John Paddington

@padders123

Transport technology, Birmingham and some other stuff. Occasional photos of Travel Basil to promote St Basils homeless charity that works with young people in Birmingham.

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John Paddington@padders123· 7h

The project I worked on conducted focus groups with people aged over 65, they're less positive about automated vehicles than younger people, but still fairly positive. (Note this was on automated public transport). www.sinfonica-kme.eu/focus-group-...

Graph from Sinfonica project, showing results of Focus Group in West Midlands: postive mentions and concerns. There's a pattern that younger age groups are more positive and have less conerns, and the older respondents, the less positive mentions and more concerns.

John Paddington@padders123· 19d

Deep fried mozzarella ball from at Italian restaurant in Vilnius. The right level of runny...

Side photo of the ball cut in half. You can see the cheese starting to ooze out.

John Paddington@padders123· Jul 21

I suspect what is going on here, is that the big supermarkets have increasingly switched to pay at pump and the level of theft hasn't really gone up significantly as it's more got concentrated in the smaller sites which don't use that technology.

Talk of how people go in to the station, fill up and then claim they're penniless to refuse to pay

John Paddington@padders123· Jul 21

What about this quote - I get £40,000 is a lot for a small business, especially if on small margins but at the same time, this over six garages over a year. It's roughly £18 a day. Again not a small figure, but this is less than one a day. I suspect most shops have a higher crime rate than that.

Thefts have grown worse since the start of the war in Iran in February. In the first week of July, the station saw three fuel runners, and in June, 12 people drove off without paying. Across his six garages, says Parekh, fuel theft cost him more than £40,000 last year, and predicting who will drive off is becoming impossible.

John Paddington@padders123· Jul 21

The Times suggests £1.2 million a week stolen. Sounds a big number yes and not insignificant. Well yes, but RAC estimates that 3800 million litres of petrol and diesel sold a month. So that means something like £5 billion total revenue. So this means theft is about 0.1% of total sales.

The issue isn’t confined to Parekh’s garages. Petrol stations have seen a 23% rise in fuel theft since the start of the Iran war, with incidents soaring from 9,089 in January and February to 11,170 in March and April, according to Forecourt Eye, a company that collects payments on behalf of about 1,000 garages around the UK. The Times estimates that more than £1.2m of fuel is being stolen from forecourts each week. Gordon Balmer, executive director of the Petrol Retailers Association, a trade body representing forecourts, says “first-time offenders” are becoming more common, with many “trying it on” due to a “combination of rising household costs and a bit of opportunism”.

John Paddington@padders123· Jul 4

And talking of the subway, no point in painting if the steps are in such bad condition that'll you trip over.

Photo of the steps where a lot of the edges have fallen off or inconsistent

John Paddington@padders123· Jul 4

This is actually quite nice but really who wants to sit next to eight lanes of traffic?! Why wasn't this on Ludgate Hill??

Photo of the urban realm with benches and plants but next to the A38

John Paddington@padders123· Jul 4

Such a missed opportunity on Ludgate Hill to create a proper green walking connection between the City Centre and JQ. Does feel the Council has a lack of ambition. (And don't get me started on the paint in the subway being described as an improvement)

Photo of Ludgate Hill with wide road for cars

Photo of the end where it meets the bridge which is not great to cross

John Paddington@padders123· Jun 30

After four years of working in Brussels, finally see the main landmark on Sunday Mini-Europe was fun.

Photo of Atomium from Mini-Europe with a small Eiffel Tower beside it.

John Paddington@padders123· Jun 27

Perhaps the best location map ever?

Photo of a house icon with water all round

John Paddington@padders123· Jun 27

St Pancras Eurostar Lounge has mega fans (as being tested by Travel Basil).

Photo of a large yellow fan with Travel Basil teddy bear in front of it. Fan must be about a meter in diameter.

John Paddington@padders123· Jun 23

Fun Quiz, although I'm slightly disappointed that I got 0% in all rounds. I think it might have been different with some other question wording.

I got 0% on the right wing plot on all categories.

John Paddington@padders123· Jun 12

One of things we really need to avoid is making transport more complicated than it needs to be. Here are the Seatfrog Standard Premium current bid prices from Euston to Birmingham. On train it's £24. Some will save £2 but the bids for 16:40 train are more than on train!

John Paddington@padders123· Jun 8

Brussels leading the way as usual... But also this is what TfWM needs to do in the unopened Digbeth tram section

Photo of a poster for a tram party with a tram with a DJ driving

John Paddington@padders123· May 30

Crowd at New St heading to UK Board Games Expo. Always find it fascinating how there's really big events that have no real news impact.

Photo of the crowd waiting at the platform. There's very little space.

John Paddington@padders123· May 27

I can see this argument for Manchester or other cities with multiple bus operators but for the West Midlands where NX runs the vast majority?

So we are changing that. We have started the process of bringing buses back under public control. We’ll see the first buses move over in 2027. That means we’ll have a system designed around passengers, with clear accountability for performance. It is a real change that people will see and feel in their day-to-day lives. It still takes too long though - two years is frustratingly slow but the legislation is set that way.

John Paddington@padders123· May 25

Inspired by @hpsvanessa.bsky.social earlier, here's my latest Linkedin job suggestion. Never done anything to do with Policing...

Sponsored post from Linkedin for "Chief Constable" recruitment

John Paddington@padders123· May 20

Innovation Workshop at TRA. Some interesting insights about how funding, pension funds can be leveraged for road safety. But also important points about city streets being different to highways.

Photo of slide from presentation. Talking about FIA initiatives SafeForAll & For Life, Road Safety Index and Driver Safety Index.

Another FIA initiative: RoadScor looking at signal timings to improve safety for non motorised road users

Toolkit of financial performance of safer roads www.gib-foundation.org/knowledge-hub

John Paddington@padders123· May 18

So looks like I'm an Eco-Socialist, at least on the short quiz. I suspect in reality I'm a bit more pragmatic than this.

Screen shot of the ratings and me showing as Eco-Socialist

John Paddington@padders123· May 16

Been to see the Stuggart 21st Century station plan museum. Got some thoughts:

View from the tower over the new station

John Paddington@padders123· May 9

Also no cult of marmalade?

John Paddington@padders123· May 9

Possible cross over event...?

Screen shot of the Cat Quest 2 Graphic with a cat and a dog on it.

John Paddington@padders123· May 8

Does feel like a game where people are trying to control certain territories.

Current map of Birmingham election results. Reform mostly in South-West corner, Greens in South, Labour /Indies in centre. Conservatives in Sutton Coldfield and Lib-dems having a small pocket around Yardley Wood

John Paddington@padders123· May 7

Been and done my civic duty

Photo of Travel Basil teddy bear in front of a portacabin with a "Polling Station" sign

John Paddington@padders123· May 7

Agreed, sounds like the £2k cap would be a targeted intervention though and Guardian not explained it properly: www.ippr.org/media-office... Fuel duty, I can see the idea, reduce costs as a reward for efficiency but I can easily see the speed limits not happening.

Introducing a temporary energy price cap at £2,000 - designed to activate only in the most severe scenarios - to limit inflation while maintaining incentives to reduce consumption
Implementing a temporary 10p fuel duty cut to offset rising oil prices
Pairing support with measures to reduce energy demand, including lower speed limits
Funding support through targeted, progressive tax measures, including strengthened windfall taxes on energy profits

John Paddington@padders123· Apr 29

Likely same vibes...

Photo of the alternative ending from the Simpsons for Casablanca

John Paddington@padders123· Apr 20

Also can this be the artefact?

Photo of my Lego Delorean from Back to the future

John Paddington@padders123· Apr 17

Terrible headline from EU, talking about costs of further integration with EU. Even mentions Horizon Europe as a cost, with only a cursory comment that we've got more out than we put in for years. Plus Horizon Europe now includes the likes of Korea, Canada, New Zealand

BBC headline UK seeks closer EU ties in volatile times - but at what cost?

John Paddington@padders123· Apr 11

This doesn't look a good start for a user friendly consultation...

First question on consultation has list of chapters in the consultation document, not very clear at all

John Paddington@padders123· Apr 10

I can probably answer this question myself (lack of joined up thinking with NH and land costs) but why didn't we build a new link to JLR as part of the A4545?