Quote:
Originally Posted by Chris
You see the kerfuffle all the well-heeled landowners and villagers are making, just because HS2 is passing within half a mile of their homes? You can multiply that by a hundred if the British government attempted to use the same methods the French do when they want to bulldoze their latest grand projet through the countryside. There are good reasons why major civil engineering projects move more slowly and cost more money in the UK, and on the whole, I think our restrictions on the State's ability to confiscate land and act regardless of local concerns is worth it.
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I don't. I counter with the example here in Aberdeen where the city bypass, which is almost unanimously supported across the city and would benefit hundreds of thousands, has been held up for the better part of a decade because of one selfish prick who doesn't want it near his back yard.
Meanwhile we continue to suffer noise, pollution, traffic, and a number of people have died from fatal road accidents due to the volume of trucks ploughing through residential parts of the city.
Sure, the argument for broadband or high speed rail improving or saving lives is somewhat harder to make but the government needs
stronger powers to confiscate land IMO.