From an interrogation at the Russian border to an anti-war lecture in Moscow and a power cut in wartime Mykolaiv, Peter Emerson travels through Putin’s Russia and into Ukraine. Along the way he asks why binary referendums, the “matryoshka” votes of Crimea, Bosnia and the Donbas, so often end in bloodshed, and what that means for Northern Ireland’s border poll.
At 82, on a folding Brompton, Peter Emerson cycles through rural Yúnnán and Guǎngxī to see how Chinese villages make decisions. There’s báijiǔ with farmers, a granny’s 70th birthday lunch, and a stop short of Tibet. He finds that China, like almost everyone else, swears by majority rule, though it held a three-option vote back in 1197.
For two decades, the Department for Infrastructure (DfI) published unchallenged plans regarding its Active Travel strategies. Like Tyrell Biggs’ pre-fight plan to defeat Mike Tyson, their plans eventually met reality on September 29, 2025. In 1987 Tyrell Biggs said he had a plan to beat Mike Tyson. Tyson famously responded, “everyone has a plan until they get a punch in the face” and then proceeded to punch Biggs repeatedly in the face until his plan fell apart. The Department for …
The Department for Infrastructure produced their Bicycle Strategy 10 years ago. It promised a revolution in transport. It’s delivered nothing. It now feels like a rather large bounced cheque – some people are angry and want their investment back. Government policy and strategy documents are like cheques – promissory notes given to the public, promising to deliver something of value at specified point in the near future. A minister signs-off the document giving it credibility and pledges to honour it …
Recently, to great fanfare, the Irish government announced an €800m funding package in support of its Shared Island strategy aimed at funding public spending on projects in Northern Ireland. The lion’s share of the spend is on the A5 project, and that, together with Casement, is where most of the media attention went. However, there is also an allocation aimed at increasing the frequency of cross border rail services. Before looking at this in detail we should talk a little …
A recent job change, for me, led to a minor conundrum associated with the loss of a free city centre parking space. I could either continue to drive to work and pay for all day parking (£7 is the lowest price I’m aware of) or I could use the bus. I opted for the bus. The Antrim Road area, where I live, is quite well served by the Metro 1 route. Using the “Belfast Bus Tracker” third party app (App …
Once upon a long ago – I think way back in the 1990s – I looked at the fares from Belfast Central to every station on the network. In those days, the Great Northern branch line from Knockmore to Antrim was still open, and I found a few surprises. Chiefly, that Bangor, 13 miles from Belfast Central, had the same fare as Whitehead (15 miles away) and Crumlin (a lot further). Granted, Crumlin had an unusual fare because the fare …
Derry and Donegal are not only marginalised by their geographic position on the periphery of the island of Ireland, but they are also very badly served by the transport infrastructure. They are not alone in this: there are similar complaints from Sligo, Fermanagh and elsewhere in the West. After a long campaign, parts of the A6 road between Derry and Belfast have been upgraded – though it is still not a dual carriageway between Dungiven and Castledawson. It was back …
Only the most devoted conspiracy theorist could deny climate change given the devastating events of recent weeks. Spring was marked by deadly fires in Canada, terrible floods in Northern Italy and even an unfamiliar heatwave in Northern Ireland. Now things have got even more deadly, with awful new fire outbreaks in Greece, Italy Algeria and Tunisia. And a severe worsening of ice melting in the Antarctic. Meanwhile, the drought and loss of agricultural land in the Horn of Africa is …
Yes, I’m cynical. You can’t entirely blame me. There is some great stuff in the All-Island Rail Review, published on Tuesday, including some blue sky thinking. The summary, with my annotations, is below. Short term and decarbonisation Electrify remainder of Belfast-Dublin line, Belfast-Bangor, Dublin-Cork/Galway/Limerick/Waterford (both companies were already working on plans to abolish diesel traction, but NIR I think also intends to electrify the Larne, Portrush and Derry/Londonderry (hereafter referred to as Derry) lines) Increase line speeed to 100mph (currently …
North of Porto, on the Caminho da Costa, the boardwalk creaks and sways to the slap of September feet as we gather each other up like strays into the community of the Road. Gerry from Dublin, ‘Just had to get back.’ His Camino Frances, two years ago, ‘was full of special people and places.’ He finds it strange that, as a member of the Irish Humanist Society, he’s drawn to the Camino. ‘I suppose religion is still lodged in us somewhere.’ He …
Close now to places I walked through last year. A glimpse of riverside willows racing past the car’s window, then the Puente Santa Maria. A year gone in a flash, like the swallows skimming the road ahead. Too soon they’ll leave, towing the dreams of summer south. Time speeding up even as it counts down. Summers’ shortening, gone like the bluebirds. Leaving us with our Celtic quandary – that of souls riven by a deep love of home and yet …
Having recovered from being effectively a no-go area for tourists for the best part of three decades Northern Ireland now has much to offer the discerning visitor. Although I seem to be one of the few people on the planet who have never seen Game Of Thrones, the show seems to have worked wonders for the local tourist industry now that places like the Dark Hedges and the Giants Causeway have become popular must-see destinations. There are of course the …
So where are you off to on your holidays? Given the massive price increases of hotels and flights, the answer might be your back garden. We were away the other week in the Hodson Bay Hotel in Athlone. It was a nice trip, just not sure it was €300 per night nice which is the price you will pay for one room for 2 adults and 1 child during the summer. I thought it was just a case of price …
The moment we met I knew that God and Allah shared a single light First impressions count and a moment of beauty can remain in the memory, to be shared and enjoyed forever. This moment for me came during my first visit to Oman a few years ago when I arrived into the country at nightfall and en route to my hotel encountered the breathtaking Mohammed Al Ameen Mosque, majestically overseeing the capital city of Muscat. It was not long …
I was dandering through Charles Hurst the other week when my eye was drawn to a Smart ForTwo for sale. It was 6 years old but it was on sale for nearly 10 grand! Turns out those Smart Cars are over 20k new, who knew? I quite liked the original Smart Car concept but the revamped model divides opinion shall we say. They get very average reviews and you can buy a Polo from 15k or the Kia Picanto from …
The Belfast Telegraph reports on the boost to NI Tourism by increasing visitors from the South: Tourism NI said it had found major growth in expenditure after analysing cardholder spend by people visiting from over the border. During June to September, total tourism spend by southerners was up 151% on the same time in 2019, while hotel spending using cards was up by the same level. And spending by southern visitors in bars and taverns had tripled, Tourism NI said, …
Anyone familiar with the Black Mountain and Cave Hill walking trails will know that the city of Belfast is cut off from urban sprawl to its immediate west and north west. This does not mean that the communities at either side of these hills are cut off from one another. To the contrary in fact, the greater Belfast commuter belt takes in the communities from these hills to Lough Neagh in an increasingly service driven economy where Belfast has become …
The Irish National Development Plan is a long document, and I have had little time to do more than skim it, but the key headline spotted by Jonny McCambridge and noted by Mick, one of the concrete proposals in the plan, is the replacement for the Belfast-Dublin Enterprise service by 2027. The branded Enterprise service was introduced by the Great Northern Railway in 1947, and at one time was extended to Cork. NIR relaunched its side of the service in …
As the Chief Executive of the Belfast Chamber of Commerce, it is Simon Hamilton’s job to fight for the success of Belfast City Centre. In an article for the Belfast Telegraph, he warned that working from home could turn central Belfast into a ghost town. For those of us who grew up during the troubles, this was the default state of the city centre for decades. Great coverage in today’s @BelTel of @BelfastChamber’s ‘Returning to the Office’ survey. The findings …
