Category: Public Transport

Toxic Earth

A warning note courtesy of http://www.indy100.org, some stuff about public transport, some stuff about science, a link to a satirical pamphlet and some photographs.

INTRODUCTION

The title of this piece comes from an article on www.indy100.com although I am sharing many other things besides that, including some of my local photographs. However before I get into the main meat of my post there is one other matter to attend to:

ERRATUM

In a recent post I identified a bed of yellow flowers as daffodils. It has since been brought to my attention that they were in fact yellow crocuses. I apologise for the mistake, and please note that I am not resorting to the equivalent of putting the apology in six point type somewhere in the middle of of page 27!

TOXIC EARTH

Reading this article put me in mind of Anna’s recent post “No 17 drawing in my goals for 2017” where the drawing is about a group of people stranded in space looking for another planet to replace the one that they had to leave behind because they messed it up too badly. Click on the image below to read this important and sobering article.

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A COUPLE OF LONDON
TRANSPORT RELATED BITS

I usually reserve stuff about London transport for my London transport themed website http://www.londontu.be, where indeed I shared the second piece in this section yesterday, but I felt these two bits should also be shared here.

LAURIE PENNY ON UBER

Laurie Penny has turned her fire on private cab hire firm Uber, and the result is a devastating article in the Guardian, which I hope will succeed in weaning a few people off this vile organisation. Please read the article in full please click on the image below.

TUNNEL ARCHAEOLOGY AT THE MUSEUM OF LONDON

The central section of the Elizabeth line (nee Crossrail) cuts through London on an east-west axis, and there being no space on the surface it also cuts vertically through millennia of history. It is this latter that has led to the creation of a new exhibition at the Museum of London showing the best finds unearthed during the building of the line. Accompanying this exhibition is a short video, embedded below. After the video are links to more about this and about the Museum of London.

Extra links:

PAYING MORE BUT GETTING LESS

This is a petition put together by Going to Work which calls not only for affordable affairs on our railways but also for a fully publicly owned and publicly accountable rail network. To view, sign and share the petition please click on the screenshot below:

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PHOTOGRAPHIC INTERLUDE

Here are some pictures from in and around King’s Lynn:

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Planning information posted near Lynnsport.

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The good and the bad of Bawsey drain in one photo – it is home to many species but in spite of continued efforts to clear it is still used by uncaring human residents as a dumping ground.

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This bridge crosses a stretch of the Gaywood, carrying Littleport Street across said river.

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The inaugural NAS West Norfolk curry night took place on Thursday, delayed by a week due to bad weather. Although some of those who had originally booked did not make it, those who did enjoyed it.
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My choice – Lamb Rogan Josh. The accompaniments are boiled rice, two small poppadoms and a garlic naan. The curry was a little spicier than I would have liked but other than that splendid. The accompanying drink, included in the £6.49 price tag, is a pint of Doom Bar ale (and yes for the record I drank only the one)
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One of many fine pictures to adorn the wall of The Globe, and the only one I got a clear shot at.

ATHEISTS ARE BECOMING MORE POPULAR

Here is a truly international link – a Brit sharing a post written by a New Zealander about the USA. Heather Hastie has carried out a typically thorough comparison between the Pew Research Centre’s findings of three years ago and of just recently. Please read Heather’s post in full by clicking here.

A TRIO OF SCIENCE PIECES

The first two pieces in this section were initially posted on whyevolutionistrue starting with a piece drawing on the work of Pliny the in Between, who runs a website called The Far Corner Cafe, and of a doctor who posts under the name of Orac on scienceblogs, whose piece can be read here, to demonstrate that Chiropractic is not merely nonsense, but dangerous (indeed potentially fatal) nonsense at that. Jerry Coyne, creator of whyevolutionistrue (it takes its name from his landmark book of that title published in 2009), has received many hostile comments in response to previous pieces he has written that are critical of Chiropractic. To read this piece in full please click on the image below, the first in a series of five drawings from Pliny the in Between that were used to illustrate the post.

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Second of the trio, again courtesy of WEIT, is a piece linking to a paper published in the journal Nature that mentions the discovery of potential traces of life in sediments that range in age between 3.77 and 4.28 billion years (the earlier end of the scale being about as early given what is known about our planet’s turbulent beginnings as life of any sort could have taken hold). To read the post in full and possibly move from there to reading the paper in Nature please click on the image below:

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The third in my science trio comes from the Smithsonian and has the self explanatory title “NASA Wants the Public to Log In to Help Find Plant 9”. To read the piece in full please click on the image below.

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A SATIRICAL PAMPHLET
FROM UNLOCK DEMOCRACY

To read this pamphlet from Unlock Democracy  in full please click the screenshot of the cover below:

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SOME FINAL PHOTOGRAPHS

This set of pictures are of items that will be going under the hammer in James and Sons’ March auction, a full catalogue listing for which can be viewed here. 

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Lot 127
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Lot 149 (three separate images joined together)
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149-b. In the past, before the American way of reckoning up large numbers took over, a 1 with nine zeros after it was not designate one billion, but either one thousand million or one milliard, and one of the banknotes here shows that the Germans with a small difference in spelling used the same word when necessary.
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393-c. When putting these together I decided to make this image the centre of the picture, thereby splitting the two sets of booklets.
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407 – a four piece composite image
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407-e – I could not resist extracting this close-up.

NAS West Norfolk Just Giving Page

Announcing NAS West Norfolk’s Just Giving page, and sharing a few other interesting and important bits.

INTRODUCTION

I have a few other links to share as well, but this will be one of my rare posts not to feature any photographs. 

THE NAS WEST NORFOLK
JUST GIVING PAGE

This was discussed and agreed on at our branch committee meeting yesterday, and is now ready for viewing. To see the page itself please click on the screenshot below:

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TWO PIECES WITH TRANSPORT LINKS

The first of these two pieces is a campaign run by We Own It titled We Want Buses for People not Profit. For more please click the screenshot below:

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My second piece with transport connections is an article by Patrick Barkham, a well known writer on nature, published in The Guardian, about a piece of road-building that is in the pipeline and if allowed to go ahead will be incredibly damaging to the environment. The development is planned because the road in question struggles to cope with the traffic that uses it. However, extending roads (as is planned in this case) or building new roads is proven not to alleviate this type of problem – it just generates even more road traffic, with attendant problems of noise, pollution and the destruction of sometimes priceless nature and habitats. Why is there so much traffic on Britain’s roads? Because our public transport system is a complete joke – and that is where attention should be devoted. To read Barkham’s article please click on the image below:

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FOR AN ELECTED UPPER HOUSE

There have been recent damning revelations about the conduct of certain members of the House of Lords. The single most damning incident caught be a fly-on-the-wall documentary was of a certain peer who arrived by taxi, told the driver to keep the engine running, went into the house to trouser his £300 daily attendance allowance and then got back in the taxi. This has prompted the Electoral Reform Society to launch a petition calling for an elected upper house to replace the Lords. To view and if so inclined sign and share the petition click on the screenshot below:

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ALWAYS #HELP TO GET HOME

This is a campaign launched by the NAS nationally. Full detail about the campaign is available here. There is a petition running as part of this campaign which you can access by clicking on the image below:

 

The A(nna) Train station

Originally posted on Annas Art – FärgaregårdsAnna:
Thomas at aspiblog has a fun challenge. Design a station challenge. My imagination started to making pictures right away. I want to do a real drawing of the things I have in my head after reading the challenge post. But for now this sketch is all…

Here is Anna’s preliminary sketch – I look forward to reading and seeing more about her dream railway station…

Anna's avatarAnnas Art - FärgaregårdsAnna

Thomas at aspiblog has a fun challenge. Design a station challenge.

My imagination started to making pictures right away. I want to do a real drawing of the things I have in my head after reading the challenge post.

But for now this sketch is all I had time to do today.


Imagine a station were the floor is painted like the ocean so everyone feels they can walk on water, the red carpet is rolled out for everyone that chose the green way to travel for saving nature. That is the A(nna)-train at the station where people who think green travels.

I want to think of this idea a little bit more. Maybe there will be more drawings on this theme. I think it’s fun. Join the challenge you too!

Anna

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A Competition to Design a Station

An invitation to my followers to demonstrate their design skills.

INTRODUCTION

The official competition is being run by Crossrail, and is open to people aged between three and 15. I am using this blog to open an unofficial version of the competition to all my followers.

THE COMPETITION

People in the age range to qualify for the proper competition can visit the site here (the competition is open until Sunday). For those not eligible for the official competition you can use this post to present your ideas, either in pictures if you have the skill and inclination, or in words, or as a combination of both. If you put your thoughts into a post of your own, include the link in a comment and I am sufficiently impressed I will reblog.