London in Quotations: Ken Livingston
In this city 300 languages are spoken and the people that speak them live side by side in harmony. This city typifies what I believe is the future of the human race and a future where we grow together and we share and we learn from each other.
Ken Livingston (b.1945), press conference, 8th July, 2005
London Trivia: Crippen’s trial
On 18 October 1910 Dr. Hawley Harvey Crippen’s trial commenced, for the murder of his wife Cora. Lasting only 5 days, the jury took just hours to reach a verdict of guilty. He was executed at Pentonville Prison on 23 November. His notoriety stems from being the first suspect apprehended with the aid of wireless telegraphy as he made his escape to Canada. Cora’s body was found under the basement floor of 39 Hilldrop Crescent.
On 18 November 1660, a proclamation forbidding Hackney carriages to ply for hire was enacted. Pepys records in his diary picking up on the following day
In 1894 Martial Bourdin accidently blew himself up – his funeral sparked riots by 15,000 near the Autonomie Anarchist Club, 6 Windmill Street
The Tower of London once contained a royal residence, barracks, armoury, prison, mint, a menagerie and an observatory
It took Dr John Snow years to persuade the establishment that cholera is the water-borne disease that he proved it to be in Soho in 1854
During the Cold War the statue of St Francis of Asissi at Brompton Oratory was used as a ‘dead letter’ drop for Russian KGB agents
Fassett Square in Dalston was the model for Eastenders’ Albert Square but no pub and the garden is for residents only
Tooting Bec Lido holds 1 million gallons, taking a week to fill, at 300ft x 100ft a maximum of 1,400 swimmers can enter the water at a time
Edgar Kail scored over 400 goals for Dulwich Hamlet FC won 3 England caps and refused to turn professional, Hamlet fans still chant his name
The first deep-level tube trains had no windows, guards called out the station names to advise your location
In the early days of the London and Birmingham Railway conductors travelled outside the train, leaning in through the open windows to check tickets
It would take 7,408 Hula Hoops to reach the height of Big Ben, it’s a claim made by the manufacturers of – well Hula Hoops
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.
Green Shelters – The Kensingtons
Kensington Park Road
The Kensington Park Road shelter which started life here in 1877 is an anomaly. Today this is upwardly mobile Notting Hill Gate frequented by film-makers.
Three decades before the arrival of the shelter, an 1849 report described most houses as ‘merely hovels in a ruinous condition’ and ‘filthy in the extreme’. A medical officer reported that it was ‘one of the most deplorable spots, not only in Kensington but in the whole metropolis’. Life expectancy was just 11 years 7 months compared with the London average of 37.
Just after the last war, the area was still one of the most deprived in the capital as related by Alan Johnson in his memoir This Boy.
Another curiosity is the road’s name – Kensington Park Road – as far as I’m aware, the nearest Kensington Park is in Romford, so this thoroughfare doesn’t take you there or provide a means of leaving the park.
Notting Hill is the sort of place where an orange Fiat 500 is in a shop window displaying pizzas, or sewing machines are stacked floor to ceiling in a frock shop window.
I’m feeling comfortable in some parts around here, but travel north and it’s a different matter.
One of my first bilkers ran away without paying in Portland Road, which has a barrier half-way up the road, acting as a demarcation boundary marking the start of a no-go area.
Kensington Road
This shelter is located on a road that actually takes you to where it promises.
Conveniently situated by some conveniences, it is almost opposite the Albert Hall near to the site of the Great Exhibition of 1850, cabbies call it the ‘All Nations’ referring to the diversity of visitors attending the famous Victorian spectacle.
Striding off towards Scotch Corner I pass the now restored Albert Memorial. Next on my right is, or what was once the Iranian Embassy. On 5 May 1980, Britain realised it had an elite force when the SAS successfully stormed the terrorist-held embassy in Princes Gate after one of the hostages was killed and his body thrown out of the embassy. The soldiers later faced accusations of unnecessarily killing two of the five terrorists, but an inquest into the deaths eventually cleared the SAS of any blame. When I first started driving a cab around London, this building was still a burnt-out shell.
Further down the hill the road now changes its name – to Knightsbridge, thereby giving the lie that Harrods is in Knightsbridge, it’s actually in the more prosaically named Brompton Road, which does go to Brompton.
A binding agreement
Some dozy twat of who went under the grand name of the junior Lib Dem Business Minister once seriously suggested that all verbal undertakings offered by tradesmen to their customers should be enforceable by law and to that end, the customer should record this on their mobile phone as evidence. It means that if Ms Jo Swinson’s proposal makes it to the Statute Book I could be prosecuted if I tell a punter “Hop in, Guv, I’ll get you to the airport in 30 minutes”, and the Westway is jammed solid.
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