currybetdotnet Transport archive
How to make friends and influence people in The Guardian office this morning...
...use the nice new Oystercard wallet that The Times were giving away outside Kings Cross station last night....
Celtic fans take over Kings Cross Underground noticeboards
For a while today, Celtic fans managed to redecorate Kings Cross Underground Station with their own take on the important information they needed to know about getting to Arsenal's Emirates Stadium for their Champions League play-off tie. At first glance I thought it was an example of London Underground being extra helpful to visiting fans to London, but I soon realised that the poster had been put together by fans of the Queen's Celtic themselves (© Fivers passim) This was...
Spotted! A multi-lingual sign on the tube
One of the notable things about our travels through Eastern Europe a couple of years back was that we could pretty much make our way around with only learning a smattering of 'yes', 'no', 'please' and 'thank you' in any country we came too. Nearly all of our travel arrangements could be made in English on the web, and pretty much every travel interchange we used came with copious amounts of dual language signage including English. Visiting Macau and Hong...
The shoddy Victoria Line replacement bus service at Walthamstow Central
This is purely and simply an unmitigated moan about Arriva's woeful Railway Bus Replacement service that operates between Finsbury Park and Walthamstow Central. I understand that the Victoria Line has to be upgraded to take the improved rolling stock I first got a sneak peek at in August 2006, but why does the replacement have to be so shoddy - it seems that every time I am forced to use it there is an issue. The first problem, as demonstrated...
Kings Cross wayfinding #fail
It is probably longer ago than I think, but it doesn't seem that long in the grand scheme of things since the whole Kings Cross St Pancras Underground ticket office complex was revamped as part of the redevelopment of St Pancras into a Eurostar terminal. That also meant a whole new set of signage for the station. Judging by this handwritten annotation, it seems that at least one member of staff thinks the wayfinding to the Metropolitan, Hammersmith & City...
'No message' at Walthamstow Central
I'd love to know who was the person writing the functional spec for the London Underground matrix displays at Walthamstow Central who decided that there needed to be a special case for when there was: "NO MESSAGE" Even more, I'd like to meet the person who had to write the bit of code that must say something along the lines of: if ($message = undef) { print "NO MESSAGE"} Obviously, the code is there so that you can tell whether...
London Festival of Railway Modelling at Alexandra Palace
At the end of March I found myself at Alexandra Palace on a Saturday morning for the London Festival of Railway Modelling. Although I've never had anything more sophisticated than a Lego train set myself, it is clearly exactly the kind of geeky hobby I would have been into if ZX Spectrums and Doctor Who hadn't existed in my formative years. I found it to be a little different from the London Model Engineering Exhibition that I attended in the...
London's abandoned Underground Stations on Google Street View
Abandoned Tube Stations on Street View
Peek at the disused bits of London's Underground that you can see overground using Google Street View
London Model Engineering Exhibition at Alexandra Palace
Following my recent trips to the BBC Studios and the old Victorian Theatre, I was back at Alexandra Palace again at the weekend. This time it was for the "London Model Engineering Exhibition". It was an unashamedly niche and geeky event, but I'd invited my young nephew along, which was my excuse anyway. It was a strange mix of a trade show and an exhibition. On one stand, for example, you could by sophisticated engineering equipment that would set you...
Police try to stop Walthamstow blogger taking pictures of a bus crash
I spotted in London Lite this evening the story of the 97 bus that crashed into McDonalds in Hoe Street in Walthamstow, and then noticed a big spike in traffic to an old currybetdotnet post about a crash near Walthamstow Central station just after it opened in September 2004. That caused the station to be closed whilst all lit up for the evening, and I sneaked in to grab some photos. I thought, as I've done with things like...
What is the collective noun for a group of atheist buses in London?
I've spent much of today trundling around London by bus, with varying degrees of success. Along the way I passed through Euston station which was chock full of number 18 buses all sporting the British Humanist Association's "There's probably no god. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life" advert. It caused me to wonder aloud on Twitter what the collective noun for a group of atheist buses might be. I got a few good suggestions back. @smagdali: a 'future' @scolvey:...
The ghost of the London, Chatham and Dover Railway Bridge across the Thames
Earlier this year I was working with a client who had offices near Blackfriars Bridge, which gave me the chance to explore that bit of Central London. I'd actually passed by that way very closely when doing a ghost walk around Haunted Clerkenwell, St. Pauls and the Barbican, but during the daylight hours it was the ghost of a bridge that intrigued me. Alongside London's Blackfriar's Bridge runs a series of supports for a bridge that looks like it was...
'Received pronunciation' for London from TfL
The BBC is famous for having an official 'pronunciation unit', that was the ultimate arbiter of how things should be said on air. With the drive towards using regional accents on television, and a move away from 'received pronunciation', the unit probably has more demand now for how to pronounce foreign names and words, than for working out whether English children were going to grow up saying 'bafth' or 'barth'. You could access a lot of the content via the...
Now and then at Green Park
Occasionally, as the London Underground gets re-fitted and re-developed, you get a glimpse back into time. On Monday night, leaving the Victoria Line at Green Park, I was suddenly transported back to 1992. The poster sites at the foot of the escalators have been peeled back to reveal adverts for, amongst other things, Pritt Stick, Monument and Bruce Springsteen. Here is one of Tower Records advertising their Easter specials. It is always good to see that regardless of whether Tower...
Walthamstow's Tramways Office building
Yesterday I was writing about the origins of the name 'currybet', which developed into a regular pub crawl around Walthamstow on F.A. Cup Final day. Part of that route was always from The Bell pub to The Dog & Duck, passing one of Walthamstow's most distinctive buildings - the Tramways Office on Chingford Road. Built in 1905, and later given codename 'WW' by London Transport, the Tramways office was a hub from trams, then trolley buses, and then motor buses....
Has Boris Johnson switched 'off' the Mayor of London 'ON' branding?
Within a day of Boris Johnson announcing his initiative to ban alcohol on London's Transport network, posters started appearing about it on the Underground. I noticed something interesting on them. Since the inception of the office of the London Mayor, publicity material that has passed through the Mayor's office has had a distinctive branding - 'MAYOR OF LONDON', with the last two letters picked out in a different colour. Generally this has been blue with the last two letters in...
Postcard from Macau #9: Information design on Macau's transport system
I recently spent three weeks visiting Macau, the former Portuguese territory on the south coast of China. As a former colony like Hong Kong, it is now a 'Special Administrative Region'. This post is one of a series looking at aspects of information design, user experience, internet use and journalism that interested me when I was there. Whilst I was staying in Macau I mostly got around by public transport. There is an excellent network of buses across the...
Unwelcome to Britain (again)
I've been zipping over Europe between London, Barcelona and Crete a lot over the last few weeks, and so I've spent quite a bit of time hanging around airports thinking about the whole user experience. I've never quite been able to put my finger on what it is exactly that makes the entry into Britain via London's airports so unwelcoming, but over the last few trips I've come to think that it is the combined effect of lots of the...
Gatwick Yotel not quite so swell
Anyone who has been following my trips on Dopplr will know that I've been stomping my carbon encrusted feet all over Europe in the last couple of months, with six flights in just over as many weeks. I've been dragging my better half around with me, but last week she headed back to Crete slightly before I did. She had an early check-in at 5:15am at Gatwick. We decided, instead of travelling through the dead of night, that we'd go...
Let's hope The Westway doesn't collapse on a weekend
I was wandering around White City the other week between various bits of the outer-lying BBC empire, when I spotted this sign on one of the bridges that makes up the intersection between "The Westway" and the local rat-runs of W12. Let's hope it never develops a major structural problem that only becomes apparent out of office hours, eh?...
Heraklion airport doesn't quite live up to the BA online check-in promise
Last Rounds project featuring some of my photographs of Tube stations
Check-in credit card trauma with British Airways at Heathrow
There's just no messin' with the kids
New Victoria Line trains on display at Euston
"Excessive Door Noise" on the Central Line
Oxford Circus Underground Timewarp
Panic On The Streets Of London
The Bike Shed at Walthamstow Central
Unusual Stuff On The Central Line
London's Transport, and Passengers Back To Normal in Walthamstow
Open Weekend at the London Transport Museum Depot in Acton Town
A gallery, a monument, a museum and a spot of shopping - Day-tripping in London
When Oyster Card fails think "Thanks for the uptime"
Could Arsenal station be retro-renamed?
What will the C-Charge extension mean to Londoners?
The worst train stations in London
London Bus fares rise by 42%. Or become free. (Depending on how you do the sums. Or how old you are)
Open House at Loughton Station
Accident at Walthamstow Bus Station
Operation Londinium at Stratford
Congestion Charge expansion in West London
It's just like the not-so-good old days
Walthamstow Central Bus Station - accessibility and security
Complaint about the 212 bus route in Walthamstow
Congestion Charging Expansion consultation
How to confuse WAGN ticket inspectors with your Oystercard
What is a ticket? And how does it apply to over-booked flights?
Congestion Charging one year on: "The sky did not fall on London's head"
'New Fines War On Bus Lane Drivers' cries Evening Standard
Oystercard - the problem is when the man meets the machine
Leaf-fall timetable starts today
Data-mining Oystercard to detect travel patterns in London
London Congestion Charge: "Thousands are fined by mistake" claims Evening Standard
Contact the Evening Standard about the London Congestion Charge
Congestion Charging introduced in London - Sky fails to fall on city's head
London Evening Standard reaction to Congestion Charging - a prediction
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I'll be appearing on a panel with Sarah Hartley and Iain Hepburn at the Edinburgh International Science Festival on Sunday April 11th. More details...
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Day of the Triffids
If everyone suddenly went blind, how long would the Internet survive, and could you still publish news on it?
With professionals of this quality, who needs 'citizen journalist' enemies?
It is hard to argue that ethics and quality set the 'professional journalist' apart from the amateur blogger, if the 'professional' keeps publishing articles so wrong that they have to be deleted.
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