It strikes me this virus could be wiped out if only everyone behaved like me.
I live alone which is much safer than living with someone else. Not only is there nobody in close regular contact but I never have to worry about them going out, catching the virus and bringing it home. Obviously if I lived with someone else I'd be very careful when I went out so definitely wouldn't catch it myself. But you never know for sure where your other half has been, so living with someone else just isn't worth the risk.
One of the chief ways this virus spreads is between family members, but you won't catch me spreading it this way. I live over 100 miles from the rest of my family so I can't be tempted to nip over see them at the drop of the hat. If only everyone lived miles from their families and couldn't just 'pop round' to see them, everyone would be much happier and thousands of lives could have been saved.
I always stay far enough away from other people when I go out. Everyone knows precisely how far away that is, the scientists have made it very clear. If I see someone coming and a close pass looks likely I'm careful to step out of the way to maintain the minimum recommended distance. And yet all too often I encounter other people who seem happy to pass much closer, almost as if they're working to a completely different standard. On what misguided basis are these careless idiots endangering my life? But I note that some people choose to step out of my way as I approach, entirely unnecessarily because I was never going to breach the definitive minimum threshold, and I find this quite offensive. I don't smell, I've not got the lurgy or anything, so what's their problem?
I don't understand why people go out in the afternoon. Streets and parks are much busier in the afternoon, from what I've seen, so it makes much more sense to go out in the morning instead. Social distancing would be so much easier if everyone went out in the morning, like me, rather in the afternoon.
I see people travelling and I don't understand why they're doing it because I don't need to. I have no need to hop on a bus so I don't, leaving more room on board for others. I also have no need to get on a train so I don't, because I am mentally capable of confining my horizons for an indefinite period. I venture no further from home than I think I should be permitted, but it seems many people aren't respecting the same limits as me. I can conceive of no reason why travel is strictly necessary, certainly not in my life, so we could save countless lives if everyone took the same approach.
I can't believe how many people keep going out for a coffee. I never go out for a coffee, mainly because I don't like the stuff, but even if I did I wouldn't go out for it. Anyone can make perfectly decent coffee at home using readily available pods and granules, so there's absolutely no need to leave the house to get someone else to make it for you. Admittedly I do go out to buy a newspaper sometimes, but that's completely different because the news you get indoors just isn't the same so this makes for a perfectly legitimate journey.
Also I don't get why so many people keep going out for takeaway food. There's plenty of food in your kitchen, or at least there is in mine, so there's really no need to keep going out and buying one-off meals elsewhere.
I fail to understand why so many non-essential shops are still open. They sell things I don't need because I've already got them, or stuff I can't ever imagine using, so we'd be a much safer country if they were all shut down. Everything can be delivered these days, indeed couriers are fast and very reliable, or better still just sit tight and make do with the possessions you've already got. Obviously it was useful that John Lewis was still open for click and collect when I needed a new smartphone, but that was plainly an essential purchase and the exception that proves the rule.
I haven't formed a support bubble with any other household. I'm legally entitled to, living alone, but I consider it'd be an unnecessary elevation of risk. My mental health is perfectly capable of withstanding a year of full-on isolation, because that's how introverts roll, and everyone else basically needs to get with the programme to save lives. Meeting other people is incontrovertibly worse for your wellbeing than being cut off from them for months and months, so we must all make every effort to stay detached.
Also I don't have offspring which simplifies my life enormously with regard to childcare. I don't live with small humans who spend the day mixing with classmates in a so-called secure bubble, I don't need to go to the supermarket to feed hungry mouths so often and I'm never dragged to the park when I could be securely tucked away indoors. Also nobody knows what surfaces little hands might have been touching, nor where teenagers have really been when they say they've been out on their bike. A country in which nobody had children to look after would be able to defeat the virus much faster, it's basic common sense.
I have no problem staying indoors because there's nowhere else I have to be. I don't have a job that requires me to travel, endangering my life and others, indeed this entire pandemic could be ended if only nobody had a job to go to and simply stayed at home.
Even if I did have a job I would make sure it could be done remotely, as all proper professional jobs can. The country ticks over perfectly well on Zoom, as we see on news broadcasts daily. If everyone got themselves a job that could be done from home most unnecessary travel could be halted overnight, stopping the spread of the virus and thereby keeping our hospitals staffed and operational.
Also I've already had the virus so I can't catch it again. I'm sure I had it because I ticked off at least one of the list of symptoms and fought off the infection just fine. Admittedly the government weren't testing us back then but I'd definitely have been positive, or so I've convinced myself, which has very much changed my mindset going forward. The science is very clear that you can only catch it once, so even if I did catch it again I couldn't pass it on.
The obvious solution to the pandemic is for us all to stay at home alone while the last traces of infection burn them out. The country would still tick over, the lights would stay on and the NHS would no longer be overwhelmed, and then we could all get back to normal within a fortnight.
I have my own rules, which are the official rules as they apply to me but perceived through the filter of common sense. I know my limits and which boundaries I can push, as I'm sure do you, but your interpretation of the rules may not be as correct as mine. Indeed I often get cross that other people aren't doing what I would do in the circumstances, which ought to be patently obvious because in my view the rules are perfectly clear.
It strikes me this virus could be wiped out if only everyone behaved like me.
[for today's post I needed an accusatory swear word which would pass unchecked through a profanity filter, so I came up with Bolx, which I shall be using with abandon]
East of the Bow Roundabout lies an enormous (and very much unfinished) mixed-use redevelopment site. It's been a decade in the planning, demolition and partial reconstruction, and has finally got to the stage where the first offices and houses are being rented out. Originally it was going to be called Strand East but a few years ago it was rebranded as Sugar House Island, which is plainly Bolx, and the creative team haven't stopped since.
Nobody lives here yet so any sense of community is a long way off. One small corner has workspaces up and running plus a never-busy restaurant, but the rest is either building site or not yet built-on, and very much in need of tenants.
This dog is the emblem of The Dane Group who manufactured inks and paints in their factory here between 1853 and 2005. Their tiled canine mural survives, but the branding team skipped the doggy angle when picking a name for the development and focused instead on a demolished building called the Sugar House. Also Sugar House Island isn't a proper island, merely a large triangular plot surrounded by man-made offshoots of the River Lea, but for marketing purposes this insular Bolx counts as truth.
Recently the hoardings facing Stratford High Street have been updated. They used to be blank, or display phrases like nine centuries of makers & innovators, their old workplaces sensitively restored which were plainly Bolx. Alas the new slogans are very much worse.
i) Coming ashore is something you do when an island is at sea. Sugar House Island is not surrounded by sea, nor even lapped by tidal waters, so that's Bolx. ii) These two drinks aren't shown from the same perspective which looks mighty odd. Also the availability of Aperol is unlikely to generate sufficiently unique chills or thrills, so that's also Bolx. iii) The writing above the apple tree branch says Space To Let Loose, which having seen the denseness of the intended estate layout is plainly Bolx. iv) None of the nooks and crannies available for exploration will be historic because the slate was wiped clean when the bulldozers moved in, so that's Bolx too.
It gets worse. These poems are so bad that a reader texted me during the week to decry their nauseating Bolxness.
I've blogged some pretty terrible marketing Bolx in my time, but these twee triples are on a different level. I think the worst, in terms of attracting people to live here, is bottom left, but top right runs it pretty close. A housing development you can giggle in while wearing pyjamas is about as far from a Unique Selling Point as I can imagine. Imagine the Brand Spark Workshop that generated these zingers.
The agency responsible are from Leeds and are called Kiss Branding. They describe themselves as Experi-Mentors, Change Makers, Brand Therapists and Future Strivers, which gives you some idea of their creative Bolx.
This list of attractions coming soon is somewhat perverse.
It looks like one of the attractions is a chimney, whereas in fact it's Chimney Walk which will be the site’s arterial heart. Someone's added a line break in the middle of Independent Retailers too, which may be utterly inept or may be a perverse way to generate interest from passers-by. Indeed you could argue that by publishing a post about Sugar House Island I have fallen into the marketing team's trap, but they probably weren't expecting anyone to repeatedly describe their work as Bolx.
Finally, let's mention the transport claims in SHI's latest brochure.
7 minutes to King's Cross looks amazing but of course it's Bolx because they've started the clock ticking at Stratford International. That particular station is a 20 minute walk away, or an eight minute bus ride assuming the 108 turns up immediately on the opposite side of the road. Likewise the 9 minutes to Liverpool Street overlooks the need to trek to Stratford and the 10 minutes to Canary Wharf ignores the hike to Pudding Mill Lane DLR on the other side of the flyover. Developers across London really ought to stop this devious connectivity Bolx, but of course they never do.
Of course there is a target audience that laps this Bolx up. They may be in need of a modern flat with concierge or seeking somewhere to relocate their edgy creative business, in which case Sugar House Island's hoardings might just hit the mark. But the general tone of presentation, and especially those Bolx poems, have convinced me I'd be totally embarrassed to consider moving in.
• rules "probably going to get tougher" (PM)
• "no doubt that schools are safe" (PM)
• 2 cases identified on Isle of Man
• rollout of Oxford vaccine begins
• primary schools reopen across most of England
• Scots required to 'stay home' for rest of January
• Lockdown imposed across England
• schools close again/summer exams cancelled
• Chancellor announces new business grants
• estimated 2% of population have the virus
• ambulance service has busiest day ever
• Oxford vaccine reaches GP surgeries
• National Express suspends services until March
• PM outlines mass vaccination plan
• arrivals in UK need to show negative test result
• Moderna vaccine approved in UK
• Mayor of London declares major incident
• If You Go Out You Can Spread It, People Will Die
• Queen and Prince Philip vaccinated
• restrictions too lax, say scientists
Worldwide deaths: 1,830,000 → 1,920,000 Worldwide cases: 84,000,000 → 89,000,000 UK deaths: 74,570 → 80,868 UK cases: 2,599,789 → 3,017,409 Vaccinations: 1,296,432 → 2,286,572 FTSE: up 6% (6460 → 6873)
A year ago today I walked across Richmond Park (deer✓, sunshine✓, bees✓, camellias in bloom✓) like it was the most normal thing in the world. I've not been back since.
I carried on walking north as far as Mortlake, and that's when I spotted London's least served bus stop. I should write about that one day, I thought. Today I'm doing just that.
This is Bus Stop E in Sheen Lane, SW14. It's exactly the kind of road that ought to have a decent bus service, being Mortlake's main shopping street and also where the railway station is located. Instead it's served by just one route and that route runs only once a day, twice a week. Miss the bus at half past ten on Friday morning and you have to wait four days for the next one.
The route in question is numbered 969 and is TfL's last surviving Mobility Bus. There used to be dozensof these across London, first introduced in 1985 to give the infirm and the disabled the opportunity to get to the shops. But they started to be withdrawn when Dial-a-Ride started, and the introduction of low-floor buses with wheelchair spaces culled numbers even further.
Ten years ago only eight mobility bus routes survived...
917 - Park Hill Rise to Croydon (Wed) 931 - Crystal Palace to Lewisham (Fri)* 941 - Bedfont Green to Hampton Hill (Wed) 953 - Scrattons Farm to Chase Cross (Wed) 958 - Woodford to Ilford (Tue) 965 - Riverhill to Kingston (Mon/Fri)* 969 - Whitton to Roehampton Vale (Tue/Fri)* 972 - Neasden to Colindale (Thu)
...and by 2013 only the three with the asterisks were left. Two succumbed in 2017 and 2018 respectively, leaving the 969 as the sole remaining example. It lingers because it's still financially supported, and used, and because it serves a number of residential streets in Whitton and East Sheen that no daily bus route touches. Depending on your definition of a London bus route, it's the only London bus route I've never ridden. But Roger has, so you should read his description of a journey instead.
The biweekly 969 begins its single journey in Whitton just off the Chertsey Road, close to Twickenham Stoop stadium. It starts by deviating round a separate estate alongside Crane Park, then doubles back towards St Margarets. Next it crosses the Thames to reach Richmond and then zigzags east through Mortlake past the aforementioned bus stop. After a brief riverside sojourn it bears south in Barnes and skirts Putney Heath to terminate on the A3 at Roehampton's Asda. Passengers have just over two hours to do their grocery shopping, and maybe partake of something in the cafe, before the day's other journey takes them home again.
London has several other little-used bus stops, including those on routes that only operate a few times a day, those used solely by schoolbuses and those served only when buses are on diversion. It's also true that several other bus stops along route 969 are served equally as infrequently as Bus Stop E at Mortlake Station. Bus Stop F on the other side of the road is an obvious example. But what I think makes Bus Stop E unique is that it's the only stop served twice a week to have the luxury of a proper bus shelter.
Sheen Lane deserves a better service, not least because it's a key connection between the Upper and Lower Richmond Roads. Plenty of other routes serve these corridors but all remain on one side or the other and only the 969 cuts across. The chief reason for this is the level crossing at Mortlake station which holds up the traffic on a very regular basis, hence it's a good idea if the only route affected runs hardly ever.
Covid hasn't killed the 969 off so it still provides a lifeline to not very many people not very often. It should still be there when all this is over, should you fancy a unique non-essential journey followed by a couple of hours at Asda. And should it be raining on the day you choose, remember to head for Mortlake so that you can have a sit down in the dry while you wait.
I walked past the ExCel Centre yesterday.
Here's an arresting image.
Rest assured it's not as bad as it looks.
These ambulances aren't transporting patients, they're empty.
And the Nightingale Hospital isn't open, let alone operational.
The ambulance front left is from the Driver Training Unit and the other four are part of the training session. London always needs ambulance drivers, and imminently a lot more than usual. I have no idea whether this particular course is the normal 22-week version, nor how close to completion it is. But a sign outside the Novotel did confirm it was just one of a number of cohorts currently undergoing training, and that the hotel car park was reserved for the trainees' vehicles.
The real surprise was how quiet the ExCel Centre seemed, and indeed how much it still looked like an exhibition centre. Back in the spring the entrance arch had Nightingale Hospital branding, but that was switched off when the facility was decommissioned at the start of May. Throughout the summer a row of NHS flags continued to flutter in the plaza outside and the posters saying Nightingale Hospital London remained. But a couple of months ago the owners reinstated their 'Welcome to ExCel London' brand and started playing digital adverts likely to appeal to global conference attendees. Even the arch now flashes up the word Welcome in a variety of foreign languages. I take this as the surest sign that nobody inside is on life support.
If further evidence were needed, the temporary Tesco hasn't reopened. A small store opened in a white marquee beneath the main entrance to serve hard-pressed staff back when they were needed. But it closed after only a few weeks, with a We'll be back if you need us sign on the exterior... which I fear may be soon. Alongside is the turning circle where TfL's special staff-only bus shuttles once terminated. The bus shelter has been mothballed since the spring, rather than removed, but a contractor's van was parked there yesterday so maybe it's being readied for fresh passengers.
Having read in the news that London's Nightingale Hospital has been "reactivated" ready to take patients, as well being due to open as a mass Covid vaccination hub, I was expecting to see more concrete evidence of preparatory action. But the quarter mile of dockside perimeter was almost dormant, bar a couple of staff waiting behind access doors and a pair of future employees with bicycles. Someone came out to greet them, confirming that yes this was where they'd need to come next week and yes the shift really did start at six in the morning.
As for the large eastern car park, its most significant feature is a fenced-off area filled with a film crew's caravans. That's because, in the absence of nurses and delegates, ExCel has been offering its million square feet of exhibition halls as a film studio and various high end dramas have grabbed the opportunity. But suddenly this week the far side of the car park is busy too, scattered with vehicles whose drivers are here to perform a variety of unspecified tasks. They could all be film-related, but the appearance of several vans belonging to Igloos (global solutions for temporary and permanent washrooms) suggests not.
One thing about ExCel is how successfully it shields whatever's going on within. Could be an arms fair, could be a romcom, could be a mass morgue serving several surrounding boroughs. But if you judge the level of activity by people's need to go in and out occasionally then the interior is not the hotbed recent news stories might have suggested. The service road alongside the DLR is silent, the platforms at Prince Regent station are quiet and ExCel's elevated eastern entrance is closed unless you're employed by security.
This tumbleweed vibe is preferable to what might be coming later in the month, if the NHS can get the staff, as the Nightingale becomes urgent overspill for hospitals overwhelmed elsewhere. But ExCel could also be a place of hope, a building to which Londoners flock for a jab that could collectively save us all. Our desire to get there might even give the Dangleway a genuine sense of purpose, rather than what I saw yesterday which was 40 consecutive empty pods. In the meantime subdued preparations are being made for whatever lies ahead, as a multi-purpose venue extends its remit.
I finally got round to buying a new phone. I should probably have done it earlier.
I usually wait until my phone's on its last legs before replacing it. My last started flickering alarmingly, the one before that developed an erupting battery and the one before that was unsmart long after its time. I kept that particular Sony Ericsson for over five years, and I kept my latest for over five years too. I am very much afflicted with technological inertia.
To give you some idea how old my most recent phone was, I bought it in the week Jeremy Corbyn became Labour leader. Simpler times. After two years it needed a new battery so I got that replaced and took some tips from the guy in the shop on how to prolong it. Try not to recharge it until it's really low, he said, so I did that and battery two lasted rather longer.
But by this time last year it had started to degrade, losing charge more rapidly and occasionally plummeting in power for no readily apparent reason. I started operating in Low Power Mode as my daily default, just in case. But it was still good enough that I managed to get all the way to Cornwall and back, and took 300 photos, without a recharge. False optimism.
In the week that lockdown started an overnight charge failed and my phone wouldn't turn back on no matter how many cables I plugged in or buttons I pressed. I spent five agonising hours convinced it was never going to revive, furious that battery failure had happened at precisely the wrong moment, until ohthankgod it somehow magically woke up again.
The issue wasn't so much the phone as the charger connection, which over the course of four and a half years had become increasingly worn. It meant that plugging in the cable didn't always work first time, I had to jiggle it a bit until the charging symbol lit up. And if the power hit ever zero this charade didn't always work, because I couldn't tell if the cable was connected and the phone had started recharging... or not.
In normal times I would have popped to a shop for repairs, an upgrade or a new phone, but shops were no longer open so that wasn't an option. You might have had a new phone delivered at this point, but I decided to continue with a suboptimal device. I can string this out, I thought, and did.
I spent the subsequent nine months trying very hard to ensure my phone never turned itself off in case it never turned itself back on. This mitigation generally worked fine, and I was able to continue to use my phone on a day to day basis, but all the time the battery was fading away a little quicker.
The turning point was Christmas Day when I went for a walk into central London hoping to take some unique photos, but having taken a handful my previously full battery suddenly claimed to be at 27%. I had a proper camera with me but that failed too, again a battery issue, so I knew my days of technological inertia were numbered.
I did my research. I sought advice. I seriously considered all sorts of repurchasing options that later proved to be either suboptimal or entirely unnecessary. This is why I normally like to go to shops to buy things rather than sitting here and guessing incorrectly. But I got there in the end.
On Monday I finally worked out that I didn't need to wait days for a phone to be delivered because John Lewis were still offering Click and Collect a mile away. I took the plunge and forked out, anticipating a pick-up time the next day... then a few hours later the Prime Minister popped up and announced Lockdown Three. Damn, I thought, I timed that appallingly.
But it was fine, because under the latest rules it seems Click and Collect remains a perfectly permissible service. I received an email earlier than expected inviting me to pick up my purchase, so trooped over to Westfield and located a lowly table placed outside the store's back door. The member of staff struggled to read my barcode with her gizmo because the display on my ageing phone wasn't bright enough, but a minute later I was walking away with its replacement. Hurrah.
Back in 2015 I'd got somebody else to do the entire changeover for me, but this time I managed it all by myself. The magic of bluetooth helped out, plus the cosy friendliness of modern gadgets, plus advice on the internet when things didn't quite go as expected. Small victories, but this is what happens when you don't do this kind of thing very often.
Contrary to normal technological progress my new phone is exactly the same size as the old one. That's potentially useful because the case from the old one still fits... although the hole where the camera goes is in a slightly different place so damn, I'm going to need a new case soon. I already have that new-phone paranoia that comes from holding a slippery unprotected slab of unblemished metal.
I'm now trying to readjust to having a phone that works the way it's supposed to. The battery survives happily for more than one day. I can listen to audio or take a photo without fear it might conk out. I don't have to repeatedly jiggle my USB cable before it connects, it just works. I've been putting up with a diminished product for so long that normality has been a pleasant shock.
But it's still a learning curve. Lots of settings aren't quite what they used to be, or more likely weren't previously featured, so I've spent a lot of time turning options off. No I do not want my phone to take a snatch of video every single time I take a photo. No I do not want to send Memoji Stickers, thanks. I'm still at the stage of wondering what I've missed.
It's been good to lose the fear that my phone might ultimately brick itself, which I now realise has been niggling away since March last year. A lot of crucial functions like banking or making a purchase assume you have a functioning phone and will lock you out if you're unable to use it. I'd hate to have missed out on a future vaccination because my local surgery wrongly assumed I could read the one-off text they sent.
So I wish my new phone a long and healthy life. The last one surprisingly cost £10 more but endured for an impressive 1937 days so turned out to be a bit of a bargain. How quickly a former luxury becomes a future essential.
Before Christmas, with much fanfare, TfL launched a new versionof the tube map with Thameslink included. Officially it was the December 2020 tube map, despite not appearing in stations or being released online.
But it's taken until this week for a digital version to appear on the TfL website, fanfare-free, so you can now download it and see what all the fuss was about.
Except it's not the same map they showed us three weeks ago. And had they released this latest version to the press I doubt it would have received as positive a reception.
For example, in the previous version Thameslink's descent through central London was a straight line with a single kink around King's Cross. You can reacquaint yourself with that central section here, if you so wish. But in the latest version the number of kinks has increased to three, somewhat inelegantly, like so.
The pink line now keeps a greater distance from Farringdon, then bends right to hit City Thameslink, then curves left and right to reach Blackfriars. It's not pretty. And it all comes down to where the station names have been placed.
• On the previous map Farringdon was written to the right of the station. Here it's to the left, which has forced the addition of a giant interchange connection.
• On the previous map Chancery Lane was written above the Central line. Here it's below, because Russell Square occupies all the available space, and this has prevented Thameslink from continuing straight down.
• On the previous map Mansion House was written to the right of the District line. Here it's to the left, and Cannon Street has been written on one line, which means Thameslink has to bend round both.
The map's designer won't have taken these decisions lightly, they'd have made the line straighter if they could. But there is a genuine underlying reason for the differences in design, namely that the two versions of the map are subtly different sizes.
The map we were shown in December is the poster version, the one that'll be displayed on station platforms and in ticket halls. Tube map posters are always Quad Royal size, that's 50 inches by 40 inches. The latest map is a bit smaller to make room for a strip above and below, so actually measures 50 by 32½. In terms of ratio, the width is 54% longer than the height.
The map that's just appeared on the website is the pocket version, the one that'll be available to pick up in ticket halls. This map has to be narrower because a folded sheet of paper has different proportions to a poster frame. In terms of ratio, the width is 42% longer than the height.
And that 12% difference in width means the poster can afford to be more spread out than the pocket map.
I've tried to overlay the two maps, proportionally speaking, by matching the Circle line on each. The map in the background is the poster. The map on top is the digital version just released. As you can see the poster is proportionally broader than the pocket map and, if keeping central London to scale, also offers a tad more room top and bottom.
All of which has resulted in Thameslink getting really twisty.
The northwest branch through Kentish Town bends through 45° nine times and 90° once. The northeast branch through Finsbury Park bends through 45° three times and 90° once. The southeast branch through Woolwich bends through 45° four times and the branch through Bromley six. The line to Gatwick bends through 45° six times and 90° twice in order to manoeuvre around Croydon's trams.
Throw in the Sutton Loop and the wiggle through central London and I make that 48 bends altogether, whereas the previous larger map had only 35. If the digital map is less aesthetically pleasing, it's because a 12% decrease in width has led to a 37% increase in twists.
The change in dimensions has also introduced several unsightly extended interchanges. I've got my ruler out and measured them, and can confirm that the five longest interchange connectors on the new tube map are all thanks to adding Thameslink.
1) The longest of all is the aberration at Finsbury Park where twin black lines extend to reach a distorted Thameslink bend. 2) We discussed Farringdon earlier. Its connector is almost long as the word Farringdon itself. 3) At London Bridge Thameslink slingshots underneath the tube station (and the extra link to a river pier only makes things worse). 4)Mitcham Junction's connector is longer than strictly necessary because the station and tram stop are in different zones. In better news, at least they've fixed the Hackbridge problem. 5)Blackfriars could have been a single blue blob but no, the designer wanted a connector stretching (diagonally) across the river.
A dishonorary mention should go to Denmark Hill in sixth place, where Thameslink and the Overground have been kept really far apart so that Peckham Rye and Queens Road Peckham can be squished horribly close together. This is what happens when the tube map's long-standing rule about only using 45° angles forces a lot of empty space to be filled wholly inefficiently.
In summary, Thameslink fits less well onto the pocket tube map than onto the poster. It may be a useful extra to have but blimey it's a mess.
And if you learned nothing else from today's post, remember there isn't just one tube map, there are two.
The odd thing about Tower, my seventh random ward, is that it contains neither the Tower of London nor Tower Bridge. Both are in Tower Hamlets, not the City, as is the dividing strip of land called Tower Hill. Tower ward is merely the irregular arc of streets beyond, a labyrinth of intermittent heritage sprawling from Aldgate to the Thames.[pdf map]
The unintentional heart of Tower ward is Fenchurch Streetstation. It's the City's oldest terminus, and the most out of the way, intensively used only by those heading Essex-ward. A compact Victorian facade faces not Fenchurch Street but Fenchurch Place, a sideroad, where a queue of taxis waits to sweep away anyone baffled by the lack of tube connection. The City's only 'LondonStreet' lies before you. So too does a large blue sign saying ARCADIA, which this plaza definitely isn't, but that's art for you.
But it's not the station entrance which dominates Tower ward, it's the viaduct the platforms are built upon. This carves obliquely across several streets, casting them into barrelled gloom, unless you're a fan of artisanal brickwork in which case it's a joy. By far the most atmospheric void is French Ordinary Court, which starts promisingly by ducking under a Georgian bedroom and then opens out into a dark pitched vault with cobbles underfoot and emergency firedoors around the walls. Here I bumped into a couple of very frustrated tourists attempting to find their way into the station but instead experiencing mild urbex nausea, so who were very pleased to be put right.
The main road underneath the station goes by the excellent name of Crutched Friars. This medieval order of 'cross-bearing' brethren once had a monastic house, long since suppressed, somewhere underneath the adjacent Doubletree hotel. You can meet two of the monks at the end of Rangoon Street in a morose statue carved into an office block, and read further background detail on a plaque outside the inevitable Crutched Friars pub. Hostelries of all kinds are very much a feature of Tower ward, and in normal times City workers flee in large numbers to the Bierkeller, Brewdog or Hung, Drawn & Quartered at the end of the working day.
A conference centre has been built above the station, called One America Square, because marketable space is at a premium hereabouts. America Square is an especially lacklustre quadrangle surrounded by buildings reflecting the worst excesses of 1980s architectural whim. But its footprint is actually 250 years old, part of a trio of spaces laid out by George Dance the Younger named Square, Crescent and Circus. Circus disappeared underneath Tower Gardens when the main road was widened but Crescent is still there, or at least numbers 6 to 11 are, in a magnificently unexpected Georgian sweep. Better still if you dodge round the rear of number 11 a fragile slice of Roman city wall survives, tall and thin, locked high and dry into a back yard.
The main street Minories gets its name from the Abbey of St Clare which was once populated by nuns called minoresses. The boundary of Tower ward juts out to encompass the original site. But it juts out further to reach Mansell Street, specifically the foot of the rear exit from Tower Gateway station, which also happens to mark the easternmost point of the City of London. As for the easternmost building that's a toss-up between Minories Car Park or the London Central Travelodge. Connoisseurs of artfully-rippled Brutalist concrete will hope it's the former. For Art Deco try the pre-war fortress of Ibex House on Portsoken Street, one of the City's older bespoke office blocks, while for 21st century excess Hilton's new Canopy hotel beside Aldgate bus station is hard to beat.
The ward contains more than its fair share of hotels, perhaps because the immediate vicinity of the Tower has a global allure. By far the grandest is the Four Seasons at TenTrinitySquare, former headquarters of the Port of London Authority, infilling an entire city block in Beaux Arts style. Trinity House nextdoor has yet to succumb to five-star dining. This was Samuel Pepys' stomping ground during the Plague and Great Fire years when he was living on Seething Lane in a house tied to the Navy Office. the great diarist is buried across the road beneath the communion table inside St Olave'schurch. This is one of the City's few remaining medieval buildings, having narrowly dodged conflagration in 1666, although what you see today is mainly a post-Blitz rebuild.
One street away is Mark Lane, today inconsequential but in its day a name as well known as, say, Downing Street is today. That's because it was the address of the Corn Exchange where the price of wheat, flour and bread was determined, initially around an open courtyard and later inside a grand classical building. But mercantile London has very much vanished, financial services aside, so the post-war version of the Corn Exchange was demolished in the 1970s. It lives on as the name of a bar and the name of an office block, the latter approximately in the correct location, but I could see nowhere that'd sell you a sandwich, let alone a loaf of bread.
Across Byward Street is All-Hallows-by-the-Tower, reputedly the oldest church in the City although others have cast doubt on its Saxon origins. By the 12th century it was definitely up and worshipping, and has since seen the baptism of the founder of Pennsylvania and the marriage of the sixth American president. Do check out the museum in the undercroft when you visit, should you be fortunate enough to be living at a time when this is permitted. The touristiest environs of the Tower of London are all across in Tower Hamlets, so thankfully skippable. Instead a strip of land barely 50m wide brings the ward to the edge of the Thames, where a chain of hospitality igloos lie empty after a festive season during which they were never necessary.
Expect it to be even emptier on the waterfront today.
There are three schools in the Olympic Park.
And they're all in different boroughs.
Mossbourne Riverside Academy is in Hackney. (in East Wick, close to Here East, facing the Lea Navigation towpath)
This is one of the Mossbourne chain of academies spawned from the original bright blue fortress wedged inbetween the railway lines just north of Hackney Downs station. That was founded in 2004 when City Academies were a Labour government innovation, and rare, rather than the free market shibboleths the Coalition turned academies into. Mossbourne Riverside is of 2016 vintage, serves primary-age pupils and the new term starts today.
Bobby Moore Academy Primary is in Tower Hamlets. (in Sweetwater, next to the Big Breakfast Cottages, facing away from the towpath)
This one opened in 2017 in a long thin modern building clad in brick tiles, and is a lot morelikely to win an architectural award than Mossbourne Riverside. It's one of 34 academies operated by the David Ross Education Trust, a Loughborough-based organisation overseen by millionaire David Ross, founder of Carphone Warehouse and a Tory donor. Local councils don't get a look-in on new schools these days. Today is the first day of term at BMA (or 'frist day', as it says on the website).
Bobby Moore Academy Secondary is in Newham. (on the other side of the Olympic Stadium, below the Greenway, near the View Tube)
This school's in a tall chunky building, cramming as much as possible into a small footprint, including a large protruding hall at first floor level. Students get to use the former Olympic warm-up track for their sports lessons, or as a necessary adjunct to the tiny playground. Geoff Hurst came along to open it in 2018, as did David Ross (because that's where being chief sponsor gets you). Today was planned to have been the first day back, but instead it's a training day to prepare staff for the rollout of mass testing.
When I took these photos the plan was for schools is Hackney to open this week but schools in Tower Hamlets and Newham to stay closed. That'll be an interesting post, I thought, highlighting the absurdity of government policy when matched to the vagaries of geographic reality. But then the minister changed the advice, having been screamed at from all sides that opening schools in eleven seemingly-random London boroughs was madness, so now all primaries in the capital are to stay closed to pupils this week (and the school in Newham is a secondary so was never going to open anyway).
Still, there are three schools in the Olympic Park.
And they're all in different boroughs.
Normally at this time of January I would head out and explore bits of London related to the new year. Last year being 2020 I visited Twentyman Close, rode the 20 and N20 buses, walked some of the A20 and explored the E20, N20, SE20 and SW20 postcodes. Alas 2021 isn't so forthcoming.
Ten posts I won't be writing in January 2021
1) A walk along the A21
The A21 starts in Lewisham (at the tediously remodelled junction outside the station) and heads for Hastings. I wouldn't have walked the whole lot, maybe only as far as Catford or perhaps ticked off highlights as far as Bromley. Locksbottom might've been good for a giggle. Pratts Bottom I've already blogged. After Knockholt the A21 has been replaced by J5-J4 of the M25, and then it's essentially the Sevenoaks, Tonbridge and Pembury bypasses. Everything gets a bit single carriageway across the Weald into East Sussex. And on arrival in Hastings it misses most of the interesting bits before ending on the seafront at Grand Parade. Sorry A21, I'm giving you a miss this month.
2) A ride on bus route 21
I've never blogged this bus, but alas it starts in Lewisham again. It's a good route because it spends half its time in south London and half in North London, pivoting across London Bridge on its way to Stoke Newington. I could have compared the Old Kent Road to the New North Road and New Cross to the City for a narrative steeped in contrasts. Some other time.
3) A ride on bus route N21
A key nightbus route linking the West End to Bexley, specifically Trafalgar Square to Bexleyheath. But a lot of it overlaps with route 21, and spending the early hours in Eltham and Blackfen is hardly essential travel.
4) A visit to postcode N21
That's Winchmore Hill in Enfield, and very much not within walking distance. But it is a fascinatingly obtuse corner of the capital, so in normal times very much my kind of stomping ground. I have walked its unlost river and the path beside the New River and hiked up to the very top of Green Lanes, so I know parts of N21, but I have yet to bring you the joys of Grange Park and Bush Hill.
5) A visit to postcode SE21
And this is Dulwich. That means Dulwich Park and Dulwich Picture Gallery, which I have blogged, but also Dulwich Village and Sydenham Hill station, which I really should have done by now. Sorry, you'll have to read about London's last tollgate elsewhere.
6) A visit to postcode E21
7) A visit to postcode SW21
Alas these postcodes don't exist because their respective sequences terminated with E20 and SW20.
8) A shopping trip to twentytwentyone
There really is a London shop called twentytwentyone, founded in 1996, so-called because it combines the best of 20th and 21st century design. They specialise in furniture and lighting for homes with a modern aesthetic, all highly desirable stuff, and very much targeting homeowners with surplus in their bank accounts. They have a showroom in Clerkenwell and a store in Upper Street but alas both are currently closed, plus I have no desire to go back to Upper Street until somebody fixes that perilous paving slab.
9) A visit to Pontoon Dock
This is more like it. The area around the DLR station is a fascinating one, including the amazing Thames Barrier Park, the relentlessly undeveloped SilvertownQuays and the emerging residential quarter of Royal Wharf. The latter's almost all finished now, and ripe for another post decrying dense flats interspersed with coffee shops. I could easily bash out 1000 words on the environs of Pontoon Dock, it's even within easy reach, but the link to 21 is probably too obtuse. That's the card game Pontoon, or Vingt-Un, if you haven't worked it out yet.
10) A walk along the A2021
For the first time in three years an A road exists with the same number as the calendar. But whereas the A2018 went to Dartford the A2021 is in Eastbourne, and that's rather more of a schlep. What's more it's only two and a half miles long and misses the town centre, the chief sights being the town's hospital and a railway bridge. It doesn't even terminate on the seafront but three streets back on a road called Seaside. Having followed it on Google Street View I feel like I don't need to do it in real life, plus I don't think it has any street signs saying A2021 so what'd be the point? But I am due in Eastbourne for my biennial hike over the Seven Sisters this year, so if I do make it I'll be sure to make a brief detour and replace that photo.
• EU launches mass vaccination programme
• Boxing Day footfall two-thirds lower than normal
• 999 calls in London exceeding spring peak
• South Africa passes 1 million cases
• British skiers flee Swiss quarantine
• more hospital beds occupied than in April
• first NHS patient has second jab
• NHS faces unprecedented pressure
• Essex declares major health incident
• Oxford vaccine approved & set for mass roll-out
• many more areas raised to tier 3 or tier 4
• only the Scilly Isles in tier 1 (nobody in tier 2)
• secondary school term to start two weeks late
• second doses to be delayed (from 2 to 12 weeks)
• "Covid loves a crowd" - stay home on NYE
• new variant raises R by 0.4-0.7
• police break up New Year parties
• 'nail-biting' weeks ahead for NHS
• all London schools to remain closed
• India approves Oxford vaccine
Worldwide deaths: 1,750,000 → 1,830,000 Worldwide cases: 80,000,000 → 84,000,000 UK deaths: 70,405 → 74,570 UK cases: 2,256,005 → 2,599,789 Vaccinations: 963,208 → 1,296,432 FTSE: down 1% (6502 → 6460)
As 2021 begins we have to hope it'll be better than 2020. But we've had hope before, not always realistically, and normality may still be some time off. So I thought I'd ask, when do you think all this might be over?
I'd like to propose 'the Christmas test'.
Imagine an unlimited number of households being able to travel across England to meet inside somebody else's home. When do you think we might be able to have a normal Christmas again? It doesn't have to be December 25th, it could be any replacement date to make up for the one we didn't just have. It might not be this year. When's the first time, legally speaking, a normal Christmas might be allowed?
Pick a month and a year and leave your prediction here. predictions
I'm asking because we're notoriously bad at predicting the future, and because when that future arrives we often forget how bad we were at predicting it. You proved this in a similar experiment exactly six months ago.
On 2nd July 2020 I invited you to predict which one of eight alternative futures we'd be in on 2nd January 2021. Not the future you wanted, but the one you expected. That day is now here, and your predictions were way off beam.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
LOCKDOWN
NEW NORMAL
HARD BREXIT
DEAL
HARD BREXIT
DEAL
TRUMP
NOT
TRUMP
TRUMP
NOT TRUMP
TRUMP
NOT
TRUMP
TRUMP
NOT
TRUMP
11%
12%
2%
4%
20%
27%
7%
17%
We ended up in future number 4, i.e. LOCKDOWN/DEAL/NOT TRUMP.
But six months ago only 4% of you guessed this correctly.
The five soothsayers were K, Matt, Alex, Gosforth Gary and Friar Sven.
The other 116 of us were wrong.
In particular almost 50% of you plumped for a NEW NORMAL with a HARD BREXIT, i.e. options 5 or 6, and that's where you messed up.
To take each layer in turn...
LOCKDOWN 30%
NEW NORMAL 70%
Thursday 2nd July was just as the first lockdown was ending and we were about to be allowed back into pubs and restaurants. Perhaps it's unsurprising that so many of you were optimistic about the future back then. But the science always said pandemics tend to come in waves, and winter brings its own challenges too, so a second peak was always on the cards. To my mind this was the obvious one - I ummed and ahhed far more about Trump and Brexit. But a large majority of you didn't think lockdown was coming back, and have alas been proved wrong.
HARD BREXIT 70%
DEAL 30%
Six months ago more than two-thirds of us were convinced no Brexit deal would be done. Perhaps we had no confidence in our government's willingness to compromise, perhaps we didn't think the EU would be agreeable or perhaps we were simply going along with the prevailing view at the time. There is a school of thought that the government's strategy was always to make No Deal sound likely in order to retain the strongest possible negotiating position, even though they never intended to go through with it. That insight may sound convincing in retrospect, but six months ago few of us saw through it.
TRUMP 40%
NOT TRUMP 60%
We did better on Donald Trump. Back in July most of us thought he was on his way out, and indeed he was. If the pandemic did the world one favour in 2020 it was to expose his presidential shortcomings and provide Joe Biden with an untweakable margin of victory. But six months ago 40% of you still thought he'd be staying in the White House, however odd that sounds today.
Overall 4% of you guessed all three things correctly, 32% got two right, 45% got only one right and 20% predicted all three wrong. We'd have done better guessing purely at random.
There's more. I asked you to make exactly the same prediction in November on the day of the presidential election. You did better this time.... but still not well.
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
LOCKDOWN
NEW NORMAL
HARD BREXIT
DEAL
HARD BREXIT
DEAL
TRUMP
NOT
TRUMP
TRUMP
NOT TRUMP
TRUMP
NOT
TRUMP
TRUMP
NOT
TRUMP
22%
26%
4%
23%
7%
11%
2%
6%
In November a quarter of us guessed correctly. The big shift was from the right hand side of the chart to the left, as 75% of us now thought January would mean lockdown. The shift on Brexit and Trump was much smaller, edging towards the correct result by a few percentage points but essentially the same as in July. Most of us still thought Trump would lose, eventually, and believed we wouldn't get a deal two months before we did.
I predicted correctly in November, so I'm pleased with that. But I messed up in July, getting No Deal wrong, even though I'm kicking myself now because it should have been obvious (but wasn't).
So do go back to the top of the post and predict when you think a normal Christmas might happen. Almost all of us will be wrong, perhaps too optimistic, perhaps not optimistic enough, but it'll be highly instructive to look back when it finally happens.
2021 anniversary quiz
Here are 26 events celebrating an anniversary in 2021. How many can you identify?
All the answers are now in the comments box, and clickable.
The Archers on Radio 4 is the world's longest-running drama series. It's also 70 years old today. Back in 1951 nobody guessed that a low-key soap about farming would last so long.
The Archers has an extensive cast ofcharacters, each of whom rise to prominence then fade into the background as storylines ebb and flow. At the start of 2020 I began counting how many episodes each of the characters appeared in, but 2020 alas proved no normal year. When the pandemic struck the number of weekly episodes was trimmed from six to five to eke out the remaining recordings, then replaced by vintage episodes for several weeks. At the end of May the format switched to internal monologues, which the audience generally hated, but gradually normal conversation returned (at a reduced rate of four episodes a week).
My 2020 Archers survey therefore covers a total of 226 new episodes, and I can announce that Ambridge's most frequently appearing characters have been as follows...
61: Kirsty 53: Lynda 48: Philip 42: Alice 41: Tracy
40: Freddie 39: Emma 37: Lillian 36: Robert 35: Gavin
If you get the big story you get the most appearances. Kirsty (very) slowly discovering that her husband was a modern slaver gifted her and Philip first and third places. Lynda was in the wrong place when the kitchen at Grey Gables exploded in March so she's second and hubby Robert is ninth. Alice had hardly registered when lockdown started, but has since embarked on an alcoholic pregnancy storyline so she's fourth. And Tracy's gone from minor character to cricket captain with a finger in various pies so she's fifth.
29: Alistair, Chris, Susan 27: Jazzer, Roy 25: Ben, Ed 24: David, Ruth 23: Josh 22: Jim, Jolene 19: Elizabeth, Oliver
17: Fallon, Harrison, Johnny, Kenton, Shula 18: Eddie, Pip 16: Helen 15: Adam, Kate 14: Brian 12: Jakob, Rex 10: Tom
These are the middle-ranking characters who've kept the stories rolling, be that detectoristing, resolving historic child abuse or renaming the pub. But this lot still only appeared an average of once or twice a month, which just goes to show how successfully a serial drama can spin an entire village narrative out of very little.
9: Jill, Justin, Natasha 8: Jennifer, Lily, Phoebe, Neil 7: Roman, Tony, Vince 6: Lee 5: Joy, Peggy, Rúairi, Will
4: Blake, Ian 3: Clarrie, Debbie, Fiona, Leonie, Toby 2: Hannah 1: Henry, Russ, Alan, Bert 0: Pat, Leonard, Usha
These are the also-rans, some of whom feel like they cropped up far more often than they actually did. Others should have cropped up far more - 2020 deserved more than three Clarries and five Joys. Some will be a lot more prominent in 2021, especially (I suspect) abrasive abattoir owner Vince. And some mysteriously never appeared at all, most notably Pat who hasn't been heard since December 2019.
All of which allows me to compile this exclusive ranking of 2020 Ambridge by dynasty.
Kirsty, Philip and Gavin take the crown this year, by some margin, thanks to a much delayed wedding. David and Ruth's family have made regular non-inflammatory appearances which add up to second place. Brian and Jennifer haven't appeared that often but their children have, so they're third. Susan's ridiculous radio show helps propel the Carters to fourth, while the Snells just nudge past the Grundys into fifth place. The unexpected quiet spot has been Bridge Farm, because if Tony and Pat aren't in the show much neither are their offspring.
We're promised a "special announcement" and a "life-changing crisis" in tonight's platinum anniversary episode. My money's on Elizabeth and Vince for the former, and let's hope nobody runs into a burning barn or falls off a roof for the latter. Whatever, the everyday story of farming folk will continue to roll on (with an omnibus on Sundays) long after this pandemic has burnt itself out.
This year is the product of two consecutive prime numbers.
This doesn't happen very often.
It last happened in 41×43 = 1763 when George III was on the throne.
It'll next happen in 47×53 = 2491 almost half a millennium from now.
It's not rare that the year is the product of two prime numbers.
This last happened in 2×1009 = 2018 and 3×673 = 2019.
It'll next happen in 2×1013 = 2026 and 3×677 = 2031.
But it is rare to be the product of two two-digit prime numbers.
This last happened in 29×67 = 1943 and 37×53 = 1961.
It'll next happen in 23×89 = 2047 and 29×71 = 2059.
I wasn't around for the last two.
I may not be around for the next two.
Happy 43×47 everyone!
Best make the most of it, just as soon as we're allowed...
2021 anniversary quiz
