Archive for the ‘London’ Category
November 20, 2009
TfL is running a poster campaign as part of its Art on the Underground initiative. It consists of a series of quotes which, according to the website, “provoke thought on life in the city”.
One of these is a quote from Gandhi, which I’ve seen proudly displayed at various points along my commute to work. It reads
“THERE IS MORE TO LIFE THAN INCREASING ITS SPEED”
As I spilled off my overcrowded Jubilee Line train after waiting an unfathomably long time at London Bridge, and squeezed my way on to the Central Line only to spend five minutes sitting in a tunnel, it occured to me that the expression of this particular sentiment is rather brazen on TfL’s part. I am very well-behaved and couldn’t possibly consider breaking the law myself, but I hereby offer £20 cash money to the first person to send me photographic evidence that they have found one of these posters and added the line
“ON THE OTHER HAND, IT WOULDN’T BE A BAD PLACE TO START”
Tags:London, TfL
Posted in London, Public transport | Leave a Comment »
August 5, 2009
I can perceive intellectually that lilies are attractive; I just can’t bring myself to believe it in my heart. The problem is one of association. Just as meeting a lovely Nigel can convince you that it’s a nice name when it plainly isn’t, lilies’ ability to give me an instantaneous, powerful and lasting headache prevents me from appreciating their aesthetic charms.
That this is a minority opinion is borne out by the two – two! – women who separately got on to my train this evening carrying large bunches of lilies. The first landed at the other end of the carriage, but the second came and sat next to me. The journey only takes ten minutes, but I knew that was long enough, so I got up and perched myself close to the door, breathing fresh air for as long as I possibly could before it slid shut.
I felt a bit bad for the woman. I wanted to explain, but my bad feeling for the woman was trumped by my wish not to have people thinking I was a madwoman on a crowded commuter train.
Fortunately, as I was leaving the train I caught a potent whiff of essence of male armpit, which put all thoughts of lilies – which put, in fact, all thoughts – immediately out of my mind.
Posted in Flowers, London | 1 Comment »
May 27, 2009
When I said
Paris does human-scale street life better than any city I can think of off the top of my head, with the possible exception of Beijing.
What I really meant was
Not including London, Paris does human-scale street life…etc etc.
London is bigger, so there are more places where it doesn’t happen, but when it does, it’s as good as anywhere else’s. I was reminded of this yesterday coming through Brixton Market, which is still the most interesting place I know in London.
Tags:Brixton, London, Paris
Posted in Architecture and design, London, Other cities | Leave a Comment »
March 3, 2009
I forgot to mention an inadvertent bit of tourism which I did on the way to Norfolk: at Stratford station we spotted what can only have been the 2012 Olympic village. It’s in the very early stages of being built, but the scale of it is awesome already. If you can find an excuse for going to Stratford, go there sooner rather than later.
Tags:2012, London Olympics, stratford
Posted in Architecture and design, Buildings, London | Leave a Comment »
October 6, 2008
I found myself in Croydon town centre a week or two back for the first time in years. It’s de rigueur to deride Croydon, and I expect you think I’m still going to, but whenever I’m there I remember why I think it’s got one of the best-designed centres of any town I know. It’s not wildly pretty, true, but it has its moments (the old hospital on the corner of the high street and George Street is one; the station at East Croydon is another), and most of all, it just works. Whether you come in on foot, in a car or by public transport the system is designed to get you to where you want to be quickly and with the minimum of fuss. The high street is pedestrianised along most of its length, and there are two indoor shopping centres (the Whitgift is older and a little more run down; Centrale, which replaced the old Drummond Centre, has a silly name but almost all the shops anyone could want to visit), so that it’s an uncomplicated and stress-free place to shop whatever the weather or time of day. The main car parks are just behind or under the high street and cars are deposited there via a system of bypasses and tunnels, so that pedestrians and vehicles rarely meet one another, which can only be a good thing. And the public transport is a dream: there are three mainline stations, countless buses and a speedy and reliable tram network (run by those good folk at TfL).
And it still has an Allders. Bromley’s Allders, where you could buy almost everything, became a giant Primark. Croydon’s goes from strength to strength. Sometimes all you need is a shop with a really good haberdashery department.
Tags:allders, croydon
Posted in London, Other cities, Public transport | Leave a Comment »
September 18, 2008
Look at this!
Furniture covered in genuine London transport moquette fabrics! There is literally nothing I want more. I wonder whether I have the space for a designer cube?
Tags:furniture, London, transport
Posted in London, Public transport, Stuff | Leave a Comment »
June 23, 2008
Look at this!
This is an artist’s impression of a plan to convert Battersea Power Station into a source of renewable energy - read the full story at inhabitat.com. It’s all very commendable, and the new structure itself is elegant and interesting, but the old power station’s dominance over the skyline of that corner of London, which is the best thing about it, will be markedly diminished if they do go ahead and build it. I’m not convinced.
Tags:Battersea Power Station, London
Posted in Buildings, London | Leave a Comment »
June 16, 2008
I’ve got today – a Monday – off work, and I’ve spent more of the day than is strictly useful looking out of the window. And I’ve made a discovery, which is that unless in some massively unlikely coincidence all my neighbours have also taken the day off, I am the only person on the estate who goes to work. Everyone else has stayed in all day, doing exactly what they do in the evenings and at weekends (I have a good view into several flats from mine; of course, this also means they have a good view of me, but I rarely do anything interesting, so it doesn’t matter).
So if you’re a burglar, don’t bother with my estate. Nobody ever goes out.
Posted in London | Leave a Comment »
May 29, 2008
I spent this morning at TfL’s newest home, the Palestra building on Blackfriars Road. When construction began several years ago I used to pass the site every day on my way to work and wonder whether it was ever going to be anything other than an enormous hole, until one day it seemed to emerge from the ground fully formed, dwarfing everything around it.
Some local residents opposed its construction, and it’s not hard to see why: there’s nothing context-friendly about the design, and apart from anything else it blocks the river views of the buildings immediately opposite. But once you’re inside there’s a lot that’s good about it: it’s open-plan without being blandly corporate, the communal areas look like some actual thought went into how and when they would be used, and I only heard good things about the canteen. Plus, they gave me free tea and cake.
More importantly, though, everything that can be done to reduce a building’s emissions is done here. I’m told it’s 100% carbon neutral, although I can’t find any official confirmation of that. But certainly a significant amount of the energy it uses comes from solar panels and wind turbines on the roof (you can see them from the nearby railway line, if you happen to be travelling into Waterloo East). This is all good.
Even better is the view from the eleventh floor, but I’m afraid I didn’t have the guts to ask if anyone minded if I took a photo, so you’ll just have to trust me on that.
Tags:architecture, London, Palestra, TfL
Posted in Buildings, London | Leave a Comment »
May 2, 2008
My main concern about Boris – aside from the embarrassment of living in a city that has Boris Johnson as its mayor – is not that he’ll introduce madcap, ill-considered transport policies, but simply that his essential lack of interest in public transport means we’ll lose momentum on what has been, for the last eight years, a quite incredible series of improvements and innovations. The mayor has a lot of power – more than almost any other civic leader – and it’s because of that power that Ken’s been able to introduce so many changes in such a short time. What he’s done here has been visionary, and it looks as though we’re about to lose that for the sake of a weak punchline, which as far as I can judge is the main reason people have voted for Boris (staunch Tories aside). It’s just like the population census we had a few years ago, when everybody thought it would be hysterically funny to declare themselves Jedis. Only worse, because at least then people didn’t have their lame laugh at the expense of something worthwhile.
Tags:Boris Johnson, Ken Livingstone, London mayoral election
Posted in London, Public transport | Leave a Comment »
