FOR the next 10 days one Merseyrail train will have a 100 per cent time-keeping record ... it's not going anywhere.

The train now standing at Pacific Road business Park is a mock-up of one of the new super duper Swiss made trains made by Stadler which will arrive on our Wirral tracks (leaves on the line allowing) in 2020.

Before then they will have had to have a TOT - that's a train version of the MOT and like one of its forefathers, Stephenson's Rocket (currently on display in Manchester), will have trial runs hopefully with better results.

Being a seven-day-a-week, 52-weeks-a-year commuter I took the 'open invite sneak peek' to see one in the metallic flesh. An appetite whetter.

So, wearing my critic's hat, I went aboard and can say it will mean easier access from the platforms for travellers and, especially, disabled people.

There is more space for sure, but I was curious about the number of flip-up chairs - no doubt these will be called upon during rush-hours for inevitable standing room only journeys.

I was relieved to see there were no straps hanging from the carriage ceilings.

I had enough of them when I was a London Tube traveller in the '90s.

That said, to this day I can read a newspaper with one hand.

Thankfully, the new trains will be air-conditioned and there are phone power points, bike racks and for those lucky to 'baggsy' a window seat - spaces to hold your morning get-up-and-go cup of tea, coffee or smoothie.

Happily, there will be a second member of staff on board – a customer liaison officer - but I am intrigued as to how they will be able to contact the driver in their state-of-the-art cabins if there is an incident.

These admirable design features have been done with input and guidance of Liverpool City Region residents and rail networkers.

'We listened' the Merseyrail and Merseytravel bosses say.

I hope they keep listening and take on board the views and comments of the people who matter - the commuters when the 'mock up viewing' moves to Lime Street in November.

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WELCOME to the Festival of Cones - 2,000 of these road safety icons will grace New Brighton to ensure we can all glimpse the last visit of the Giants.

I have enjoyed previous visits by these puppets but, without sounding like Granty the Grouch, I would have preferred the money spent on this visit to have been used on home-grown talent.

The pool of creative artists in the Liverpool City Region is immense, so why go outside?

Merseyside is itself a 'giant' when it comes to art and culture.

I hope everyone who sets out (be early folks) to see the Giants will be left with inspiring, imaginative footprints.

But for the next big thing can we put out a call for local talent to shine with an ambitious attraction of our own Why import imagination?

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SILLY Mayor or forward-looking one?

The head honcho of that wonderful touristy place Venice isn't keen on ... tourists.

Mama Mia!

What is wrong with the harsh mayor Luigi Brugnaro?

His Italian job is getting harder keeping his 290,000 residents happy while coping with a gondola-loving 27 million visitors a year.

He is not happy with the excessive noise and those creative types sitting down in the street and producing art without a license.

People are not respecting the urban decorum.

Time, me thinks, for someone to compose a new opera ... Dearth in Venice.

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SMART Alex ...

The Inferno says good luck to Wirral wannabee Alex Finn ... the 21-year-old who makes his debut, tonight, in the new series of The Apprentice.

It is 16 to 1 odds for Alex the IT analyst with what he describes his 'gift of the gab.' 

Judging by the team photo shoot for the new series, the designer-dressed candidates wouldn't look out of place on Love Island.

But I think telly bosses are missing a trick.

Here's an idea for a 'spy-on-the-wall' reality show.

Mi5 is offering 11-week-long, paid internships at its London HQ, to help thwart terrorism while immersing themselves in the global news agenda.

One criteria is that successful interns don't tell their partners what they are up to.

Even Bond couldn't manage that.

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AND finally ...

Tomorrow is National Poetry Day and we have been told that memorising a poem is good for our well-being.

So I have learned this ode from Merseypoet Brian Pattens' latest Book of Upside Down Thinking.

Called Vanity, it reminds me of Boris Johnson currently starring in Carry On Conference in Birmingham where he is on a profile-boosting, Brexit de-railing mission.

"When I broke the mirror I bought a new one I didn't like what I saw so I took it back to the shop and asked for one like the one I'd bought some years before." 

Peter Grant