What Effect Will Crossrail Have On The Dartford Crossing?
I asked yesterday, if we needed another crossing of the Thames.
Looking at the Crossrail web site, I see that from Shenfield to Whitechapel will take 39 minutes and Abbey wood to Whitechapel will take 25 minutes. So to do that into London and out again will take 54 minutes plus a couple of minutes for the change of train and direction at Whitechapel. the current journey incidentally takes around 90 minutes, but you can do it in a car in just under 50 minutes, assuming you get a good run over the bridge.
So it would appear that the Crossrail route would be about the same time as a car, which might or might not be enough to persuade travellers to go by rail.
There will also be opportunities to change at Stratford to HS2 to get into Kent. This won’t help the journeys such as Abbey Wood, but it would be a great help to such journeys as Colchester to Canterbury.
All of these options, might cut the number of car journeys over the Dartford Crossing. It would of course be helped by adequate car parking at the Crossrail stations.
Where’s Laura?
Buses over London are showing my name.
Coke Advert On A London Bus
I’ve actually just had a Coke too! But where is Laura?
Where’s Laura?
She is on lots of other buses.
The French Get Touchy About Language
The French can get very touchy, when English encroaches on territory, they think is reserved for French.
But this row, reported here on the BBC is totally of their own making, Here’s the introduction.
The French parliament is debating a new road map for French universities, which includes the proposal of allowing courses to be taught in English. For some, this amounts to a betrayal of the national language and, more specifically, of a particular way at looking at the world – for others it’s just accepting the inevitable.
The English-speaking world has nothing to do with it.
My French is such, that I can get by as a tourist. I also successfully used the language, when I was at ICI, as it was quicker to read scientific reports from the Belgian company, Solvay, in French, rather than wait for a translation.
On the other hand, when I was in Montreal, a few years ago, I was totally baffled, as Canadian French, is more different to French, than American is to English.
When we developed Artemis, we sold in quite a few European countries, but didn’t bother with French, as we thought they would be touchy, wanting everything in their own language.
In the late 1970s, Metier had installed an Artemis system, at Chrysler in Coventry. For various reasons, it hadn’t been upgraded, as much as it should. Soon after Peugeot-Citroen took over Chrysler in 1979, someone in Peugeot-Citroen decided to do a company wide survey of the various project management systems in use in the group. on one visit they went to Coventry and because they were impressed with what they saw, they came straight down the M1 to see us in our offices in Hayes.
Peugeot-Citroen then decided to buy a system for Paris. We told them it was only in English, but they said not to matter, as all their engineers knew the language. They did ask us to get some proper sales flyers in French.
The rest as they say is history, in that Peugeot-Citroen introduced Artemis to a lot of their friends.
Another story I remember, which illustrates the French and their language, happened a few years later. In the 1980s, I owned a company that made hand-tools. One tool, was exported to France and the United States. Our American agent asked if we could produce an English/French version for Canada. But a straight combination of what we already had was unacceptable and we had to get a special French Canadian translation at great expense. Eventually, the Canadians excepted it.
A couple of years afterwards, we had an urgent order from France, but unfortunately we were out of French leaflets. So we faxed over the French Canadian one to ask if that would be acceptable. The response was, that it will do, but that the French would have a bit of a laugh about the language.
Make of that, what you will!
I should say, that I once travelled to the States with a secretary from the New Zealand embassy in Ottawa. She told me, that some Canadians got very upset, if she sent them a letter with some American English spelling.
Polycell Launch Underpants For Builders
This was reported in The Sunday Times.
Builders have long used Polycell to cover up unsightly cracks, so it was only a matter of time before the company launched its own underwear range. PolyPants have a high waistband to avoid revealing “builder’s bottom”.
A cartoonist friend, will have to redraw one of his best cartoons.
Irving Sellar Does A Guy De Maupassant
Prufrock in the Sunday Times reported that Irving Sellar, who developed the Shard, has his own table in the restaurant on floor 32.
He must only be following the reasoning of Guy de Maupassant, who often ate lunch in the Eiffel Tower. Wikipedia says this.
Maupassant was but one of a fair number of 19th-century Parisians who did not care for the Eiffel Tower; indeed, he often ate lunch in the restaurant at its base, not out of any preference for the food, but because it was only there that he could avoid seeing its otherwise unavoidable profile.
So does Irvine Sellar feel like that about the monstrous Shard?
The Anonymous Widower 