London’s Other New Underground Line
In the middle of next month, Phase One of London’s other new Underground line will open.
The Bank station upgrade may only be a short section of new Southbound tunnel and track for the Northern Line and a much expanded station, but it promises to do proportionally for the City of London, what Crossrail will do for the whole of London.
The lucky Ian of IanVisits has been allowed to descend into the depths of the new section of the station with his camera and has posted this report on his web site, which is entitled Behind The Scenes At Bank Tube Station’s Huge Upgrade Project. The report contains twenty-four revealing photographs.
If ever there was a must-read, then Ian’s article must be it.
The Great Bus Robbery
Transport for London (TfL) obviously don’t like people where I live in the Northern part of De Beauvoir Town in the London Borough of Hackney.
When I moved here, ten years ago there were six bus routes that passed through the traffic lights where the Balls Pond Road (It is not a made-up-name from Round The Horne) and Southgate Road/Mildmay Park meet.
- 21 – Newington Green and Lewisham Shopping Centre
- 30 – Marble Arch and Hackney Wick (From the sublime to the ridiculous?)
- 38 – Victoria station and the romantic Clapton Pond
- 56 – Bart’s Hospital and Whipps Cross (You’d be cross, if you’d been whipped!)
- 141 – London Bridge Station and Palmers Green North Circular Road (Surely, another romantic destination!)
- 277 – Highbury & Islington Station and Crossharbour
Note.
- We had two bus routes to and from Highbury & Islington station for Dear Old Vicky!
- We had two bus routes to and from Moorgate, Bank and the City of London.
- We had four bus routes to and from Dalston Junction station and the cultural attractions of Hackney Central.
- We had a direct bus to Canary Wharf.
TfL looked at the name of the district and thought the posh French name, meant we were all had expensive vehicles or Hackney carriages and said we had too many buses.
So in June 2018, the 277 bus was cut back to Dalston Junction station and TfL promised that the frequency of the 30 bus would be increased. We’re still waiting for extra services.
Now, if you want to go to Highbury & Islington station, according to TfL’s Journey Planner, it’s often quicker to take a 38 or 56 bus to Essex Road station and take a train.
To make matters worse the 30 bus route now has cheap and nasty Egyptian-built buses with more steps than Russia. All buses should have flat floors like the New Routemasters.
What is TfL’s latest crime?
The 21 and 271 buses are going to be combined into a new route between Lewisham and Highgate, which will go nowhere near the Balls Pond Road.
So we’ll just have the one bus route to the City of London.
On past form, if TfL say they will increase the frequency, I wouldn’t believe them.
I think that TfL have ignored some problems.
The Elderly And Disabled
Between Newington Green and Englefield Road, a higher proportion of the passengers getting on the 21 and 141 buses seem to be in these groups.
- As it’s a nice place to live, I suspect many elderly people have just stayed on.
- I believe that North of the Balls Pond Road, there are some care homes and sheltered housing.
Have TfL analysed their passengers?
Not Everybody Has Cars
There are several blocks of social housing on the Newington Green and Englefield Road stretch and you see a lot of passengers who don’t look like car owners.
The lack of parking and the Low Traffic Neighbourhoods don’t help.
Access To Waterloo
My quickest way to Waterloo, which is London’s busiest rail terminal, is to take a bus to Bank and then get the Drain.
A halved service to Bank station will probably force me to take longer routes.
Tradition
When I was a child in the 1950s, the 141 was the 641 trolley bus, which ran between Winchmore Hill and Moorgate.
People, who live in Wood Green, Turnpike Lane and Manor House still commute to the City by bus, as people have done for over a hundred years.
I suspect a lot of commuters change from the Piccadilly Line to the 141 bus at Manor House station. I certainly use that route if I’m going to Southgate or Cockfosters.
The 21 bus starts at Newington Green, which means if you want to go from Balls Pond Road to Bank, you’ll usually get on a 21 bus, as the 141 buses are full with passengers from further North.
So it looks like to get to Moorgate, we’ll need to get a bus to Angel and then get the Northern Line, after the rerouting of the 21 bus.
Crossrail
This will have a big effect.
Suppose you live in Wood Green and want to get to Crossrail.
There is no obvious connection, but tradition will mean your preferred route will be to take a 141 bus between Manor House and Moorgate.
There will also be a quick route between Moorgate and Liverpool Street station, that I wrote about in London’s First Underground Roller Coaster.
Conclusion
We will need the 21 bus to provide us with a route to Crossrail, as the 141 buses will be full.
The 21 bus is needed where it is and mustn’t be stolen.
Green Hydrogen Can Save Us. But Waiting For It Won’t.
I saw the title of this post on the side of a green bus.
Route 43 goes between London Bridge station and Friern Barnet via Bank, Moorgate, Old Street (Silicon Roundabout) and The Angel.
So it goes right through the centre of the City of London.
Andrew Forrest is intending to get his message across to the City.
To find out more, you could always connect to the web site on the bus.
Finsbury Circus Appears Fully Open
I bought my breakfast yesterday in Leon on Moorgate and ate it in the nearby Finsbury Circus Gardens.
It is now fully open.
This picture shows the gardens during the construction of Crossrail.
Note.
- The bandstand can be picked out amongst the trees.
- The shaft towards the bottom is forty metres deep and was used to get men and materials to the tunnels.
Comparing the pictures shows that the gardens are now able to used for their original purpose.
Gore Street Energy’s £60mln Fundraise Significantly Oversubscribed
The title of this post, is the same as that of this article on Proactive Investors.
Surprise! Surprise!
Well not to me! Or I suspect Which!
This article on Which is entitled Solar Panel Battery Popularity Is Booming: Should You Buy One?
I have read the article and it leaves, the overall impression, that the UK population are thinking seriously about adding batteries to their solar panels.
So if the UK population is thinking seriously about personal energy storage, it would be very surprising if professional fund managers weren’t thinking the same.
After all, I did write World’s Largest Wind Farm Attracts Huge Backing From Insurance Giant, over two years ago.
So if we’re operating and commissioning offshore wind farms like these.
- Dogger Bank – 4.8 MW
- Gwynt y Mor – 576 MW
- East Anglia Array – 7.2 GW
- Hornsea – 6 GW
- London Array – 630 MW
- Walney – 1.7 GW
- Whitelee – 539 MW
We’re going to need some humungous batteries to tide us through calm periods.
As I write this post on a Monday afternoon, the UK is generating 11.5 GW of electricity by wind, which is more than we’re generating by biomass, coal and nuclear combined.
This is a quote from Alex O’Cinneide, who is Gore Street Capital’s chief executive, in the Proactive Investors article.
We are looking forward to deploying this capital against our significant global pipeline of 1.3GW and towards the capital expenditure requirements in the company’s existing 440MW portfolio.
Gore Street certainly seem to be expanding, their portfolio of batteries.
Conclusion
The City of London has discovered renewable energy and found a way to fund it, to the benefit of all investors, from the guy with a pension managed by a reputable company to global insurance companies, funds and other companies, who have billions of pounds, dollars or euros, that needs a profitable home.
The next big development will come, when a company like Gore Street goes Giga and decide to fund Gigawatt batteries being developed by the next generation of energy storage companies, like Gravitricity, Highview Power, Siemens Ganesa and Zinc8.
Do We Need More Bikes Like This?
When I moved back to London in 2010, bikes like this were rare!
Now, you see various bikes every day delivering bread, children, dogd and parcels in the City and East End of London.
It swhould be noted that in a circle of two to three miles from Bank, London is fairly flat and ideal cycling terrain.
But we still need more!
Have we got enough people, prepared to ride them?
Is This A Massive Endorsement For The City Of London?
This Google Map is dominated by the new Goldman Sachs building in the City of London.
Make what you want of the building and its significance for the City.
But is it an endorsement of a strong future or a monument to a glorious past?
Location, Location, Location
One property developer once said, these were the three most important things about a property.
This Google Map shows the location with respect to Farringdon station.
The station, which is at the top of map, will be the best connected in Central London as it will be the crossing of Crossrail and Thameslin. That probably won’t be important to some of the employees of Goldman Sachs, but the building apparently has favoured bicycle spaces over car parking.
Note just to the South of Farringdon station, two of the large buildings of Smithfield Market. These two are very much under-used and plans exist to convert part of them into the new Museum of London.
But a lot of the area between Goldman Sachs and Farringdon is under-developed and will the Goldman Sachs decision, lead to more development of offices, hotels and residences in this part of London at the West of the actual City?
Terminal Six At Heathrow And Terminal Three At Gatwick
I often joke, that this area, will become extra terminals at Heathrow and Gatwick Airports, with an easy link to the trains to Scotland and the Continent just a short taxi ride, bicycle ride or one stop on the Underground up the road at Kings Cross and St. Pancras.
A Walk From Smithfield To The Goldman Sachs Building
These are some pictures I took on the way.
The New Museum Of London Site
Holborn Viaduct
The Goldman Sachs Building
I’m sure that if I can walk to and from Farringdon station at seventy-two, then a lor of people working in the building will use the railway to get to and from work.
Conclusion
Have Goldman Sachs decided to build their new offices at the Crossroads of the World?
Wimbledon Comes To The City
I took these pictures in Spitalfields today.
Perhaps, we should do it more often!
Are Attitudes To Cars Changing?
There were two articles on the same page of yesterday’s Times.
City Steps Up Safety Drive With 15mph Limit
This is the first paragraph.
A blanket speed limit of 15 mph will be introduced in the City of London as part of a safety drive.
They are intending to have the limit in place by 2021-22!
Hopefully, in that time, these rail projects will be finished and discouraging the use of vehicular traffic.
- Crossrail
- The capacity increase at Bank station.
- New trains and faster suburban services into Cannon Street, Liverpool Street, London Bridge and Moorgate stations.
- Frequency improvements on the Circle, District, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan Lines.
- Better cycling and walking routes.
The City of London wants to attract more visitors and these projects and the speed limit will surely help.
Travellers Who Arrive Ar Heathrow By Car Face Pollution Charge
This is the first paragraph.
Motorists will be charged up to £15 to drive to Heathrow under plans to combat congestion and pollution around London’s busiest airport.
Heathrow’s Chief Executive, is quoted as saying.
Three or four years ago the general mood was of opposition. The mood has changed hugely.
I believe that Hathrow can cut its carbon and pollution footprints significantly, by the following.
- Making all air-side vehicles zero-carbon.
- Increasingly the rail lines and services to the Airport.
- Encouraging passengers and workers to go to and from the Airport by zero-carbon transport.
I also think, that an Airport, that marketed itself as No Addition Carbon, could attract more passengers.
A Tale Of Two Cities
This article in the Evening Standard is entitled Traffic Will Be Banned From Three Roads Leading To Bank Junction Following Cyclists’s Death.
- Priority will be given to pedestrians and cyclists at Bank Junction in the City of London.
- The works will be completed before the works at Bank station are completed in 2022.
- There may be a street market in front of the Bank of England.
- The taxi drivers don’t like it.
Compare this to the attitude of London’s other city;Westminster, which has recently, gone against the pedestrianisation of part of Oxford Street and the extension of a Cycle Superhighway.
The Anonymous Widower 