A Walk Along The Thames
One of the great things about the River Thames in London, is that for most of its route, you can walk along the banks, using the Thames Path.
Today, was rather cold, but I felt I needed a walk, so I walked along the north bank of the Thames from London Bridge to Wapping, with a diversion into St.Katherine’s Dock, where I had a cup of tea and a lovely salmon salad for just over six pounds.
I took these pictures along the route.
Next time, I might walk as far as Greenwich and then cross using the foot tunnel, before coming back along the other bank.
A Trap For The Unwary
Several times in Bilbao, I saw steps that were not easy to spot.
A Trap For The Unwary
In fact, I was first alerted to the problem, when a sensibly-shod middle-aged lady fell sat the bus station.
Many semed to have been designed the way I saw them.
A Tale Of Two Cyclists
Coming back from the shops this evening, I needed to cross the zebra crossing by my house. There were no cars in view, but I could see two cyclists coming towards the crossing. I couldn’t miss one, as he had a high visibility jacket on and lights flashing away. But the second was not so visible.
The first cyclist stopped and as I expected the second to do the same, I stepped onto the crossing shouting a loud thank you to the first cyclist.
I started to cross, when I realised the second cyclist was intending to overtake the first and ride straight across in my direction. I think the first cyclist could have obscured his view of me on the crossing.
When he saw me, he braked hard and virtually ended up in a heap on the crossing. He said nothing, picked up his bike, whilst the first cyclist who’d stopped, shrugged and made a long face, at the antics of the other cyclist.
Luckily there wasn’t any other vehicles behind him, otherwise a simple mistake might have become a serious one.
We may need more cycling and better routes for cyclists, but we also need better standards from all road users.
Cyclists may come off badly, when hit by buses and trucks, but pedestrians don’t fare well, when hit by a fast moving cyclist.
Are These A Good Idea?
This advert for noise-cancelling head-phones are on buses all over London.
Are These A Good Idea?
Personally, I have always hated head phones, even when I flew aircraft, but surely to cut the noise of traffic out, is not necessarily a good idea for pedestrians and cyclists.
We need a serious analysis of accidents involving pedestrians and cyclists.
Legible Brighton
Like London, Brighton has gone Legible with lots of liths. Legible Brighton is described here. The page contains this statement.
Research has shown that people are more likely to return to a city if they have found it easy to navigate their way around.
So why are some places, slow to follow the lead of London and Glasgow? Here’s one of Brighton’s liths.
One Of Brighton’s Liths
They are generally fairly simple, like most of London’s.
Keeping Cyclists And Pedestrians Safe
There is a big row at the moment over safety on London’s cycling superhighways.
I wemt to Islington twice today in the morning and to Walthamstow in the afternoon. I saw several instances of bad behaviour, by drivers, pedestrians and cyclists, but the most dangerous ones, were when drivers were turning left and ignoring Rule 170 of the Highway Code and not giving way to pedestrians. In one instance the driver braked hard to avoid pedestrians and a cyclist ran into the back of his car.
So perhaps the best way to cut deaths and injuries to cyclists and pedestrians, is for all road users to obey the law as best they can.
As I said in this post, the Scots have some of the worst pedestrian death rates in Europe and it appeared to me, when I visited, that Scots are much more impatient, than modt of the pedestrians in my part of London.
After my experiences in Croydon yesterday, I would think that signposts showing the shortest and most convenient routes for pedestrians would help too. In a lot of places, cyclists already have these.
The Nightmare That Is Croydon
I went to IKEA at Croydon, as I needed to get some drawers and seat cushions, which weren’t in stock at Edmonton. The easiest way to get there is to take the Overground to West Croydon and then get the Tramlink to Ampere Way.
The Nightmare That Is Croydon
This picture sums it all up. There was no signposting to the westbound tram stops and in the end, I had to cross the road in a long subway, take an eastbound tram and then walk across to a westbound one.
It really needs a good sort-out and it not up to the usual standard that Londoners expect.
They could also make it a lot more pedestrian friendly crossing thev road at West Croydon station and getting to and from the tram at IKEA.
They could start by putting up some proper signs to direct people who want to go west from West Croydon. It would probably at the moment mean going via East Croydon, but then hopefully signs would stop people from getting lost, like I did!
At least two pedestrian crossings with lights also need to be installed. or does Croydon have a policy of discouraging pedestrians. After all they do make bit of a mess to the motor, if you hit one hard.
There doesn’t seem to be any plans to route some westbound trains past West Croydon station, but then it does seem to me, that it’s now too late, as logically, this should have been done, when the initial lines were laid down.
My Use Of The Word Lith
I grew up in my father’s print works, where words were the substance of the business. My generation also used to make up words much more than most seem to do today. For instance at school, we used to use the word plob for the little stopper in the end of a Bic pen.
On the Wikipedia entry for Legible London there is a section, that describes the elements of the system.
The existing primary Legible London on-street signs or information boards are the ‘Monolith’ ‘Midilith’ and ‘Minilith’ which are free standing signs made of a mixture of vitreous enamel and vinyl printed glass materials within a stainless steel frame.
So I just shortened the whole of that to liths, as a convenient collective term for all of them. It also means, that I don’t have to state what type of lith it is.
I shall do what my father would have done over questions of words and contact the OED.
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.
The Anonymous Widower 