Chaos In The Balls Pond Road
The roadworks that caused all the problems with the buses, last week are still ongoing. There are no open bus stops and just one narrow lane for the traffic.
One Narrow Lane In The Balls Pond Road
When I left home this lunchtime, I walked to the next stop, where there was an angry crowd and even angrier drivers trying to get onto the Balls Pond Road.
The diversion on Dove Road was congested and totally inadequate, especially as they were running extra buses as the Overground was closed, so putting a large number of extra passengers on the buses. When I returned later in the afternoon, the problems were made worse, by everybody trying to get to the Emirates to see Arsenal at home to Liverpool.
If they’d wanted to organise chaos, they’d created it, in the best way possible.
I was talking to a bus driver and he blamed Boris, which was a bit unfair.
As my background is project planning and management, I believe this chaos was all down to no co-ordination between the parties involved. The Arsenal match has been in the calendar for months, so surely to do the necessary resurfacing work, on a match day was a bad decision. It was probably costly too, as it meant that all of the chaos, meant that not as much progress as had been hoped was made.
Surely too, the Overground should have been kept open, whilst the road was effectively closed, as this closure imposes extra strains on the road network.
The only good thing about the roadworks, was that I could cross Southgate Road with ease.
A Closed Southgate Road
But crossing the Balls Pond Road is difficult for pedestrains, as there are no lights and we’ve been left to our own devices and wits.
No-one seems to have any idea, how long this chaos will go on. Although this notice mentions that Phase 5 ends on the first of December.
I can’t help feeling, that traffic problems in the area would be helped on match days, if the Northern City line was open between Finsbury Park and Moorgate. Perhaps, when Thameslink is fully established this line will get some long-needed improvement.
I Finally Get To Watch A Premier League Football Match On BT Sport
I’ve had BT Sport for about three or four months now!
I’m now sitting at my table, typing at my computer and I’m just about to watch the first Premier League football match on the channel.
The reason, is that normally at this time, I’m travelling to see Ipswich Town, and they played last night. I could have seen a previous match, but I wasn’t interested, as it featured Norwich.
Newcastle against Chelski, wouldn’t be my choice of a match, but at least I may have the pleasure of seeing the London side lose.
Hollande Shows How To Ru(i)n Football
The top French football clubs, are showing what they think of President Hollande’s high earner tax, by going on strike, as is reported here on the BBC. Here’s the first paragraph.
French President Francois Hollande has rebuffed protests against a 75% tax on high earners, prompting football clubs to press on with a planned “strike”.
Mr Hollande stood firm by his plan to levy the tax on incomes above 1m euros (£850,000; $1.36m) at a meeting with club presidents.
Ed Milliband admitted in this interview to being a lapsed Leeds United supporter and now follows Doncaster, so expect him to raise taxes like Hollande if he gets elected, as it won’t effect any of his teams. It might even raise Doncaster into the Premier League!
Racism In Moscow
One of the stories dominating the news on my trip north was the racial abuse of Yaya Toure in Moscow by so-called fans of CSKA Moscow.
I shall be looking forward to the fifth of November and the return fixture in Manchester.
Knowing Manchester City fans, they might come up with an unusual and probably humorous protest, that everybody, except racists, will applaud.
As my father often said, there’s nothing that bigots, fascists and bullies hate more than ridicule.
Back Home Via Bolton
I didn’t go directly home, but broke the journey to see Ipswich play Bolton at the Reebok stadium, which is very close to Horwich Parkway station. This meant changes on both legs at Preston.
I would have preferred to come home via Manchester, but because Manchester United were playing Stoke City, I couldn’t get a train ticket at a reasonable price.
This resulted in having to rush my second change at Preston, as the London train had already arrived, when my local train came into Preston a few minutes late.
But the train was in London at the scheduled time of 20:15.
I’ve talked about the problems of getting gluten-free food on Virgin at weekends, so I didn’t really bother, as they had one gluten-free ham salad sandwich in the Marks and Spencer’s at Glasgow Central station.
And of course, it’s impossible to get any gluten free food in a football ground.
If I’d gone home by Manchester, I could have eaten in Carluccio’s in Piccadilly station. And probably a couple of other places too!
Glasgow’s Impressive Buildings And Structures
There has been a lot of building in Glasgow lately, much of it to do with the 2014 Commonwealth Games.
I was totally surprised by the combined velodrome and sports hall, called the Emirates Arena, which looked a real world class building from the outside.
What with three large football grounds; Ibrox, Celtic Park and Hampden Park, the SSE Hydro and the Clyde Auditorium, Glasgow certainly seems well prepared for the Games.
The finnieston Crane is a Glasgow landmark and was used to lift heavy cargoes onto ships. It reminds me of the massive seaplane crane at Felixstowe, which was used to lift seaplanes and flying boats out of the water. There’s a picture in this report.
i can’t find anything suitable about the Clyde Harbour Tunnel of which the two rotundas are part. They look very much like the buildings of the Greenwich Foot Tunnel in London, except they are much larger.
Ipswich Town Supporters Club – London Branch AGM
It was the AGM yesterday and I took these pictures.
Jay Tabb made an interesting confession, when I asked what it was with footballers wearing beards these days. He said, that he can’t!
Oh Dear! Christmas Is Coming!
I hate Christmas and the older I get, the more I do so. Remember C died just before Christmas in 2007.
Oh Dear! Christmas Is Coming!
This picture from John Lewis sums it all up. Tat hanging from the ceiling, to try to get you into a jolly mood!
This year, I won’t even have the relief of football on Boxing Day, as Ipswich are playing in Doncaster and there won’t be any trains.
What Do Arnold Schwarzenegger, Pete Sampras, Carl Jung And Roy Hodgson Have In Common?
I could also throw in Magic Johnson, Esther Williams, Lucille Ball and Albert Hitchcock.
So Roy is the only football manager there, but they are a successful group of individuals.
And they’re all quetzals or those born under the sign of Leo in the Chinese year of the pig. I don’t believe in astrology, but I read a book linking the various threads of the beliefs together some years ago and they described Leo pigs as blessed and a 100% pure pork.
Sometimes when I look at my life, I certainly feel I have been very lucky and have made the best of at times of a very dodgy and difficult set of cards.
The same could be said for Roy Hodgson, who took over the poisoned challenge of the England job and has now got us to the World Cup Finals in Brazil.
But then you underestimate the strength of character of a Leo pig at your peril!
I should know, as Roy is just seven days older than myself!
A Stadium In Need Of Updating
Hillsborough has seen better days.
These days you expect to have an uninterrupted view and some form of decent match timing device.
You can understand, why it is no longer used for FA Cup Semi Finals. I know the reason is to get more matches at Wembley, but I go to so many stadia, that are far superior to Hillsborough these days.
The Anonymous Widower 