American train travel has a reputation for being a bit of a joke, and it’s certainly not without its problems. …

Clear the mentions, this one’s going to get a lot of letters. Flags are a fascinating piece of design lore — at once attempting to be ancient pieces of heraldry and to signify the quintessentially modern notion of the sovereign nation state. I drew up some fairly arbitrary rules for…

This one has been coming down the tracks as reliably as a Japanese bullet train. …

Ah, think tanks. Refuges for failed politicians, failed politicians’ advisers, and sockpuppets for partisan interest groups. Sometimes a few of them produce interesting research, too. If you’re not familiar (although if I know my audience, you oh so definitely are) a think tank is a fairly catch-all term for an…

This wasn’t the most original idea for what is rapidly snowballing into a regular feature, but sometimes the most straightforward concepts are the good ones. Britain’s public transport is a glorious patchwork of different modes and providers, and as a result throws up a wide range of system logos from…

I’m firmly of the view that if you want to get to experience a place, even when on holiday, it’s worth placing yourself for a short while in the role not of visitor but of a resident. …

As the focal point of nostalgia marches relentlessly on, it was inevitable we would move from pixelated 2D graphics reminiscent of the SNES or Mega Drive to the look and feel of the early 3D consoles. The upsurge in that style has tended to make itself felt in the 2.5D…

Alright, time for the difficult third album. …

The humble local council. Recipient for every half-informed beef of the British busybody, from potholes to bin collections to tree-felling. But they do some more noble tasks, too — providing housing, social care and public services like libraries for millions of people. These quite disparate functions need a banner under…