A Mayor For Manchester?
Rochdale though sums up one of the problems of Manchester. You have all these individual towns, that it would seem don’t talk to each other. Some are proposing that there needs to be a mayor for Greater Manchester. There was a big article in The Times yesterday about a mayor for Manchester.
Recently,on my travels to the 92 football grounds in the UK in alphabetical order by public transport, I put England under a savage microscope. Some places like Exeter, Sheffield and Newcastle were no problem, as everything was signed and easy to understand.
But the biggest contrast was between Hartlepool and Manchester. I’d expected a post-industrial dump in the first and a modern city in the second.
I was so wrong about the first and was surprised to see a town that had pulled itself out of the abyss, with the help of a mayor who fought for the town. Manchester may have some nice new buildings and attractions, but it has the most disintegrated public transport system in the UK. Try turning up at Piccadilly station in a wheelchair and getting to Oldham hospital to see your mother, who’s fallen and broken her hip, without using a taxi! I know London isn’t perfect, but try getting from Euston to Barnet General.
Where was Manchester buses, welcoming booth at the station? Why didn’t the buses talk me through their route? Where were the street and bus maps at every bus stop? Where were the wheel-chair accessible buses with separate doors for entrance and exit?
London’s bus system has improved so much over the last few years and this is probably down to one person being in charge of the whole system, who reports directly to the mayor.
We are having a mayoral election in London in May. Manchester could do a lot worse than ask the one who comes second to be their interim mayor, with a major responsibility to sort out their transport system and make it friendly and understandable to everybody and especially visitors and the disabled.
London Bus Myths
When we were kids, there was always a story or myth about a particular London bus route, that ever since one got a direct hit from a German bomb has gone in convoy. I know 38s, seem to run in threes, but I don’t think it was that route.
The myth round here is that 4s have a take your own line approach to getting from one end of their route to the other. This was illustrated today as I saw a 4 going towards the Islington Angel on the Essex Road. I did find though when I got home, that there had been a traffic accident.
There must be many more myths.
Liverpool Comes To London
HMS Liverpool is in London this weekend and I went to have a look.
Note the red liver bird, which gives the ship it’s nickname of Crazy Red Chicken.
Around Tower Hamlets Cemetery Park
This park is based on the old Tower Hamlets Cemetery and is now a nature reserve as well.
I went on Friday to have a look round and took these pictures.
Note the daffodils and the derelict St. Clements Hospital. The War Memorial is still intact and hasn’t suffered from metal thieves.
Credit Unions
THe BBC is plugging credit unions this morning. I am all for that, as I think they are a good alternative to banks for a lot of people with simple financial needs.
but type in “credit union Hackney” into Google and you get this message.
Hackney Credit Union has ceased trading and the branch has closed.
So not a good start!
Type in “find credit union hackney” and you get some assorted credit check and loan adverts.
You do get this page from Hackney Council, which tells you about credit unions. But it doesn’t give the branches in the borough.
So unless you know about credit unions and where one is located, you haven’t really got much help.
If we want to get more people to use credit unions, then they must get control of the Internet. Especially typing “find credit union” should not get a loan shark.
Credit unions are much more successful in the US, but then they are much bigger with probably more branches. Look at the web site of the Credit Union of Southern California. IT certainly doesn’t look to be a small organisation. Where is the Londonwide credit union?
Could it be that the banks have got their friends in Government to effectively ban them?
Around Chambers Wharf
Chambers Wharf has made the news recently, as Thames Water want to make it one of the sites from where London’s Thames Super Sewer is to be built. So I went and had a look round this lunchtime.
I couldn’t actually see much of the site as it is surrounded by blue fencing. But it strikes me that if they do any serious digging from here, that because the site is so close to the Thames, any serious engineer would take the spoil out that way. If Thames Water don’t do that it will probably cost them a lot more, as lorry journeys through a city like London are always delayed by traffic and only carry a few tonnes, whereas a proper barge can carry many times more. If we look at the Olympic site, a lot of materials like concrete and spoil were moved in and out by rail. Also go to Pudding Mill Lane and look at the portal for CrossRail, which is for two much larger tunnels, where the spoil will probably be removed by train. So opponents of the use of the Chambers Wharf site, who say there will be thousands of lorry journeys are not talking engineering sense. The site is also quite large and the hole is only going to be under thirty metres wide, so there should be quite a lot of space for machinery to move the spoil to the river.
I have no direct interest in whether the sewer is built, but I have a friend, who used to live in an area of London, that flooded badly every ten or so years. The sewer will hopefully stop all that.
Although I should say, that as someone who has spent a lot of time around project management and managers, I will say that what gets built in the end, will be quite unlike what was originally proposed. That’s what good project management is about. It makes a project better, cheaper and less disruptive. Hopefully, because of the sensitivity of this project, Thames Water will follow the example of Transport for London on the East London Line and hire the best people and contractors to build the sewer.
I was upset though to see the bench that had held Doctor Salter’s statue is now bare. A picture of it is in this set of pictures.
You Can Advertise But Not Sell
James Smith & Sons is probably the last real umbrella and walking stick shop left in London if not the world.
I passed the shop on a bus yesterday and took this picture.
James Smith & Sons
Note that at the top right the wonderful shop front says they sell dagger canes and swordsticks.
They may do for those who have a special need, but I suppose if I walked in to buy one, I would be refused.
Facts About London During Wikipedia Blackout
You don’t need Wikipedia. Just look here.
Why Is The Jubilee Line Always Delayed?
Or it seems to be when I go near it!
This morning I went to Elephant and Castle and passing through Monument, an announcement said that all lines on the Underground were running well except for the Jubilee.
It always seems to be like that. Could it be, that as it was built to be finished by the Millennium for the do of the great-and-good at the Doom, that it wasn’t done properly? Or was it NuLabor couldn’t afford the bribe to keep the workers on the job, so they left out a few important wires?
As it was, today it didn’t matter, as I took the Bakerloo from Embankment. But it was still suffering delays, when I came back!
Property Prices In London
I was surprised to read this article in the Evening Standard.
Property prices may be flat elsewhere, but it seems they’re holding up in my part of London. Am I bothered?
The Anonymous Widower 