2004, a preserved former South West Trains electric unit was named Gordon Pettitt. He told the naming ceremony at Waterloo station: 'I was bowled over when I was told I would have a train named after me. The unit has been beautifully restored and for the general public it's a piece of history.' It was brought back to Waterloo for his 90th birthday. Since 2014, Pettitt had been president of the Bluebell Railway Preservation Society, having been instrumental in securing the steam railway's reconnection to the main line at East Grinstead. He was at various times president of the Institution of Railway Operators, a governor of Middlesex Polytechnic and a trustee of the Woking Homes and Railway Charities. He is the author (with Nicholas Comfort) of The Regional Railways Story (2015). He was appointed OBE in 1991. Gordon Pettitt married, in 1956, Ursula Hokamp. She survives him, with their three daughters. Gordon Pettitt, born April 12 1934, died March 31 2025 Broaden your horizons with award-winning British journalism. Try The Telegraph free for 1 month with unlimited access to our award-winning website, exclusive app, money-saving offers and more.
