If you sent me a DM before, tinfoil hat as it might be, I'm not sending my private data to a third party i've never heard of. Email me and I'll sort you out.

I'm on research leave for the first half of 2026. I'd like to use some of that to do some of the reading I'd love to but never have time or head space. I'd love your recommendations of books/papers you think I should be looking at. Cycling/Active Travel especially, but also devolution/local govt.

Unless there's an unbreakably valid safety reason why not, all button-operated pedestrian crossings should activate the lights in pedestrians' favour instantly when pressed.

Someone on reddit summed up the current state of affairs in the UK pretty well if you ask me (which you didn't, but you are here)

The "idaho stop". Interesting... theconversation.com/cyclists-may...

For a while now I've been making so many spelling mistakes that I've been wondering if I'm going mad. It turns out that the youngest child button mashed off the spellcheck in my settings... Not convinced I've fixed it, mind.

The haters said they couldn't do it. And they were right. Honestly, great call from the haters.

That snake was in St Helens. It was ace! My nan and grandad bought me a lego train from that Woolworths.

I've had such a crap commute this morning, that I've written to my MP and Councillor. I'm just a bloke trying to get to work, and I want to go home to my kids at the end of the day. Our road culture is fundamentally broken. cc @liamthorp.bsky.social

Why has copilot appeared on my emails? How do I turn it off? Just go away. I dont want it. It's worse than that paperclip...

Phase 1 (35 out of a total of 150 2,000 word reports) are done. So its time for a little treat.

A big chunk of those replies also makes you want to point out that now, using GPS they can apply speed limits and even geolock e scooters to stop inappropriate behaviour. I've got a car on the drive that can do 120mph if I wanted to...

Someone just shared this with me: 1967, 3,000 publicans marching against introducing breath tests for drivers. Barbara Castle MP got this introduced and speed limits and seatbelts as mInister for transport, and faced the standard opposition.

For example: My ride home now (and i went the long way) was 10 mins quicker than the car and 20 mins quicker than the bus. I got to filter through half a mile of traffic. It was the equivalent of going to the gym so I don't have to do that either. And how much did it cost, Alex? Zero pounds.

We were talking about this at yesterday's @justcentre.bsky.social meeting. I'm more and more convinced that you can (and in some cases, should!) have conversations about transport, energy, homes etc without ever mentioning climate or emissions. The tech is just better, cheaper, more efficient.

After however many years I've realised that the reason these ticket machines are so slow and unresponsive is because im too tall, and despite looking normal from my perspective I'm jabbing the buttons too high...

My first chance to really play with the new IMD 2025 (I made a quick map of Liverpool last night). The bottom 10 most-deprived areas is eye-opening. 7 of the bottom 10 are in Blackpool...

You'll have to excuse me, I'm a...

I might feel like death warmed up. I might have 4 hours of lectures in the next 5 hours. But the river with a stonking tailwind is always nice. I'll take that commute over a drive or even the bus any day of the week.

I suppose if the 5 year old can find the enthusiasm to activelt want ride to school while it's raining I can put on my rain trousers and knuckle down to it...

"The only viable option" An easy logical fallacy to start your week... Have they tried not building a car park at all? www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

I wrote two sets of quarter pages in this and I realise making students do a 2hr exam is a physical task as much as a mental one... *I do legit think exams are an important pedagogical tool and I will die on that hill.

I've been getting back into the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy series after many years, and the most relatable part is how everyday objects like doors and elevators have been imbued with artificial intelligence and it just makes them obnoxious and frustrating to use and everyone hates it.

I got into maiden by picking up random albums I could find in shops when I had cash. I think the 3rd one i found was Virtual XI. A non standard way in... With Spotify we're so lucky there is so much music at our fingertips. But I feel sorry that people can't discover music in that haphazard way.

In Wolverhampton to watch form Maiden vocalist play the X factor in its entirety. It's a deep deep cut. But what a lovely fellow he is.

On my way to Wolverhampton (of which more later). Stopped at the services. In the loo, whilst I was washing my hands not one single bloke washed theirs. Sample size about 6 or 7. Genuinely worrying, and disgusting.

One of the lazy tropes used by men of an older generation to emasculate men of my generation was "he couldn't even put up a set of shelves". Well I can, and I have. So nerr.

Interesting. Our local school kind of fits this bill - it would never be suitable for a 'standard' school street (and I'd never given it serious consideration) but it's ripe for intervention: nuisance street parking, dangerous side streets, air and noise pollution. @andrewmakinson.bsky.social

Nobody ever believes me, but keep the faith on those green tomatoes...

Happy with that

...and so it begins. 4 weeks of wall-to-wall marking. For those of you who don't know me - it's an annual feast.

I'm at an @engageliverpool.com event this evening, and what a venue: the renovated Royal Daffodil, with the docks lit up as part of the river of light.

The story about Rachel Reeves aside, how is posting a picture of the house - her house, ultimately, i presume - on the front page of BBC News alright?

They've changed it back (or at least given the option for an old mode). That says to me that they had a LOT of poor feedback.

One thing that never fails to get under my skin: when a journal requests a review and then gets high and mighty with a super short turnaround. Behaving as if they're doing me a favour rather than hitting me up for free labour. You can fire publons back to where it came too, while we're at it.

An example of where the framing (the image) doesn't correspond to the article/report. It just reports that walks of 15min+ are better - nothing really about suiting and booting to go to the countryside. Just walking to the shops/the park/the train station will do. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

The electoral reform debate moves past good practice and towards survial/self interest with each day that goes by. Even so, I still wouldn't bet any of my own money on it happening any time soon...

I'm trying to contact building control for an inspection (case ongojng). Officer not responding. Generic email acct not responding, and no longer advertised. Everything now online forms which seemingly restart the process. Digital planning which is simultaneously more accessible but somehow worse?

I reckon i built something like this out of lego when I was about 8. Someone clearly never grew out of their 'everything is a football stadium' phase.

Having watched drivers (on two occasions, actually) undertake a funeral procession I'm not surprised by this story. Obviously a big part of this is the diminishing nature of road policing. But also, we're also afraid to flat say to some people: "you're an arsehole" www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

What's happened to the @metoffice.gov.uk website? It's gone from a really functional, really simple design to super basic and all the detail (which is why it was good!) Is now buried.

I'm at that point in my life where I have to spend significant chunks of my life at soft plays for kids birthday parties. Sitting in one place and just watch: you learn plenty about society.

There is inevitably a bit of Baader-Meinhof and nostalgia, but I feel like we're in a period where the limits of the trust we place in the Internet are being reached. Cyber attacks, password/data loss, physical media v streaming, radicalisation. It's not golden. www.bbc.co.uk/news/article...

There are sniffs of it (e.g. from the Guardian) from time to time, but there are now so many instances where it has become so painfully obvious: Your big car is stupid and doesn't fit in the modern city. You shouldn't be allowed to abdicate your problem on to everyone else.

Big news! I might get a real version made so the lads on the club run know what's what...

One the findings of cllr views is they do listen to these consultations. If you can: go. Don't be 'a cyclist'. Be a resident who has views about cycling. If consultation is unrepresentative and at unrepresentative times, I'd also be writing to my councillor. www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

I've been updating my lecture slides for this cycle, and I was about to post how it's wild to me that the last Index of Multiple Deprivation is still 2019. It's not like *anything at all* has happened in the last 6 years to warrant an update. Before I did, I thought I'd better go and check...

This is wild. I've sat on peer review colleges and I would say that maybe 20% of what you see is solid enough you'd happily fund it. It's such a crushing waste of time - especially when you see it metricised as a vehicle to determine "performance". Even submitting is a herculean task...

After a series of community events in Sept/Oct, the JUST Centre has been launched in West Cumbria, Merseyside, Gtr Manchester, West Yorkshire & the North East. Big thanks to all who participated. Looking forward to working together for an inclusive just transition in the UK @justcentre.bsky.social

Yet again, we can't afford to let LLMs become a source of epistemic grounding for society.