Nobody takes a flight from London to Manchester. So why would we take HS2?

From Edinburgh airport there are more than 45 flights a day to London. And, I imagine, the same number back. You can fly from Edinburgh to London Heathrow, -London Gatwick, London Luton, -London Stansted and London City — even to the optimistically named -London Southend. Glasgow offers a similar choice.

I have often used these flights. I live about 25 minutes’ drive from Gatwick, so when I go to Edinburgh my -favourite plan is to take a morning train up and then fly or take the sleeper back.

Since Manchester is bigger than Edinburgh, I had naively assumed that I would be able to do something similar for an upcoming trip there.

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Rupert Darwall

Labour has walked into a net-zero trap of its own making

I decided to fly from Gatwick and take the train back. ‘You can’t. There aren’t any flights from Gatwick to Manchester any more.’