DISTRICT VIEW

摘要

Forecasting is a notoriously unreliable business. You might get four days with the weather. Beyond a week can be difficult in the world of politics. Three years is long term in many businesses. And, as planners have learned, the more one moves away from the relative certainties of population forecasting and households to employment and the economy, the more hazardous things get. Which brings me to the Department of Transport planners who confidently predicted in 2011, after reading the tea leaves, that spending £rjbn by 2026 would create 40,000 jobs.