U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson this month endorsed a new high-speed rail line between London and the north of England. As a tale of the temptations facing a politician urgently trying to boost the economy, it doesn’t get more cautionary than this.
High Speed 2, or HS2, will augment Britain’s first bullet train that now runs between London and the Channel Tunnel. The new one will connect London to Birmingham, Manchester and Leeds in the English midlands, promising to deliver train speeds of up to 250 miles per hour and reducing…
