Yeah

@jon I like how they don't even consider that railways should connect with other railways. But my favourite detail might be the render showing the viewing platform for the scenic coastline, with the massive concrete viaduct placed exactly at eye level to block as much of the view as possible.

@jon "Neom-informed Loop"

@jon Oh, and "it'll be cheaper than HS2 if we build a viaduct all the way" sounds a lot like "maglev will be cheaper if we put it in a vacuum tube"

@jon TIL there was a long history of tunnel projets between Ireland and Great Britain https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proposed_British_Isles_fixed_sea_link_connections#Proposed_fixed_sea_links_between_Great_Britain_and_Ireland

(… and a 2018 idea by boris johnson of a **bridge** betwean France and Great Britain)

@_nb Yes I am aware. I even made an April Fools joke about it!

@jon Is it more practical (to build, if not to use) if the trains are half the height of a person and the whole thing's made of Lego? Because that's what his pretty pictures seem to show.

@jon he is quoted in Architects Journal as saying, "Maybe I have been too influenced by the Line."

Quite.

@jon Wow, I’ve crayoned ridiculous pie-in-the-sky proposals that make more sense than this.

@jon he was doing a slightly less violent version of what Trump is doing just now. He would produce absurd schemes to dominate the headlines to take attention of way from the unpleasant changes he was making below the radar.
Trump is doing the same to keep attention off Epstein

(By the way, it would be ludicrous to run any kind of fixed connection all the way between England and Northern Ireland when Scotland is so close)

@jon I like how the loop, rather than going at the narrowest point of the North Channel, instead takes a trip to Arran for the lolz.

@thias @jon
1/9th or 1/10th? 5.5m is the population of the state called Ireland, not the island called Ireland.

@jon A perfect send-up of both.

I enjoyed it so much I read it twice.

@samueljohnson Also I had forgotten Arc Uri Ltd providing services to Boris Johnson.

@jon The Irish Sea is clearly the issue here. Let's learn from the Dutch, put some dams across the St George's & North Channels, pump out the water and bingo, problem solved. This even gives the Isle of Man a nice hilltop location from where to waive at the bypassing trains.

@jon I confess I corresponded with the CEO of said enterprise via Twitter. Gondolas on fire off the shoulder of the Isle of Man... Moments lost in time like tears in the rain - - I deleted everything (had to do it twice, they restored it all). She was v much unamused by her former client.

@jon That northern crossing reminds me of an old what-if idea:
What if there was an island SW of the Mull of Kintyre? i.e. so that even the Victorians would at least do serious plans for bridging the gaps.
Then there'd be a connection in the present day - put it'd be *VERY* inconvenient for almost all trips. Freight? sure. Scotland - Ireland, sure. But Liverpool - Dublin? nope.

@jon i don't think it's fair to call RIBA serious

the anglosphere has the worst construction costs in the rich world and they've done nothing to stop it

this kind of rubbish is very on-brand

@tops suspect a generous editor has capitalised that and misunderstood the kind of lines he was influenced by

@jon

@bovine3dom you're right, it's a pull-quote. I believe it represents the spirit of what he said, though - the full text is, "Maybe I have been too influenced by the scale, the vision and the ambition of NEOM the Line in Saudi Arabia, having worked on the high-speed stations running alongside the 170km city for the last few years."

https://www.architectsjournal.co.uk/news/riba-president-proposes-giant-loop-city-spanning-britain-and-ireland

@jon

@tops sorry, i was being mischievous and making a joke about cocaine...