My Dad came down from East Anglia for the day (yes, I'm afraid his shoes lived down to all my expectations) and we spent most of the day amongst the dead.
First on our list was Paddington Cemetery (which is of course 3 miles away from Paddington) on a hunt for my great grandfather's grave. Edward was born the son of a tailor in South Molton Street, just round the corner from Bond Street tube station. He later moved out north-westwards to Maida Vale, but ended up being gassed on the battlefields of Belgium as a soldier in World War One, dying of respiratory problems two years later. We searched round the cemetery trying to find the right inscription on the right grave, but alas with no success. Knowing the family interest in horticulture, his was probably that grave with the small shrub planted on it 80 years ago, now grown into an enormous unkempt thorny weed, obscuring the entire plot and that of the two graves on either side.
Later in the day we visited Highgate Cemetery, the final resting place of, amongst others, Karl Marx and hordes of European student vistors. The twin cemeteries were dark, mysterious and silent, crowded full of ostentatious Victorian monuments and featuring an amazing Egyptian mausoleum cut into the hillside. The whole place is now seemingly run by a crowd of ageing volunteer lesbians, no doubt drawn there by the body of Radclyffe Hall, early 20th century dyke icon authoress.
We rounded off our day with a trip to Body Worlds in Brick Lane, an anatomical exhibition of real human bodies, preserved after death by the mysterious German scientic process of 'plastination'. It was disconcerting to come face-to-skull with what I look like underneath, alarming to realise how much good meat I have inside me, and particularly unnerving to see how testicles dangle from the pelvis like a couple of deeley-boppers. On emerging from the exhibition the restauranteurs of Brick Lane stood in their doorways trying to invite us into their curry houses, but strangely enough we were no longer feeling hungry.
I bought a danish pastry at Liverpool Street station this morning. Three questions struck me:
• Why, when I asked for a danish pastry, did they insist on giving me a danish pastry, a paper bag and three serviettes?
• Why, when I'd finished my danish pastry, did I discover that there are no litter bins anywhere on Liverpool Street station into which to dispose of my paper bag and three serviettes?
• Exactly how many years ago was the last time that a terrorist organisation actually placed a bomb in a litter bin in London, and how many more years will it be before anyone in London dares to put all the litter bins back? Please.
Wednesday, October 09, 2002
Takeaway
When you've spent nearly twelve hours in the office for the third day in a row, the last thing you want to do on getting home is cook, so the local fish and chip shop is a real saviour. I now have the luxury of two fish and chip shops located within two minutes walk from my flat. This is a big improvement on Suffolk, where it was probably quicker to drive to the coast and catch a fish myself, rather than wait til Monday for the chip van to turn up in the neighbouring village. One of my two local chippies is run by the mysterious 'Mam', a woman with over-starched red hair and a permanent bemused smirk on her face. Unfortunately on my last visit Mam kindly served me up with a newspaper full of food poisoning, which helps to explain why that was my last visit. So, tonight I visited chippie number two instead, which is basically one bleak white room next to the post office with a fish frier in the corner. I was served by an old trout (which I guess is only to be expected in a fish shop), who looked even older than the bottles of own-brand ketchup and no-brand vinegar substitute stacked on the shelves behind. Meanwhile her teenage son lounged menacingly at the end of the counter, no doubt ready to mug me of my change on the walk home. Most frightening of all, however - the menu board announced the sale of 'donor kebabs'. I shall definitely avoid the steak and kidney pies there in future, just in case they're from the same source, and stick to cod and chips instead.
Thursday, October 03, 2002
How the other half live
After yesterday's journey into the parallel universe surrounding my local post office, I decided to experience the other end of the social spectrum by visiting the new Waitrose that's just opened up at Canary Wharf. It's huge. It's on three floors. The food mall sells every ingredient that Delia Smith ever put in one of her recipes. The select band of shoppers carry shiny new green baskets filled with aubergines, balsamic vinegar and organic vitamin supplements. Local business types can grab a quick lunch at the in-store sushi bar, or maybe dine out on steak and oysters instead. For anyone who's planning a dinner party for the boss and her husband there's a complete set of bone china and designer cutlery on sale, as well as a huge selection of quality Indian and Chinese gourmet ready meals. The lovely Jessica is on hand to pamper you with a manicure in the nail bar if the stress of shopping gets all too much to bear. It's dead posh, even for a Waitrose. But I bet not one person who uses my local post office will ever set foot in there.
Wednesday, October 02, 2002
Another tube strike
Week-day-world: Being at home today, it seemed a good idea to pop out at lunchtime to see what the world round here looks like during the daytime. I risked a trip to the post office across the road, in what used to be the local high street until post-war planners concreted it over. It clearly wasn't a normal day out there, with big queues at the bus stops and unusually heavy traffic, all courtesy of the tube strike. However, normal life was still going on for all the people round here who don't have anywhere to commute to. Our three local alcoholics sat on the brick wall by the shops, well into their third hour of lager drinking, heckling the passers by. An old man who hadn't washed either himself or his clothes recently walked past, just too close for comfort. A large group of spotty schoolchildren stood around outside the kebab shop eating their nutritionally balanced lunch of chips and more chips. In the post office an old lady in fully knitted costume spent unfeasibly long sorting out her pension in front of me, savouring her one social contact of the day before dragging her shopping basket back to the nearby block of flats. And when I finally got to the front of the queue the man behind the counter looked at me as if I was speaking in a foreign language, which of course I was, and I walked away empty-handed. Back home I was glad to be able to get on with some work - it's a different world out there for those who can't.
Tuesday, October 01, 2002
Splat
Unlikely as it may seem, in the year I've been in London I have yet to see one single traffic accident. I can't understand why I haven't, given that most car drivers in London appear to have a deathwish, and most pedestrians in London appear to have a deathwish too. Car drivers in London are speed-obsessed. This is odd, given that most of London has a 30mph speed limit, and even then drivers are lucky if they ever reach even 10mph in all the jams. Nevertheless, most drivers still love nothing more than to prove that that their car can still do 70mph, even if it means accelerating and braking like a maniac between two red traffic lights fifty yards apart. Pedestrians in London don't seem to have noticed this, however, and love nothing more than walking straight out into the traffic to avoid a thirty second detour via the nearest pelican crossing. Hence my disbelief that, so far, I have yet to see one of these blinkered pedestrians get mown down by one of those grand prix boy racers.
So, this morning, there I am crossing the busy red route just outside my flat - admittedly only thirty seconds from a pelican crossing, but there was nothing coming, honest. And then, following me across the road, came a little squirrel. It was a bit of a shock to see wildlife on the streets of the capital, but I hoped I wasn't about to see it flat on the streets instead. The squirrel scampered across the road, then stopped and turned to face the number 25 bus suddenly bearing down upon it. Time stood still - as did the squirrel. Then, at the very last moment, the little rodent turned and ran, alas right under the wheels of the the blue car now doing 70mph up the outside lane. Were I ever to witness a car accident, I suspect the police would be very disappointed at my descriptive powers when it comes to cars. "Make and model please sir?" "It was, er, blue, officer, and it had four wheels." There was another heart-stopping moment - for the squirrel, if not for me. And then, unexpectedly, a flash of grey sped out from under the chassis and into the nearby churchyard, back to safety. So, that's yet another accident I haven't seen in London, but I do hope my luck holds out longer than that squirrel will.
Sunday, September 29, 2002
Last Train To Epping
It's not quite the last train to Clarksville that The Monkees sang about, but it's still one of the world's great epic journeys. People gather, drunk, on the platforms at Oxford Circus, Tottenham Court Road and Holborn. They wait for ages, because there's a huge gap between trains at this time of night, trying hard in the meantime not to stagger off the platform onto the live rail. Then they crowd into the Cental Line carriages, in cattle-truck conditions reminiscent of the weekday rush hour. Some are still finishing off chips and kebabs, much to disgust of the nostrils of the majority. People try to grab a glimpse of the front of the early editions of the Sunday papers, disbelieving that John Major ever had a sex life, let alone with Edwina Currie. Around Bank the more inebriated passengers grab onto whatever or whoever they can, as the train careers violently from side to side round curves resembling a theme park thrill ride. A group of lads shout loudly across the carriage at each other in a foreign language - which might well have been English earlier in the evening. And at Mile End I escape across the platform to the waiting District Line train, happy to abandon the drunken revellers safe in the knowledge that I won't be ending up back in Essex with them by mistake.
Saturday, September 28, 2002
Welcome to the modern village
Guy Browning has written an article in the Guardian which sums up the whole nightmare and nothingness of village life.
"The modern village is defined as a small group of houses, none of which can get pizza delivered. Many urban dwellers have a secret dream of living in a beautiful collection of rose-covered cottages nestled around a wide village green and overlooked by the church spire and village pub. Many people who live in real villages also have this dream."
That's exactly how I felt about living in a village. That's exactly why I left one a year ago.
The Guardian article is magnificent. It's very accurate, it's very long, you can read it here and I wish I'd written it.
Thursday, September 26, 2002
Sniffle: On Monday morning I sat on the tube next to a 12-year old schoolboy who insisted on coughing and spluttering all over the surrounding carriage. When I went to work this morning, I was feeling fine, so I thought. Around mid-morning I started sneezing rather a lot. Around lunchtime my left nostril started to feel a little bit runny. By early afternoon I was getting my handkerchief out for the first time in months. Late afternoon and I was filling that handkerchief at regular intervals. On returning home I tried to track down the supply of clean handkerchieves I know have at the back of a drawer somewhere. Tomorrow I expect to wake up with a blocked nose, breathing like Darth Vader. No doubt I'll spend the weekend laid up in bed with a gallon of Beecham's. And, come Monday morning, I'm sure I'll be just well enough to go back to work, despite still feeling sub-standard. However, it'll be worth it just to cough all over that bloody 12-year old on the tube journey in again.
Wednesday, September 25, 2002
Tube strike: It only takes two hours to get back from Leeds to London by train - I was well impressed. However, it then takes roughly as long to get from Kings Cross home to East London, thanks to the tube strike they kindly put on to celebrate my return. I've stood in bus queues for buses that either didn't arrive or were full and didn't stop. I've stood like a sardine in a variety of jam-packed stations and train carriages. I've walked overground across London carrying incredibly heavy luggage. I've travelled miles out of my way just to get on board a train that still exists. I suspect I've just lost all the weight I put on while having those two stodgy hotel breakfasts. But it is so good to be home.
Sunday, September 22, 2002
22 September - the Countryside comes to London
It's exactly a year today since I packed up all my belongings and moved from a small village in Suffolk to the East End of London. To celebrate this anniversary, the Countryside Alliance kindly arranged for quarter of a million country folk to come up to London just to remind me exactly what I'm missing. Nothing.
The streets of London were filled with red-faced protesters, converging on Whitehall via Hyde Park and the Embankment, demanding Liberty and Livelihood. Most were wearing that dull shade of green that only people who live in the country ever dare to wear in public, usually a Barbour jacket or something disturbingly tweedy. They wore flat caps, sensible brogues and sideburns - it was as if last week's London Fashion Week had never happened. They dutifully waved their placards, some lovingly laminated from a poster in the Daily Mail, others insulting the Prime Minister, but most just admitting that they enjoyed murdering animals for fun.
Some marchers looked so rich, in an in-bred landed-gentry sort-of-a-way, that it was obvious they were only there for the Liberty of shooting a few foxes rather than the Livelihood of a few genuine farmers. Many had dragged their children along and given them a whistle to blow and a political statement to make. I thought there were far too many marchers from Essex, which in my opinion is barely the countryside at all. However, I suspect many of the more bemused-looking country folk had never been to London before in their lives. I fully expected to see some of them in Pret attempting to barter a prize sheep in exchange for a sandwich.
The march went on, and on, and on, in much the same way that the countryside does. At the Cenotaph the protestors marched past in silence, which might have been powerfully impressive were it not for the racket being created by the helicopter hovering overhead. Then after Big Ben everyone dispersed, either to the clubs of Pall Mall, which appeared to be doing brisk business, or back to the Landrovers and home to rural Hampstead.
I know that the moaning marchers have all missed the most obvious way to improve their lives - sell up and move to a town. I found my Liberty and Livelihood by escaping the countryside and moving to London, and I have no intention of ever going back. More buses pass my front door in an hour now than used to serve my old village in a week. If I want a pint of milk today I can buy some in a shop one minute's walk away rather than have to get in the car and drive for miles. If I want a life I have one on my doorstep, rather than just the possibility of village hall bingo every third Thursday. So, I'll happily leave the countryside in the capable hands of the Barbour brigade. The rest of us will carry on living.
Saturday, September 21, 2002
40 things I love about... London
Life, nightlife, the sense of history, the Underground, the view from Greenwich Park, the fact there's always somewhere new to discover, Oxford Street, the sound of Big Ben, nightbuses, sunlight on the Thames, buying your Sunday paper on Saturday evening, the museums in South Kensington, the wobbly Millennium bridge, being able to choose from more than two local radio stations, Tate Modern, not needing a car, the view from Hampstead Heath, Arsenal shirts, Trafalgar Square, the top pod on the London Eye, St Pancras station, decent mobile phone reception, Routemasters, the East End, 24 hour bagel shops, culture on your doorstep, Hungerford Bridge, Old Compton Street, deckchairs in Green Park, the DLR, 0° longitude, the City, Covent Garden, decent record shops, St Paul's Cathedral, walking faster than the traffic, crossing Westminster Bridge at night on the back of a bike, the sheer variety of Theatreland, the British Museum, just living here.
London Open House weekend: What a fantastic idea, to open up some of London's buildings to the public free for the weekend. I resisted the temptation to queue up for Broadcasting House, or the Victorian Sewage Works down the road, and instead headed up to Westminster. The queueing crowds were mostly either over 50 or gay, or both. And I got to see 5 places that I'd always wanted to see:
Westminster Hall: Now that the Queen Mother has moved on, there were hardly any queues. I stood on the spot where her artificial hip had lain in state, just out of respect you understand.
Portcullis House: The new office block for MPs, famous for its fig trees imported at a cost of £150,000. If you're a UK taxpayer, you'll be glad to know none of them look as if they need replacing yet.
Foreign and Commonwealth Office: Magnificent and opulent courtyards and staircases. I suspect we bled the Empire dry to pay for it all.
Cabinet Office: Had to queue for one and a half hours, but well worth it just to see the door that Sir Humphrey couldn't get through when his key was confiscated in Yes Prime Minister. It has a card swipe now, by the way.
Midland Hotel, St Pancras: Glorious old hotel, now fallen into serious disrepair. I suspect it never recovered after the Spice Girls recorded the video for Wannabe there. Zig-a-zig-ah.
Friday, September 20, 2002
3 things I hate about... pedestrians who get in my way
1) Mobile phone users: They are the new living dead. They walk the streets like zombies. They are totally absorbed in the text message they're typing into their mobile phone. They always walk right in front of me without looking. Not enough of them walk straight out into the road in front of cars.
2) Tourists: Us people who live in London are usually trying to get somewhere. Tourists, on the other hand, are happy to stay exactly where they are. Being ignorant of the ways of the capital, tourists will happily stop dead in the middle of a narrow pavement, just outside a station entrance or directly in front of a minor photo opportunity. Two tourists, if positioned carefully, can completely block a London pavement in seconds, causing pedestrian gridlock. Large groups of French schoolchildren, if left unattended, can suddenly seal off half of Central London. Mayor Ken would do well to consider the huge economic savings to be made by deploying tourists on strategic pedestrian crossings around the capital as a cheaper alternative to congestion charge technology.
3) People with bags: On Fridays, people take to the escalators of London with suitcases. They're obviously planning on rushing off somewhere after work for the weekend, maybe to Amsterdam, maybe to the second home in Wales, or maybe they just like carrying suitcases, I don't know. But these people are out there on Friday mornings stopping me from climbing the escalator and getting my daily exercise. Then of course there are all those people with rucksacks who are prone to turn round and smash their fat bag into you, ignorant of the carnage happening right behind them. And please don't even get me started on pushchairs.
Thursday, September 19, 2002
3 things I hate about... Travelcards
1) Buying them: My annual London Travelcard expires in three hours time. I went to my local tube station last week to try to renew it. "Oh no", they said, "you can't do that yet. Come back nearer the time." I returned at 10pm on Sunday evening when, after much protest, the staff finally agreed they were perhaps willing take £912 off me if I really insisted. It was clear that the man behind the counter had never used a computer before, as he attempted to work out what all the buttons were for and where on earth the letter 'E' was. Next year maybe I should buy my ticket at 8:00 on a Monday morning instead, just to see how long I can get the queue of irate passengers behind me.
2) Other people buying them: Don't you hate in when you're stuck waiting in the queue at the ticket office on a Monday morning, with some urgent travelling to do, and some idiot in front of you has decided to buy their annual travelcard by debit card, and the monkey behind the counter can't get the computer to work?
3) Other people selling them: It's become one of the most modern but most undesirable forms of begging in London. Shuffling grubby reprobates gather round the exits to tube stations during the early evening, asking if they can relieve you of your used Travelcard. Not mine mate, it cost me £912. There again, maybe tonight I should have flogged it. I have three hours left to find a buyer...
Wednesday, September 18, 2002
3 things I hate about... being stuck in a tube carriage between Green Park and Piccadilly Circus for 20 minutes on the way home from work
1) Being late: I don't normally stay late at the office until 7pm. So, when I do stay late, the last thing I want is "a safety alert at Caledonian Road" to delay me even longer. One minute into my tube journey tonight we ground to a halt in the middle of a Piccadilly Line tunnel. It was very helpful of our tube driver to keep us updated by telling us that we weren't moving, although we had noticed this for ourselves. Then he told us the blockage ahead had been cleared and that we should be moving soon, except we didn't. He ought instead to have told us there was a really impatient American moaning at his wife on the third seat down on the left, because there was.
2) The Evening Standard: Normally it takes me most of the tube journey home to read the Evening Standard. It's not a great newspaper, bearing far too much of a resemblance to the Daily Mail for my liking. Tonight, however, I had time to read the paper twice. Second time around I was left having to read the article bashing Ken's congestion charge, the editorial supporting the green welly Countryside Alliance. the daily cosmetic surgery scare story and even the recipe for anchovy bruscheta. Please please let me not be so delayed going home tomorrow.
3) You don't care: I've told you the story of my dreadful journey home, and you don't care. Nobody ever cares about nightmare travel stories. That's unless one happens to you of course, in which case you feel as if you have to tell everyone at your destination every single intimate detail. I bet you've just skimmed through my tale of underground woe, but please remember, next time you're late I won't be at all interested either.
Tuesday, September 10, 2002
Tuesdays - what is the point?
First thing every morning, at the top of the steps outside the tube station on my way to work, some grinning idiot tries to thrust a free magazine in my hand. Every Tuesday, that magazine is called 'Midweek'. Why? Do they not realise they're at least 28 hours early? The last thing I want to be told on a Tuesday morning is that it's halfway through the week, because it so disappointingly isn't. Still, it's better than the similar situation every Monday morning, when the same grinning idiot always tries to offer me a copy of 'Ms London' instead.
Tuesday, June 11, 2002
Bow Road station, London E3
My local Underground station is 100 years old today.
Bow Road is an Underground station, but only partly an underground station. That's because Bow Road is the station where eastbound District line trains finally emerge from their tunnel under East London and head off towards Barking and Upminster at surface level. Half of the station is underground and therefore has crap mobile phone reception. The other half of the station is open to the elements and therefore gets wet when it rains. Pigeons appear to be happy to crap on either half.
Bow Road is a station on both the District and Hammersmith & City lines. You might think this was obvious from looking on a tube map, but it appears that nobody has yet bothered to tell anyone who works at the station. Once upon a time Bow Road used to be a station on the Metropolitan line, until this part of the line was reassigned to the new Hammersmith & City line back in 1990. That was a decade ago, but nobody has yet managed to update any of the signs here. The big nameplate outside the front of the station still proudly displays that Bow Road is a station on the "District and Metropolitan lines". The train indicator on the platform still lights up to announce to passengers that the next train is a "Metropolitan line train via Kings Cross". Wrong. Anyone who wanders into the station expecting to catch a Metropolitan line train is in for a very long wait.
Bow Road is a station on the Hammersmith & City line. Everyone in London thinks they live near the tube line with the worst service in the capital. Everyone else is wrong. The Hammersmith & City line has the worst service in the capital. The trains are infrequent and irregular. On the rare occasions that you might actually want to catch one, you can find yourself waiting around through fifteen minutes of endless District line trains until a Hammersmith & City finally decides to turn up. The trains are shorter than District line trains so you then find yourself having to run down the platform in order to dive headlong into the last carriage before the doors shut. However, should you be waiting to catch a District line train, you can of course guarantee that a half-empty Hammersmith & City line train will rumble into the station instead, open its doors apologetically at the platform and then rumble off into oblivion, ready to stall itself at the signals just outside Aldgate East for ten minutes while everyone in the carriage sighs, shrugs and overheats. Line from hell. Never, ever, rely on it.
Bow Road is a station round the bend. Mind the gap. You have to step carefully on and off the trains to make sure you don't slip and fall through on top of the rats scurrying around on the tracks below. Mind the gap please. More annoying is the impossibility of reading the 'next train' indicator from the far end of the platform. Please mind the gap. Not only is the next destination obscured by the bend and by a huge pillar but, in a way reminiscent of far too many other tube stations, the view is now also completely blocked by the CCTV cameras they've installed - right in front of the 'next train' indicator. Please mind the gap between the train and the platform. Please mind the gap between the ears of the station planners, more like.
Bow Road is a station with thousands of passengers every day. I know this for a fact, because every day they all seem to stand in my way and block the entrance to the ticket gates. Some of them insist on queueing up to buy tickets from the temperamental ticket machines in the entrance hall, a queue which invariably spreads out to block the two foot gap through which everyone everyone else is trying to walk. Other passengers don't bother to buy a ticket at all and instead walk brazenly up to the special gate for those with oversized luggage, open it and saunter through to the buzzing sound of the electronic alarm. Meanwhile the ticket inspector sits disinterestedly in her little booth and continues to read her newspaper, ignoring the gate even when someone with oversize luggage really is trying to get through. Could this explain why London Underground don't collect enough money from fares to invest in our stations?
Bow Road is an interchange station with the Docklands Light Railway. At least that's how it looks on the tube map. In real life, however, Bow Church DLR station is at least a three minute walk up the road, and not particularly well signposted either. You wouldn't want to change trains here carrying a suitcase (although people do, and they generally get their cases stuck in the ticket gates right in front of me too). I seem to end up at least once a week directing lost travellers from one station to the other before they stumble off lost into the back streets of Bow and are never heard from again. Tempting to send them off in the wrong direction I know, but the pavements are crowded enough round here as it is.
Bow Road is 100 years old. And blimey it looks it. The whole place could do with a lick of paint, and not that ghastly combination of green and yellow they still have down on the pillars at platform level. The station could also do with one of those nice 'how many minutes is it until the next three trains' indicators like they have at the next couple of stations down the line. Not that they're very accurate, of course, but they're better than a piece of smashed glass which lights up merely to tell you there might be a train going somewhere arriving sometime. In fact I doubt that London Underground have spent a penny on this station for years. I hear we're nearly next on the list for renovation, but they've been saying that for years and nothing's happened yet. As a result I suspect the station will continue to be the endearing dump it is today for a number of years to come.
Happy anniversary.
Friday, January 09, 2004
Local transport news - Bow Road tube station
A while ago I ranted about my local tube station being an under-resourced ruin, with not a penny spent on it for years. Until today, that is. Tube operating company Metronet is launching a multi-million pound five year programme to renovate more than 150 Underground stations, all part of the government's controversial public-private funded infrastructure programme. And, what do you know, the very first station to be renovated will be Bow Road. About time too. They haven't told us local passengers yet - I only uncovered the news in Metronet's in-house journal (check pdf pages 6-7 and 28-30) - but renovation is now imminent. Apparently Bow Road station is a Grade II listed building, and we have serious problems with 'water ingress behind a brick retaining wall'. That would explain the acres of peeling paint I get to stare at each morning. Hopefully not for too much longer though.
I wonder if workmen will finally get round to updating the sign outside the station, the one that says Bow Road is on the "District and Metropolitan lines". Bow Road's not been on the Metropolitan line since 1990 when the Hammersmith & City line took over the section east of Liverpool Street. But, I read, there are plans to change that back again. Tube bosses want Metropolitan line trains to run from northwest London right through to Barking again, hopefully by 2011. Meanwhile the Hammersmith & City and Circle lines will be sort-of-merged to provide what's being called a 'T-Cup' service. Trains will run from Hammersmith to Edgware Road, then continue all the way round what's now the Circle line before terminating at Edgware Road second time around. You heard it here first. I heard it here first. And no, I don't believe it'll happen either.
Monday, February 09, 2004
Change at Bow Road...
They finally, finally, made a start on renovatingBow Road tube station today. Well, they dumped four blue portakabins outside on the pavement, even if nothing yet appears to have happened inside the station (see photo).
This is Day One of London Underground's PPP-funded station update programme, which just goes to show how dull history in the making is. Starting on the first of next month they'll be closing Bow Road station early each night and working passenger-free between 10pm and 6am. That's closing early daily until at least the end of September. Great. Every time I find myself staggering home after closing time this spring or summer I shall have to get off at Walford East instead. It had better be worth it.
I know you'll all be on tenterhooks to discover the latest news from Bow Road, the Underground's pioneer renovation station. What rebuilding work will the good people at Metronet be carrying out? How hard will the builders be working? Will the station's listed architectural features remain intact? How will travellers be inconvenienced? What does cutting-edge urban ergonomic design look like? Well, worry no longer, because I've decided to provide regular daily updates...
Monday 9th February (Day 1) Four blue portakabins have appeared on the pavement outside the station.
Tuesday 10th February A blue wall has appeared in front of the four portakabins. It is made of metal.
Wednesday 11th February There are now flashing orange lights on top of the blue metal wall.
Thursday 12th February The orange lights continue to flash.
Friday 13th February The sound of sawing can be heard from behind the blue wall during daylight hours.
Saturday 14th February No sawing today.
Sunday 15th February The flashing orange lights have disappeared.
Monday 16th February A group of blue-uniformed staff have been observed entering a mysterious lock-up on the eastbound platform, clutching a wad of plans.
Tuesday 17th February The orange lights on top of the blue wall have been replaced by more permanent-looking light fittings on the side of the blue wall.
Wednesday 18th February There are now bulbs in the light fittings, but they're not yet lit.
Thursday 19th February Still not lit.
Friday 20th February The blue wall remains graffiti-free.
Saturday 21st February On closer inspection, there is a padlocked door at the end of the blue wall furthest away from the station entrance. The door is surrounded by safety notices.
Sunday 22nd February A laminated licence is attached to the blue wall, giving permission to Elliot Thomas Ltd to "erect a hoarding on a public highway" until 25th February 2005.
Monday 23rd February The licence was approved and signed by Mr P Williams of WSP UK plc.
Tuesday 24th February Mr Williams' middle name begins with an S.
Wednesday 25th February The blue wall is starting to get a little dirty.
Thursday 26th February Most of the blue wall is still very clean.
Friday 27th February There are a number of discarded cigarette butts at the foot of the blue wall nearest to the station entrance.
Saturday 28th February Probably about twenty butts, approximately.
Sunday 29th February The overnight closure of Bow Road station is supposed to be starting tomorrow. Nothing. Not a sign.
NDBow Road station, London E3
I wonder if workmen will finally get round to updating the sign outside the station, the one that says Bow Road is on the "District and Metropolitan lines". Bow Road's not been on the Metropolitan line since 1990 when the Hammersmith & City line took over the section east of Liverpool Street. But, I read, there are plans to change that back again. Tube bosses want Metropolitan line trains to run from northwest London right through to Barking again, hopefully by 2011. Meanwhile the Hammersmith & City and Circle lines will be sort-of-merged to provide what's being called a 'T-Cup' service. Trains will run from Hammersmith to Edgware Road, then continue all the way round what's now the Circle line before terminating at Edgware Road second time around. You heard it here first. I heard it here first. And no, I don't believe it'll happen either.
