(Mayor of) London Calling: Friday 20 November 2009

On Tuesday 17 November London’s larger than life Mayor, Boris Johnson unveiled his vision for London’s streets, parks and open spaces. (It’s funny how although these things really only have an existence in the virtual world they are still ‘unveiled’.) As the document says: “The Mayor’s vision is to transform the everyday experience of London’s outdoor spaces and create beautifully designed oases throughout the capital’s urban jungle.”  Well who could disagree with that? (Although ‘oases’ as a plural of oasis always looks wrong to me and the authors of this must’ve been watching The Wire too much – ‘urban jungle’ – that’s just a plain lazy description). It goes on: “The Mayor’s manifesto ‘London’s Great Outdoors’ details the Mayor’s vision and objectives. It’s supported by two very practical programmes: ‘Better Streets’ and ‘Better Green and Water Spaces’ that outline how exactly this vision will be delivered so that Londoners will have a much nicer, brighter and enjoyable city to live, work and play in.” Well, we’ll see people and you can believe I’ll be checking it out.

And I started the very next day. I happened to be leading a Met Walker walk from Sloane Square – the haunt of those 80’s exiles the Sloane Rangers – down to the river and back again. The Mayor’s document divides projects into 3 categories:

• secured
• development
• aspirational

Despite being the subject of many proposals for re-development over the years I couldn’t find Sloane Square mentioned anywhere in ‘London’s Great Outdoors’. The most recent plan involved a change to the road layout to make it more pedestrian friendly. One option was to create a central crossroads and two open spaces in front of the Peter Jones department store and the Royal Court theatre. This option was put out to consultation, and the results in April 2007 showed that over 65% of respondents, including local celebrity residents like Bryan Ferry, preferred a renovation of the existing square, so the crossroads plan has been shelved.

My walk headed down Chelsea Bridge road going past the most expensive real estate in the world (eat your heart out Dubai). In April last year the 12.8 acre site, previously the home of the Chelsea Barracks, sold for £959 million. Not much seems to be happening on the other side of the hoardings but the re-development has been in the news lately. The Mayor of London – I just can’t keep him out of this blog can I? – and Lord Rogers have fallen out over the style of the project. The dull boring traditional fuddy-duddies like Boris and Prince Charles favour dull boring classical architecture – as if London hasn’t got enough of that already? While Richard Rogers supports a more avant garde radical approach. I know whose side I’m on.

Oxford Circus does appear as a secured project in ‘London’s Great Outdoors’ and indeed you can already see the fruits of some of this re-design. The £5m makeover, contains two big innovations. As well as crossing the intersection laterally, pedestrians now have a 30-second window when all traffic stops and they can go at a diagonal along a giant X marked into the junction with metal studs. Known to road engineers, slightly alarmingly, as a “pedestrian scramble”, it is modelled on the famously frantic junction adjoining Shibuya station in central Tokyo. And I’m telling ya it’s strangely liberating to cross the road diagonally. Of course this hasn’t got anything to do with the present Mayor because this work started over 2 years ago.

There’s quite a few projects listed under aspirational that interest me but none more than the Thamesmead Canals – according to the blurb this particular project will provide opportunities for the refurbishment of the canal network in Thamesmead to manage surface run-off and mitigate flood risk, upgrade the public realm for recreation and improved access, removing concrete culverts for biodiversity and wildlife and aesthetic benefits. I used to live there and frankly it’s such a god awful place to walk and pedestrian unfriendly I used to apply the Thamesmead test to other environments. They’ve got a big challenge on their hands there but if a majority of the projects are as innovative and successful as Oxford Circus so far, London will indeed emerge as a better place to walk and explore.

More information:
o London’s Great Outdoors  http://www.london.gov.uk/greatoutdoors/

Useful links:
o The Ramblers    http://www.ramblers.org.uk/
o Metropolitan Walkers   http://www.metropolitan-walkers.org.uk/
o Mayor of London   http://www.london.gov.uk/mayor/
o Sloane Square   http://www.londontown.com/LondonStreets/sloane_square_596.html
o Chelsea Barracks   http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chelsea_Barracks
o Richard Rogers   http://www.richardrogers.co.uk/rshp_home
o Oxford Circus re-development http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2009/nov/02/x-oxford-circus-crossing
o Thamesmead Canals   http://www.flickr.com/photos/mynameismisty/3832733337/

Listen to:

The Clash – London Calling
Dolly Parton – The Great Pretender
Orchestral Manoeuvres In The Dark – Architecture And Morality
Morrissey – Hairdresser On Fire
Roxy Music – Do The Strand
Jack Hylton & His Band – Life Begins At Oxford Circus