Today I took the Amtrak Acela service from Boston to New York. As trains go, it was very comfortable. The seats were bigger and had more leg room than an equivalent train in the UK. The food on the train was nothing to write home about, but that’s not unusual. The one thing that was very obvious, however, was how terribly slow it was. If they had decent track they could probably shave an hour off that journey. Thankfully the Connecticut coastline is so pretty, especially on such a clear and sunny day, that you don’t care too much how long the journey takes.

When there is a Starbucks in the hotel foyer so that if all you want for breakfast is a bagel and a decent cup of coffee you are not forced to pay $20 in the restaurant for a bagel and bad coffee.

You know that you have become acclimatized to California when…

…you completely forget that in other parts of the world you might need such a thing as an umbrella.

I’ve just seen Kevin off on the train to Sacramento for the holiday weekend. He’s not taking his laptop, so he won’t be able to blog about this, but I’m sure he wants to.

Our local train station, being a mere halt on a long-distance Amtrak line, doesn’t get much attention. The line is single-tracked for much of its length, but there are two platforms here. One of them is much too short for a full train. This tended to slow boarding, so Amtrak have come up with the clever idea of only using only the one platform. Except that sometimes they need to use the double track to allow trains to pass. So in the past you boarded on Platform 1 for San Jose and Platform 2 for Sacramento. Now you always board on Platform 1, except when you don’t. Naturally the notices that tell you this are small and well hidden, and anywhere there are no signs to tell you which platform is which. And the public address system doesn’t say which platform to use. The station is, of course, unstaffed.

The net result of all this is that people end up waiting for trains on the wrong platform. And there is no means of crossing the tracks except at the grade crossing at the end of the platform, which is often blocked by carriages. So what tends to happen is that people who are stood on the wrong platform see the train coming in, figure that they might not be able to get to it, and run across the tracks in front of the oncoming train.

We almost had an incident like that today. Thankfully the people concerned had more sense. Also the train driver saw that they were on the wrong platform and made sure he pulled in as far as he could. Then the conductors (they had two) made sure that the missing passengers had made their way onto the right platform before closing the doors. The line isn’t very busy so the Amtrak staff can take a relaxed attitude to such things. In the UK, of course, anyone on the wrong platform is liable to miss the train, but then we have good signage and announcements.

Silicon.com, an online IT magazine based in the UK, has been campaigning for a reduction in the absurd prices British hotels charge for Internet access. Rather bravely, an IT director in the hotel industry has contributed an article explaining why he thinks hotel wi-fi should not be free. Given that a lot of convention attendees seem to think that free wi-fi is a basic human right that must be provided, at the convention’s expense if necessary, I thought some of you might appreciate a link to this one.

Drivers in the Bay Area have been puzzled to see flocks of goats lining the freeways over the past few days. There have been some notable slowdowns as drivers gawp at what is happening around them. But it is all worth it. Gary Richards, the transit correspondent of the San Jose Mercury News, explains:

It would take Caltrans two months, perhaps, to cut the vegetation in this area with a crew of a dozen. Anywhere from 300 to 600 goats can do the same work in a week-plus, and they eat everything — poison ivy and berry vines included — for around $700 an acre.

And, unlike human laborers, the goats don’t leave any debris that needs to be hauled away.

At this time of year, vegetation by the roadside is a serious fire risk. I’m very impressed that the State Government can come up with such innovative solutions to their problems.

London is Europe’s most expensive city for wi-fi access from hotels. Some are charging as much as $40/hr. On the other hand, there are good deals to be had if you look for them. A little consumer pressure is always useful.

The list of things for which people in the UK think I’m morally degenerate keeps getting longer. The latest addition is, of course, because I use air travel. Personally I suspect that Bliar’s sudden devotion to the idea of punitive taxes on short-haul airlines has as much to do with the fuss that RyanAir kicked up over the recent security fiasco as it does to commitment to green principles, but the general point is good. Air travel does emit a lot of CO2.

In my defense I’d like to point out I don’t own a car, and I work from home, so for considerably more than half the days of the year I don’t use motorized transport of any sort. I therefore suspect that my carbon footprint is rather smaller than a lot of other people’s. But that, of course, is no excuse. As far as the media is concerned, people who use air transport are now on the same level as people who eat babies. And as I said, the point is a good one. What I’m wondering is, what the heck can I do about it?
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Today’s Guardian has an article about restrictions on liquids in aircraft being “lifted”, but what the article says is far from clear. It talks about a new EU initiative that will allow up to 100ml bottles of liquid on board if they are carried in a transparent bag, but within Europe it has always be OK to carry liquids if they are purchased airside. Is that now to be stopped? A typical bottle of water is around 500ml, after all. And how does the transparent bag rule relate to the “one carry-on bag only” rule? We also learn that it is now OK to take liquids purchased airside on board flights leaving the US, but apparently not on flights to the US. Confused? You will be.

To make matters worse, the article mentions a recent survey finding that 90% of people believe the new security measures have made air travel safer (which just goes to show how little most people know about making bombs) and that a similar number would be happy to see iris photography and fingerprinting introduced here. So all of you Brits who are refusing to travel to the US because you don’t want to be fingerprinted…

According to The Guardian we’ll be able to take normal-sized hand luggage on board planes as of tomorrow. There’s no word on dangerous terrorist lipsticks, and apparently bottles of water are still banned, even if you buy them airside.

Update: Email from BAA confirms that “solid” cosmetics will be allowed on board. I think that includes deadly terrorist lipsticks.

I see from the BBC that Virgin Atlantic has joined a growing list of airlines that are banning the use of Dell and Apple laptops by battery power while in flight. I have, of course, checked my battery, and it isn’t on the danger list. Indeed, it is made in Korea, so it comes from an entirely different factory to the recall stock. However, I can quite understand that airlines fear many passengers won’t bother to check what batteries they have. And hard-pressed airline security staff can’t be expected to check battery serial numbers against the danger list. Knowing how some passengers behave, they’ll probably soon be impounding the batteries at the gate to make sure people don’t slip them back in once they have boarded.

It would, of course, be good if airlines offered in-seat power points for more than just first and business-class travelers, but that would mean upgrading aircraft and they are short enough of cash as it is. And the inevitable result of all these security measures is that fewer and fewer people will fly, and flying will become more and more expensive. -sigh-