A London boy, oh a London boy, your flashy clothes are your pride and joy, a London boy, a London boy, you’re crying out loud that you’re a London boy.
David Bowie (b.1947)
All posts by Gibson Square
London Trivia: Tony Blair sees purple
On 19 May 2004, just weeks after a £600,000 security screen was installed at the public gallery of the House of Commons protesters threw condoms full of purple flour hitting Tony Blair during Prime Minister’s Questions. It was realised that the front three rows of the public viewing gallery, normally reserved for ambassadors was not behind the screen. It was the most serious attack since CS gas was thrown into the chamber 30 years previously.
On 19 May 1649 the Rump Parliament passed an Act to turn England into a Republic, it lasted 11 years before we regained our senses
In 1678 the body of Sir Edmund Berry Godfrey was found on Greenberry Hill later three were hanged for the murder their names Green, Berry, Hill
The 19 May is St Dunstan’s Day celebrating the Benedictine Bishop of London who granted a charter authorising the building of Westminster Abbey
Britain’s first fatal car crash took place on Grove Hill, Harrow. Today a plaque on the spot warns drivers to take heed
On 19 May 1536 Anne Boleyn, second wife oe Henry VIII, was beheaded at the Tower of London for alleged adultery
Douglas Adams based characters of Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Universe on Islington where he lived, Hotblack Desiato was an estate agent
The Apollo 11 crew’s first alcoholic drink back on Earth was the Moonwalk, invented by Joe Gilmore of London’s Savoy hotel
On 19 May 2007 The new Wembley Stadium ‘officially’ opened for the FA Cup Final between Chelsea and Manchester United (1-0)
Demonstrating a new crossing in Camden aimed at reducing pedestrian road deaths Transport Minister Hore-Belisha was nearly knocked down
Many of the streets in the city were named after the particular trade which practiced there, for example Threadneedle Street was the tailor’s district
When John Noakes climbed Nelson’s Column (removing pigeon poo) for TV’s Blue Peter a sound engineer didn’t record the stunt, Noakes had to reclimb all over again
Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.
Previously Posted: It’s a two-way street
For those new to CabbieBlog or readers who are slightly forgetful, on Saturdays I’m republishing posts, many going back over a decade. Some will still be very relevant while others have become dated over time. Just think of this post as your weekend paper supplement.
It’s a two-way street (19.04.11)
It was the Peruvians – that’s if Wikipedia is to be believed – who invented the first one-way street for their capital Lima.
The idea to the layman appears obvious, traffic flows better if all vehicles are moving in the same direction. Find two parallel streets in a city and you have the makings of a one-way traffic system, and with the correct signage or today’s SatNavs, nobody should get lost or confused.
Now conventional traffic planning appears to have been turned on its head. The first scheme to remove a one-way system was the Aldgate East gyratory, built in the 1970s it was criticised ever since for creating a “racetrack” mentality among motorists, terrifying pedestrians and cyclists. The word racetrack in this context is a euphemism for no traffic jams and was about the only road left in London where you could travel at 30mph. Now at Aldgate, the surrounding areas of Whitechapel and Spitalfields are gridlocked for virtually the entire day. The queue of stationary traffic spreads throughout all the small residential streets around the area.
The next one-way system to receive attention was Piccadilly Circus. Creating a bus lane at the southern extremity of Shaftsbury Avenue and making the west side of Piccadilly Circus two-way by inserting a 200-yard-long bus lane has improved journey times for buses travelling south. Unfortunately for buses travelling north on Lower Regent Street, the effect can only be described as gridlock with dozen of buses stationary. Anecdotal evidence suggests that Freedom Pass holders are alighting from their bus at the back of the jam, walking past the Piccadilly Circus pinch point to get on to the next available bus exiting the jam.
The latest roads about to get a £14 million two-way makeover are Piccadilly, Pall Mall and St. James’s Street which is but a stone’s throw from Albemarle Street which was the first one-way street in London. The occasion prompting this decision was a series of lectures given by Samuel Taylor Coleridge at the Royal Institute. The resulting traffic jams caused by those eager to attend resulted in such horrendous queues of horse drawn carriages that the measure was quickly adopted to remove the congestion and the road remains one-way to this day.
Supporter of the two-way movement, the Head of the New London Architecture Centre, Peter Murray, said: “One-way streets reflect the dominance of the car and the failed go-faster policies of the traffic engineers. As we begin to realise that walking and cycling should be the dominant forms of transport, the one-way street should be consigned to the dustbin of history.”
The two-way movement believes that a lot of gyratory systems were built in the Sixties and it is timely to remove them believing two-way streets make journeys easier for drivers and keep more traffic on the main road and out of side streets.
Other thoroughfares in the traffic planner’s sights include: Wandsworth; New Cross; and I can’t believe I’m writing this; Tottenham Court Road and Gower Street; followed by Baker Street and Gloucester Place once the 2012 Olympics are over.
No doubt there is a wealth of computer simulations that turn conventional wisdom on its head to prove two-way is the way to go, but they should remember the best-laid schemes of Mice, Men and Macs can go wrong.
In 1864 London’s first traffic island was built on St James’s Street, one of the roads currently being turned two-way. It was funded by one Colonel Pierpoint who was afraid of being knocked down on his way to (and more likely from) his Pall Mall club. When it was finished, the good colonel dashed across the road to admire his creation, tripped and was bowled over by a cab.
London in Quotations: Paddington Bear
In London everyone is different, and that means anyone can fit in.
Paddington Bear
London Trivia: Political sleeze
On 12 May 1891 prominent member of the National Vigilance Association, an anti-vice pressure group, Captain Edmund Verney, MP, was expelled from The House of Commons. He had pleaded guilty to conspiring to procure, for corrupt and immoral purposes, a girl of nineteen and was sentenced to one year of imprisonment. It’s good to see that today not much has changed with our political leaders.
On 12 May 1906 John Bull Magazine was first published designed to bring satire and political comment to its readers
When Julian Assange was holed up at the Ecuadorian Embassy those visiting included Pamela Anderson, Lady Gaga, Eric Cantona and Nigel Farage
On Knight’s Road in Docklands, the world’s largest tin of syrup is affixed to Tate & Lyle’s factory producing the world’s oldest branded product
The finest dentures of 19th-century London contained real human teeth, some gleaned from casualties of the Battle of Waterloo
The Wiener Library, Russell Square contains 1 million items relating to the Holocaust, it is the world’s oldest library of related material
Now charmingly inaccurate, the life-sized models of dinosaurs in Crystal Palace Park, constructed in the 1850s were the first in the world
The basement at 27 Endell Street was once the animal depot for West End theatres once 2 bulls escaped liberating a menagerie on Soho streets
Mitcham Cricket Club has played on the world’s oldest cricket pitch since 1685, and today is still an active cricket club
Amersham is the second most westerly tube station, the highest at 147 metres above sea level and the second furthest Underground station from central London
Burrell & Co on Blasker Walk in Docklands once manufactured dyes, red smoke from the chimneys would tint the local pigeons rose-pink
Wartime song A nightingale sang in Berkeley Square was almost certainly a robin, the only town bird known to sing at night
Trivial Matter: London in 140 characters is taken from the daily Twitter feed @cabbieblog.
A guide to the symbols used here and source material can be found on the Trivial Matter page.
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