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The Jubilee Line wants to be silver, but on printed maps this means it is grey. Which is appropriate as the building material of choice for the recent extension from Westminster is concrete. I love it though.
Tunneling has come on a long way in the last hundred years, and the stations on this line are underground cathedrals of vaulted spaces, space age and swimmingly futuristic, constructed from arches and pillars of poured concrete. God Save the Queen, and the fascist regime!!!
Tunneling has come on a long way in the last hundred years, and the stations on this line are underground cathedrals of vaulted spaces, space age and swimmingly futuristic, constructed from arches and pillars of poured concrete. God Save the Queen, and the fascist regime!!!
We start this leg of the tour from North Greenwich. I am amazed to see the Millenium Dome is right outside the station, flanked by soaring aerofoils and concrete flags, for no explainable reason other than they look cool against the blue winter sky. They fascinate me; they should be generating electricity. It is as surprising to see the Dome really is right there as it is to see how close Stonehenge is to the road. However, there's a fight going on aesthetically between the vaguely fascist 'tomorrow belongs to us' exhuberant brutalist architecture and the mundane world of bus stations and carparks, vast tarmaced vista stretching to the horizon, the British way of not being quite finished yet, all chipboard hoardings and hazard tape. All very 1984 as staged by the Beeb with Peter Cushing in the lead. As much as I love the Edwardian sections of the tube, I can't help but love the clean lines and open spaces on the Jubilee; the proud grandeur they were striving for in being overtly modernist in design - to be as 'of the time' as much as the early tube stations were of theirs, the acres of reflective, toughened glass, brushed steel and superstructure on view. Nothing softened by anything organic or green. However, it's gleaming and shiny now, and pleasantly deserted at two in the afternoon. Will it retain the sharpness and futurist beauty after twenty years of foot-traffic and budgeted maintenance? The noise of the now pentrates the open station...(oh yes, I have a degree from Goldsmith's and I'm not afraid to use it)
blue glass mosiac tiling on the support beams...
Still, the expanses of glass and chrome, are shiny shiny surfaces to play with. Having someone with you to take pics, rather than accosting a random stranger who might nick yer camera, and in front of whom you'd feel stupid clambering about on street furniture pulling silly poses, means we can muck about. No staff are about to tell us off either.
Needless to say, pvc has little friction and is very grabby; I get stuck on the post...bet that doesn't happen to Catwoman. We are giggling like fools as G extricates me. Blimey - my arse is so shiny I can actually see people reflected in it. Sadly angle wrong to reflect the station name...
Next stop up, Canary Wharf . We need food, and there are plenty of places there in underground shopping complexes geared up to serving office blocks containing the population of large villages...
Up in the ticket hall, we spot the perfect location for General Bamford to survey her domain...
Only going back now, the Hodgkin mural (above) has finally been replaced, two years past expected lifespan but instead of a new art piece, there's a giant iPod nano ad. This makes me sad.
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( Read more... ) it's all a bit scuzzy on the Northern Line really, dog-eared, unglamourous and unloved, flaky paint and leaky ceilings. Ah, the Northern Line I remember.
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