London yesterday - what a scruffy old dive!

[srw]

As for the bike hopping thing - I can truthfully say that I'm in green stuff in fifty minutes, but green stuff in the southeast of England isn't really countryside. More like the outer suburbs. Pretty, though.

True, but the Southeast of England is in the three quadrants SW, SE and NE of London. NW, in the Chilterns, we have proper countryside. I can get as far into London as Rickmansworth along what are just as much rural roads as anything you'd find in Shropshire.

 

[ChrisKH]

A somewhat dated simile. Have you been to Harlem recently? It's proof that areas go through cycles. It's all part of the life history of great cities.

No, but I've been to Beckton.

 

[LLB]

True, but the Southeast of England is in the three quadrants SW, SE and NE of London. NW, in the Chilterns, we have proper countryside. I can get as far into London as Rickmansworth along what are just as much rural roads as anything you'd find in Shropshire.

[pedant]That's four Quadrants, and all of them are in the south east[/pedant]

 

[CopperBrompton]

but this doesn't mean that everyone in the south eats caviar for breakfast and wipes their @rses with tenners.

Indeed, I would say that most people only use fivers, and in the poorer parts of London they are reduced to using HSBC shares.

Ben

 

[wafflycat]

London... okay to visit friends for the day, but to live in? No thanks: I wouldn't live there out of choice. London is okay if you're young, free & single and don't mind having your nose full of black crud at the end of every day. It's not a good place to bring up a family though. With regards to that, I'm incredibly glad of living in a rural area with a couple of market towns and a small city within relatively easy travelling distance. Ideal.

 

[JamesAC]

...I'm sure it wasn't like that when I lived there in the mid 80s.. .

and therin lies the problem. Decent, hardworking folk, 2 adults (one of each sort) and 2.4 children, resonable standards, balance of "rights" and "responsibility", job etc have b*gg*r*d off to all points of the compass. The hole left behind has filled up with all sorts of rubbish. It is an insideous process, and probably is clearly evident to someone who knew the place as it was 10 or 20 years ago, and then comes back and sees a snapshot as it is now.

The transport system in general, and the Jubilee line and DLR in particular, are dire. Signal failures are a permanant feature, and at weekends, huge sections of the network are shut down for "improvements" - why couldn't they get it right in the first place?

James

 

[tdr1nka]

Signal failures are a permanant feature, and at weekends, huge sections of the network are shut down for "improvements" - why couldn't they get it right in the first place?

In fairness they did get a lot of it right in the first place, but that was 100 or so years ago. The essential problem with the Underground is that it is one of the only non subsidised Public Transport Systems in Europe. The failings are a representation of how it is near impossible to run Public Transport at a profit.

 

[Flying_Monkey]

Oh, but of course it is all those blacks and gays who are to blame (or am I just misreading James' not so subtle subtext about the 'rubbish'...)

 

[Maz]

Oh, but of course it is all those blacks and gays who are to blame (or am I just misreading James' not so subtle subtext about the 'rubbish'...)

Add Eastern Europeans, single-parent families, students etc etc to that list...

 

[CopperBrompton]

The essential problem with the Underground is that it is one of the only non subsidised Public Transport Systems in Europe.

Are you sure it's unsubsidised?

http://www.tfl.gov.uk/assets/downloads/corporate/TfL_Factsheet_May_2008.pdf
seems to suggest otherwise.

Ben

 

[NickM]

...they did get a lot of it right in the first place...

Not the bloody Jubilee Line, they didn't. Why did they stick a station out at the end of the Greenwich Peninsula where nobody lives? What genius designed that station so that no matter which coach you arrive in, you still end up walking the entire length of the platform to leave the poxy place?

And for the newest line in the system, they seem to spend an inordinate amount of time fixing it.

 

[domtyler]

Not the bloody Jubilee Line, they didn't. Why did they stick a station out at the end of the Greenwich Peninsula where nobody lives? What genius designed that station so that no matter which coach you arrive in, you still end up walking the entire length of the platform to leave the poxy place?

And for the newest line in the system, they seem to spend an inordinate amount of time fixing it.

You could always try cycling instead Nick!

 

[Mr Phoebus]

 

[JamesAC]

Oh, but of course it is all those blacks and gays who are to blame (or am I just misreading James' not so subtle subtext about the 'rubbish'...)

I think you shouldn't put words in my mouth, as it were.

Just look at the number of knife murders carried out on young people in east London, for example. I'm not an expert on sociology or whatever, but it seems clear to me that disfunctional disparate families with no hope, self respect or aspiration do detract from society.

As to the transport situation: yes, London had a World leading public transport system from the middle of the 19thC until a decade or so ago. Now it is a shambles.

For example, an airport was built in the Docklands. A Docklands railway was built at about the same time. Did they join up? No! You had a 1/2 mile walk from one to the other. Only in the last couple of years has a spur been opened on the DLR to connect to City Airport.

And why on earth have they had to lengthen the DLR platorms TWICE since it was built? Shurely Any Fule No that if a 12-coach train pulls into Stratford station and disgorges loads of passengers heading for Canary Wharf, they won't fit into a 2-coach DLR train!!

And the Jubilee line seems to have endless problems, particularly with signal failures around Greenwich North.

Flying Monkey: you should know that blacks, to say the least, have featured in the development of east London for over a century: Canning Town had a "Black Mens' Club" in the late 19thC. I don't think homosexuals were actully allowed until recently

 

[Tynan]

the stabbings in east london at least are almost entirely due to some charming gangs of asian teenagers, I go to West Ham football and they think they own the place and are forever causing trouble, attacking people in broad daylight for no reason and all the numerous police on overtime will do is tell people to stick to the main roads, it's absurd

they'll nick people for standing up or heaven forbid swearing inside the ground though

no-one gets stabbed up norf though do they, some lovely riots up there of late surely