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.

Cracking the Code (21.06.11)

With the news that the Olympics site has been designated with its own postcode, my question today is: “Does anyone understand postcodes in London?”

Until now, the E20 postcode of Albert Square in BBC’s soap Eastenders (no I don’t watch it either) was merely fictitious, but Olympic bosses applied for premises on the Stratford site to use the iconic postcode, and the move, due to be taking effect for the start of the Games next July, has been made despite the next available East London code being E19. Postcodes it would seem have no obvious logic to their designation and no relevance in relation to the adjoining areas.

To complicate life for a cabbie house numbers sometimes have even and odd numbers on opposite sides of the street, while on others the numbers run sequentially up one side and down on the opposite side, in addition, some houses are designated a street and number even though their front door actually opens onto an adjacent road; the lowest number on any street is supposed to be the house closest to Charing Cross or is that an urban myth?

If London’s postcodes are allocated alphabetically why is it that E2 is Bethnal Green; E3 Bow; E4 Chingford; E5 Clapton; E6 East Ham; E7 Wanstead; and then arbitrarily E8 Hackney?

Conversely, if the postcode number denotes its position away from the centre of London why is NW1 near Mornington Crescent but NW2 miles away in Cricklewood; and Sloane Square SW1 while Brixton Hill is SW2 and Scotch Corner just yards from Sloane Square near Harrods SW3? How does that work?

You have to ask yourself, just why it is necessary for Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens to be in five different postal districts unevenly divided between W1, W2, W8, SW1 and SW7, with the lines curving and twisting through the parks.

It all started out so simple; during the 1840s the number of letters being sent in London was increasing rapidly, with many localities having similar street names, and letters were often misdirected. So in the 1850s, a committee was instructed to find a way to stop the confusion. They originally planned to rename the streets, but many residents objected, so they decided instead to split the city into various sectors. The two central sectors were EC and WC (East and West Central) and the outer ones were named N, NE, E, SE, S, SW, W and NW after the points of a compass. A scheme which involved people adding these letters to their addresses was implemented between 1857 and 1858. In 1866 in author Anthony Trollope, then a surveyor, who also introduced our red pillar boxes, suggested that NE be merged into E and then S vanished two years later, after being split between SE and SW.

While it is immensely helpful for the Post Office in locating addresses, without a vast knowledge of the postcode system it is of little use to the man, or cabbie, on the street, except to perhaps point people to a general area, say within 10 miles from their destination. If you want to find where you are going don’t rely on a postcode; use a map or better still jump in a cab and let him figure it out.

Some notable postcodes:
SAN TA1 – Father Christmas
GIR OAA – Girobank
RM1 1AA – Royal Mail Customer Service
E20 – Walford (Eastenders) or the Olympic Park
SW1A 1AA – Buckingham Palace
SW1A 0AA – House of Commons
SW1A 0PW – House of Lords
SW1A 2AA – 10 Downing Street
SW1A 2AB – 11 Downing Street
W1A 1AA – BBC Broadcasting House, Portland Place

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.

Toilet Caper (10.06.11)

London’s lost loos, were until the 1950s famous the world over, these magnificent Victorian edifices, both decorative as well as functional, were built in the first place simply that the government saw them as essential to the wellbeing of Londoners.

If you were caught short in London before their construction you would simply relieve yourself in the street. The delicate-minded and, of course, women found this unacceptable and the solution was provided by human lavatories. Men and women wore voluminous black capes and carried a bucket, for a farthing they would shield you from preying eyes while you sat on their bucket. Only one of these heroes for modesty is known: one Thomas Butcher of Cheapside who in 1190 was fined for overcharging his clients. Samuel Pepy’s wife in the 17th century didn’t want to pay for a caped crusader, as he noted in his diary at the time, how his wife squatted in the road “to do her business”.

No word in English has changed its meaning more than “toilet”. In about 1540 it described a kind of cloth derived from the French “toile” – a kind of linen. Then the term was used for the cloth to used to adorn dressing tables, later for the items upon the cloth, hence “toiletries”. The dressing table itself was next to receive that Monica, then the act of dressing, Georgians would use the word to describe the act of receiving visitors when dressing, next came the receiving room or any adjoining rooms, as indoor lavatories arrived that room became the toilet and now we politely call the ceramic bowl a toilet. It explains why in English you can describe something splashed on one’s face as toilet water or the liquid used to flush away faeces. The English noted for the reluctance to talk about such matters have given a plethora of euphemisms to avoid that unmentionable word: spend a penny; smallest room in the house; loo; lav; karsie; bog; john; head; water closet; and for obscure reasons in the 18th century “jordan”.

As these fine conveniences in London disappeared new names have sprung up for their modern counterparts, the automatic loos are known as “Metal Mickey’s”. These automatic machines perhaps reflect the lack of pride much in evidence in the first half of the last century.

I can vaguely remember a toilet near Chancery Lane station, with its polished brass and mahogany fittings surmounted by a set of superb cut-glass cisterns. The pride of its attendant knew no bounds as he then stocked these cisterns with goldfish, where they lived happily for many years until the local authority decided the public would prefer to use the nearby McDonalds toilets and closed this shrine to civic pride.

One of the last personalised loos to go was a splendid example in Covent Garden next to St. Pauls Church on the piazza. Here the attendant was a keen opera buff who decorated the walls with reproductions of some of the National Gallery’s famous pictures, and played well known operatic arias to his customers.

Paul Herringshaw has written a series of spoof histories on individual London toilets, entitled Stall Stories.