The optimistic tone of NLA’s 2013 infrastructure exhibition ‘Planes, Drains and Trains’ was in stark contrast to Sadiq Khan’s forlorn announcement this week that he could not fund signalling improvements to the Piccadilly Line or repairs to Hammersmith Bridge unless he received more funding from central Government.

 

The exhibition and catalogue quoted then Mayor, Boris Johnson, saying that over 10 million people relied on London’s transport system to go about their daily lives and international businesses based themselves in capital knowing they can rely on London’s infrastructure. 

 

“That is why so much money is currently being invested in London’s infrastructure,” ran the text “on magnificent projects like Crossrail and the many station upgrades, and why so much investment is being planned for new transport links, sewage systems and possibly a new airport for London. Vast swathes of the capital including Stratford and King’s Cross are benefitting enormously from the regeneration that improved transport links can deliver.”

         

We wrote that we must not rest on the laurels of Crossrail but commit now to Crossrail 2 if we were to cope with the increases in the city’s population and associated pressures. We aimed to highlight the wealth of activity taking place at that moment in London. The range and scope of infrastructure development, spurred in part by hosting the 2012 Olympic Games, was on a scale that had rarely been seen before, and was being compared by some commentators to the achievements of the Victorians.

 

The Government had declared its commitment to kick-starting major schemes across the nation to boost economic activity which was still suffering from the financial crisis of 2007/8. Over 30 mega infrastructure projects, some of them in London, were being closely monitored by a Cabinet committee to ensure they were delivered as speedily as possible.

 

The parlous state of the public finances did not allow Government to fund all these schemes itself, so money needed to be injected by the private sector, and much discussion was taking place over how best to marry the interests and resources of Government, developers and utilities companies. New hybrid financial models were emerging, and the cross-fertilisation of cash achieved on Crossrail 1 and the Northern Line extension at Battersea gave hope that the barriers to new investment were not insuperable.

 

“It is then a question of how quickly the chosen projects can navigate their way through Britain’s notoriously dilatory planning regime” we said, omitting to mention the hurdle of Government decision-making which means that  neither Crossrail 2 nor the expansion of London’s airport capacity seem any closer to being agreed than they did in 2013 when our exhibition opened.