JUBILEE: 5 things I found outside this station
I've devoted a month to the Jubilee line before. It was May 2004, the line's 25th anniversary, when I ran a station-by-station feature entitled Silver Jubilee. I visited every station, wrote about each of them in turn, and took pictures too. One part of this mammoth chronicling was a section entitled 5 things I found outside this station, which I thought I'd repeat nearly ten years later to see what's changed. The original lists are in the first column, using red text for anything that's no longer there. And my updated lists are in the second column, using green text for anything that definitely wasn't there last time. Think of it as an urban history project. A lot's changed.
5 things I found outside this station...
May 2004
November 2013
Stanmore
a small green stall selling flowers, some slatted wooden benches, a pedestrian crossing, a big tube sign on a blue pillar, the Green Belt (the line stops right on the edge of London - a few hundred metres further on and you're in the countryside)
Esquire's Barbers, Express Stop (a very mini newsagent), a dispenser containing free copies of Jewish News, Accident Advice House (part of the Stanmore Business Centre), a grumpy fat man swearing hoarsely into his phone
Canons Park
a very short green cycle path, Canons Park Motors (operating from three arches underneath the station), Eddy's kebab shop, Hearts & Flowers florists, the number 79 bus.
four very short green cycle paths, Canons Perk (coffee and snack bar), Cannons Tandoori (blatantly misspelt), the Fountain Park estate, a Barnardo's bin
Queensbury
Queensbury Circus, Hunter & Hunter estate agents, some bicycles chained to the railings, Joe's Bake & Bite, three levels of flats built above the station entrance
Queens Internet cafe, a new bike rack, a mega Morrisons, Hair Magic, a greengrocer stall selling fruit and veg at £1 per bowl
Kingsbury
a sign saying 'humps for 350 yards', a lot of local shops, a machine selling parking tickets, Jyoti Jewellers, a yellow box junction
Sahara Lounge II, a security camera on a tall pole, National Halal Centre, Mepani News, a drinking control area (maximum penalty £500)
Wembley Park
a pelican crossing, that huge extra entrance/exit for use on days when there's a big event nearby, the College of Northwest London, Olympic Way, a big sign pointing towards 'Stadium tours' (unlikely at present)
Wembley Stadium (rebuilt, with arch), Victoria Hall Student Living (skyrise silver shoeboxes), a new huge station entrance/exit, the Ark Academy, Olympic Square (except no, it's more sort-of curved)
Neasden
a pelican crossing, two giant billboards, Falcon Park RNIB centre, Adrian's Newsagent (a tiny kiosk), a pedestrian sign pointing towards 'Neasden Temple & Superstore' (I hope that's two different places)
Cafe Dori, City Plumbing Supplies, a blue bobbly standalone National Lottery sign, a big empty warehouse to let (which may have been the RNIB centre), a sign pointing to 'Magistrates Court'
Dollis Hill
the 'Dollis Hill' mural, belisha beacons, a big tube sign on a brick column, wide avenues of suburban semis, a parade of shops
Dollis Hill Garage, standalone cash machine (£1.75 to withdraw), Liberty Food & Wine, 'Kitten Found' poster, mini-roundabout
Willesden Green
a yellow plastic box full of grit, Camerons Stiff estate agents (giggle), 10 piles of free magazines (mostly expat related), Dynamic dry cleaners, lots of laminated Wanted For Murder police posters
six smart flower boxes (still flowering), City AM newspaper box, Willesden Green Town Team noticeboard (mostly empty), a big bike rack (full), a shakes & smoothie shop (closed, about to become a barbers)
Kilburn
a double viaduct painted blue, Shoot Up Hill (actually the A5 Watling Street), an old postbox, Kilburn Flowers, a dry cleaners that sells records.
Dutch & Dutch fruit & veg stall, Kilburn Confectionery, three bridges, a sign pointing to Brondesbury station, the Kilburn Mural 2004 (painted by Snug, Dane, Bleach, Busk, Tizer and Asset)
West Hampstead
long queues for tickets, Mr Gingham's sandwich bar (sliced egg, £1.30), The Flower Gallery, the smell of bacon, a big green Camden 'Trade Waste' bin.
Sorry Position Closed, Mr Gingham's sandwich bar (sliced egg, £1.50), North West 6 (gift shop), The Railway (pub & Costa), a streetcleaner eyeing me suspiciously
Finchley Road
the 02 shopping centre (a very modern mall complete with fishtanks and jungle-themed escalators), George's Shoe Repairs, the A41, Waitrose, a mysterious old wooden door labelled 'Meakers'
British College of Osteopathic Medicine, expensive florist stall (bouquets in multiples of £5), Canfield House, Evening Standard lock-up (white), Holy Trinity church (plus Alpha Course)
Swiss Cottage
five station exits via subways, a dead busy road junction on the Finchley Road, Ye Olde Swiss Cottage (a chalet-style pub, built in 1840 beside the old Junction Road tollgate, now complete with exhaust fume soaked beer garden), Fujifilm House, an old Odeon cinema
Hampstead Theatre (House Full), Eton Avenue Farmers Market (late in the day, so absolutely no customers), Overground House, Star Box Coffee (a small kiosk with hygiene rating 4), Swiss Cottage Library
St John's Wood
a circular ticket hall with high glass windows, seven floors of flats built above the station, a shrubbery complete with palm trees, the Abbey Road Café (it's tiny, but it has an informative website), hordes of Inter-Railers clutching Multimap printouts trying to work out where 'that' recording studo is.
Acacia Road, a newspaper kiosk sponsored by the Wall Street Journal, a Countdown crossing, the Beatles Coffee Shop (it's tiny, but it has an informative website), hordes of foreign tourists consulting the Legible London map (which doesn't mark the terribly famous nearby zebra crossing)
Baker Street
hundreds of tourists buying tacky souvenirs and pizzas, long queues for sightseeing buses, a statue of Sherlock Holmes, Transport for London's Lost Property Office (it's amazing what people lose), the big green copper dome of the London Planetarium (opened 1958)
M&S Food To Go, long queues for the Sherlock Holmes Museum, Belgian Waffles, The Metropolitan Bar (formerly the Chiltern Court restaurant), the big green copper dome of the Marvel Super Heroes 4D film experience (it's an absolute travesty, sigh)
Bond Street
bustling Oxford Street, the West One shopping centre, bureaux de change, loads of people, this view.
a hole where Crossrail will be, Forever 21, Delicious Crêpes, a park-up spot for pedicabs, lots of yellow Selfridges bags
Green Park
the grinning lady who blocks the station exit trying to hand out free magazines, the smiley bloke who sells me my Evening Standard, Piccadilly, the Benjy's where I often buy lunch, a surprisingly high proportion of posh men wearing bow ties and dinner jackets
an Audi showroom, a Big Bus Tours driver on his break (yelling into his mobile), the new leafy chasm exit direct into Green Park, Langan's Brasserie, Sea Strata (a Portland stone artwork by John Maine)
Westminster
Big Ben (OK, St Stephen's Tower), the Houses of Parliament, Portcullis House, the River Thames, tight security
Big Ben (OK, the Elizabeth Tower), the 'secret' underground entrance to Parliament, Tesco Express, three groups of three Jehovah's Witnesses handing out 'Awake' magazine, St Stephen's Tavern
Waterloo
Waterloo mainline station, Waterloo Eurostar station, a giant illuminated elephant's head at the top of an escalator, an IMAX cinema, homeless people
famously fresh baguettes, Bank Machine Welcomes You To London Waterloo, Fishcotheque, the Wellington, foreign students sat down on the floor chatting
Southwark
a circular entrance lobby lit by a central glass drum, Waterloo East station (via dedicated exit), Blackfriars Road, a building site dominated by a towering blue crane (any buyers for a new glassy office building?), The Ring public house
Palestra (a glassy office building, where TfL lives), snacklite, Rowland Hill House, 15 150th anniversary Art on the Underground posters, the former Blackfriars station
London Bridge
London Bridge, the London Dungeon, Borough Market (selling posh organic food for Observer readers), Southwark Cathedral, Guy's Hospital
the Shard, a new bus station, Sam Souviners (sic), the Shangri-La Hotel (opens Q4 2014), a temporary ticket office
Bermondsey
Jamaica Road, an electronic display welcoming you to Bermondsey station, two cashpoints, Feltor Carrington estate agents, densely-packed council blocks
sign to Bermondsey Square Antiques Market, dual carriageway, Local Express, Jimmy's & Son Barber Shop (est 1970), an old soldier selling poppies
Canada Water
a big round glass drum, a bus station, large tracts of open space awaiting redevelopment, Surrey Quays Shopping Centre, Canada Water (complete with bird raft and wind turbine)
Canada Water Library (est 2012), the Maple Quays Sales and Marketing Suite, maple trees, Mousetail coffee cart, a private gym for residents of the adjacent development
Canary Wharf
Docklands, One Canada Square (Britain's tallest building), a sculpted head lying on its side, Jubilee Place shopping centre beneath Jubilee Park, four clocks on poles
a rack of Boris Bikes, bankers, an advert for St Peter's Barge (London's only floating church), a row of international cuisine kiosks, Montgomery Square
North Greenwich
a carelessly-discarded Dome, WH Smiths, a bus station in the middle of nowhere, a 1000-space car park, Group 4 security
Classico Expresso, a world class 'entertainment district', thousands of people rich enough to watch tennis, the London Diner, windswept Millennium Square
Canning Town
a big flyover on the A13, an MFI superstore, a teeming bus station, Purvi newsagents, a large stone memorial commemorating the nearby Thames Ironworks (HMS Warrior was built here in 1860)
Terry Spinks Place (under the flyover), the place, Matchday route to West Ham, the Bow Creek exit (no public access), flyers for Poverty Kickz (Charity Dance Workshop)
West Ham
Ibstock bricks and small glass squares, Costcutter Express, a mini-roundabout, Memorial Avenue, a chippy under new management (shame, because the old management served right tasty cod)
a superloo (10p fee), the Rial Lifestyle Cafe (recommended), DLR roundel, regular courtesy minibus to West Ham Bus Garage (invariably empty), a lady humming in the bus shelter
Stratford
Meridian Square, a big bus station, a purple steam engine called Robert, scores of people, my local shopping centre
my new local shopping centre, Deano's Continental Hot Food, obscuring fish scale sculptures, a zigzag row of security bollards, Stratford Plaza (all now sold)
125 years ago, in the early hours of a Friday morning, London's autumn of terror ended. The man we know as Jack The Ripper claimed his fifth and final victim in the rookeries of Spitalfields, not that anybody realised it was his last at the time. The murder was also his most brutal, carried out in the privacy of the victim's own home, which allowed time for additional gruesome mutilation. So today I'm completing my quest to visit the five confirmed murder sites as the anniversaries pass, comparing what happened then to what's there now.
The fifth of the Ripper's murders took place off Dorset Street, a grim thoroughfare to the west of Commercial Street in Spitalfields. Dorset Street started out as a footpath along the edge of open countryside - the 'Spital Field' belonging to the priory hospital of St Mary's. During the 17th century the area became home to artisans and silk weavers, many of them Huguenots fleeing from abroad. When the silk trade finally died out, many of the four-storey townhouses on Dorset Street became lodging houses for London's poorest. Many so-called double rooms were really nothing more than brothels, and the street soon earned the nickname of "the worst streetin London". An alleyway led off between the house at number 26 and the chandler's shop at 27, behind which lay Millers Court. This had once been a back garden, but was infilled with cottages in 1851 and later partitioned off into separate rooms. And it was in one of these, a back parlour 12 foot square, that the Ripper's foul crime was committed.
Mary JaneKelly, at 25, was by far the youngest of the Ripper's victims. Her early years are somewhat under-recorded, but it's believed she was born in Ireland, near Limerick, then moved to Wales at an early age. At 16 she married a coal miner, but he died in an explosion and she turned to prostitution for a living. Later she moved on to West London, then briefly to France with a client, then to East London where she lived with a variety of men. An attractive fair-looking soul, she was described by one acquaintance as "a very quiet woman when sober but noisy when in drink". Her last partner was Joseph Barnett, a fish porter at Billingsgate, but he moved out of their shared room in Millers Court after a row a week before Mary Jane's death.
Late on the evening of Thursday 8th November she brought home a stout ginger-haired man for sex, then went out into the streets in search of more money. A witness later reported seeing Mary Jane in Dorset Street at 2am in the company of a pale man with a moustache, wearing kid gloves and carrying a small parcel. The pair walked arm-in-arm into Millers Court, with Mary Jane's last known words "All right, my dear. Come along. You will be comfortable." At 4am neighbours heard cries of "Oh, murder!" , but thought nothing of it, this being a common cry hereabouts. It wasn't until nearer 11 o'clock that a rent collector knocked on Mary Jane's door and, receiving no answer, peered through the window and discovered her body. It was clear that something quite terrible had taken place, but the full extent of her horrific injuries wasn't known until the police broke down the door early in the afternoon.
Dorset Street took many years to shed its unsavoury reputation, changing its name to Duval Street in 1904 in an attempt to camouflage its past. The road is still there, sort-of, but you'll not find it listed in the A-Z today thanks to two rounds of development by the City of London. First (in 1928) they knocked down all the houses on the north side of the street, including MillersCourt, and in their place rose the London Fruit and Wool Exchange. This Portland stone edifice housed traders selling fruit and veg sourced from countries all around the world, conveyed onwards via fourteen loading bays still visible round the back. The Gentle Author offers insight via a 1937 catalogue here. The slums on the southern side of the street lasted much longer, until fifty years ago, and in 1971 were replaced by the White's Row multi-storey car park.
Dorset Street survives, for now, as a private unnamed road used occasionally for deliveries. A few years ago it was fenced off at both ends, somewhat frustratingly for Ripper Tours who can now only stand each evening and point through the mesh at the distant murder site. But that's not going to be the case for too much longer. The Fruit and Wool Exchange is awaiting demolition, after Boris over-ruled Tower Hamlets council and gave the go ahead for a major commercial redevelopment. The building looks a bit sad now with its office tenants evicted and all its doors and windows boarded up, awaiting the arrival of an army of deconstructors and diggers. At least the façade facing Spitalfields Market will be retained, but only as a heritage veneer covering up an uninspiring mixed use block behind. One consequence of this is that Dorset Street will be built over and disappear from view, perhaps with part surviving as an interior shopping court, or something equally inappropriate.
The White's Row car park is also under threat from the same development plan. Its loss will be less keenly felt, except by car drivers and by motorcyclists seeking somewhere free to park. Strange building. From the outside it looks like a metal skeleton with brick stairwells, but step inside and the full concreteness of the multi-storey hits you. And you can step inside, very easily, via a set of always-open stairs facing onto Commercial Street. The stairwell leads all the way up to the 5th floor, which is the open roof, from which there's an alternative view of the City skyline. Most days there's absolutely nobody parked up here, nor even on the two floors below, which allows the casual visitor easy opportunity to stare down at what used to be Dorset Street below. Those green painted delivery bays with the yellow hatched lines, that's where the Ripper last struck. Prior to that a City flowerbed, prior to that a school playground, prior to that a Sunday clothes market, prior to that a Crossrail building site. Five points of terror, each erased and redefined by London's ever changing landscape. 125 years on these murder sites have changed forever, but the collective memory of Jack's brutal deeds remains.
A few miles north of Bradford, ten minutes away by train, is the village of Saltaire. It's no ordinary place, it's a UNESCOWorld Heritage Site, one of only 28 in the UK. It's an almost complete survivor of the Victorian industrial age, a complex comprising a woollen mill and adjacent housing. What's special is that the housing is part of a benevolent community created by the mill's owner, Sir Titus Salt. In the 1850s he moved his manufacturing business out of Bradford to a better location in the country, settling beside the River Aire, the Leeds and Liverpool Canal and the new railway. To look after his workers he built a village of terraced houses alongside, complete with schools, shops, running water, church, library and concert hall. This was revolutionary social thinking, later taken on board in the development of garden cities, council housing and urban planning. And it's gorgeous, even on a ropey wet day in November.
The mill complex is huge, straddling the canal and sandwiched between the river and the railway. The main block is four storeys high - deep, whopping storeys - and at least 60 windows long. It was designed to impress, in the Italianate style, with turrety flourishes proclaiming success to the world. Alongside are weaving and combing sheds, and boiler houses and dye works, plus a huge great big chimney visible for miles around. Thousands would have worked within creating Yorkshire textiles, and business continued right up to 1986 when the looms fell silent for good. A local businessmen then snapped up the somewhat dilapidated buildings and transformed them, somewhat unexpectedly, into a retail commercial venture. Some of the blocks are now office space, while the main building houses restaurants, various shops and an art gallery. It's called Salt's Mill, and it's a middle class day out par excellence.
The mill's owner became good friends with David Hockney, hence Salt's Mill now showcases many of his works of art. They're scattered around the main building, especially on the lower floor - the 1853 Gallery. This enormous room is also an art shop, with materials and books aplenty, so it's quite easy to forget to look at the proper stuff on the walls. Upstairs is a proper bookshop, with excellently-chosen stock, indeed I had to force myself to purchase only what I could carry. There's also a large restaurant, nicely done, and if you walk through that more shops (including a design outlet with nagging notices everywhere). Upstairs again is a smaller dining area, more boutique, more cafe, leading through to more Hockneys. Some of his iPad paintings are being shown, which I can take or leave, but also some of his trees, which I like considerably more. I particularly liked "25 Trees Between Bridlington School and Morrison’s Supermarket along Bessingby Road in the Semi-Egyptian Style", a seasonal East Riding triptych in sun and snow.
Saltaire's original residents had no such upmarket fripperies for entertainment. They had Roberts Park across the river, with cricket pitches and bandstand, but also byelaws preventing singing and the consumption of alcohol, and use of the playground at any time on a Sunday. A particularly fineCongregational church sits above the Aire, again Italianate in style, and one of only four nonconformist churches in England with its own ring of bells. The main road up from the river is Victoria Street, which rises first past neat parades of shops. Some are gifty boutiques, while one is a gastropub wittily named "don't tell Titus...". Many sell cakes, pies and sandwiches, not just for the well-dressed over-50s tourists but also for students at Shipley College. They're based in several buildings here, including the former primary school, and at lunchtime students pour out into the heritage streets and stuff their faces with pastry.
And these are seriously fantastic streets. Titus Salt's factory accommodation consisted mostly of back-to-back terraces built from local sandstone, yet again Italianate in style. Some for more well-to-do workers had front gardens, but most had doors opening out onto the street and tiny little back yards. That allowed Saltaire's streets to be crammed tightly together, far closer than any urban planner would allow today. The sidestreets are named after Titus's family, including a Herbert Street, a William Henry Street and a Fanny Street. A series of back alleys run parallel, and each runs down towards the river with the moors rising up green and gold on the opposite side. They're not large homes but they're no slums either, well built with a touch of genuine class. Were these in inner London they'd sell for nigh on a million, I bet, whereas up here they sell for under £200,000, which is eminently affordable in southeast terms.
Step too far up the hill and the edge of the World Heritage Site is immediately clear. Beyond the almshouses is the busy Bingley Road, where you'll find Qasim's Car Wash and a KFC. But Saltaire proper is a lovely place, an industrial gem, and a timely reminder that working class housing doesn't have to be cheap and characterless.
Yesterday I visited the National Media Museum in Bradford. My dad went to the opening, back in 1983 when it was called the National Museum of Photography, Film and Television. He rode on a special train up to Yorkshire along with some of the great and the good of the British Film Industry, and he still uses the souvenir mug they gave everyone that day. The train had its own cinema carriage, which sounds very cool, although 30 years later people watch films on trains without a second thought. Indeed I'm writing this very paragraph on the train home, somewhere between Doncaster and Retford, which just goes to show how far "media" has progressed.
The NMM is a rare National Museum in that it's outside London. Three hours outside by train, which may be why you've never been, although it's much more conveniently located if you live elsewhere. You'll find it in the centre of Bradford, next to the Alhambra theatre, beneath a mysterious tower block labelled 'Ice Skating'. Wednesdays in November ought to be a great time to visit because the museum's going to be quiet... or so I thought. I'd reckoned without the school parties, several of them, whose coaches were lined up outside. One group of teenage girls were wandering around with video equipment, which was way cooler than any school trip I ever went on. That would have been fine, but then there were the primary classes and they swarmed everywhere. I soon discovered that a multimedia gallery where you can't hear the sound is worse than useless, so I escaped and came back mid-afternoon after they'd all left. Perfect.
Starting in the basement, one large gallery tells the story of photography. It's sponsored by Kodak, so you tend to get the history of Kodak cameras and not enough else, but the coverage is impressively comprehensive. One of the oldest exhibits is the first ever photographic negative, or at least a copy of the original which the museum stores safely elsewhere. The most recent is a board installed 10 years ago on which Kodak confidently state that "digital photography's share of the market remains comparatively small". Where are they now, eh? Moving up the building, on the ground floor is a rather good gallery outlining the history of the web, from Arpanet teletype to the internet of things. One cabinet contains a handwritten letter, a board game and a photo album and asks "do you know what any of these objects are?" I almost laughed, but then I remembered the target audience and almost cried.
The TV galleries are in two halves, one about the programmes and one about making them. The former is a bit light, with some classic moments to watch and a fairly small number of supporting facts alongside. More excitingly, to those of us of a certain age, Zippy and George from Rainbow are here, as well as PlaySchool's Humpty, Jemima and two Teds (plus some doll that replaced Hamble). More interesting is the gallery featuring the history of TV, with a century of tubes and screens and cameras plus some of the BBC's old radio mikes. You can also play at being in a TV studio, from appearing in your own drama to playing with greenscreen. I tried reading the news, to an audience of zero, only to find (somewhat disappointingly) that the autocue failed to work and then the playback was entirely interference.
Upstairs is the electronic equivalent of a hall of mirrors, with all sorts of science fun involving lenses and light, plus a camera obscura. There's quite a large section on British children's animation, though a little dated for 21st century youngsters, and not especially animated. And then there's an entire floor devoted to gaming, from Atari to the Xbox, which in reality turns out to be a 'lounge' with arcade games in. I sat down and played Pacman (20p) and Frogger (20p), then realised I'd completely forgotten the keys for Manic Miner on the Spectrum. Again my enjoyment was enhanced by there being absolutely nobody else in the room - I suspect on a normal weekend even Pong is busy.
On floor six is a BFI Mediatheque, like the one on the South Bank, where you can watch archive films and programmes for nothing. I was going to watch something erudite but then spotted the very first episode of Doctor Who on the list so watched that, because it seemed appropriate this month. And then I watched the start of the very first episode of Rainbow I last saw when I was seven, with a man who wasn't Geoffrey teaching a man in a bear suit about shapes. "Yes that's a triangle Bungle, well done."
I stayed at the museum over two hours, so there was obviously plenty to see. There'd have been three floors more if I hadn't turned up "between exhibitions", so it pays to check the timing of your visit carefully. But the whole thing had felt a little lightweight, which I suspect is the fault of YouTube and the internet making most of this stuff available elsewhere. Like I said, media's moved on since 1983, from a one off treat to ubiquitous consumption. So all in all I'd say the NMM's not by itself worth the six hour round trip from London, but definitely worth a visit if you're closer.
Seaside postcard: Margate → Broadstairs
If I've walked a bit of coast before, I don't normally come back and tell you about it again. But I'm going to make an exception with the Thanet Coast from Margate to Broadstairs because there are some things I didn't mention last time. And because five years ago there was no art gallery, there was no high speed rail link and there were no Clangers. Here, then, is a further list of things to look out for. [map][13 (above average) photos]
» Margate beach: It's quieter in the autumn than the summer, so sometimes they seal the sand off for special events like motocross. Packs of padded bikers muster by the beach cafe, then ride a series of races round a special course of turns and leaps, with everything created, ridden and cleared between the tides. The crowd seemed to be mostly locals, increasing footfall on the promenade without necessarily bringing more trade to the town. A lovely day for it, even if the wind was whipping bracingly over the harbour arm. [photo]
» Turner Contemporary: This was my fourth visit to Margate's seafront gallery, which isn't bad going given it only opened in 2011. This time nobody was braving the terraced tables outside the cafe, with chairs flung asunder by blowy gales. The big exhibition over the winter features Turner and Constable, and a bundle of fellow 18th century English oil painters who enjoyed sketching in the outdoors. It's a more serious exhibition than I've normally seen here, which I reckon is a good thing, but there's still a sparse gallery of modern arty stuff alongside. Several dozen lovely landscapes won me over, and you can see Turner at the Turner until the new year. [photo]
» Walpole Bay Sea Bathing Pool: You'd have to be fairly brave to enter the waters at the moment. You'd also have to be slightly adventurous, because this cliff-foot pool is located beyond normal strolling distance of central Margate. A concrete breakwater curves out from the shore and bends back to enclose a large expanse of water. Outside the waves are beating hard, whereas in the centre the water's merely choppy, if unappetising. A sign urges you not to walk around the edge, which I ignored, only to find that it was a bit slippery underfoot out there and I had to tread really carefully not to become lifeboat-fodder. Three years ago 200 people walkedseven circuits of the pool as part of an artwork for the Turner Contemporary, but I bet they had a lifeguard nearby. [photo]
» Botany Bay: There are several bays between Margate and Broadstairs, most a mixture of rock and sand beneath chalk cliffs. Botany Bay is one of the sandiest, and also boasts a series of geography field-trip-friendly landscape features. A chalk stack standing separate from the adjacent headland [photo]. An actual arch carved through by the beating waves, which one day will collapse to form a second stack [photo]. Various caves, some very shallow and others deeper, which one day will cut through to form an arch which one day will crumble to create a stack. It'll take centuries, but how great to be able to stand here and explore the full cycle. Just make sure you come near low tide, not at high tide, else the joys of scrambling round the headland through the arch to neighbouring Kingsland Bay will be lost. [top photo]
» North Foreland Lighthouse: South Foreland Lighthouse is near Dover, whereas this one's at the top right corner of Thanet keeping watch over the entrance to the Thames estuary. It was also the very last British lighthouse to be fully automated, with the Duke of Edinburgh turning up in 1998 to press the button that made our last lighthouse keeper redundant. It's beautifully whitewashed today, with pristine clipped hedges, and the two cottages alongside are now rentable as unique holiday homes (sleeps 4). [photo]
» North Foreland Steps: I was thrilled last time I walked this way to discover that an obscure staircase carved down through the chalk to the beach was in fact famous. Author John Buchan was convalescing from a duodenal ulcer at a clifftop villa north of Broadstairs when he wrote The Thirty-Nine Steps in 1913. And these are they, although there were actually 78 of them, later replaced to become 108. I crept partway down last time, and brought a torch this time in the hope of exploring further. Alas no, the gate at the top is now firmly locked with a sign warning "no unauthorised access" - for residents of the local private estate only. Damn. Sigh. But blimey, the Thirty-Nine Steps. [2008 photo]
» Broadstairs: It's a bit classier than Margate, sorry Margate, even if it's missing a big-hitter attraction. The beaches are a bit more sheltered, which at this time of year might be important, and the narrow streets by the sea can out-quaint Margate's Old Town any day. Charles Dickens spent many of his summer holidays here, and wrote David Copperfield in a house overlooking Viking Bay, hence there's a small museum nearby. I didn't go back inside this time, I wanted an ice cream... [photo][photo]
» Morelli's: Wow, just wow. Entering this fifties-style ice cream parlour on Victoria Parade is like stepping back in time. Salmon pink decor, a soda fountain, a juke box, a padded counter, an illuminated menu of convoluted sundaes, what's not to adore. Smiling uniformed ladies are lined up ready to serve you sweet treats and tea, and then you can retire to a pastel-coloured booth to wolf the whole lot down. Morelli's is older than this Art Deco pastiche would suggest, with the UK's first ice cream parlour opening right here in 1932. The brand now has an outlet in Harrods' Food Hall, no less, and further branches in (and I am not making this up) Bahrain, Monaco, Gabon, Dallas, Dubai, Manila, Kuwait and Tbilisi. Not bad for a business that started on the back of a bicycle in Broadstairs. [exterior][interior]
» Oliver Postgate's house: To those of us of a certain age, Oliver Postgate sits at the pinnacle of children's TV. How we loved his Bagpuss, and his Clangers, and his Noggin the Nog - many of these now to found in the Museum of Canterbury. But Oliver lived here in Broadstairs on Chandos Road, in a small square overlooking the seafront, until his death in 2008. His partner Naomi still lives here, and the house is marked by a blue plaque and a very special mosaic. Tiny Clanger and Major Clanger look down from the front wall, surrounded by stars and boulders and (of course) a trademark dustbin lid. It's lovely, and a delightful tribute to the man who made so many childhood days sparkle. [house][plaque]
So, where's the largest new native forest in England? An 850 acre wood created from open fields. A twelve year plan to transform farmscape into forest. Somewhere in the Pennines maybe, or deep in the West Country? Not at all. In fact it's just north of St Albans, less than ten miles outside Greater London. It's Heartwood Forest. And it isn't quite ready yet.
Heartwood Forest is an attempt to create a broadleaved woodland in the Hertfordshire Green Belt. It's the brainchild of the Woodland Trust, a conservation charity with projects nationwide. Heartwood is their largest project, due for completion in the early 2020s. They found a mostly featureless expanse north of the village of Sandridge, with a few patches of existing woodland within, and bought up the fields round about. They're now gradually turning over those fields to tree cover, planting saplings over the winter months with the help of volunteers. If you want to see a lot of leaves, go somewhere else. But to see nature in transition, amid attractive rolling countryside, there's no time like now.
Heartwood's not been planted with easy public transport access in mind. A couple of bus routes run up the middle, but not that frequently, and positively rarely on Sundays. The Midland mainline runs up the western edge of the forest but there's no station particularly near. Instead this is very much a venue for car drivers, which is fair enough because most people in this part of Hertfordshire have cars. But I had to walk, having missed the last bus for two hours, which involved a three and a half mile trudge from St Albans station. It wasn't the most alluring of journeys, alas, but the village of Sandridge at the far end was pleasant enough. It boasts a 12th century church, and three decent-looking village pubs, and also has takeaway leaflets featuring maps of the forest, which is more than the actual forest does.
The thing you most notice as you turn off the main road towards Heartwood Forest's car park is the lack of forest. The adjacent slopes are in fact covered with trees but they're very small, planted last year I think, and barely poking up above the long grass. The other thing you'll notice are the slow cars, their drivers adhering faithfully to the 10mph speed limit, most likely with a dog peering up from the back seat. Heartwood's very much a place for canine exercise, especially (but not exclusively) the paths closest to the car park. And if you come in summer expect to see the wildflowermeadows ablaze, with echoes visible even into November.
It's quite easy to get quite lost quite quickly, even with a map. One area of open common looks much like another, and the paths aren't especially well signposted, indeed barely at all. One tip is to try to follow the waymarked trail, which tours the site via numbered points of interest, although some of the information therein is already out of date. One board says you'll probably have to look hard to see the trees, whereas in this area they've grown up since and are nearly two metres tall. Elsewhere an entire hillside looks like commonland, until you spot the tiny oaks spaced lightly across the contours.
Four pockets of ancient woodland remain - that's defined as woodland over 400 years old. Langley Wood is the nearest to the car park, and the best for wandering about in. It can take a while to find a way inside - the forestry managers have been busy creating bramble and bracken barriers along much of the perimeter. In six months time expect carpets of bluebells. But at this time of year there's much leaf cover to stomp around in, and a fair number of broken branches as a result of last week's storm. Indeed the skyline's highly unusual for November, with most trees still fully green thanks to the mild weather, and any leaves turned brown, red or gold ripped off already by the wind.
Heartwood isn't yet an ideal shape for rambling, not while some fields are sealed off prior to planting, and not with a large private farm located awkwardly centrally. But it does connect to an existing open space to the north, that's NomanslandCommon, an established and locally-loved slice of green. It's also the place where my parents first met, so I extended my walk to make a pilgrimage to this very special site. There was just a hint here of what Heartwood Forest might look like once it's matured, a swathe of deciduous woodland where folk might stroll and enjoy and meet. The next tree-planting day's in a fortnight's time, that's Sunday 17th - please bring a spade. Come visit Heartwood then, or soon, or much later, depending.
My three line-by-line visits to Wembley this year have provided the perfect opportunity to keep an eye on what's going on opposite the stadium. In February (for the Bakerloo) I noted a new town hall and retail development under construction. In June (for the Metropolitan) I looked inside the new Brent Civic Centre and its associated library. And now in November (for the Jubilee) I've returned to discover the capital's latest shopping mall. It's the London Designer Outlet, billed as Wembley's answer to Bicester Village, and it opened tendays ago. Umpteen brands have moved in to sell their goods at "up to 70% off", which is a technically meaningless quote but looks great in all the publicity. Throw in a dozen restaurants and a multi-screen cinema and the developers hope they've ticked all the boxes for a commercial-friendly day out.
If you've not been to Wembley recently, I have to warn you it's changed utterly. Developers Quintain have knocked down most of what used to be here, assuming it hadn't been pulled down already, and are busy creating a "destination living" space on a huge scale. 5000 flats are planned, of which a small number are already in place (including some very boxy student accommodation). A lot of hotels have gone up already, because accommodation will always thrive alongside Wembley Arena and the national stadium. It's all a bit tall-modern-ugly, to be frank, thus far in a couple of clusters close to the Jubilee and Chiltern stations. And now there's the London Designer Outlet, a clad stack of retail to the west of the stadium, which fits in perfectly with the general lack of architectural distinction. [8 photos]
The LDO consists of a double decker outdoor mall ending at a small piazza, plus three other shorter arcades, two indoors. The anchor tenants are around the piazza, that's M&S and Superdry and H&M and Gap. This being an outlet venue most of the goods are reduced in price, so appear to be bargains even if they're really hard-to-shift fashion leftovers. The M&S outlet store has chunky discounts on clothes and homeware, most marked down from the usual in-store price and some of the rest made specifically for outlet purchase. Fleecy lounge trousers are the big push for men, while the Christmas gift department is already well stacked. Superdry's shop is darker and edgier, indeed I chose to leave after about fifteen seconds, having not spotted much looking bargaintastic. Gap, however, achieved the unthinkable and actually made me want to buy stuff. Half price shirts, half price jackets, half price woolly top things... I was sorely tempted. And then I saw the tills, which were too few, and the queues, which were too long. Somebody at Gap clearly underestimated how popular their shop would be, so never mind, I left empty-handed.
Footwear fanatics can find stuff anywhere on a spectrum from Clarks to Nike (though I didn't spot much with stilettos, sorry ladies, maybe I wasn't looking carefully). There are also several cookware shops - you know the sort of thing, with nice crockery and cutlery and gadgets you don't necessarily need but are selling fairly cheap. In case you think the whole place is upmarket, not so, there's a Calendar Club for anyone who needs twelve photos of One Direction to wrap for a wayward niece. Indeed there's little high-end here to match the elite selection to be found in Bicester - no Armani, McQueen or Burberry - so the moneyed classes of the Home Counties won't be rushing here fast. Indeed thus far I'd say most of the London Designer Outlet's clientèle are fairly local, which means a lot of Asian families from Brent mixed in with curious shoppers from wherever. A couple of launch events have already reached out specifically to the local Wembley community. Last Saturday a group of Bollywood dancersshimmied appealingly at the foot of the escalators, while this Saturday saw a Sitare Festival with a procession of lights and a stage showcasing Bhangra musicians.
The biggest success thus far, it seems, has been food. Pizza Express looked almost full at the weekend, ditto Nando's. Maybe Wembley's been sorely lacking in dining outlets that serve more than fried chicken, or maybe it's just that most of the other restaurants here haven't opened yet. Various units on the upper mall are still being fitted out with kitchens and banquettes, and whether the LDO can support a dozen family-sized eateries has yet to be proven. It's not all sit-down stuff, there's a Pret and a Nero and a Costa for all those shopaholics who need a rest between purchases. You may have to hunt to find them, though. Neither the website nor the giveaway leaflet feature a map of the complex, only a list of brands contained therein. I suspect that's because stores are opening all the time, not everything was open on day one. And I also suspect it's because a map might, thus far, look woefully unimpressive.
An awful lot of the units at the London Designer Outlet remain closed. The first and second floors have several vacancies, at present covered over by upbeat LDO branding. The arcade leading north to Lakeside Way has no tenants at all, apart from one unit occupied by the Outlet's own Information Centre. Quite a few frontages announce someone's "coming soon", so I know that Lindt and New Balance and Jimmy's World Grill & Bar are on their way. But there's a silent tumbleweed feeling to some corners, which may not last forever, but I bet the developers are gutted they couldn't sell the place out from the start. They may have more luck filling the cinema, although the architects seem to have gone out of their way to make winding your way up from the ground floor to the entrance on the fourth as winding and tortuous as possible.
If you fancy a visit to the London Designer Outlet - probably later when a few more shops are open - it's fairly easy by train. From Wembley Park station you get there by walking down Wembley Way as if going to the football, then diverting right past the Arena. Alternatively Chiltern's Wembley Stadium station is much closer, approached via a windswept charmless piazza. If you live locally, or come by bus, you can nip in direct from Empire Way. But you'll probably drive - that's the intention for luring in those across a much wider catchment area. And if you do drive and you end up in the "Yellow parking" zone, spare a thought for what used to be here. When I visited back in February the last remnant of Wembley's 1924 Empire Exhibition - part of the Palace of Industry - was still standing. That's since been entirely demolished, and now several acres of former heritage have become nothing more than a blank car park. They'll be flats and offices eventually, such is Wembley's march towards "destination living", but I can't say I much like what the area is becoming.
You've probably heard of his elder brother. Eric Gill was a sculptor (see 55 Broadway) and typeface designer (see Gill Sans), with a distinctly questionable private life. MacDonald Gill took a livelier look at life, making his name as a graphic artist with a particular penchant for painted maps. An exhibition of his work has been underway for the last six weeks in Ealing in the gallery at Pitzhanger Manor and, sorry, it was well worth a visit. Gill's fledgling skills were spotted by Frank Pick, London Underground's great design coordinator, who asked him to create a light-hearted map of the system to display as a poster. The result was the 'Wonderground' map, a triumph of cartoon cartography, which captured the hearts of the capital's travellers in 1914. They stopped and stared at the intricacies and characters on within, from Camden to Clapham and from Hammersmith to Hackney, and thousands bought their own copy for six shillings. It's still a treat to scrutinise the map today, spotting the puns and poems and stations long since closed. Further maps of Theatreland and Country Bus Routes ensued, each equally engaging and eminently covetable. You can forget Google Maps - MacDonald's coloured charts have far more 3D charm, and often far more useful information.
At the end of the war Gill was commissioned to design the typeface used on standard military gravestones, hence his work can be seen across countless cemeteries in France and Flanders. The exhibition also included several maps of the Empire, with large parts painted red of course, to highlight themes such as Post Office Communications, shipping lanes and tea. The International Tea Market Expansion Board commissioned several pieces, with one - Tea Revives the World - appropriated as part of the war effort in 1940. One of his largest works was for the first class lounge on the Queen Mary, a figurative map depicting a transatlantic crossing. We enjoyed all of these, and more, those of us who trotted along to Ealing on the last day of the exhibition. And you can't, because it's closed. But you can click through a detailed guide to the exhibition's first appearance, in Brighton in 2011, which ought to give you all the graphic backstory you could want. Alternatively there's a 40 minute podcast biography to enjoy here. And if you're particularly smitten you can buysome of Gill's maps, including the marvellous Wonderground. It would be fantastic to see it again adorning platforms next year to celebrate its centenary... what say you TfL?
WarrenElsmore never grew out of playing with Lego. Not the skewiff blocky houses that most of us spent our childhoods creating, but proper recognisable buildings, and on a grand scale. He's done a lot of London landmarks, and he specialises in 3D commissions for corporations, campaigns and whatever. I was immensely impressed by his Olympic Park last year, which you can see under construction here and in its final full glory here. Warren's compiled many of his favourites into a book, entitled Brick City. It's been out for a while, but various models from within are currently on tour and have spent the last week in the artsdepot in Finchley. I had to fight past an uber-worthy street theatre company singing some eco-message on carts in the road outside, which wasn't pleasant, but thankfully the gallery inside (and upstairs) was rather quieter. Centrepiece was a massive St Pancras built from sixty thousand plastic bricks, with the proper gothic hotel up front and the full set of platforms out back. Some of the Eurostars looked like they were toppling off the track, but the attention to detail was impressive, even down to a behatted Betjeman in plastic staring up at the roof.
I was expecting more, but only a small number of additional models surrounded the big station. A Buckingham Palace balcony complete with waving royals for one, and a Battersea Power Station (plus flying pig) for another. Heading abroad there was a Reichstag and a Colosseum, the latter a fine example of how it doesn't take too many bricks to create a convincing reproduction. The exhibition attracted Lego lovers of all ages, from three old ladies who followed me off the number 82 bus to a couple of hairy, animated students. One fan, who must have been all of two years old, stepped forward to rearrange the characters on the St Pancras hotel forecourt somewhat destructively. His mum held him back and gave him a talking to, to no avail because he was straight back in there stepping enthusiastically through the barrier. Thankfully he was swiftly distracted by the opportunity to play with some ordinary non-landmark Lego in the corner of the gallery, and further damage was averted. Had we been there earlier we could have met Warren himself, who was present to sign some books and smile. But you're too late... unless you're in Paisley over the winter, or in Newcastle next Spring. Sometimes the most interesting exhibitions are to be found where you'd least likely look.
It's time to take an end-to-end journey on the Jubilee line. That's an 1870s bit, a 1930s bit, a 1970s bit and a 1990s bit, which is far more of a 20th century mixed bag than any other line. From Stratford to Stanmore is 22 miles by train, but nearer fourteen direct, because the Jubilee goes all round the houses. Let's start at the modern end.
Pretty much Nowheresville when the Jubilee line extension first arrived, Stratford has since been transformed into East London's transport hub. Three platforms line up beneath the station's glass roof, with the next departure announced via an inadequate Next Train Indicator (which I've slagged off before). A mass of humanity swarms towards the Jubilee line concourse, squints to work out which platform's departing next, then dashes/jogs/runs towards the rear of the train to board before it leaves. The end result is one of the most asymmetrical loading patterns at any terminus station. The front carriages are always nigh empty, because nobody can be bothered to walk that far, or daren't walk that far in case the doors shut. Meanwhile the back carriage is rammed, the rear of the back especially so, because people are lazy, or fearful the train might leave without them. It's a sub-optimal start, to be frank.
I take a seat at the back of the next-but-one train, and wait. For the first minute it's very quiet, then comes a light flurry of people who didn't think they'd be able to reach the first train in time, and then the hordes. A large family group arrives and despairs at not being able to find five seats together. Three lost-looking tourists stumble in, bemused and blocking the entrance. A middle-aged couple sit on either side of me and conduct a conversation past my face. Two teenage girls board with McDonalds meals ("We'll stink the train out" "I don't care"). Two French boys sit on the floor to play a tiny handheld game. As the doors beep an older lady ducks in, and gets mildly smashed, then stares dejectedly because she can't sit down. And we're off, in cattle truck conditions... even at the weekend.
Thanks to the DLR there are now two additional stations to pass on the way to West Ham - one suspects neither is busy, but it's not easy to see. This southbound run isn't scenic, running past the main depot, some rows of flats and a string of commercial units. If the Jubilee was ever meant to bring prosperity to this edge of Newham, it hasn't quite yet. But the interchange at Canning Town throbs with people - there's some event on at ExCel that involves dressing up, so Princess Fiona shares the platform with a crowd of weird but undistinguishable comic characters.
That's it for overground, which means we're about to enter the tunnelled extension section with the splendid architecture. North Greenwich glows blue, though darkly, and you don't get the best view from the train. "Exit here for the Emirates Airline and the Oh Two" says the recorded announcement, plugging two different multinational brands, like you do on the modern Underground. There's no such promotion at Canary Wharf, just some whopping great roundels at the foot of a silver void. It might be busy up the front end of the train, but nobody walks down to the back, neatly balancing out our earlier Stratford-related rear overcrowding.
A third crossing of the Thames brings us to Canada Water, where the Overground allows South Londoners to flock in. Then Bermondsey allows a rare glimpse of daylight pouring down the escalator shaft, which is a bit brighter than those dull grey tiles on the walls down here. At London Bridge those French boys have to be almost dragged from the train by their parents, who just about make it onto the platform with their luggage before the doors close. It's busy here, so busy it's hard to believe that 15 years ago only one tube line served the mainline terminus above. It's less throbbing at Southwark, which is barely any distance from Waterloo East, and not that far either to Waterloo. By now the great majority of people who boarded in Newham have disembarked and I have fewer, different neighbours. I would have one more but he arrived too late and ran headlong, slap, into the platform doors.
Westminster is the last station with protective glass panels, and also the last with metal panels bolted to the platform walls. Green Park is much more 70s, and often smells somewhat of dank water, which isn't quite the right image for the heart of Mayfair. It feels here like a tipping point has been reached. The train's much emptier, as if the northwestern suburbs are rather less buzzing than the east. And the journey onwards is more jolty too, which must be 20 years difference in quality of track. I like the tiling pattern at Bond Street, a wrapped gift with a blue ribbon, with a letter 'B' that must still stand for Bond and not yet Burberry. Then the next station has its Sherlock Holmes theme, a series of cameos depicting the detective's stories, one of which is placed out of reach at the end of the platform beyond a barrier.
I'm surprised that Baker Street is the middle station on the Jubilee line, I thought we'd come much further. It also signals the transition to becoming a local train for local people, with the buzz of central London now behind us. The lengthy run of step-free stations is long gone too. St John's Wood is another that wheelchair users can't access, which'll be because we're now on the 1930s section of the line. Swiss Cottage also has that pre-war style, with glorious uplighters on the escalators, and a tiling pattern that echoes the Hainault loop. And then, after nearly half an hour in subterranea, we emerge into daylight again.
Finchley Road boasts an optimal cross-platform interchange with the Metropolitan. A Chesham train lines up beside us, supposedly running fast to Wembley Park, except we manage to run faster and are only overtaken as our train brakes for West Hampstead. This is the first station we've seen with a shrubbery, or indeed any attempt at horticulture, here somewhat softening the adjacent builders yard. Hurrah for the viaduct approaching Kilburn, one of the finest vantage points on the Underground, with north London spread out in panorama all around. Less hurrah for the husband who boards here, then holds the door open for several seconds while his wife totters on heels behind.
Two platforms at Willesden Green stand empty, where Metropolitan line trains could but don't stop, much to the relief of long-haul Bucks commuters. The tracks now pass the backs of gardens, some small and yardy, others larger and cultivated. It's properly residential by Dollis Hill, its island platform blessed with splendidly curved canopies and still with flowers blooming yellow and gold in their beds. Neasden's less special, sorry, with a light blue shade to the paintwork across the station. Watch out for the enormous depot to the right, for the Met rather than for the Jubilee, though always with an intriguing additional assortment of rolling stock parked outside.
We reach Wembley Park just eleven and a half minutes after Finchley Road, which isn't much slower than Metropolitan passengers who've leapfrogged the intermediate five stations. But theirs are the busier trains as we continue outbound, indeed there's only me left by now in my Jubilee carriage as we duck beneath the mainline and head north. Much of the rest of the ride will be along the backs of substantial white-painted semis, our surroundings now properly Metroland. We pass the foot of Barn Hill on the way to Kingsbury, a station with an almost rural feel that greatly reminds me of Croxley. Queensbury misses out on the illusion by being elevated, although that does allow a view of the unique roundel roundabout built to give this 30s community a sense of place.
That temporary-looking stadium beneath the tracks before Canons Park is The Hive, the new home of Barnet Football Club. The nearside building could be an out-of-town warehouse, while their main stand resembles a three-bar electric fire... but the club's not planning on being here long. And then there's only one station to go, running up the side of a park (it's Canons Park, obviously), before queueing to enter the terminus ahead. Stanmore has three platforms, and like Stratford two are back to back while one's out on a limb. I don't understand the rationale behind the three Next Train Indicators here, which announce the platform of the next train south, then the times of the next two trains from that platform, which can be half an hour away. But this is only of interest if you're heading straight back south again, whereas what you should do is exit up the far stairs to Stanmore proper. Hmm, perhaps.
So the Cycle Superhighway 2 extension opened yesterday, but not officially. Cones were removed and cyclists started riding along the segregated lanes, but nobody came along and cut a ribbon. TfL were definitely planning a launch and "media event" on Thursday, but they missed the deadline and this never materialised. I can't say I'm surprised. Even last Sunday CS2x was far from finished, and a 50-strong hi-vis army was busy repositioning kerbs and painting tarmac. The work's still not complete - at least two of the junctions aren't ready and not enough signs are in place. I hope the contractors are being duly fined for their tardiness. But one further weekend blitz should do it, and then the media can turn up next week and focus their cameras appropriately.
As a local resident I got a leaflet through my letterbox yesterday exhorting me to try "your new way to get around" and "discover the joys of cycling". No thanks, not while the rest of CS2 is so inadequate, not a hope. But I did go for a walk yesterday along half the extension, from the Bow Roundabout to the Greenway and back again, to see how the project's stacking up. It was the height of the evening rush hour and eastbound traffic was jammed solid, so my experience probably isn't representative. But here are some things I spotted along the way, some of which weren't what I expected.
Cycle early start, westbound
This is the updated approach to the Bow Roundabout, very similar to the double lights that've been on the eastbound for a year. Traffic holds back while cyclists filter in front, then they get away first when the lights change. Except it's not working like that. I stood around for a few minutes during which time three cyclists turned up, and every single one of them jumped the final red light. They did this safely, because no traffic was coming round the roundabout at the time, but that's not how traffic lights are meant to work. Admittedly this is a tiny sample, entirely statistically inadequate, but it matches behaviour I've seen repeatedly coming the other way. TfL will tut and say they've built something that's safe if used properly, but I'd argue their early start design actually increases the number of red light jumpers, so is far from being an ideal solution.
Bow Flyover bus stop bypass
The idea here is that cyclists nip round the back of the bus stop, which has been pushed out towards the traffic making space for a narrow bike channel behind. There is a designated crossing point for pedestrians, but as yet there are no markings on the ground nor any signs to indicate to pedestrians where that crossing point is. This blue hump in the blue cycle lane is especially hard to see after dark. Also somewhat hard to see, it seems, is the entrance to the bus stop bypass itself. The blue lane veers left into a channel in the surrounding pavement, but many cyclists are riding straight past towards the bus stop itself. Maybe they think it'll be quicker, but then they end up in the wrong place for the cycle early stop lights ahead and lose out. I'm surprised there isn't an arrow or a logo or something painted at the entrance to the bypass lane, because I don't think the way to go is entirely obvious, especially not after dark.
Westbound segregated lane
It's an impressive width, this. In many places you could park a car between the barrier and the kerb, which leaves plenty of space for cyclists, even for cyclist to overtake cyclist if necessary. The blue lane's a bit intermittent in places, breaking for every sideroad and access point along the way, so it's no panacea. But compared to the original CS2 you'd feel pretty safe here, I reckon. So it was a surprise to see quite how few cyclists were taking advantage. I walked up CS2x for ten minutes at "going home" time, and only fifteen bikes went by. Maybe that's because this was the "into Central London" direction, but I was expecting Stratford High Street to be much busier with cyclists. When you're on a bus queuing in the two lanes alongside, you have to wonder if blue paint is the best use of the entire third lane.
Greenway puffin crossing
Hurrah! Atempting to cross Stratford High Street at the Greenway has been impossible for years, with a barrier along the centre of the road forcing awkward diversions to left or right. A straight-across crossing was installed for the Olympics, then barriered off immediately afterwards, now re-engineered into two staggered sections. And it's open, actually open, which is excellent. The driver of this change is joining up both sides of the Greenway for cyclists, with pedestrians the added beneficiary. Never mind that the Greenway into the Olympic Park has been closed for years, and will be for two more while Crossrail do their stuff... this is thinking ahead. But the lights have been timed to allow pedestrians an interminable time to cross. Maybe someone at TfL thinks they're being very kind to the elderly, but I watched a mother cross with a toddler, and they could easily have walked back again in the time it took before the traffic moved again. Forget "smoothing the traffic flow", instead TfL's new puffin crossings unnecessarily slow it down.
Eastbound segregated lane
I expected this to be much busier. Half past five in the evening, the heart of the rush hour... but barely any cyclists passed. Again I walked alongside CS2x for ten minutes, and again only fifteen bikes went by. Worse, about half of them weren't even using the new blue lane. Two were riding on the pavement, which to be fair is vast here, indeed it's odd that CS2x's blue lane wasn't carved out of the mega-pavement instead. The other five were in the road, weaving through the traffic, which I thought was odd until I realised where they were coming from. These were cyclists who'd chosen to ride over the Bow Flyover rather than following the blue line round the Bow Roundabout, so they'd arrived on the wrong side of the traffic away from the blue strip. TfL's designers have been good and left a big gap in the barrier, but these cyclists weren't seeing it, or weren't wanting to use it. All in all, the brand new Cycle Superhighway extension was getting less than one user per minute. That might improve, indeed should improve, once word gets out that Stratford High Street's much safer to ride. But CS2x isn't yet properly signposted, nor fully integrated into its surroundings, so let's give it time. Best I come back later and report properly.
The fifth of the Ripper's murders took place off Dorset Street, a grim thoroughfare to the west of Commercial Street in Spitalfields. Dorset Street started out as a footpath along the edge of open countryside - the 'Spital Field' belonging to the priory hospital of St Mary's. During the 17th century the area became home to artisans and silk weavers, many of them Huguenots fleeing from abroad. When the silk trade finally died out, many of the four-storey townhouses on Dorset Street became lodging houses for London's poorest. Many so-called double rooms were really nothing more than brothels, and the street soon earned the nickname of "the worst street in London". An alleyway led off between the house at number 26 and the chandler's shop at 27, behind which lay Millers Court. This had once been a back garden, but was infilled with cottages in 1851 and later partitioned off into separate rooms. And it was in one of these, a back parlour 12 foot square, that the Ripper's foul crime was committed.
Dorset Street took many years to shed its unsavoury reputation, changing its name to Duval Street in 1904 in an attempt to camouflage its past. The road is still there, sort-of, but you'll not find it listed in the A-Z today thanks to two rounds of development by the City of London. First (in 1928) they knocked down all the houses on the north side of the street, including Millers Court, and in their place rose the London Fruit and Wool Exchange. This Portland stone edifice housed traders selling fruit and veg sourced from countries all around the world, conveyed onwards via fourteen loading bays still visible round the back. The Gentle Author offers insight via a 1937 catalogue here. The slums on the southern side of the street lasted much longer, until fifty years ago, and in 1971 were replaced by the White's Row multi-storey car park.
The White's Row car park is also under threat from the same development plan. Its loss will be less keenly felt, except by car drivers and by motorcyclists seeking somewhere free to park. Strange building. From the outside it looks like a metal skeleton with brick stairwells, but step inside and the full concreteness of the multi-storey hits you. And you can step inside, very easily, via a set of always-open stairs facing onto Commercial Street. The stairwell leads all the way up to the 5th floor, which is the open roof, from which there's an alternative view of the City skyline. Most days there's absolutely nobody parked up here, nor even on the two floors below, which allows the casual visitor easy opportunity to stare down at what used to be Dorset Street below. Those green painted delivery bays with the yellow hatched lines, that's where the Ripper last struck. Prior to that a City flowerbed, prior to that a school playground, prior to that a Sunday clothes market, prior to that a Crossrail building site. Five points of terror, each erased and redefined by London's ever changing landscape. 125 years on these murder sites have changed forever, but the collective memory of Jack's brutal deeds remains.
The NMM is a rare National Museum in that it's outside London. Three hours outside by train, which may be why you've never been, although it's much more conveniently located if you live elsewhere. You'll find it in the centre of Bradford, next to the Alhambra theatre, beneath a mysterious tower block labelled 'Ice Skating'. Wednesdays in November ought to be a great time to visit because the museum's going to be quiet... or so I thought. I'd reckoned without the school parties, several of them, whose coaches were lined up outside. One group of teenage girls were wandering around with video equipment, which was way cooler than any school trip I ever went on. That would have been fine, but then there were the primary classes and they swarmed everywhere. I soon discovered that a multimedia gallery where you can't hear the sound is worse than useless, so I escaped and came back mid-afternoon after they'd all left. Perfect.
Seaside postcard: Margate → Broadstairs
» Botany Bay: There are several bays between Margate and Broadstairs, most a mixture of rock and sand beneath chalk cliffs. Botany Bay is one of the sandiest, and also boasts a series of geography field-trip-friendly landscape features. A chalk stack standing separate from the adjacent headland [photo]. An actual arch carved through by the beating waves, which one day will collapse to form a second stack [photo]. Various caves, some very shallow and others deeper, which one day will cut through to form an arch which one day will crumble to create a stack. It'll take centuries, but how great to be able to stand here and explore the full cycle. Just make sure you come near low tide, not at high tide, else the joys of scrambling round the headland through the arch to neighbouring Kingsland Bay will be lost. [top photo]
If you've not been to Wembley recently, I have to warn you it's changed utterly. Developers Quintain have knocked down most of what used to be here, assuming it hadn't been pulled down already, and are busy creating a "destination living" space on a huge scale. 5000 flats are planned, of which a small number are already in place (including some very boxy student accommodation). A lot of hotels have gone up already, because accommodation will always thrive alongside Wembley Arena and the national stadium. It's all a bit tall-modern-ugly, to be frank, thus far in a couple of clusters close to the Jubilee and Chiltern stations. And now there's the London Designer Outlet, a clad stack of retail to the west of the stadium, which fits in perfectly with the general lack of architectural distinction. [8 photos]
Pretty much Nowheresville when the Jubilee line extension first arrived, Stratford has since been transformed into East London's transport hub. Three platforms line up beneath the station's glass roof, with the next departure announced via an inadequate Next Train Indicator (which I've slagged off before). A mass of humanity swarms towards the Jubilee line concourse, squints to work out which platform's departing next, then dashes/jogs/runs towards the rear of the train to board before it leaves. The end result is one of the most asymmetrical loading patterns at any terminus station. The front carriages are always nigh empty, because nobody can be bothered to walk that far, or daren't walk that far in case the doors shut. Meanwhile the back carriage is rammed, the rear of the back especially so, because people are lazy, or fearful the train might leave without them. It's a sub-optimal start, to be frank.
Westminster is the last station with protective glass panels, and also the last with metal panels bolted to the platform walls. Green Park is much more 70s, and often smells somewhat of dank water, which isn't quite the right image for the heart of Mayfair. It feels here like a tipping point has been reached. The train's much emptier, as if the northwestern suburbs are rather less buzzing than the east. And the journey onwards is more jolty too, which must be 20 years difference in quality of track. I like the tiling pattern at Bond Street, a wrapped gift with a blue ribbon, with a letter 'B' that must still stand for Bond and not yet Burberry. Then the next station has its Sherlock Holmes theme, a series of cameos depicting the detective's stories, one of which is placed out of reach at the end of the platform beyond a barrier.
As a local resident I got a leaflet through my letterbox yesterday exhorting me to try "your new way to get around" and "discover the joys of cycling". No thanks, not while the rest of CS2 is so inadequate, not a hope. But I did go for a walk yesterday along half the extension, from the Bow Roundabout to the Greenway and back again, to see how the project's stacking up. It was the height of the evening rush hour and eastbound traffic was jammed solid, so my experience probably isn't representative. But here are some things I spotted along the way, some of which weren't what I expected.
