Fenman

I guess unsurprisingly, Hattons is now showing these as having slipped again, this time to October-December 2020. Paul

So, for you, Floyd is an imperfect symbol because at some point in his history he had a repugnant criminal past. But, somehow, morally repugnant slave traders must not be judged on the morality of their pasts, only on whether or not their statue already exists - in which case it must stand in perpetuity? As it happens, I believe everyone has feet of clay, all our heroes are flawed and, well, human. But a statue isn't a human, it's a symbol. As a symbol, it often has a real meaning in our contemporary lives (someone earlier was claiming that Stonehenge had no religious symbolism today -- try telling that to the bunch of druids who worship Solstices. Personally I think they're barmy, but it appears they are genuine in their beliefs). Symbols are not neutral. And societies change through protest and demonstration -- even through illegal activity. Thatcher famously dismissed Mandela as nothing more than "a terrorist", despite most of the rest of the world at that time believing otherwise. Few people today would consider him to be more a terrorist rather than a freedom fighter. Times change. Judgements change. Some criminal activities turn out to be, to later people, justifiable. That shouldn't surprise us -- the law is usually a lagging indicator of the views of the majority of society (or, sometimes, of the views of the rich and powerful). That lag is where protests and illegal activity occur. Generally, I'm a big fan of the Rule of Law: it's what should protect us from the forces of evil; but, sometimes, it just ain't right, and, just as Nuremburg said that obeying the law / following orders is not always legally right, so sometimes breaking the law is the right thing to do. I'd much rather did that by taking out their passions on inanimate objects than taking it out on other people. Paul

Doesn't this all come under the basic lesson in morality that was taught to us by our mothers -- "two wrongs don't make a right"? Someone else being even more evil than us doesn't justify our own evil. The fact that there are mass murderers and serial killers does not justify me indulging in "only" a single murder. Of course you can flip it round: if I had to live under only one tyrannical blood-sucking empire, which one would I choose as the least-worst? From examples you've given, for sure I would probably choose, say, the British rather than the Belgian. But that's not much for the British empire to boast about, is it? A lot of modern states are much happier living their lives through denial: Austria today, for example, likes to present itself as largely a victim of those evil German Nazis, rather than being an enthusiastic participant in the regime. Sweden and the Netherlands largely pretend their colonial pasts didn't really happen (I'm doing them a disservice, but the gist is right). Germany has probably done more than many states to live up to its own historical failings and the consequences that resound today. We British seem to prefer to look only at the spread of railways through the world, ignoring, for example, the rampaging genocide we carried out in, say, Australia. Of course there are nice things in our history too. But pretending our history was only lovely strikes me as odd. Just as only having statues which pretend slave owners were fine upstanding people -- to be celebrated because they whitewashed a bit of cash on public works -- is a bit, well, partial. Paul

I think you're being too simplistic. The statues represent the oppressiveness of what some people say is their lived experience today; for example, from the video timeline provided by the Washington Post, the killing of George Floyd looks to me to provide prima facie evidence of something rotten in the system, something we know has been going on for a long time. So what should the oppressed people do? Suck it up? Lay down quietly and accept their fate? Many of them have been peacefully campaigning for a long time, with little result (how long has that debate been going on in Oxford, about the Rhodes sculpture?). Or should they now forcefully express their views, taking out their feelings on inanimate symbols of what they believe to be their oppression instead of engaging in violent riots against people? Attacking the inanimate symbols seems to me the preferable approach, given many of the alternatives -- I'd rather not have more people (on either side) killed, and a democracy means accepting that not everyone will think the same as me. Just as I accept there are people on here who sincerely believe racism doesn't exist today -- but that doesn't mean I shouldn't be free to protest the opposite. What is going on right now, rough-edged and imperfect as it is (and much as I would rather some things had not happened or had happened differently), seems to me to be mostly within the bounds of a reasonable demonstration of passions in a democratic society, in the context of people from some groups continuing to die or be killed in disproportionate numbers, including those who are killed by agents of the state. Paul

You see I largely agree with that. But it’s very different from what you wrote before, in which you completely disagreed with me and then summarised T5 as “very good”. It isn’t. I would completely agree with your new statement that “A lot more are far worse”, but that’s a whole new proposition. To bring it back vaguely on topic, I fear some of the Crossrail stations look as if they might have been infected by the same poor planning that has hit airport and some recent railway developments (starting with the terrible walking route and distance from domestic rail arrivals at St Pancras to the Underground stations). Many designers now seem to think it doesn’t matter how far the self-loading cargo has to traipse when connecting. The environments on many recent developments have also been aesthetically extraordinarily aggressive (Stratford International is particularly bleak; King’s Cross Thameslink is also actively unpleasant). We seem to have forgotten the mostly joyful aesthetics of the mostly rather good JLE stations. I am hoping the Crossrail stations are better than the worst recent examples, and there are some hopeful signs. I guess we’ll find out in a few months time. Paul

Except it’s really not. It's poorly planned, with unpleasant choke points as you move through, and deliberately forces you to walk excessive distances past retail opportunities. An example: BA begged BAA to let their passengers access their lounges direct from security. BAA refused, knowing it would reduce shop rents. It took a decade before BAA finally agreed - after getting BA to pay compensation - and the First Wing opened. That’s at the opposite end of T5 from the public transport, but at least you now only walk one length of the terminal rather than two. If you think T5 is a “very good terminal”, you really need to travel more! Paul

That I'd agree with. The traditional "kings and queens"-type history that was endemic in many schools does us a profound disservice. It's also, today, ridiculously partial (endless repetition of the rise of Nazi Germany; nothing about the very foundation of England, for example. I don't know of any other country which so completely ignores its own formation in its school history. And there's usually almost nothing on the history leading to the Treaty of Union between England (sic) and Scotland). Slavery was a massively important economic force in the development of the contemporary UK. Slavery as a phenomenon (including forms of bondedness within this country, as well as overseas) has been almost always present in our society. A beautiful rose can grow from a dungheap. But we're only fooling ourselves if we pretend the dungheap never existed. Personally, I'm not keen on "historical" statues which show only the rose and ignore the dungheap. That does a disservice to all of the victims, and leads to misunderstandings of the reality of history which can catch us out today. Paul

History's a funny thing. A few years back, I realised it was some decades since I'd looked around Kensington Palace. I had a day out, bought my ticket, then was told that you could no longer just wander around -- you had to take part in a guided tour. Our party of 20 or so set off, marshalled by a jolly-sounding gel, who immediately launched into the detailed family history of Queen Victoria. In every room she told us an anecdote about some branch of the family. The crowd I was with was wildly appreciative -- the majority were American, judging by the accents. They asked enthusiastic questions, and were clearly fascinated by a particularly lengthy story about the Duke and Duchess of Teck. Our splendid guide told us all about their children, pointing out happy family images, without once mentioning that the Duke of Teck was one of the most notorious homosexuals in Victorian England. We concluded the tour, everyone apparently happy and the Americans passing over generous tips. I was left in a state of wonder that she had managed to complete the entire tour without once mentioning the name of an architect. What history? Whose version? As it hapoens, I think the National Trust, for example, is now doing a rather more rounded job at many of its stately homes in telling us where the money came from to build the thing, what the conditions were like for all the inhabitants of the estate (not just the rich family), and so on. That seems to me to be more balanced and, actually, more interesting. Paul

I'd agree with most of your points -- but I don't understand why you apparently insist that all statues must remain exactly where they were first placed. There are lots of examples of statues moved for entirely prosaic reasons (Eros in Piccadilly was shifted a bit sideways, to make traffic management simpler). Why can't a statue now serve a more useful and interesting role in a museum or a museum garden, where more of its history can be explored? Paul

Your post is intriguing: for someone who consistently argues how much better things were in the past as opposed to how horrible almost everything is today, I would have imagined that you would be even more aware than most of the important part that history plays in contemporary culture. We are shaped by our collective past, or by our own fantasies about it -- see how one tabloid newspaper decided that the recent "VE Day" celebrations stood for "Victory over Europe Day". Either historically breathtakingly ignorant, or using its partial interpretation of history to support its present-day agenda. If you think the long-ago past has no effect on the present, have a look at what proportion of the UK's land is owned by people descended from the same families who grabbed most of it in the eleventh century. Paul

I very much hope that not wishing to celebrate slavery is not a "flavour of the week". Paul

Emphasis added Really? You think statues of slave-owning Confederate generals in the US south have no "meaning" today? Paul

Not necessarily -- it depends what you do with them. A public sculpture is, by definition, something celebratory put into a public space. Individuals can't avoid it unless we give up the public space. It therefore seems reasonable that things in the public space should be, at least, not overly objectionable. Somewhere else on RMWeb there was a discussion of how pre-Victorian street names were censored or bowdlerised by the Victorians (the example I gave was the wonderfully descriptive Pissing Alley in Clerkenwell, which became the dull-sounding Passsing Alley). I haven't seen any campaign to restore those vigorous original street names. So, why shouldn't statues move around: at some points in their histories they may be cause for celebration; at others, cause for educational lessons? The example of how some of eastern Europe has handled its legacy of toxic statuary might be helpful. I quite like the idea of museum gardens which contextualise and contrast. Things can have more than one meaning*. Paul * There was a nice example of a Porsche exhibition at the Design Museum, 20 years ago. Every highly-polished car had a label telling us the maximum speed, but not one of the labels told us about, say, fuel consumption, or emissions of noxious gasses. Those things strike me as equally important to the engineering story, but the museum didn't bother. Then again, the exhibition was sponsored by Porsche, so I guess it wasn't in their financial interests to tell any story other than the corporate one of speed/glamour. Unsurprisingly, Porsche's role in designing Nazi tanks was also overlooked.

That would be wonderful. The concourse building was an homage to the great Rome Termini building, and rather lovely. The redevelopment/ restoration of the Great Eastern 1960s stations has been effective — eg, Harlow Town, and especially Broxbourne, have been nicely done. The strength of the original architecture mostly shines through. Paul

Some get this right: the very simple (but striking) West Hampstead Thameslink station is basically just a box, but has a strong street “presence”, and very nice use of coloured tiles (a good vernacular tradition in London railway stations). No air conditioning. Paul

I think the only UK airport building which is in the same league, architecturally, as some of the great railway buildings is Norman Foster’s terminal at Stansted. Huge, soaring roof, but then that was utterly compromised when owner BAA filled all the space (and blocked all the sight lines) with wretched “retail opportunities”. For a long time BAA was, financially speaking, a car park operator and landlord for retail space, which happened to have a few runways as a sideline. In fairness to BAA, Southampton airport isn’t bad, architecturally — a swooping bird, by Manser Associates, though it’s let down by the cheap materials. Heathrow T5 is a prime example of architectural ignorance — conceived as a soaring wavy form by Richard Rogers (just like the glorious roof at Madrid T5 by the same architects), BAA then handed-over the design to get it “value engineered”, which resulted in the current cheap-looking tin shed. Stuffed full of retail opportunities. Though the railway hasn’t been immune to that: British Rail cut off views of trains at Liverpool Street with lines of shops (having already tried the same thing at Euston, to make it look as much like an airport as possible). And smaller but architecturally glorious stations like Barking have been ruined by poor maintenance and dreadful space management. The last time I was there, significant numbers of the retail opportunities had gone bust and been boarded-up — the worst of all worlds. But Waterloo and it’s new-ish balcony of shops and cafes is a rather good example of how to get a good balance, I think. Paul

Blimey: you sound as if you're enjoying life up there on the moral high ground. A few years back there was a lovely tv interview with Ken Livingstone when he was invited to crow at the failure of one of the policies of his successor as Mayor of London, BoJo, something about which Ken had warned at the time. Ken declined to crow, on the grounds that no human had ever become more sexually desirable as a result of constantly crowing "I told you so". Paul

I think you are forgetting that the railway system was originally built by the dynamic and, allegedly, hugely efficient private sector. This was not public investment in aid to people in either bankrupt or failed states (with all the difficulties that implies of getting aid where it is needed): these were private companies operating at the height of 19th century entrepreneurial industrialisation. They were meant to be models of the efficient allocation of scarce capital. But it turned out that a combination of the egos of the company leaders and an overwhelming desire to create monopolies (that could then be exploited with high rents) were the main driving forces. Jack Simmons has written how the celebrations when the first railway company reached a particular town were usually dwarfed by the celebrations when a second company arrived: local people were usually fed up of the exploitation and welcomed the competition that would drive down prices. So, two crude forces at play: the (in)efficient allocation of capital to try create monopolies or to boost egos (look at the Forth Bridge, or stand inside the trainshed at St Pancras); and the power of competition. Paul

You missed the mass move to single households, which had a huge effect. Combined with planning policies that didn’t help stimulate mass development of the sort of housing that society needed/ wanted (and in some instances has led to appalling housing — policy on conversion of offices to micro-flats, for instance). So another positive might be new planning policies that encourage housing with gardens or, at least, flats with decent sized balconies and nearby open space. Paul

Dunno what went wrong there — apologies for duplicating.

Possibly I should be posting on the 50s/60s thread, but The Guardian did itself a disservice when it lost its “Manchester” roots. I liked hearing the voice of northern mercantile liberalism. I’m less excited about a voice rooted in the same metropolitan disposable culture. But if you triangulate somewhere between the Guardian’s misery-mongering and the Telegraph’s BoJo-can-do-no-wrong cheer-leading, you’re probably not in a bad place. I’m finding the most accurate and challenging recent reporting on Covid19 is in the FT. Paul

I think it will be a different picture to that. Gatwick and Stansted will both survive (LGW is having a torrid time with BA and VS both closing their operations there, but STN is in a much happier situation). As all three have different owners, why would any of them close to help Heathrow? But Heathrow won’t get its 3rd runway. It’ll be sacrificed to “prove” the government’s green credentials. (And for the same reason I’d assume HS2 will go ahead.) Of the regional airports you mentioned I’d have thought Southampton would be fine — the Channel Islands will still need airlines and that’s most of its business. I’m less sure about the others. My own local, Norwich, is also likely to survive: already low-cost, it has a lot of essential helicopter traffic to North Sea gas platforms, as well as mostly business traffic to Schipol. It’ll be a mixed picture after, with winners as well as losers. Although who knows when “after” will be or all the consequences? I’m optimistic something better can come out of this if we want it to. Paul

Countrywide, or just in London? I remember the first time I went to Edinburgh, how odd it seemed to see pubs open first thing in the morning. Paul

BA is one of the business world’s great survivors. Who knew the depressing nationalised corporation of the 1970s would reinvent itself as the world’s favourite airline; before reinventing itself as a credible competitor against the new low-cost airlines; before reinventing itself as part of a pan-European group based in Madrid — all the while making shedloads of cash by ruthlessly exploiting its stranglehold over scarce Heathrow slots. In any event, while a lot of its business is leisure, much of it is not: cargo pretty much *is* an essential service (and will remain so unless the world’s economy *very* radically reorganises). Long before Covid19, my organisation conducted >90% of international meetings by Zoom and GoToMeeting. But the remaining foreign travel enabled some essential (to us) things to happen which just cannot be done via computer screens. That business travel is still necessary. BA has always been clever at getting that market (from the staggeringly innovative Club World, now copied (and bettered) by pretty much every serious airline), to the fact that it runs 1st class on more routes than any other airline I can think of). So far, we’ve seen BA close its entire Gatwick operation (that’s mostly leisure traffic, of course), consolidating all London traffic into a single terminal at Heathrow; it’s announced about a third of its staff will be made redundant (which will likely be brutal for very many of them. The longest-serving cabin crew, on the best T&Cs, are likely to be hit worst); and unlike pretty much every other world airline it’s said it doesn’t want a tax-payer subsidy. I suspect BA is likely to remain a survivor. Paul

Ooh, good to know. Does it still open in the morning (most of the Smithfield ones now don’t)? Paul