Life on the Tube April 5, 2006
Posted by CamdenKiwi in : Camden , add a commentThis morning, I got up as usual, got on the tube at Euston, and spent the next 20 minutes stuck in a sardine can with all the other sweaty and slightly nervous suits as 'signal failure at Victoria' meant we got to move 100 metres and then wait. When the train finally pulled into Warren Street, and I found that I'd spent half an hour getting a distance I could walk in 15 minutes, I decided to call it quits and work from home. As a freelancer, with a tolerant client, and no major meetings today, I'm able to do that, but many of the people on that train will be late for work, possibly with pay docked or important deadlines missed. This doesn't happen often, but at least once a month my journey to or from work extends from its normal hour and a quarter to well over two - from tolerable to impractical.
Even hour each way is a huge amount of time to spend thumb twiddling, novel reading, or blackberrying. This is not to blame the transport system, which has improved vastly in the 7 years I've been in London, but instead to question the whole idea of working so far from home.
I do it because I freelance, because the assignment is good in all other ways, because I'm going out of London and so most of my journey is in a half-empty train. And its only a short-term arrangement. I could not make a lifestyle of it.
Is this really the best way to spend time? Can we think of nothing better to do?
Could businesses and employees make it a priority when selecting staff and jobs, to be within, say, a thirty minute commute?
Why do people tolerate excuses that 'there was a bad traffic jam' or 'the circle line was down' when staff, supplier or client are late?
Would a payroll tax on long-distance staff make a difference, taking the cost to the environment into the company benefiting from it?
How about making short distances fairly cheap, and longer ones disproportionately expensive? It costs me £1.50 to get to Victoria (about 5 miles) and only another £9 to get to Gatwick (about 35 miles).
The unfortunate answer is that in fact people don't mind commuting much. This is obvious by the way that we do it in our thousands. We accept the huge waste of our time and energy, the stress and the discomfort. Moving people as quickly and efficiently as possible over quite extreme distances every day is a major priority of our politicians, and on the whole, they do it well enough.
Sadly, its bad enough to moan about, but not bad enough to rebel against.
Hosepipe bans April 3, 2006
Posted by CamdenKiwi in : Environment, Green in the City , add a commentHere's how I would solve the current water crisis and perhaps even prevent a new one. Right now, everyone needs to save water, and the water companies need to urgently fix leaks. For the immediate future, we need to rethink our approach to water use, making better use of the water that lands on our roofs, and reusing it before it leaves the property if at all possible.
- Water is a highly regulated industry. I would regulate it further, and introduce penalties for every day on which an inadequate supply of water is available. This must hit shareholders profits, not just consumer's pockets, and be large enough to provide a good incentive for money to be diverted into fixing leaks.
- All households with gardens to have a water butt for garden watering use.
- If it's yellow, let it mellow. If it's brown, flush it down.
- Get a few celebs to drive around in dirty cars, and make it cool not to wash it.
- Minimum flush toilets to become the only legal variety by, say 2010. All new toilets to be minimal flush designs.
- Compulsory water meters for all homes and businesses. As I've said before, if you want to help people on low incomes with their water bills, give them cash. They can then spend it on water if they wish, or save water and spend it elsewhere.
- Any planning permission for building or alterations should include a requirement to provide sinkholes and increased drainage into the ground. We must stop putting water into drains, where it runs out to rivers and the sea.
- Encourage the removal of concreted front gardens and patios, replacing them with gravel or vegetation. We must increase the amount of space open for water to drain into the ground, rather than just into stormwater systems.
- Any planning permission for building or alterations should also include a requirement to install a grey-water collection system, for gardening, toilet flushing, clothes washing and other non-drinking uses.
- Do not allow water companies to remove water from aquifers at a greater rate than the rate of recharge.
- Sponsor a series of an Alan Titmarsh gardening program where drought resistant plants are strongly featured
From NZ to Heathrow April 1, 2006
Posted by CamdenKiwi in : Travel , add a commentMy parents arrived in England today. For my mother, its her first ever trip, and my father hasn't been back since he left as a child fifty years ago.
As we sat on the Picadilly and Victoria lines, wending our way up to Walthamstow, my own first impressions on that same trip through the above ground stations of west London came back. The backs of houses, all looking dour and dark in their brick rather than the painted weatherboard I was used to. The sheer size of the city stretching out forever. Giggling at the surreal experience of traveling through the monopoly board stations of Oxford Circus and Kings Cross. Being so tired I was almost awake again after the long, long trip here. A surprisingly mild and bright spring day.
Mum's blogging her trip over on Ruth's Reflections. Go and have a look
Naked without my mobile phone
Posted by CamdenKiwi in : Miscellany , add a commentYesterday, in a moment of sheer idiocy, I detached my phone from the spare charger I have on my desk at work, put the phone in my drawer, my charger in my handbag and set off home. I was right back in central London before I realised what I'd done.
I'm amazed how bereft I felt, seriously contemplating an hour and a half return journey to get it. It was like one of those odd dreams where you realised you're walking down the street wearing nothing but a hat. Could other people tell I was so undressed? A glance around the carriage showed a couple of blokes listening to their ipods, who hadn't noticed my embarrassment, and a women staring out the window. It seemed I was safe. Through the tube, and up the street to the flat, and still noone noticed, not even the gaggle of hoodied teenagers on the corner.
As I walked into the flat and collapsed onto the couch, I realised that salvation was at hand. I have a spare pay-as-you-go, bought for visitors to the UK. Charged it up, turned it on, and I'm fully dressed again. No-one knows the number, but I know I have it, and I'm connected.
