And then there were seven 👀 When I first spoke to @joshih.bsky.social in 2020, he'd just launched The Mill and was thinking of setting something up in Liverpool. Less than six years later, today we're launching our seventh title in Leeds (@leedsnewlocalpaper.bsky.social). Sign up 👉 leeds.ghost.io

At long last, we’re launching in Leeds! Ever since I started The Mill, people have asked us to create a publication across the Pennines. If 500 people pledge to become members, we’re going to hire two journalists and do it. Please share with Leeds friends. leeds.ghost.io

Fantastic piece in the @FT on London's poor record of building the homes it desperately needs. I added in another major global city* in the UK which seemed to have slipped out of the data during production 😉 giftarticle.ft.com/giftarticle/...

Really good discussion this. Sounds like an excellent issue for Andy Burnham to take up on the Lovelace Labs, and Tracy Brabin for the National Data Library to Leeds. Probably much easier for govt to deliver - and quicker - than a tram.

I did a podcast about why the Lovelace Labs should be in Manchester. And other varied ramblings including National Data Library, AI Action Plan, and why Leeds wool matters. youtu.be/WQnWrJlIQRQ?...

In the absence of the list being published, is anyone I know on the National Data Library Expert Advisory Group? Or know anyone who is?

"Welcome to Decline" -- still one of my favourite graphs from last year. In the late 1970s, Britain's economic fate very clearly split in two. How much you blame Thatcher will depend on your politics, but her leadership is useful to understand the timing. tomforth.co.uk/welcometodec...

Answers to the nine most common questions I get about the (now delayed) Leeds tram. tomforth.co.uk/tramquestions/

Though ENICs are a non-starter in current context; I'd go for a local income tax. Picked it up from this @tomforth.co.uk oped. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Most Yimby, abundance style stuff just brushes away or ignores real world trade-offs. I have to say though, this one on tram financing and management is compelling. Would involve a big shift in power and resources to the local level- including local taxation. www.britainremade.co.uk/backontrack

When the Manchester Guardian calls, the people of the North heed the call. And if those people are me, we inject Manchester Liberalism, even from across the Pennines, right back in to the paper of Northern record. Get your fill. www.theguardian.com/commentisfre...

Welcome To Decline. I constructed a historical dataset of economic growth in "The North" and "The South" of Britain and used it to show that Thatcher DID put The South on a course for convergence with the USA. 👍 And put The North on the opposite path. 👎 tomforth.co.uk/welcometodec...

Welcome To Decline. I constructed a historical dataset of economic growth in "The North" and "The South" of Britain and used it to show that Thatcher DID put The South on a course for convergence with the USA. 👍 And put The North on the opposite path. 👎 tomforth.co.uk/welcometodec...

Good morning good people. I'm on BBC Radio Leeds shortly to talk about whether the Leeds Tram has been cancelled. The kind of question that local radio doesn't typically dedicate a morning to unless the answer is pretty close to Yes. Which it is.

In fact the concentration of R&D in universities is a relatively recent development, beginning in the 1980s and accelerating in the Blair governments

this is not behavior becoming of a FIFA Peace Prize recipient.

I went to a dinner with the AI Minister and I read a paper on Lovelace Institue --- a proposal from Tony Blair's Institute on how we could fund breakthrough science better. And I wrote that all up into one incoherent mess for you to enjoy. tomforth.co.uk/nationalpurp...

Self-driving cars and why I think they might fix England's unusually weak second city economies. tomforth.co.uk/selfdrivingc...

One of my favourite podcast chats to date so far, with @tomforth.co.uk on the north-south divide. Turns out reason for the North’s poor productivity isn’t a centralised political culture causing low transport, investment, it’s because they’re drunks... www.freewheeling.info/the-freewhee...

I did a podcast episode seemingly. About the North South divide and its interaction with transport. With @freewheeling.info. So what better way for me to listen to it for the first time than on a slow train back to Leeds from Rotherham. Which is what I'll do right now.

London is a great city. It didn't invent the steam locomotive or start the industrial revolution. That's fine. Its fans shouldn't claim it did. I wrote about that. tomforth.co.uk/greatestcity...

What to see how I turned thousands of live buses into charts like this? And what it all means for mayors wanting to integrate their public transport systems? Come to see me talk about all this and more to our event at 1pm: www.centreforcities.org/event/report...

"Evil or Irrelevant: pick one." > I wrote up why I'd usually prefer to have an 'evil' company succeeding in Leeds than a good one succeeding in London. (But really it's about Stoke-on-Trent). tomforth.co.uk/evilorirrele...

Also includes a graph, for I am known for such things, on how Almere, the Netherlands' most successful new city has overtaken Lelystad, the Netherlands' most mocked new city in population since they were built on land reclaimed from the sea.

Includes a map I drew (actually traced) by hand (well in Inkscape) and styled myself (actually got Luke to help me). But it's a good map. I tried to get ChatGPT to draw it for me, but it was rubbish. So I did it with humans.

I've written about the worst city in the Netherlands. It's just 3000 words. A quick read. What Lelystad teaches us about new cities, why you probably shouldn't build them, what to do if you must,... and why you might need to. ps. Lelystad is actually good. tomforth.co.uk/newcities/

I've written about the worst city in the Netherlands. It's just 3000 words. A quick read. What Lelystad teaches us about new cities, why you probably shouldn't build them, what to do if you must,... and why you might need to. ps. Lelystad is actually good. tomforth.co.uk/newcities/

You will learn more about the ongoing furore over asylum seekers in hotels from this incredible piece by @jenwilliamsft.bsky.social than from a hundred front page headlines.

By default, the tool includes a dozen example networks to give an idea of how it works. Take a look at for example: France railmapper.net/project/fran... US northeast railmapper.net/project/nort... Indonesia railmapper.net/project/indo... India railmapper.net/project/indi...

I built a web tool so anyone can design and evaluate ridership and costs of high speed rail networks anywhere in the world: railmapper.net

One of the reasons I'm cautiously positive about Reform's rise is that messages like this will reach different people and be believed by more people when Reform say it. And they have been saying it a lot, all over the UK, on many issues, since they gained power. www.bbc.com/news/article...

So THIS is what central government was using all these years whenever Leeds called asking for a metro system

Milwaukee & Chicago are a similar sized pair of cities a similar distance apart to Leeds & Manchester. The trains are half as frequent, but frequency doesn't seem to matter nearly as much as the trains being bigger, nicer, and cheaper. So US ridership is over twice as high. tomforth.co.uk/traindata/

In most of the world, bigger cities have stronger economies. It happens in France, the USA, the Netherlands, Belgium, and on, and on. But not in Britain. In Britain, the bigger a city gets the weaker its economy is, except for London. This costs us dearly.

In most of the world, bigger cities have stronger economies. It happens in France, the USA, the Netherlands, Belgium, and on, and on. But not in Britain. In Britain, the bigger a city gets the weaker its economy is, except for London. This costs us dearly.

Really pleased to see JP go for this. Behind the scenes he's got so much done to increase growth and accelerate devolution for North England. Consistently more right and more polite than me. A bit less gobby, but we can work on that.

I think it's more useful to think about productivity than wealth. And yes, very much a UK second city problem, as this plot I've pinched from @tomforth.co.uk makes clear

Is Manchester really turning into London? No. London is a very unequal city, but Manchester is both more equal than London, & significantly poorer. A plot comparing spatial inequalities in household incomes (after housing costs) in GM and London (inspired by an earlier version by @tomforth.co.uk)

Wrote a paper. Read the paper. Seems okay. You can read it too. The pub is now much fuller than my reading on X. niesr.ac.uk/publications...

How do we get great graduates into great jobs more quickly? We're trying a new thing at The Data City to make that happen. It might work, it might not. I guess we'll find out in 8 weeks when our first ever data science fellowship completes. Let's see. github.com/TheDataCity/...

Unsurprisingly the panel will not feature me, because I will not be there. Which probably means it will be even better and you should go!

Big thanks to @jamesomalley.co.uk and ‪@mjrobbins.com‬ for somehow editing our conversation about a National Data Library (datalibrary.uk) into something that makes me sound quite coherent and considered. I start chatting at 45 minutes if HS2 makes you too sad. www.abundancepod.com/p/why-hs2-is...

So I wrote a thing. Here is the gist. My provocation was a bit of heresy aimed at my own tribe of decent, evidence-driven, apolitical policy wonks who quite sensibly worship at the altar of the arms-length institution, the predictable rule, politics-free decisions and so on ... 1/

@jacktindale.bsky.social thinking of u.

us government went from telling miners “learn to code” to telling coders “learn to mine” in less than ten years

I read the new @labourtogether.bsky.social report --- Nation Rebalanced --- and I thought it was excellent. You can read it too, starting here. The foreword is a bit partisan, but the main report is much more,..... 😎,..... balanced. www.labourtogether.uk/all-reports/...

We're getting on with building The National Data Library here in Leeds. We've had huge interest and support from the private and public sector and it's growing fast. Learn more and join in! datalibrary.uk