Yes, another post in my series giving a station by station guide to London. I felt that it was not inappropriate for a series based on British public transport that after none yesterday there should be two in a row today!
A GOOD IDEA DEFLECTED
North Greenwich is one of the stations on the Jubilee line extension finally opened in 1999. North Greenwich serves what is now the O2 arena, having started life as the Millennium Dome. Unlike any of the other stations featured in this series (more available here) this is one that I personally have never used as destination, though I have passed through it a few times.
When the Jubilee line opened in 1979 it was intended that there should be a south eastern extension from the then southern terminus of Charing Cross. Unfortunately, a combination of obsession with the Canary Wharf development and the vanity project of the Millennium Dome caused the original plans to so warped that the new terminus of the Jubilee line is at Stratford, and it no longer serves Charing Cross.
By the way, although as a public transport user I am always keen on improvements to public transport, I do not automatically support. For example I do not consider that a high speed railway that only the wealthy will be able to afford to be something to celebrate, and neither does a cable car link between two minor stations seem especially impressive to me!
This is the latest post in my series providing a station by station guide to London. Previous posts in the series can be viewed on the following link. Enjoy…
THE SOUTH BANK OF THE THAMES
Waterloo has more main line train platforms than any other station in the country, is served by four underground lines (all ‘tube’ rather than ‘surface’). The Waterloo and City line, originally run as part of the London & South West Railway, opened for business in 1898 making it the second oldest of London’s deep level tube lines after the City and South London Railway (now part of the Northern line). The Bakerloo line opened in 1906, the second underground line to serve Waterloo. A southbound extension of the Charing Cross, Euston & Hamsptead line to enable an amalgamation with the City and South London to form today’s Northern line took place in 1926, making it the third underground line to serve Waterloo. Finally, in 1999 the Jubilee line was extended via Waterloo, although the original intent to serve the still under-equipped parts of south east London and west Kent has been warped by a combination of greed and vanity about which more in my next post.
Waterloo is as the above makes clear a major interchange. It is also a superb destination in its own right, being home to The Old Vic theatre, The Royal Festival Hall, The complex of the Purcell Room and the Queen Elizabeth Hall, The National Film Theatre, The National Theatre, The Museum of the Moving Image, besides serving as a good starting point for a walk along the Thames which depending on how energetic you are feeling could be stop at Southwark (Jubilee line), Blackfriars (District, Circle and main line railways), London Bridge (Northern, Jubilee, main line railways) or even further east.
To end this post here are a couple of pictures for orientation purposes. I have chosen (as will be general policy in this series) to use the Diagrammatic History rather than a current schematic diagram…
As well as my title piece I have some links and pictures (the latter connected with the title piece). Enjoy…
WORKING FOR THE GREAT CENTENARY CHARITY AUCTION
Todat I have been working on some stuff for the Great Centenary Charity Auctioin, the first running of which takes place on June 28th (another auction is planned for March). Most of today’s work was imaging small items, but there was also a poster to create, based on the fact that the Eastern Daily Press gave us almost a whole page in their Monday issue. There was an advert that we did not wish to display in our poster, so I occuipied that space with a picture of Lot 1 and some accompanying text…
Given the size of the newspaper in question this required two scans and then some clever editing to combine them. By the way the chap in red jacket next to the auctioneer is yours truly.The first individual scan.The 2nd scan.
There were some very interesting items to image, including a decorative piece featuring a picture of the Obelisk of Hammurabi (King of Babylon circa 1,700 BCE, creator of a famous code of laws)…
Lot 556 (the ‘Hammurabi’ piece) in fullFocus on the dish itself.An ultra-close up of the inscription.
My remaining links are both connected the same story, somneone who got a work experience placement at Job Centre and has produced a damning expose of the behaviour anbd attitudes of staff there:
This is the sixth post in a series I have started recently, in the form of a station by station guide to London. Before moving on to the meat of today’s post, here is a link to the previous five.
LOUGHTON
Loughton has been served by the Central line since 1948, but before that it, along with the rest of the eastern end of the Central line was part of the Great Eastern Railway. Nowadays there are only three stations beyond Loughton on the Central line, but as you will be seeing in a later post there used to be more. This is the first of the stations I have covered in this series to be on the Central line, so a mention of Danny Dorling’s marvellous book ‘The 32 Stops’ is mandatory – complete with link to snapshot review and a picture…
As a preamble to talking about Loughton itself I am going to say a bit about going there, for which I need to make some very brief technical points. London Underground (the correct name for the whole network) comprises two separate systems, the older lines (Metropolitan, District, Circle and Hammersmith & City) known as ‘surface’ lines whose tunnel sections were built using the self-explanatory ‘cut-and-cover’ method and the newer, deep-level ‘tube’ lines. The older lines were built to the same spec as mainline railways, while the newer lines are built for much smaller stock. Where there are direct cross-platform interchanges between older and newer lines the platforms are built to a compromise height so that there is a step down into a tube train and a step up into a ‘surface’ train.
My preferred method of getting to Loughton, unless I was starting from a Central line station, would be to get on to either the Hammersmith and City or District lines first, and change at Mile End, which is an interchange that is unique – it is a cross-platform interchange between ‘surface’ and ‘tube’ lines that is in tunnel (the Central line rises to the surface at the it’s next station eastwards, Stratford).
I first visited Loughton for a Geography project at school, studying the Loughton Brook. In spite of this introduction I subsequently returned of my own volition more than once – it is very scenic, both north towards the sources of the brook and south to where the brook flows in to the river Roding.
To finish this post I have a few map pictures for you…
This map has got a bit damp stained over the years, but it does reveal how much the central area of the network is expanded in the schematic diagrams that are usually shown at stations.
This map shows what the London Underground system looked like in 1950, just after the Central line had started serving the stations out to the then terminus at Ongar.
This is a blog post of my most frequent type – a title piece, some infographics from various sources, some links and some photographs. Enjoy…
A WET SUNDAY
Although the weather was far from appealing yesterday I did manage to get a decent length walk in en route to my aunt’s house for a birthday meal, and as you will see late there were some good pics to be taken.
The meal was superb, and there was some decent television afterwards.
I got home just in time to catch the final stages of the day’s play in the test match. England are going to need to bat very well to win (and with two days to go a draw is almost out of the question.
INFOGRAPHICS
My first infographic is an important ‘mythbuster’…
The next infographic concerns the requirements that the Tories plan to impose on strike ballots. Bbefore showing it I will say this: I do not think that those who choose not to express an opinion deserve to be taken into account, which is why when talking about the vote gained by the Conservatives at the last election I always refer to the 36.9% of the votes cast that they receive and not the 24% of the electorate that voted for them. Now for the infographic…
My last two infographics are both aimed directly at Mr Cameron…
LINKS
COSMOSOLOGY
Cosmos Up are a very reliable source of interesting material, and today the provide the first two links that I choose to share:
It is no secret that I sign and share a very large number of petitions. This, courtesy of change.org, is a story of a petition that has achieved the desired result, and I am delighted to share the celebration of this success.
PHOTOGRAPHS
I hope that you have all enjoyed this piece, and that you will share it. Here to round it off are some photographs…
This bird is so small that was very difficult to capture it at all.
Not a bad pic of something that is a quarter of a million miles away!
This is a different post from my usual style – there will be no pictures, and just the one link which I feel must be shared and which will feature at the end of the post.
FORTY
It is inevitable when writing about the number 40 that there will be considerable overlap with the detail contained in Derrick Niedermann’s wonderful book Number Freak but I hope that some of the stuff I come with is new. One of the things Niedermann talks about is the use of forty in ancient times to denote ‘a large number’ in which he context he mentions various biblical references and the tale of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves – which reference particularly appeals as I am the proud owner of both a four volume boxed set of the complete 1,001 nights and a Folio Society edition of the highlights.
SOME OF THE PROPERTIES OF THE NUMBER 40
It can be expressed as the sum of a square and a triangle in two different ways: Two squared added to the eighth triangle number or five squared added to the fifth triangle number (note 8+2 = 10 and 5+5 = 10).
It is both double and quadruple a tetrahedral number (10= 1+3+6 = the sum of the first three triangle numbers and 20 + 1+3+6+10 = the sum of the first four triangle numbers).
It is the sum of the fourth triangle and the fourth pyramid number (10 = 1+2=3+4 and 30 = 1+4+9+16) and it is also thus the sum of third tetrahedral number and the fourth pyramid number.
Another connection of two fours and forty is that four squared plus 4 factorial = 16 + 24 = 40.
WHY THE NUMBER 40?
I have written about the number 40 because today is my 40th birthday and I thought this would be a fun way to commemorate the landmark for followers of my blog.
THAT ONE LINK
I am sharing one link with this post, from Autsim Mom, who will be visiting this country shortly. This post was first published before I had started following that blog and I am delighted to share it now.
This post is the fifth in a series I am running on this blog providing a station by station guide to London.
HISTORY, ASTRONOMY AND DETECTIVES
Baker Street was one of the original stations that opened in 1863 as The Metropolitan Railway, the world’s first underground public transport system, on January the 10th 1863. Those platforms, two of 10 at that station (the most on the entire system) to be served by underground trains, are still in service today, and have been restored to look as they would have done when first opened. Ironically, they are no longer served by the Metropolitan line, which uses two terminal and two through platforms just to the north of the originals, its tracks joining those of the Hammersmith and City and Circle lines just east of Baker Street. By way of explanation I turn to Douglas Rose’s London Underground: A Diagrammatic History
The other two lines that serve this station are the Bakerloo and Jubilee lines. Baker Street is a division point between the old and new Jubilee lines – south of Baker Street is all new track, northwards old, dating from 1939, when it was opened as a branch of the Bakerloo, taking some of the strain of the Metropolitan by taking over services to Stanmore and assuming sole responsibility for intermediate stops between Baker Street and Finchley Road, and also between Finchley Road and Wembley Park. When the Jubilee opened in 1979 it comprised the old Stanmore branch of the Bakerloo and three stations south of Baker Street.
Reverting temporarily to the Metropolitan, those four platforms at Baker Street, from which trains go to a variety of destinations developed from what started as a single track branch going only as far as Swiss Cottage. It grew out of all recognition during the tenure of Edward Watkin, who saw the Metropolitan as a crucial link in his plan for a railway system to link his three favourite cities, London, Paris and Manchester. At one time, as my next picture shows, the Metropolitan went far beyond it’s current reach…
Baker Street is home to Madame Tussaud’s and the London Planetarium, both of which merit a visit.
Of course, no post about Baker Street would be complete without something about it’s most famous ever resident, Mr Sherlock Holmes, consulting detective.
I am an avid fan of the great detective, having read all the original stories and many modern stories that feature the great detective. As well as owning a respectable collection of my own, I regularly borrow books about this subject from the libraries that I use…
A remarkable recent find.The great originalsSome of my modern Holmes stories.
To end this post, along with my customary hopes that you have enjoyed it and that you will share it, a couple more maps, first a facsimile of the original Beck map of 1933 and then for comparison a facsimile of the 1926 Underground Map…
When Beck first produced a prototype of this map in 1931 his superiors thought that no-one would like it – but eventually they agreed to a trial of it in 1933, and now every public transport system in the world uses schematic diagrams of this type.
As well as my title piece, I have my usual selection of links, infographics and photos to share with you.
ANOTHER GREAT TEST MATCH IN THE MAKING
In spite of the interventions of Jupiter Pluvius (a mischievous deity who specialises in interrupting test match play in England) the truncated day’s play we got yesterday at Headingley was sufficient to indicate that we are in for another classic test match. Luke Ronchi, making his test match debut for New Zealand, scored a spectacular 89, and the scoring rate was lively throughout. The pitch offered plenty to bowlers throughout, but any error in length or direction was liable to be punished. James Anderson became the first England bowler to take 400 test wickets. It is possible that this will not be the only historic milestone to feature in this match – if Cook bats well he could become the first England batsman to amass 9,000 test runs. The second day is just under way, and a mere six minutes in to the day a six has already been hit – and a wicket has been taken by the very next ball. Yesterday was a wonderful day for cricket lovers – after play finished at Headingley there was commentary on the T20 Blast (20 overs each per side) game between Essex and Somerset, which ended in a tie. Chris Gayle making his debut for Somerset scored an explosive 92, giving the houses adjoining the ground a peppering.
INFOGRAPHICS
I have no fewer than six high quality infographics from various sources to share with you…
A reminder for those who are sceptical about trade unions of where we would be without them.
LINKS
RELIGION
First up in this section, an article highlighting some indefensible behaviour and attitudes from those running a Jewish school in north London.
Second, a cardinal who has described the Irish as ‘worse than pagans’ following their decision to legalise gay marriage.
My first link in this section follows on from the stuff about religion, and comes with a very impressive picture. It comes courtesy of Huffington Post and features a creationist who discovered a 60,000,000 year old fossil fish.
This is my final subsection of the links section, and includes three items. Of course, this entire blog is strongly anti-discrimination, but these three pieces relate more specifically to that concern than anything else in this post. First up, the S*n have been hammered by IPSO over the despicable behaviour of their columnist Rod Liddle in relation to Emily Brothers, who is both blind and transgendered. Enjoy this piece from zelo-street.
My second piece in this subsection comes from across the pond bpecial neey way of Disability Scoop and concerns schools (ab)using truancy laws to get rid of children with special needs.
My final piece, again from the other side of the Atlantic concerns a large donation made to college by the mother of an autistic student by way of thanking them.
PHOTOGRAPHS
I hope you have enjoyed this post and that you will share it. To finish off I have a few pictures for you…
These dragonfly jewels were on display in the window of the Salvation Army shop in Fakenham
This detail is from the side of St James MCP, from outside which i shall be catching the bus next week.
This is the fourth piece of its kind, providing a deeply personal, station-by-station look at London. The previous three pieces focus on South Kensington, Tooting Bec and Aldwych.
RUSSELL SQUARE
Russell Square is served by the Piccadilly line and was one of the original stations on that line when it was opened in 1906. It is connected to the surface by lifts or stairs according to choice. It is the local station for the British Museum, but although I love that institution this is not the main importance of Russell Square in my life. Russell Square is also the local station for Great Ormond Street Hospital, where i was a patient for a very long time in my childhood. I managed by to be ill in way that they had never encountered before. They eventually worked out what had caused the illness by discarding all the impossibles and accepting that whatever was left (a previously unheard of reaction to a bout of chicken pox) however improbable it might seem had to be the answer. I eventually left the hospital for good 14 months (one sixth of life to that period) after first being admitted.
There are three things I remember about this period. First of all, as a day patient in the last few months of my time at the hospital, it was during this period that I properly discovered London Underground, and began to develop an enduring interest in public transport. Secondly, it was as a patient at the hospital that I discovered my affinity for numbers, courtesy of the ward tutor, Don. Thirdly, I remember regular trips to nearby Corams Fields to get out in the open air.
This is going to be one of my ‘interesting mixed posts’ as John P Ointon of notesfromthenorth recently described one, featuring my main body piece, links, infographics and photos.
AUCTION AND ITS AFTERMATH
James and Sons had their May auction this Wednesday just gone, at The Maids Head Hotel, Norwich and Thursday was therefore tied up with attending to tasks created by the auction. I made sure that my database was fully updated with details of people who had bid online, produced a word document containing a full list of all of these individuals for our records and also made a start on the press releases.
The auction day was marred by the fact that the venue was far too hot, and for much of the day we could not open any windows due the noise of roadworks going on outside. Nevertheless, there were some good moments, as there should have been given the quality of the stuff we had going under the hammer…
The dog decides to sample the view from the auctioneers chair!
There were two items which stood above all else, and gave the themes for my press releases, lot 218 a gold $20 coin in a sealed plastic box which having been estimated at £1,000 actually went for £1,800, and lot 251 a Waterloo medal, which was estimated at £1,500-2,000 and went for an eye-popping £4,700.
One the Thursday, while prepping the press releases I assembled a composite of all the images I had of the gold coin, and I will conclude this part of the post bu sharing the full gallery with you…
This is the composite image…While this image and the next five are the component parts of that composite.
INFOGRAPHICS AND LINKS
First up, my one stand-alone infographic…
A POST FROM AUTISM MOM
This wonderful post fully deserves a subsection to itself, and comes with some excellent infographics, which I have included here:
I have gained another new follower both for this blog and for my twitter account this morning, and I take this opportunity to share her latest blog post, a wonderful open letter to a fellow parent.
WIND POWER
Take Part Daily provided this superb feature on the possible future of wind power in the United States. As well as links to both the full post and the graphic I include a still of one part of the graphic:
I have three more links to share. First of all, this one from Vox Political on the DWP’s desperate attempts to avoid revealing what they obviously know will be a devastating truth. From Manchester comes this horrible story of a speeding motorist who killed someone, bragged about his speeding, and still only got sentenced to six years in jail. Finally, an important petition: El Salvador has one river still capable of providing it with clean drinking water, which will soon not be the case if one greedy mining company gets its way. I urge all of you to sign and share this petition.
PHOTOGRAPHS
Just before moving on to my final set of photographs I hope you have enjoyed this post, and if you have I urge you to share it. These last pics are all from a display in Fakenham Library…
aspiblog 
