Who Parked This Bus Here?
Yesterday, I needed to go between Waterloo and Victoria stations.
According to my mother’s ready reckoner that is four stations; Embankment, Westminster, St. James’s Park and Victoria and one interchange at Embankment.
So at two minutes a station and one interchange at five minutes that is a total of thirteen minutes.
But after a bit of difficulty locating a bus spider map for Waterloo, I found that I could get 507 bus direct to Victoria station, from the Cab Road, which is a very short level walk from the main station concourse.
I waited perhaps two minutes for the bus and it took fifteen minutes for the journey.
So my bus journey probably took just four minutes longer than the Underground, but there were no steps, escalators or changing trains.
The 507 bus also stopped in the forecourt of Victoria station, just a short level walk from the trains.
The forecourt at Victoria station is rather small, so why do they allow buses like these to take up valuable space?
Who Parked This Bus Here?
I think that tourist buses are an unnecessary curse on London’s traffic and they are part of a big industry that rips off visitors and puts them off the greatest city in the universe!
Hopefully, someone will write a guide and an app, which will mean that all the Routemasters can be used as tourist buses, which explore all parts of the City.
I live on the Routemaster-equipped 38 route from Victoria to the romantically-named Clapton Pond and know a lot of the interesting history you pass through from end-to-end of the route.
One decent audio-guide app, would help to consign tourist buses to the dustbin of stupid and unnecessary ideas.
The Spacious New Platforms At London Bridge Station
These pictures show some of the rebuilt terminal platforms, at London Bridge station.
Space is much better than the London Bridge station, that I remember from before the rebuilding started.
Even the Class 455 trains, built in the 1980s, but refurbished since, doesn’t seem to show its true age.
London Air Ambulance Gets A Brain Scanner
The BBC are running a story this morning about the London Air Ambulance having a portable brain scanner and that they are able to scan injured patients on the way to hospital.
I’ve had a few brain scans in my time, but I can’t imagine one of the machines that have scanned me, being air-transportable in anything less than a C-130 Hercules.
But search the Internet and you find the device. It’s called an InfraScanner. It works using the same infra-red spectrum as a television remote control.
This superb piece of medical engineering, or others based on the same technology, must end up in the bag of every A&E doctor, or those who work in areas where there is a high risk of brain injuries, like sporting events or combat zones.
Crossrail Gets Its Rails
There is an article in Rail Engineer with this title and it describes how Crossrail’s contractors will fit out the line.
In some ways, one thing that surprised me is that the massive concreting train, that lays the concrete slab for the rails is a refurbished one from France. At least they were able to drag it here, through the Channel Tunnel.
It’s a fascinating article, that is well worth reading.
Warfarin And Lansoprazole
As I said in this post called Fasciitis In My Foot, I’ve got fasciitis in my right foot.
It wasn’t going away so my doctor prescribed 500mg. of Naproxen, night and morning, together with 30mg of Lansoprazole first thing, as I’m on Warfarin.
Normally, I take 4mg. of Warfarin a day, but when I am on other drugs, I test my INR regularly to make sure the drugs aren’t affecting my levels.
After a few days, my INR had gone up from its normal level of around 2.3-2.7 to around 4. So obviously, the new drug combination was raising my INR.
I solved the problem and brought the level of Warfarin down to 3mg. After a few days, my INR had returned to around 2.5.
That was a few weeks ago, but the fasciitis has refused to go away, so I am now back on the Naproxen/Lansoprazole combination, but with only 250mg. of the Naproxen.
My INR has jumped in the same way, but as before reducing the Warfarin dose to 3mg. has brought it back to normal.
I am drawn to two conclusions.
- The Lansoprazole raises my INR,
- Regular self-testing of your INR usually picks up problems.
This is very much a repeat of my experiences of taking Terbinafine, which I wrote about Interaction Between Warfarin And Terbinafine. Although that drug dropped the INR.
Enfield Fighting For A Better Train Service
With Waltham Forest getting a new Lea Bridge station, Enfield Council are trying hard to get an improved service at Angel Road station, which is going to be rebuilt and renamed Meridian Water. Wikpedia says this about the development.
The London Borough of Enfield announced in January 2014 that the station being an integral part of the proposed Meridian Water development would be turned into a ‘thriving’ new hub and renamed as Meridian Water. The £3.5 million project due to be completed within the next five years is being supported with funds from the Greater London Authority and Enfield Council.
This article in the Enfield Independent is entitled Council Loses Angel Road Court Case.
The Council were trying to get four trains per hour all day at Angel Road station.
The two stations of Angel Road and Lea Bridge illustrate the problems of timing the building or updating of stations and the train services to serve them.
Lea Bridge Station – 28th December 2015
Things are moving on apace at Lea Bridge station.
The first pictures show a new bridge and cycle route alongside Lea Bridge Road, so it’s not just a station that’s being built.
What surprised me, is that you can clearly see the yellow warning lines on the platform faces. I would have thought that this would have been one of the last jobs to be done!
The station certainly looks to be on track to be completed in the first half of next year. Will it be opened in time for the timetable change in May 2016?
Could IPEMUs Be Used On The Windsor Link Railway?
I quite like the concept of the Windsor Link Railway.
When I wrote Walking The Proposed Route Of The Windsor Link Railway, I was unsure about how they woud arrange the power supplies on the route.
Now that the concept of an IPEMU or independently-powered electrical multiple unit is better defined and probably nearer to delivery, I think that the train may have an application on the Windsor Link Railway.
In researching the branches of the Great Western, in Towards A Thames Valley Metro, I came to the conclusion, that Slough to Windsor should be worked by an IPEMU.
If the Windsor Link Railway is ever built, then the Windsor Tunnel doesn’t need to be electrified, as at five hundred metres, it is short enough for an IPEMU to get through on batteries.
The tunnel would be smaller and simpler.
Heathrow Express And Crossrail
There is an interesting report on the front of the Business section of the Sunday Times entitled Heathrow starts fight over bill for Crossrail link.
Apparently, the airport want to charge passengers using Crossrail to the Airport for using the part of the Airport Rail Link, that was funded by the Airport. The Airport wants to raise a total of £40million every year.
My first reaction is to think this is an story worthy of April the First or someone in the negotiations for the route of Crossrail has made a big mistake.
If I wanted to build a new railway into say a small town, before I started to construct the railway, I would make sure all of the legals were tightly sown up and agreed.
Surely with a fourteen billion pound project like Crossrail, where since 1974, there has been talk of a link to Heathrow, you wouldn’t start construction of the project, unless you had everything nailed before starting construction.
The Crossrail Bill was approved in 2005 and has since been backed by all Governments and most political parties.
According to Wikipedia, Heathrow Airport Holdings,owns or part owns the Heathrow Airport branch of Crossrail. So it would appear that they may have some basis for charging passengers to use the line.
As I said the Crossrail Bill was signed in 2005 and then because of competition concerns, the company was made to divest themselves of most of the other Airports, that it owned. Competition Concerns in the Wikipedia entry for Heathrow Airport Holdings details the competition concerns.
Wikipedia describes Heathrow Airport as being owned like this.
The airport is owned and operated by Heathrow Airport Holdings, which itself is owned by FGP TopCo Limited, an international consortium led by the Spanish Ferrovial Group that includes Caisse de dépôt et placement du Québec and Government of Singapore Investment Corporation.
From what I can gather the Spanish group took over the old BAA plc, which had been privatised in 1986, in July 2006. So surely, as the Crossrail Bill had been signed in the previous year, they would have known all about the rail project.
So why just four years before Crossrail opens and everybody in London is getting excited about the project and especially the link to a major airport, should Heathrow Airport come up with a demand for forty million pounds a year?
I think there is a clue in the comments placed on the article, by subscribers to the Sunday Times web site. who are probably a fair cross section of the people who regularly use Heathrow.
There is not one comment, that thinks that Heathrow has a valid case and many are hostile even about the existence of Heathrow.
So has Heathrow just done a bit of research on the Heathrow Express?
They will have found some or all of the following.
- Heathrow Express only goes to Paddington.
- Passengers for Heathrow come from all parts of London and the South-East and don’t use Heathrow Express because getting to Paddington is difficult.
- Many of the workers at the airport, take public transport to get to the Airport and few use Heathrow Express.
- Crossrail will serve Central London and other important districts like Canary Wharf, Reading and South Essex.
- Crossrail links directly to Thameslink and the services out of Liverpool Street.
- Many passengers will use Crossrail instead of driving to and from the Airport.
- Crossrail will run all night.
- Londoners see London Overground and Underground as theirs and use them.
- Crossrail will be part of Transport for London’s system.
- Crossrail will use hassle-free contactless ticketing. Most travellers will just use a bank card and expect no waiting time.
- There will be a big row, if pensioners can’t use their Freedom Passes on Crossrail to Heathrow.
- No Mayoral candidate in next May’s election will back Heathrow over Transport for London.
- Gatwick Airport will introduce contactless ticketing in a few months.
- Paddington to Terminal One takes fifteen minutes on Heathrow Express and will take only nine minutes longer on Crossrail.
- A big enthusiasm for Crossrail
- As seen in the Sunday Times comments, deep resentment for Heathrow and Heathrow Express.
They will also probably have had some very forthright comments about the cost of tickets for Heathrow Express.
At the moment Heathrow Express is the only fast and comfortable train service to get between Heathrow and Central London.
But Crossrail will be a game-changer, as it will be not much slower, spacious, frequent, more convenient and hopefully comfortable.
For a few years, Crossrail will also have the new factor and passengers will at least give it a try.
I think that all this means there will be a massive shift of passengers away from Heathrow Express to Crossrail.
So seeing this projected loss of revenue, they have come to the conclusion that they must get another income stream to make up the losses.
But travellers are not stupid any more and unless their company is paying, now chose the most convenient route to their ultimate destination at the best price.
I may not be typical, but I have five convenient local airports, so on many flights, I have a choice of airport. Unfortunately for Heathrow, more and more of their possible travellers, have this luxury of choice.
All this leads to my view, that Heathrow will be forced to apply the-if-you-can’t-beat-em-join-em principle, as I think Heathrow possibly needs Crossrail, more than Crossrail needs Heathrow.
Consider the following.
- Crossrail links at Farringdon to Thameslink, which serves Luton and Gatwick Airports.
- Crossrail links directly to the City and Canary Wharf.
- Crossrail avoids the bottleneck at Paddington.
- Crossrail will link Heathrow to the West Coast Main Line and the future HS2 at Old Oak Common.
- Crossrail will expand in the next few years to give better connectivity to many more places.
- Heathrow needs to build a direct link to Reading.
- Heathrow needs to link Crossrail to Terminal 5.
- Routes are possible, that could link Crossrail 2 to Heathrow.
- Heathrow will lose credibility and passengers, if it is not just seen as a stop on London’s transport network.
If Crossrail didn’t serve Heathrow for the first few years after it opened, I don’t think that Transport for London would get the blame!
In some ways, Heathrow’s best policy might be to cut their losses and sell the Heathrow Airport Links and its stations to Crossrail, after agreeing extensions to the Airport Rail Links.
But that would give in the eyes of some, London’s Mayor too much control over airports policy for the South East! Surely, he or she would know more about Heathrow and the problems the airport causes, than a faceless multi-national.
Is This The World’s Most Annoying Christmas Gift?
This was at a lunch today!
It is rather spectacularly annoying!
You can imagine Lord Whats-Is-Name giving it both barrels with a 12-bore.
The Anonymous Widower 