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.

Get to the point (29.01.13)

I have to say I’m a little miffed. For the last 3 years, I have been craning my neck out of the cab window marvelling at the way construction workers assembled – and that’s the right word – assembled The Shard.

So it was late last Monday that I found out that cabbies could – for free – go up to the viewing platforms instead of paying £24.95 if you pre-booked or if you should just turn up on the day a whopping £100.

The Shard has polarised opinions, during the last year I have been authoring a feature entitled The London Grill in which the same 10 questions are asked of the guest contributor. Two questions are: ‘What is your most hated/loved building in London’.

The Shard comes up time and again. One contributor was so enthused by its construction she had photographed it through every stage of the build.

This Marmite of a building reminded me of the anecdote when after its construction the Eiffel Tower was highly controversial amongst the Parisians. One famous quote is from novelist Guy de Maupassant, who hated the tower but still went to its restaurant every day. When asked why, he said it was because it is the only place in Paris where one cannot see the structure.

Luckily for the Eiffel Tower haters, Eiffel only had a permit to keep the tower for 20 years, after that it would be demolished. However, as the tower proved valuable for telecommunication purposes, it was allowed to remain intact even after the time had expired. As time passed, more and more people started to like the building. Today, almost all Parisians love the tower.

The Shard, symbolising London’s burgeoning wealth has a 75-year specification written into its design, but will this new icon prove to be as ephemeral as the 1960s buildings which once graced London Wall or, as with the Parisians, Londoners take it to their heart?

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.

The Knowledge Alphabet (18.01.13)

Today we have a guest post from @knowledgeboy10 whose blog London Taxi Knowledge records his journey that starts with buying a scooter to hopefully receiving his Green Badge so he can work as an all-London taxi driver.

He invites you to share his highs and lows as he works his way through the 25,000 streets and learns every Point on them.

“I thought I would write about something a bit different and slightly light-hearted as I am getting very stressed about my progress so far, I’m halfway through book two and seem to have hit a brick wall with my calling over, I just can’t remember the runs, so I’m having a week off to re-charge my batteries and I thought this would be fun…”

A – Appearances. The meeting with the examiners when we find out just how much we know or don’t as the case may be, is the joy of sitting in front of someone feeling very stupid and hoping all our hard work shows through.

B – Blue Book. Our Bible, all 320 runs in a nice little book this is what our lives now revolve around.

C – Calling Over. The bane of our lives, we love being out there doing the runs and visiting the points but then we have to call over either the BB or P2P hate it really hate it lol.

D – Dedication. As Roy Castle used to sing, if you haven’t got it give up now it’s gonna take years to do, gonna take over your whole life nothing else will matter – if you’re not dedicated then may as well not start.

E – Ex. Ex-wives/girlfriends, unfortunately, many of us KoL peeps can end up losing our partners as they can’t put up with what we have to go through – I hope it doesn’t happen to you.

F – Fifty-six. The start of it the appearances, once the map test is out of the way the real fun begins.

G – Green Badge. Why we’re doing this, the Holy Grail.

H – Helmet. A KoL boy best friend for the times that you come off the bike due to Addison Lee cutting you up.

I – Impossible/Inspiration. How the KoL feels and what you need to get through it.

J – Job. Something most of us have to do to pay the bills while doing the KoL, a few lucky sods give up work but for the rest of us, we have to fit in the KoL around it.

K – Knowledge Schools. Somewhere to go to meet other KoL peeps and get help and advice, or somewhere to go to find out you know a damn sight less than you thought you did.

L – Lost. We all do it, don’t deny it is one of the pleasures of doing the KoL.

M – Maps. Second only to our Blue Book we love our maps we study them, and write on them and when I’ve finished the KoL I never want to see another map again in my life.

N – New Friends. One of the joys of the KoL is meeting new people who are doing it, they are the people we can talk to about it and they understand what we’re going through, and even when they pass out we’re pleased for them even though we are soooooo jealous.

O – Over and Over and Over. What we do when we call runs, visit points EVERYTHING OVER AND OVER AND OVER AND OVER and eventually it sinks in (we hope).

P – Points. What we have to learn, all of them, every single bloody last one (for those of you that don’t know a point is a place of public interest, on any road within a 6-mile radius of Charing Cross. Could be a hospital, church, shop, club police station or government building or anything else, and yes there are lots and lots and lots of them).

Q – Quit. Out of every 10 people that start the KoL, only 3/4 will get the Green Badge the rest quit. You can’t fail the KoL only quit it.

R – Red-lined. What happens on appearances when you don’t get enough points, means you could go from 28’s back to 56’s happens to the very best of us.

S – Scooter. The KoL peeps best friend, what we use to take us around London in all sorts of weather and hopefully it doesn’t break down, I spend more time on my scooter than I do my missus.

T – TfL. The organisation is responsible for putting us through this. Used to be the Carriage Office now TfL.

U – Understanding. What do our Friends and family need to be while we have 3 years’ worth of mental breakdowns because we can’t remember whether it’s a right turn or a left turn.

V – Victories. We have little ones every day, we find a point we couldn’t or we finally work out how two roads link up, every one of these is personal and no one else will understand just how great it feels when you get one.

W – Weather. Out on the scooter in the freezing cold or the pouring rain or when it’s boiling hot – we take on the weather and win because we are on the KoL.

X – XXXX. Pick any swear word you like, and you’ll say it a million times when you miss a turn, miss a point, come off your scooter or call over a run wrong, in fact, if you don’t swear then you’re not doing the KoL right.

Y – Why? I ask myself this question every day and it is a great motivator, we all have our reasons for doing the KoL, and we also ask ourselves why we put ourselves through it, but it’s worth it in the end.

Z – ZZzzzzz. Sleep, What we all seem to miss out on doing the KoL, and when we do finally go to sleep we’re thinking of the best lines to call or where a certain place is. How I wish for the days when I would fall asleep and just dream of me and the spice girls and a very large bottle of vodka.

I hope you enjoyed my light-hearted look at the alphabet, until next time stay safe and be lucky.

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.

London’s first coffee house (11.01.13)

In 1971 three men sat down and decided to open a coffee supply company in Seattle which within 40 years would become the largest coffeehouse company in the world.

Their choice of name would be prophetic for they chose a fictional seafarer. Their first favoured name was Pequod named after a whaling boat from Moby Dick this was rejected in favour of Starbuck the ship’s chief mate.

The coffee shop we know today came about after Howard Schultz, who had joined the company the previous year; he travelled to Italy and saw the potential to develop a similar coffee house culture in Seattle.

Using a coffee house to relax, talk with friends, meet and conduct business might have been novel to Howard Schultz but in London 300 years ago this was precisely what Londoners did in coffee houses. Only the business conducted would have been marine insurance, for the type of boat featured in Moby Dick. According to Dr Matthew Green who conducts coffee house tours of London the Starbucks in Russell Street, Covent Garden occupies the same site that 300 years ago stood Button’s Coffee House. It was here that people gathered to discuss the issues of the day. Journalists would gather stories with poets and playwriters would meet to discuss and critique each other’s work.

Nailed to a wall where the Starbucks community board now resides was the marble head of a lion with open jaws in which Button’s customers were invited to pop stories for a weekly publication.

London’s coffee culture had started in 1652 by a Greek, Pasqua Roseé and it wasn’t long before he was selling 600 dishes of coffee a day. The beverage was seen as an antidote to drunkenness and the coffee houses’ popularity would give rise to London becoming the world’s insurance capital.

The coffee houses became the centre for free thought as well as business and by 1663 there were 82 coffee houses within the old Roman walls of the City. By the 28th century, London had over 550 coffee houses each with its own identity, unlike today’s homogenised Starbucks.

London’s coffee houses would transform Britain. The exchange of ideas would make it the centre for invention and the arts.

The first stocks and shares were traded in Jonathan’s close to the Royal Exchange.

Lloyd’s Coffee House on Lombard Street (now a Sainsbury’s) attracted merchants, ships captains and stockbrokers.

How did the beverage taste? The 18th-century palate found it comparable to ink or soot for it was a thick, gritty but addictive drink which gave a physical boost.

Starbucks might produce a more sophisticated brew but the convivial atmosphere where debate and communicating (with laptops) did not originate in Seattle but within London’s Roman walls by a Greek.

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.

Cabbie entente cordiale (04.01.13)

Tourists it seems, still think of the traditional London cab as an iconic symbol of London. It was rather reassuring to me when I was contacted by Amandine late last year who was working for a French publisher of tourist guides wanting to include a London cabbie in this year’s French London guide.

My return to London after the New Year break was not to sit on a rank, at this the quietest time of the year, in the forlorn hope of getting a fare. No today I was to be interviewed and spend time being photographed beside my cab.

Amandine, I was relieved to discover spoke perfect English, just as well for I can just about order a coffee in French.

After meeting outside Leadenhall Market we drove to Westminster Abbey and parked in the forecourt outside the south entrance. The Abbey is too large a building to be photographed at such close quarters, but in winter with the trees stripped of their leaves, the Sanctuary, to give it its correct title, is perfectly positioned to photograph Big Ben in the distance.

It was not long before the photographer; Regis and his assistant Caroline were asked for a photography permit. We were informed that this land was owned by the Abbey.

For a place of worship needing £150,000 a day just to maintain the fabric of the building, one would think publicity would be embraced.

After a short period of discussion it transpired that while the Abbey is trying to forge stronger bonds with Rome, entente cordiale seems not one of their priorities.

With the cost of travel falling year-on-year, the tourism industry has found it much tougher to attract to London the much-needed Euro and Dollar, and yet no one seems prepared to support the very unique aspects of our Capital.

The old Routemaster bus was replaced by a German bendy bus seen in many towns in Europe. After much public debate, a token route is now maintained.

Drive around central London and every tourist wants to be photographed opening a red telephone box. With their demise with the advent of the mobile phone, we are left with a stock of dirty boxes advertising ‘adult services’. How much would it cost to clean them up?

Now we can see on the horizon the demise of the traditional London cab. Its predecessors the Fairway and FX Series are being withdrawn from service. Now deemed to pollute London’s atmosphere. While the manufacturer of the current model has been placed into administration as a buyer is sought, many in the trade feel that it is the end for the black cab.

The only current alternative is a converted van from a German manufacturer, the like of which could be seen around the world. The Queen’s Diamond Jubilee and the highly successful 2012 Olympics have shown London in the best light for a generation, now is not the time to sit back and wait for the world to come to us.

We need red buses, red telephone boxes and yes, at this time we should have a colour prejudice – black cabs.

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.

Blogger’s Block (01.01.13)

I could have entitled this post . . . and why won’t it just write itself. My New Year Resolution that I must spend more time writing and less fiddling with the nuts and bolts of the blog has been broken in under a day.

First I caught the vomiting virus and two days after that came a cold. No work, no London, nothing to write about. Now here’s the thing: You go for months with loads of inspiration and then you’re under the weather for a few days and suddenly it all stops.

I’m scratching my head staring at a lone cursor blinking in the middle of a blank white screen. So why do bloggers put themselves through this? I started nearly 4 years ago as a little light distraction and after trying various platforms and blog names within a short time I realised that not only did I have something to say about London you, dear reader, were willing to contribute with comments, suggestions and occasional guest posts.

On the 4th anniversary of CabbieBlog next month I’ve scheduled my 21 tips for bloggers, one of which will be that you don’t beat yourself up trying to write on a regular basis. Better to have one good post than 10 bland ones. So why am I worrying because one bi-weekly post is missed?

The attraction of blogging is writing about a subject you live – in my case it is London – and sharing your passion with others from around the world. Look at the map at the foot of this blog for how spreads over the globe CabbieBlog’s readers are.

The problem is exacerbated is your chosen blog is about an unchanging subject – say chewing gum through the ages. But for London, which seems to reinvent itself every 10 years, the opportunities for writers are endless. I know of at least 20 top London bloggers (see my blog list on the right) and curiously many are not born and bred Londoners.

So why would anyone want to put themselves under pressure to write regular posts? Many just start a blog with a few well chosen pieces which become less and less over the first few weeks and then after a month the passion to communicate goes away and http://www.chewinggumthroughtime.com becomes another dead digital spot which even the author seems to forget exist.

For others – myself included – writing is a feeling of catharsis. It costs nothing to put pen to paper and even the most obscure topic will be read by someone in the world who might even reply.

So this week I plan to return to London, its streets might not be paved with gold, but I know somewhere there will be a nugget to write about.

Watch this (blank) space.