CIBA Freight, which is based in Southall, west London, imports fruit and vegetables from Africa. It employs 22 people and has an annual turnover of between £3m and £4m.. This week, part of the Avenue des Champs-Elys? will be converted into a railway station. Tracks are already being laid in its lower section and the first trains – including a British-designed 160 year-old steam locomotive – will be shunted into place tomorrow. Cars will be banned and a diesel train will give free rides along rails laid temporarily for almost a mile from the Place de la Concorde to the Avenue George V.The Train-Capitale exhibition is intended as a statement of France’s faith in the future of railways and has been designed by Gad Weil.

In addition to the exhibits, there will also be model railways, free showings of classic movies with railway themes and trade stands on developments in railway technology.One of the stars of the show will be the Buddicom St Pierre, built in 1844, the oldest surviving French railway locomotive. The locomotive, designed by a British engineer, William Barber Buddicom, once hauled expresses from Paris Gare St Lazare to Rouen and Le Havre at the startling speed of 40mph.Other exhibits include the SNCF electric locomotive BB9004, which took the world speed record for rail to over 200mph in 1953, and new generations of the trains ?rande vitesse (TGV), which have transformed French railways with cruising speeds of around 180mph in the last 22 years.Louis Gallois, president of the SNCF, said that the exhibition was an “expression of confidence in the future of the train.. and its capacity to re-invent itself” It is also a useful political statement. The centre-right government in France has made clear its preference for road schemes and called into question plans for further TGV lines to the south-west, to Brittany and under the Alps into Italy.The autonomous French state planning body called last week for future transport spending to be concentrated on railways and waterways.. When it comes to Jackson Square, in the heart of the historic French Quarter, there seem to be no limits to the controversial ambitions of city councilwoman Jacquelyn Brechtel Clarkson. Since taking office she has waged a war on loiterers, drunks and scam artists who might impinge on the square’s Disneyesque perfection. Neighbourhood activists said she was trying to stop the homeless sleeping on them. When the benches returned, clean and painted, they had metal dividers to prevent anyone lying down.Now Ms Clarkson wants to clear Jackson Square of unlicensed “psychic readers” and street performers who – complain the 200 open-air artists who have permits to work in the district – are crowding them out.

Last week she persuaded her colleagues to give the artists exclusive rights to work the perimeter of Jackson Square, through which millions of tourists pass every year; the tarot readers and entertainers are going to court.Next on her agenda is a proposal to limit French Quarter tours to 28 people at a time, and to get tour groups off the street by 10pm – which could make life difficult for the ghost and voodoo tours. What is happening to the quarter’s raffish reputation?The killer Sars virus, war in Iraq, economic gloom – it’s not all bad. Crowds at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival, which ends tonight, are the smallest they have been for 10 years.This meant I was able to get up close to the likes of Sonny Landreth, the Louisiana slide guitar legend. And there were shorter queues at the food tents – themselves an attraction, with alligator sausage and 27 different ways to eat crawfish.

I went for the Crawfish Monica, a kind of seafood macaroni cheese.The only real controversy this year was the booking of LL Cool J. “What jazz, what heritage?” was the general disgruntled outcry.. The most bizarre event in the poultry calendar is held this month, when a small American town holds its annual festival to celebrate its most famous son: a rooster called Mike that lived for 18 months after its head was cut off. His eye lighted upon a plump, young rooster, he grabbed it by the neck, reached for his axe, and, he thought, despatched it with one blow But Mike had other ideas. He walked carefully around the yard, attempting to peck for food and preened his feathers. The next day Mr Olsen found Mike asleep with his head under his wing. Intrigued, he fed him using an eyedropper.After a week Mr Olsen took him (plus his head) to the University of Utah in Salt Lake City.