Earlier this month I became the first person to walk the entire new (2015) tube map, in support of Bowel Cancer UK.

During 39 walks between August 2012 and August 2015, I took thousands of photos and noticed that I tended to focus on things that had changed, were likely to change or oddly have not yet changed.

This could include anything from buildings under construction to abandoned (ghost) stations to anachronisms to important international events. London is a unique place where you can to see change unfold right before your eyes.

Below I’ve featured 39 photos, one photo from each walk, that mostly look at some aspect of change in London that I observed during the past 3 years.

These are not necessarily my best photos or even good photos, but each of them tells a small London story that I find interesting. I hope you do too.

Date Taken: August 19, 2012
Walk 1: Waterloo & City line, Waterloo to Bank

About the photo: Blackfriars Station. This photo of was taken between the end of the 2012 Summer Olympics (25 July to 12 August 2012) and the start of the 2012 Summer Paralympics (29 August to 9 September 2012). Just a small reminder of how of London was blanketed with signs for London 2012 just a few years ago.

Date Taken: September 29, 2012
Walk 2: Victoria line, Walthamstow Central to Brixton

About the photo: Old public toilet, Fitzrovia. I thought this rather ornate, disused Victorian public toilet seemed slightly out of place in modern London. By sheer coincidence the rather quirky Attendant coffee shop opened here just 4 months after this photo was taken.

Date Taken: October 20, 2012
Walk 3: Bakerloo line walk 1 – Harrow & Wealdstone to Kilburn Park

About the photo: Wembley Central. This shows the what the area looked like before most of the current development work started. It also shows that a fair bit of London 2012 signage remained for months after the end the 2012 Summer Paralympics.

Date Taken: October 27, 2012
Walk 4: Bakerloo line walk 2 – Kilburn Park to Elephant & Castle

About the photo: The photo shows the former Heygate Estate as it was awaiting demolition.

Date Taken: November 17, 2012
Walk 5: Hammersmith & City line – Barking to Hammersmith

About the photo: This shows the Walkie Talkie (aka 20 Fenchurch Street) under construction and also includes Paleys upon Pilers, which has now been moved from this location.

Date Taken: December 29, 2012
Walk 6: Circle line – Hammersmith to Edgware Road

About the photo: This photo shows what King’s Cross looked liked before the old green canopy was fully removed. King’s Cross station was something of one of focal points of my tube walks, since 6 lines converge at King’s Cross-St. Pancras Underground station. It was interesting to watch the station’s exterior change over the course of 2012-13.

Date Taken: February 2, 2013
Walk 7: Jubilee line walk 1 – Stratford to Waterloo

About the photo: Shows both the Walkie-Talkie and Cheesegrater under construction.

Date Taken: February 10, 2013
Walk 8: Jubilee line walk 2 – Waterloo to Stanmore

About the photo: The former Marlborough Road tube station. The building now houses a substation, but until 2009 the Royal China restaurant occupied the building.

Date Taken: February 23, 2013
Walk 9: Former East London line – Former Shoreditch station to New Cross to New Cross Gate to Surrey Quays

About the photo: The former Britannia Pub in Shadwell, now a fried chicken takeaway. There’s something incredibly London about a former pub being reused to serve Halal fast food. While I think it’s a shame so many pubs in London are closing, I really like how they’ve kept the original signage outside.

Date Taken: Taken on March 9, 2013
Walk 10: Northern Line walk 1 – Morden to Edgware via Charing Cross

About the photo: Clapham North deep level shelter to let. Subsequent to this photo being taken, the space was let to Growing Underground, which grows food hydroponically underground and has ties to former Masterchef – The Professionals star Michel Roux Jr.

Date Taken: March 16, 2013
Walk 11: Northern line walk 2 – High Barnet to Kennington via Mill Hill East and Bank

About the photo: Former South Kentish Town Station and old Castle pub. This is one of those perfect combo shots, a ghost station and a ghost pub. The former Castle pub building on the right, was subsequently partially demolished by property company Ringley, without proper planning permission.

Date Taken: April 28, 2013
Walk 12: District line walk 1 – Earls Court to Upminster

About the photo: A field full of horses next to the North Circular between East Ham and Barking. There’s something rather strange about seeing a field full of horses in such an urban environment that (as far as I see) is not part of one of London’s city farms.

Date Taken: May 5, 2013
Walk 13: District line walk 2 – Edgware Road station to Earls Court and then to all other branches

About the photo: Earls Court Exhibition Centre. Earls Court was the hub of my District line walk and a great example of Art Deco architecture. So I find it rather sad that it’s now permanently closed and looks as though it will be demolished.

Date Taken: May 19, 2013
Walk 14: Walk 14: Metropolitan line walk 1 – Aldgate to Wembley Park

About the photo: Old and new building in the City. The reason I took this photo was to show the Cheesegrater still under construction. However, looking back at it, there’s a fair bit of history on display.

The church is the wonderfully named St. Botolph without Aldgate and was completed in 1744. The building to it’s right is the former Matrix building, an example of the brutalist architecture popular in the 1960s and 70s. It’s currently being redeveloped into Matrix House Aldgate, a 275 room, 4 star hotel.

Finally, in the far left of the photo, you can see the top of the Lloyd’s building, Richard Rogers Grade I listed masterpiece completed in 1986.

Date Taken: May 25, 2013
Walk 15: Metropolitan line walk 2 – Wembley Park to Uxbridge and Harrow-on-the-Hill to Moor Park

About the photo: Zizzi in Pinner. It’s located in the old Victory pub, which dates back to 1580 (as you can clearly see in the picture). While I have nothing against Zizzi (I actually quite like their food), this photo sums up the ongoing homogenisation of the British high street and the loss of architecturally interesting British pubs.

Date Taken: June 2, 2013
Walk 16: Metropolitan walk 3 – Watford to Moor Park to Amersham to Chesham

About the photo: Road under the M25. London itself changes the further out you go, dense Victorian terraced houses give way to less dense interwar homes which in turn giveway to countryside. This photo shows how the final transition looks. A simple country road, with no pavement (sidewalk for Americans) under one of the busiest motorways in the country.

Date Taken: June 22, 2013
Walk 17: Piccadilly line walk 1 – Hatton Cross around Heathrow to Acton Town

About the photo: Not a cycle lane into Heathrow. Despite Boris Johnson’s love of cycling and the expansion of the Cycle Superhighway there is no legal way to cycle to Heathrow Terminals 1, 2 & 3 station (also the only station you can’t walk to). However, this was not always the case as you can see at some point in the not too distant past, a dedicated cycle lane did exist. It’s now used exclusively by taxis.

Date Taken: July 21, 2013
Walk 18: Piccadilly line walk 2 – Uxbridge to South Kensington

About the photo: Automatic tobacconists at Uxbridge station offering day & night service. I love that TFL have kept these two (non-working) machines at Uxbridge. Not sure how old they are, but given that they’re selling cigarettes for 20p, they must pre-date the London Underground smoking ban by at least a few years.

It’s odd to think that until 1984 you could still find smoking carriages on the tube. And that full non-smoking enforcement only began after the terrible King’s Cross Fire in 1987.

Date Taken: July 27, 2013
Walk 19: Piccadilly line walk 3 – South Kensington to Cockfosters

About the photo: Former York Road Station. York Road is one of London’s less famous ghost stations and was located on that long stretch of the Piccadilly line between King’s Cross-St. Pancras and Caledonian Road.

While it closed in 1932, you can clearly see the surface building today. However, given the recent development in the King’s Cross area, it probably stands the greatest chance of any ghost station of being reopened at some point in the future.

Date Taken: August 4, 2013
Walk 20: Central line walk 1 – Ealing Broaway to West Ruislip

About the photo: Old Hoover factory, Greenford. The Hoover Building has to be one of London’s best examples of Art Deco architecture. In a move symbolic of the ongoing changes in the British economy, Tesco bought the factory buildings from Hoover in 1989 and subsequently turned them into a Tesco Superstore.

Date Taken: August 11, 2013
Walk 21: Central line walk 2 – Epping to Woodford via Hainult

About the photo: Roding Valley Station. This is London’s sleepiest Underground station with only 255,000 entries/exits in all of 2014. To put that into context Oxford Circus recorded 269,863 entries/exits per day (98.5 million per year) in 2014.

Date Taken: August 18, 2013
Walk 22: Central line walk 3 – Leytonstone to Bank

About the photo: Olympic Stadium and Park. Taken a year after London 2012, you can still see the original lights on the Olympic Stadium and see that most of the Olympic Park is still under conversion to what will become the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park. Interestingly, despite its name, the Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park is not one of the Royal Parks. Nevertheless, it’s well worth a visit if you haven’t already been.

Date Taken: August 24, 2013
Walk 23: Central line walk 4 – North Acton to Bank

About the photo: Paternoster Square (location of the London Stock Exchange and located next to St. Paul’s) sign. This photo was taken over a year after the Occupy London protests, ended in 2012. As a walker this is one of the most worrying and sad changes I’ve seen developing in London in recent years.

Basically it just says that the security personnel at Paternoster Square can ban you for whatever reason they wish. This is diametrically opposed to the British concept of rights of way and a perfect example of the privatisation of public space.

Wikipedia has a great List of privately owned public spaces in London, many of which surprised me. The Guardian also has more even more data on the subject.

Date Taken: March 8, 2014
Walk 24: Gospel Oak to Barking Overground

About the photo: Gas Holder, East Ham. I love reminders of London’s not too distant industrial past. However, what I really like is the lone football goal post in the field in front, suggesting at one point people could play here. Now there seems no way to access the field. Incidentally, this gas holder is located just the other side of the street from the horses seen in the photo from walk 12.

Date Taken: June 21, 2014
Walk 25: Euston to Watford Junction Overground

About the photo: Former Norfolk Arms pub, North Wembley. This is just one small example of how many pubs outside of central London are struggling and closing. I came across a large number of pubs facing closure and even more that had clearly been converted in the past.

While there’s nothing obviously special about the Norfolk Arms, the one thing that caught my attention, as a Canadian, was the sign for Labatt’s Canadian Lager (not one of Canada’s best beers incidentally). I found it odd since I thought you rarely found Canadian beer in the UK, until I learned that Carling is actually Canadian (I’m so sorry).

Date Taken: August 2, 2014
Walk 26: New Cross Gate to West Croydon via Crystal Palace Overground

About the photo: Former Crystal Palace stairs, Crystal Palace Park. The Crystal Palace is one of those great London stories and is the very embodiment of change. Originally, built in Hyde Park to house the 1851 Great Great Exhibition, it was subsequently moved down to Sydenham Hill in 1854. Finally, it was destroyed by fire in 1936, but it managed to lend its name to the Park and surrounding area.

All that remains today are a few random statues and these stairs. Again, if you haven’t been you really should since both the station and Park are among my favourites.

Date Taken: August 24, 2014
Walk 27: Stratford to Richmond Overground

About the photo: Car Doors, Hackney Wick. To be honest I’m not sure if these doors are part of a scrap yard or the next art installation. In either case, Hackney Wick is set to see massive redevelopment over the next 10 years and I expect both scrap yards and art installations will not survive the process.

Date Taken: August 30, 2014
Walk 28: Lewisham to Bank DLR

About the photo: Warehouses and Banks, Canary Wharf. This a classic contrast of old a new you can find in many parts of London. In the foreground you have old sugar warehouses that house the Museum of London Docklands, among other things. In the background you have the skyscrapers of Canary Wharf. Neither would have been built if it wasn’t for the profits that trading provides.

Date Taken: September 14, 2014
Walk 29: Overground Circle (Kentish Town West to Kentish Town West)

About the photo: Wapping High Street. Of all of London’s High Streets, Wapping’s feels the most anachronistic and far removed from modern London. It’s also often eerily empty, which I am sure it would not have been the case when the docks were in full operation.

Date Taken: January 10, 2015
Walk 30: Tower Gateway to Beckton DLR

About the photo: Billingsgate Fish Market. Billingsgate operated in the City of London starting from 1699 and at one point was the world’s largest fish market. The market moved from the City to its current nondescript location, next to the A1261 in Canary Wharf, in 1982. Looking at it now, you’d never guess at its long history.

Date Taken: February 1, 2015
Walk 31: Stratford International to Woolwich Arsenal DLR

About the photo: Former North Woolwich station. This might just be London’s grandest and saddest ghost station. It’s located in the relatively empty approach to the Woolwich ferry.

The station building opened in 1854 but closed in 1979. Rail service continued at the station, using a more minimalist entrance, until 2006 due to the opening of King George V DLR station nearby. The station building reopened as the North Woolwich Old Station Museum in 1984 but it too closed in 2008.

Thus, I think making it London’s only ghost station and ghost museum.

Date Taken: March 8, 2015
Walk 32: Beckton to Stratford International DLR

About the photo: Canning Town. While Canning Town is one of my least favourite parts of London, I took this photo because I think this area will be unrecognisable in 10 years time, given the current pace of building, and I wanted to capture before it changes.

Date Taken: March 15, 2015
Walk 33: Stratford to Lewisham DLR

About the photo: Future Canary Wharf Crossrail station. Another attempt at taking a photo before the whole area changes. In 4 years time, the foreground will be unrecognisable.

Date Taken: March 28, 2015
Walk 34: Cable Car

About the photo: Failed London Pleasure Gardens, Pontoon Docks. A London 2012 project that failed almost right from the beginning. A prime site for redevelopment, it likely won’t stay this way forever, but curious that remnants from it’s sad, brief history are still visible 3 years later.

Date Taken: June 6, 2015
Walk 35: Cheshunt to Enfield to Liverpool Street Overground

About the photo: White Hart Lane, Tottenham. I took this photo for two reasons. First, White Hart Lane is the only English football stadium I’ve visited. Second, its redevelopment story is another interesting one, pitting Tottenham Hotspur FC vs a Archway Sheet Metal Works, a family-run business.

Date Taken: June 21, 2015
Walk 36: TFL Rail Liverpool Street to Shenfield

About the photo: Good to see TFL already have plans for how to handle Crossrail weekend engineering works in 3 years time.

Date Taken: July 19, 2015
Walk 37: Liverpool Street to Chingford Overground

About the photo: Gas Holder, Cambridge Heath. Another fun anachronistic photo. The car makes it look like this could almost be the 1980s east end and not what you’d expect to find in 2015.

Date Taken: August 9, 2015
Walk 38: Romford to Upminster Overground

About the photo: Americas garden in Havering. Surely, one of London’s smallest but oddly appropriate London 2012 legacy projects. I thought this was appropriate since there were so many signs of the Olympics when I started my walks, but was not expecting to see much 3 years later in the depths of zone 6.

Date Taken: August 9, 2015
Walk 39: Woolwich to Bank DLR

About the photo: Canary Wharf Crossrail station. A second photo of the station for the simple fact that Crossrail is going to be the next major addition to the Tube map when it opens in 2018/19, which for me potentially means a whole lot more walking….

I hope you enjoyed the photos and that they perhaps inspire you to explore London just a little bit more (or move here if you don’t live here already). Also, if you’d like to show your support for the project, my Just Giving page is still accepting donations.

For more on walking the Tube, Mark Mason has literally written the book about the tube portion of the walks (the longest and most interesting sections).

Finally, if you have any questions or comments about the walk please leave them below and I’ll do my best to respond.

Note: All images can be used in any way you wish so long as you provide attribution back to RandomlyLondon.com

The post 39 Pictures Showing How London Constantly Keeps Changing appeared first on Randomly London.

On Sunday, August 9th, 2015, I became the first person to walk the entire new 2015 Tube Map. This includes not only the London Underground (completed two years ago) but also the Overground, DLR, TFL Rail and yes the Cable Car (I walked via Woolwich rather than attempt to swim the Thames).

In total, I walked 632.45 miles (1,017.82 km) over the course of 39 walks that collectively took 229 hours and 47 mins of my life. I also managed to raise £1,803.43 for Bowel Cancer UK.

Below are a few stats from my various walks, followed by a few random thoughts on the whole journey and finally a complete summary of my walks if you’d like to follow in my footsteps:

Total distance walked: 632.45 miles (1,017.82 km) – almost as far as London to Nice and further than the Land’s End to John o’ Groats as the crow flies.
Time spent walking: 229 hours and 47 (about 9.5 days!)
Number of walks: 39 (full list at the bottom)

Shortest walk: Waterloo & City line: Waterloo to Bank – 1.6 miles (2.6 km)
Longest walk: Overground Circle: Kentish Town West to Kentish Town West – 34.48 miles (55.49km)

Average walking speed: 2.75 miles/hr
Average walk length: 16.22 miles (26.1 km)
Average walk duration: 5 hours and 54 minutes

Tube line walking distance: 394.3 miles (634.56 km)
Overground walking distance: 149.57 miles (240.71 km)
DLR walking distance: 57.68 miles (92.83 km)
TFL Rail walking distance: 24.68 miles (39.72 km)
Cable Car walking distance: 6.22 miles (10.01 km) – Walked not swam via Woolwich foot tunnel

Most frequently visited stations: Liverpool Street (7 walks), Stratford (7 walks), Bank-Monument (7 walks), King’s Cross-St. Pancras (6 walks), Baker Street (5 walks), Canning Town (5 walks), and West Ham (5 walks)

Tube Map in August 2012 when I started:

New 2015 Tube Map:

As you likely can’t read either map above, there are quite a few differences. First the Overground became a second circle line (extension from Surrey Quays to Clapham Junction; Also completed as a pub crawl) at the end of 2012.

Then a few months ago 3 new Overground lines, along with TFL rail were added. The end result is that I ended up walking roughly an extra 100 miles more than I would have if the map had stayed the way it was back in 2012.

A few thoughts on finishing: When I finished walking the tube 2 years ago, I felt that while I’d achieved something few people would bother to do, I still hadn’t seen huge sections of London.

Over the course of my walks during the last 2 years, I’ve walked to even more remote parts of London, out past the M25 3 more times and even walked to a second London airport. Yet, while I feel I have a much better sense of London north of the Thames, most of my new walks didn’t take me very far south.

Thus, I still feel as though I have large gaps in my local London knowledge, which is not just confined to areas south of the river.

For example, I recently started a new job located in Angel, an area not too far from where I live, and one I’ve passed through while walking the tube and several more times while walking the Regent’s Canal (the best walk in London IMHO).

But as I go out for short walks at lunch time, I’ve found that there’s far more to discover about the area than I originally thought. And, I suspect that I’d find this to be true for the vast majority of the areas I’ve just walked through once or twice during the past 3 years.

So while I feel I now know London a bit better there still loads to discover. To use the most clichéd of clichéd London quotes: “when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life; for there is in London all that life can afford,” said by Samuel Johnson in 1777 but just as true today.

When when I finished walking the Tube I promised I’d create blog posts around each of them. That clearly did not happen and I think if I’m being honest is unlikely to happen going froward. While I plan to keep exploring London, I think its unlikely I’ll be blogging too much about it.

I’ve got a few other non-London projects I’m working on and find I really don’t have the time to devote to both exploring London and then sitting down and writing about it. I hope you’ve enjoyed the journey and thank you very much for reading.

Finally, for those who’d still like to show your support please consider donating to Bowel Cancer UK.

If you’re curious about the routes I took, have a look at the list of walks below:

Full List of Walks:

1. Walk 1: Waterloo & City line, Waterloo to Bank (1.6 mi; 2.6 km) – Very easy intro to tube walking that takes you into the heart of the City.
2. Walk 2: Victoria line, Walthamstow Central to Brixton (15.5 mi; 24.9 km) – Easy enough to complete in one day, real mix of different parts of London.
3. Walk 3: Bakerloo line walk 1 – Harrow & Wealdstone to Kilburn Park (13.8 mi, 22.2 km) – It’s possible to walk the Bakerloo line in one go, but I lost data on my phone for 3 hours so couldn’t use Google maps, as a result got very lost.
4. Walk 4: Bakerloo line walk 2 – Kilburn Park to Elephant & Castle (8.7 mi; 14km) – Fortunately, maps worked correctly for the second walk.
5. Walk 5: Hammersmith & City line – Barking to Hammersmith (20.8 mi; 33.47km) – Poor weather meant this wasn’t one of my favourite walks.
6. Walk 6: Circle line – Hammersmith to Edgware Road (21.4 mi; 34.4km) – The best line to see London’s famous tourist attractions. Only problem is everyone else looking at them too.
7. Walk 7: Jubilee line walk 1 – Stratford to Waterloo (14.32 mi; 23.05 km) – Travelled on the cable for first time on this walk.
8. Walk 8: Jubilee line walk 2 – Waterloo to Stanmore (17.29 mi; 27.83 km) – Worst of all my walks, rained the entire way.
9. Walk 9: Former East London line – Former Shoreditch station to New Cross to New Cross Gate to Surrey Quays (10.5 mi; 16.9km) – A very nice walk with Pete Stean and Mandy Southgate. The line was the second shortest tube line, but is now part of the Overground.
10. Walk 10: Northern Line walk 1 – Morden to Edgware via Charing Cross (23.11 mi; 37.19km) – The furthest south I went on the tube portion of the walks and since I started at Morden, I immediately headed north.
11. Walk 11: Northern line walk 2 – High Barnet to Kennington via Mill Hill East and Bank (20.36 mi; 32.77 km) – Great walk through the heart of the City and also a side trip to little visited Mill Hill East station.
12. Walk 12: District line walk 1 – Earls Court to Upminster (25.92 mi; 41.71 km) – An amazing walk that took me the farthest east I’d go until walking TFL Rail.
13. Walk 13: District line walk 2 – Edgware Road station to Earls Court and then to all other branches (23.76 mi; 38.24 km) – The least straightforward of all my walks given that the District line has so many branches in West London.
14. Walk 14: Metropolitan line walk 1 – Aldgate to Wembley Park (13.21 mi; 21.26 km) – Pretty standard walk through the City and inner North London.
15. Walk 15: Metropolitan line walk 2 – Wembley Park to Uxbridge and Harrow-on-the-Hill to Moor Park (19.13 mi; 30.79km) – By pure coincidence I started this walk from Wembley Park the same day as the 2013 Champions League Final final between Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich. Because both teams are German, all station announcements were also being given in German. A vision if things had turned out differently in World War 2?
16. Walk 16: Metropolitan walk 3 – Watford to Moor Park to Amersham to Chesham (23.97 mi; 38.58 km) – This was my favourite solo walk of the entire project. Perfect weather, bucolic scenery and my first chance to walk beyond the M25. This was also the only walk that happened entire outside of London, which is rather strange for a project so rooted in exploring London.
17. Walk 17: Piccadilly line walk 1 – Hatton Cross around Heathrow to Acton Town (19.7 mi; 31.7 km) – This was by far my strangest walk. I walked to both Heathrow Terminal 4 and Terminal 5. It’s a very odd experience to actually walk to an airport terminal, especially at one of the world’s busiest airports. It also includes the only station that it’s impossible to walk to, Heathrow Terminals 1,2 & 3, although there used to be a cycle path that allowed people to cycle to the airport but its now sadly been turned into a taxi lane.
18. Walk 18: Piccadilly line walk 2 – Uxbridge to South Kensington (22.19 mi; 35.71 km) – Great walk with lots of classic Charles Holden stations to see.
19. Walk 19: Piccadilly line walk 3 – South Kensington to Cockfosters (17.76 mi; 28.58 km) – This walked featured the largest number of ghost stations including Brompton Road, Down Street, York Road and most famous of all Aldwych, which warranted a special detour. It also included Charles Holden’s classic stations at Arnos Grove, Southgate and the snigger inducing Cockfosters, which is actually a really beautiful station and shares a very similar design as Uxbridge at the other end of the line.
20. Walk 20: Central line walk 1 – Ealing Broaway to West Ruislip (13.3 mi; 21.4 km) – A pleasant walk with the Hoover Building being a real stand-out.
21. Walk 21: Central line walk 2 – Epping to Woodford via Hainult (27.97 mi; 45.01 km) – Started outside the M25 and then walked the circle section of the Central line, which includes Roding Valley, the least used station on the London Underground.
22. Walk 22: Central line walk 3 – Leytonstone to Bank (9.00 mi; 14.84 km) – This was the first of two walks I did with my Dad to finish walking the tube. Great walk that started with the Alfred Hitchcock mosaics at Leytonstone (my Dad is a Hitchcock fan), through the partially re-opend Olympic Park and ending up right where I finished my first walk.
23. Walk 23: Central line walk 4 – North Acton to Bank – (11.13 mi; 17.91 km) – This walk was also designed to finish at Bank and so as to bring the whole tube portion of the project full circle. While the weather wasn’t the best for this one I did have my wife and Dad for company which made the celebratory pint at the end all the better.
24. Walk 24: Gospel Oak to Barking Overground – (17.03 mi; 27.41 km) – The first of my walks aiming to walk the Overground and DLR. Nice walk through many of London’s soon to be gentrified neighbourhoods.
25. Walk 25: Euston to Watford Junction Overground (22.27 mi; 35.84 km) – This was a great walk that surprisingly was all contained within the M25. Highlight was probably walking through a field full of horses.
26. Walk 26: New Cross Gate to West Croydon via Crystal Palace Overground – (13.32 mi; 21.44 km) – The real highlight from this walk was Crystal Palace Park, if you’ve never been you should. The other thing to note about this walk is it took me the furthest south, although it doesn’t look that way on the Tube map.
27. Walk 27: Stratford to Richmond Overground – (22.35 mi; 35.97 km) – A very nice walk through North London that ended in the leafy Richmond.
28. Walk 28: Lewisham to Bank DLR (9.45 mi; 15.21 km) – A much shorter walk than many of the preceding Overground ones, but crammed in a lot including Greenwich, Canary Wharf, Docklands and the City.
29. Walk 29: Overground Circle (Kentish Town West to Kentish Town West; 34.48 mi; 55.49km) – This was the longest walk of the entire project, taking nearly 11 hours to complete. And while I’d previously walked large sections of the circle, it was the walk that covered the most ground in South London.
30. Walk 30: Tower Gateway to Beckton DLR – (10.77 mi; 17.33 km) – Not a hugely interesting walk but I did get to finally see Balfron Tower and found where the Traffic Light Tree has been moved to (in front of Billingsgate Fish market)
31. Walk 31: Stratford International to Woolwich Arsenal DLR – (8.07 mi; 12.99 km) – Ironically, Stratford International has no international services, but if you follow the DLR you’ll eventually end up at City Airport that does actually offer international flights. Besides including the second airport I’ve walked to in London, other highlights included Thames Barrier Park and the Woolwich ferry, which has to be one of the most ridiculous features of London’s transportation system. A bridge or tunnel would make much more sense.
32. Walk 32: Beckton to Stratford International DLR (8.01 mi; 12.89 km) – Probably the least interesting walk of the whole project. Thankfully it was one of the shortest.
33. Walk 33: Stratford to Lewisham DLR (8.93 mi; 14.37 km) – A decent walk that included a visit to Pudding Mill Lane the newest station on the map.
34. Walk 34: Cable Car (6.22 mi; 10.01km) – Given that the Cable car is only 0.62 mi (1km) long, this walk the had the greatest divergence from the service’s route. Walked it via Woolwich foot tunnel (a first) and included some of the few remaining industrial sections of London, that are sure to be redeveloped at some point in the not too distance future. Also had the pleasure of being accompanied by @avail, @Ianfurey1 and @ldnative.
35. Walk 35: Cheshunt to Enfield to Liverpool Street Overground (23.28; 37.47 km) – My second walk to start outside the M25. Nice weather made for a rather pleasant if unremarkable walk.
36. Walk 36: TFL Rail (24.68 mi; 39.72) – For those that don’t know, TFL Rail will turn into Crossrail in a few years time. So I’ve got a bit of leg up when that opens. This walk took me beyond the M25, past zone 9 to the dreaded Special Fares apply zone and the farthest east I’ve ever walked.
37. Walk 37: Liverpool Street to Chingford Overground (12.86; 20.7 km) – This walk was quite interesting and varied and included rapidly gentrifying parts of East London, totally empty parks and fields and a cycle path through the middle of an industrial estate.
38. Walk 38: Romford to Upminster Overground (3.98 mi; 6.41 km) – You’d think my second shortest walk all the way out in zone 6 would have little to see. And you’d be partially correct. Highlights included the least used station on the entire Tube map (Emerson Park), the Upminster Windmill and a walk past the only station with a Swastika in its design.
39. Walk 39: Woolwich to Bank DLR (12.45 mi; 20.04 km) – My final walk, like the vast majority of my walks, was done solo. While some people think I must get lonely, the truth is just the opposite. Walking alone allows my mind to wander, me to set my own pace and finally indulge in detours other people might not think are interesting. For example, on this walk I made detours to both the Thames Barrier Park and the wonderfully bizarre Trinity Buoy Wharf. That’s not to say I haven’t immensely enjoyed the company of those who’ve come on walks with me as part of this project, it’s been great to share the experience with others. However, at the end of the day I think it was fitting in many ways that the final walk was a solo one and that it ended where my first walk ended, at Bank. Plus, wife did meet me at the end for another celebratory pint!

For most posts related to the Tube Challenge click here.

If you’ve got this far, thanks very much for reading. I hope you take this as an inspiration to go out and explore London in your own way. If you have any questions or comments please just leave them below and I’ll do my best to respond.

The post New 2015 Tube Map Walked For The First Time! appeared first on Randomly London.

It’s been over 6 months since my last blog post, so I thought it was probably about time to give a quick update about the status of my walks. Last month, I was literally 1 walk away from walking the entire Standard Tube Map (Tube, DLR, Overground and Cable Car), but then TFL went and added a few new lines.

Therefore, I’m going to be walking the additional new lines over the next couple of months and hope post a final summary of the whole project at some point this summer. Yesterday I started by walking the new Cheshunt/Enfield Town branches of the Overground, which was great as it brought me to several parts of London I’d never been to before.

By my reckoning this leaves me with 3 walks: TFL Rail from Liverpool Street to Shenfield, Overgound from Liverpool Street to Chingford and DLR Woolwich to Bank. I’ll also have to squeeze in the new Overground route from Upminster to Romford at some point, but figure that can be included in one of the other days walks.

To all those who’ve followed along thank you very much for your support. Truth be told, I’ve mostly done the walks for myself, but felt it would be shame not to ask for charity support, which is why I ask if you’ve enjoyed hearing about them that you give generously to Bowel Cancer UK.

The post New Tube Map & Walking Update appeared first on Randomly London.

Here are a series of photos taken by my wife and I on Christmas Day, 2014. Since it’s the only day of the year public transit is completely shut, it provides a rare opportunity to see the streets (almost) completely empty. Hope you enjoy:

Oxford Street

Regent Street

Around Carnaby Street

Piccadilly Circus

Leicester Square

Trafalgar Square

The Mall

Bonus

However, even more surprising than walking around the near empty streets of London was seeing a large transport helicopter in Regent’s Park, with the blades still running, as we walked down to central London.

It looked like it was being used to be transport someone for a medical procedure, although it may have been a training exercise, as they didn’t seem to be in too much of a hurry. Does anyone know if this is a routine thing? Seems odd to use Regent’s Park as a helipad. Any information would be greatly appreciated.

The post Christmas, The One Day London’s Streets Are (Almost) Empty appeared first on Randomly London.

These photos were take on December 30th, 2014 by my very talented wife. London always looks great in the morning.

The post A Frosty Primrose Hill Sunrise In Pictures appeared first on Randomly London.

The Michelin restaurant map above was created by Mike David Smith and lists the 1, 2 & 3 star restaurants that made it into the Michelin Guide London 2015 along with Bib Gourmand entries and the best London pubs featured in Eating Out in Pubs 2015.

I’ve also included a list of restaurants by star level, sorted from cheapest to most expensive according to the Michelin website (obviously the price you pay will depends on what you order).

3 Star

Alain Ducasse at The Dorchester
Park Ln W1K 1QA Mayfair

Gordon Ramsay
68-69 Royal Hospital Rd. SW3 4HP Chelsea

2 Star

Hélène Darroze at The Connaught
Carlos Pl. W1K 2AL Mayfair

Square
6-10 Bruton St. W1J 6PU Mayfair

Sketch (The Lecture Room & Library)
9 Conduit St (1st floor) W1S 2XG Mayfair

Greenhouse
27a Hay’s Mews W1J 5NY Mayfair

Hibiscus
29 Maddox St W1S 2PA Mayfair

Marcus
Wilton Pl SW1X 7RL Belgravia

Dinner by Heston Blumenthal
66 Knightsbridge SW1X 7LA Hyde Park

Ledbury
127 Ledbury Rd. W11 2AQ North Kensington

Le Gavroche
43 Upper Brook St W1K 7QR Mayfair

1 Star

Barrafina
54 Frith St. W1D 3SL Soho

Arbutus
63-64 Frith St. W1D 3JW Soho

Social Eating House
58 Poland St W1F 7NR Soho

Trishna
15-17 Blandford St. W1U 3DG Marylebone

Lima
31 Rathbone Pl W1T 1JH Marylebone

Tamarind
20 Queen St. W1J 5PR Mayfair

Amaya
Halkin Arcade, 19 Motcomb St SW1X 8JT Belgravia

Rasoi
10 Lincoln St SW3 2TS Chelsea

L’Autre Pied
5-7 Blandford St. W1U 3DB Marylebone

Quilon
41 Buckingham Gate SW1E 6AF Victoria

Yauatcha
15 Broadwick St W1F 0DL Soho

Galvin La Chapelle
35 Spital Sq E1 6DY Spitalfields

Gymkhana
42 Albemarle St W1S 4JH Mayfair

Murano
20 Queen St W1J 5PP Mayfair

Umu
14-16 Bruton Pl. W1J 6LX Mayfair

Texture
34 Portman St W1H 7BY Marylebone

Club Gascon
57 West Smithfield EC1A 9DS London

St John
26 St John St EC1M 4AY Clerkenwell

Angler
3 South Pl EC2M 2AF Finsbury

Kitchen W8
11-13 Abingdon Rd W8 6AH Kensington

Harwood Arms
Walham Grove Fulham SW6 1QP

Seven Park Place
7-8 Park Pl Saint James’s SW1A 1LS

HKK
Broadgate West, 88 Worship St Shoreditch EC2A 2BE

Outlaw’s at The Capital
22-24 Basil St. Chelsea SW3 1AT

Alyn Williams at The Westbury
37 Conduit St Mayfair W1S 2YF

Ametsa with Arzak Instruction
5 Halkin St Belgravia SW1X 7DJ

Pied à Terre
34 Charlotte St Bloomsbury W1T 2NH

Dabbous
39 Whitfield St Bloomsbury W1T 2SF

Chez Bruce
2 Bellevue Rd Wandsworth SW17 7EG

La Trompette
5-7 Devonshire Rd Chiswick W4 2EU

The Glasshouse
14 Station Par. Kew TW9 3PZ

Galvin at Windows
22 Park Ln (28th floor) Mayfair W1K 1BE

Wild Honey
12 St George St. Mayfair W1S 2FB

Pollen Street Social
8-10 Pollen St Mayfair W1S 1NQ

Maze
10-13 Grosvenor Sq Mayfair W1K 6JP

Launceston Place
1a Launceston Pl Kensington W8 5RL

L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon
13-15 West St. Strand and Covent Garden WC2H 9NE

Hakkasan Mayfair
17 Bruton St Mayfair W1J 6QB

Brasserie Chavot
41 Conduit St Mayfair W1S 2YQ

Hakkasan Hanway Place
8 Hanway Pl. Bloomsbury W1T 1HD

City Social
Tower 42 (24th floor), 25 Old Broad St City of London EC2N 1HQ

Benares
12a Berkeley Square House, Berkeley Sq. Mayfair W1J 6BS

Pétrus
1 Kinnerton St Belgravia SW1X 8EA

Locanda Locatelli
8 Seymour St. Marylebone W1H 7JZ

Story
201 Tooley St. Bermondsey SE1 2UE

Clove Club
380 Old St Shoreditch EC1V 9LT

Kai
65 South Audley St Mayfair W1K 2QU

Hedone
301-303 Chiswick High Rd Chiswick W4 4HH

River Café
Thames Wharf, Rainville Rd Hammersmith W6 9HA

Kitchen Table at Bubbledogs
70 Charlotte St Bloomsbury W1T 4QG

Fera at Claridge’s
Brook St Mayfair W1K 4HR

If you’d like to see a list of Bib Gourmand restaurants and/or best pubs please use the map above, visit the Michelin website and/or buy the Michelin Guide London 2015 and Eating Out in Pubs 2015.

Ever eaten in any of the restaurants above? If so let us know your experience below.

The post London’s 2015 Michelin Starred Restaurants Mapped & Listed appeared first on Randomly London.

Of all the things I’ve seen on my many London walks, coming face to face with a stag in a very foggy Bushy Park, has to be the most unexpected and surreal.

I took the photo yesterday (November 15th, 2014) at the end of a 17 mile (27km) walk from Primrose Hill to Hampton Court via Richmond Park and Teddington. Most of the walk was less than thoroughly enjoyable given that it was raining off and on for most of it.

Moreover, I’d hoped to see some deer in Richmond Park, as I’ve yet to see them, but no such luck.

Fortunately, the rain stopped just as I entered Bushy Park at dusk. Plus, I noticed there were signs warning people about deer, so I thought maybe I would get my chance to see some after all.

All the rain and the quickly dropping temperature also meant that the whole park was covered in low level ground fog. A rather atmospheric way to end any walk, although still no deer in sight.

Now normally at the end of my walks I’m fairly tired and I make a beeline to the nearest station. However, just as I was about to leave the park I remembered a property listing I’d seen months earlier which showed a house backing right on to the park. Given that I’m not normally down in this part of London, I figured now was as good a time as any to make a quick detour, fog or no fog.

So I followed a rather small, muddy trail that runs behind a whole row of houses (see image below), all of which back directly on to the park. I mean how cool would it be to have Bushy park as your backyard?

At this point the fog was becoming much thicker and I could barely see 20 feet in front of me. So it was with some surprise that I found myself almost face to face with a stag, with what looked to me like rather large antlers.

Discretion being the better part of valour, meant that I decided to turn around rather abruptly and quickly walk back the way I’d come, all the while hoping that the stag wouldn’t follow/chase me. This of course after I’d taken the time to get my phone out of my pocket and take a photo.

At times like this, I wish I’d brought a better camera with me, since the photo could be clearer. However, in reality I doubt I’d have taken the time to compose the perfect shot.

So that’s how I came face to face with a stag in Bushy Park. The only thing that’s even crazier to think about is that there are people who could wake up with deer right at their window on any given morning. How amazing would that be?

Below are a few other, far less interesting, photos of the fog in Bushy Park yesterday.

The post Unexpected Foggy Encounter With a Stag in Bushy Park appeared first on Randomly London.

A few weeks ago, Tube Challenge World Record Holder, Geoff Marshall, came up with the brilliant idea of renaming all of London’s 270 tube stations with other plausible names. He made the request via the Londonist, and I suspect got a few more responses than he was expecting.

He’s now sifted through the more than 300 comments and distilled them into the map above. Having walked to all of them, I think he’s done a pretty good job selecting the new names, although I do have a few disagreements. I made the following suggestions and am happy to see that several (in bold bellow) made the cut.

1. Bank -> Mansion House – Really disappointed he went with the more boring, but sensible, City.
2. Monument -> London Bridge – Pudding Lane is a decent choice, but I still like moving London Bridge north of the Thames.
3. Embankment -> Charing Cross – Hungerford (Charing Cross) is good but I think straight Charing Cross is better for historic reasons.
4. Charing Cross -> Trafalgar Square (or Strand)
5. Tower Hill -> Mark’s Lane (Or Tower of London) – Tower Bridge is a good choice, I just like going with old names.
6. Holborn -> British Museum – Kingsway is a solid choice.
7. Chalk Farm -> Primrose Hill – Annoyed that this one didn’t make the cut as it’s my home station, Roundhouse is OK but Primrose Hill is far better known and has the added advantage of being the name of a nearby ghost station.
8. Moor Park -> Sandy Lodge
9. South Wimbledon -> North Morden – Although Morden does get renamed to North Morden
10. London Bridge -> Shard (or Borough Market)
11. Camden Town -> Camden Market – still think Camden Market is better than the more boring Camden Central.
12. Waterloo -> Royal Festival Hall (or London Eye) – Although neither of my suggestions made it, Southbank is a solid choice.
13. Westminster -> Houses of Parliament – Still think Houses of Parliament is better than Parliament Square.
14. Vauxhall -> MI6 – Albert Embankment is OK.
15. Canary Wharf -> One Canada Square
16. North Greenwich -> Thames Barrier – I like Blackwall South but not as much as Thames Barrier.
17. Stratford -> Queen Elizabeth Park – Olympic Park is the better name.
18. Upminster -> Windmill – Really pleased he picked this one.
19. Tottenham Hale or Blackhorse Road -> Walthamstow Reservoirs
20. Arsenal -> Emirates Stadium – Gillespie Road is the better (and more historic) choice.
21. Moorgate -> Finsbury Circus – London Wall is a good choice.
22. Farringdon -> Smithfield Market
23. Elephant & Castle -> Strata – Actually had to Google Newington Causeway.
24. Southwark -> Blackfriars Road
25. Pimlico -> Tate Britain
26. Sloan Square -> Chelsea – King’s Road is more original.
27. South Ken -> Museums
28. Hyde Park Corner -> Aplsey House – Wellington Arch is a great choice.
29. Ladbroke Grove -> Portobello Road Market
30. Uxbridge -> Grand Union Canal – Colne is still a good water based name.
31. Warwick Ave. -> Little Venice
32. Neasden -> BAPS Shri Swaminarayan Mandir – Really surprised he didn’t go with something based around the Temple.
33. Hillingdon -> Swakeleys

While I’m giving Geoff a bit of hard time here, I think he did a great job overall. With a task like this it’s impossible to please everyone. Here are some of the other changes I really liked:

• Russell Square -> Brunswick
• Heathrow’s stations -> Great West Aerodrome Central, East and West
• Ickenham -> Glebe Avenue – I grew up in Ottawa’s Glebe neighborhood, one block away from Glebe Avenue.
• The movements of the Ruislip stations
• Goldhawk Road -> Shepherd’s Bush Market (moving one stop south)
• Earl’s Court -> Kangaroo Court
• Kensington (Olympia) -> Exhibition
• Brixton -> Electric Avenue
• Lambeth North -> Bedlam – One of the best of the bunch
• Kennington -> Newington Butts – Would likely become the new Cockfosters
• Borough -> Marshalsea
• Debden -> Bank of England
• Walthamstow Central -> Walthamstow Dog Track
• Hampstead -> Heath Street
• Preston Road -> Kenton South
• Warren Street -> Euston Road

Plus, so many others. However, South Camden doesn’t have quite the same ring as Mornington Crescent for a game.

You can read more about the final version on the Londonist website.

Have any stations you’d like to see renamed? Leave a comment a below if you do, maybe we can convince Geoff to make a second alternative tube map.

The post Tube Stations Renamed – Plausible Alternatives For All 270 appeared first on Randomly London.

All three images were drawn by French illustrator Thomas Danthony. Whether you love or hate brutalism as an architecture style, there’s something oddly compelling about these ghostly illustrations of some of London’s best known brutalist buildings.

The only complaint is that there aren’t more of them. Where’s the Barbican, Brunswick Centre or the Alexandra Road Estate? Nevertheless, if you’d like a print of any of the three here, you can order them via Black Dragon Press.

What are your thoughts on London’s brutaist architecture? Love it? Hate it? Leave your comments below:

The post 3 Ghostly Illustrations of London’s Iconic Brutalist Building appeared first on Randomly London.

The last 48 hours have been interesting for me and this blog. It all started with this post: What Are The Best Things To Do In London That No One Knows About?.

The post is just a collection of the best responses from this reddit thread by cr3 and has been online for well over a year.

The responses are the best form of satire, utterly ridiculous but yet believable enough that you could see someone being fooled by them. British humour at its finest.

Until 2 days ago, the post only received around 300 visitors a month. I’d never given the post much though after it went live; assuming anyone who visited the page would realise it was satire, hopefully have a laugh and then go elsewhere. However, it seems not everyone took it in the spirit which it was intended.

One suggestion in particular seemed to cause some confusion:

Keep it to yourself, but you can get a free cocktail at the bar at the top of the OXO tower if you take ten wrappers from OXO cubes with you. OXO cubes are about £3 a pack and are useful in cooking anyway; everyone’s a winner!

You get a different cocktail depending on the wrapper type – beef is different to vegetable stock for example. They rotate these choices weekly but they’re all pretty cheap cocktails, don’t expect too much.

On it’s own, the above borders on plausible. However within the context of the whole post, I’d assume most people would realise it was in no way meant to be serious.

So it was with some surprise that I received the following message on twitter:

I then followed up with:

And it given the above you won’t be surprised by their final response:

Before I continue, I just want to make it really clear that whoever runs the Oxo Tower’s twitter account was extremely patient and polite in the face of my rather obtuse responses.

As a result of a customer not understanding the humour of an old blog post, I’m sure they were asked to go get the offending section taken down. Then after contacting me, I play dumb to try and draw out the joke a little longer. So fair play to them for keeping a level head throughout.

I’ve only been to the Oxo Tower Bar & Restaurant once, but I found the food, drinks, service and views to be among the best in London. If you haven’t been before, I’d highly recommend it, just leave the Oxo cube wrappers at home!

Now since the original suggestions and post idea came from reddit, I thought some people there might also see the humour in this situation. So I wrote this post 2 days ago.

Somewhat unexpectedly, the post made it to the top of r/London, a subreddit with around 34,000 subscribers. I’ve been lucky enough to have a few of my other posts, such as my serious Things To Do in London and Moving to London guides make it to the top before.

Generally speaking, if you make it to the top of r/London you can expect to see a traffic spike of between 1,500 – 2,000 visitors over the course of about 24 hours. Most shared hosting accounts can handle this sort of traffic spike and so far Hostgator, which I use for this site, has manged to keep up each and every time.

However, as Upworthy would say, you won’t believe what happened next…

The post was submitted to r/BestOf, which has 4.7 million subscribers or over 100X more than r/London.

I braced myself for a deluge of traffic, not really sure if Hostgator could handle it. Fortunately, I’ve had one similar run-in with a massive traffic spike in the past.

At the start of the year, this post: Disused Tube Stations Mapped got a huge surge of traffic because the BBC linked to this Us vs Th3m, which in turn linked to me.

In total, I received over 18,000 visits to that post in 2 days and it temporarily brought my hosting down for 3-4 hours, right when traffic would have been at its highest. The one lesson I learned, is that you need to use a caching plugin to reduce server load. I’ve used one ever since, but have never had to put the site to the test, until now.

The site hit the top of r/BestOf just as people were waking up on the East Coast of America and caused my server CPU usage to look like this:

When checking analytics, this translated into over 750 people simultaneously on the site at the same time at some points. While I know some people did experience errors when trying to access the site, the servers never went down. So kudos to Hostgator for handling all the traffic.

As of me writing this, the blog post that started it all, has received 59,815 visits in the last 48 hours! Which makes analytics look like this:

Crazier still, when I look at the Imgur stats, they report that over 113,000 people have viewed at least one of the screenshots above. Thus, I assume at least that many will have read the reddit post. It’s a bit nuts to think that that many people have read something I wrote.

Furthermore, it’s now the 212th highest rated post of all-time in r/Bestof and the highest rated post of all-time in r/London.

Incredible and unbelievable.

I just want to give a massive thank you to everyone on reddit who upvoted and commented on the two reddit posts, you can read all the amazing comments from r/London here and r/Bestof here. And of course an extra special thank you to Cr3, without whom none of this would have happened.

Finally, while I haven’t contacted the Oxo Tower restaurant before publishing this post, I will reach out to them after. I hope they can see the humour in all of this as they’ve been so polite so far.

Who knows maybe they could even turn this to their advantage. Perhaps a happy-hour special along the lines of buy one cocktail, get the second free when you bring in 10 Oxo cube wrappers?

Update 2/11: Reddit user torakamikaze has even created a mock-up of what this promo could look like here. Here’s a second design by user rugbyj. And a third by user duudass.

The post When Satire Goes Wrong: The Story Of The Oxo Tower, Cubes, Cocktails & 50,000+ Redditors appeared first on Randomly London.

One of the best things about London is discovering hidden gems in places you thought you knew. I’ve walked across Regent’s Park dozens of times, but had no idea it contained a secret waterfall and hidden Japanese island garden, which most people seem to walk right past, until reading this blog post.

Both the waterfall and the Japanese garden are located in the Queen Mary’s Gardens (in Regent’s Park inner circle), most famous for its 12,000 roses. Simply enter enter via the Jubilee Gate and take the first path right and you should be able to find both fairly easily.

While the rest of Regent’s Park was quite busy this weekend, this small section of it was remarkably quiet.

You can walk up to the top of the waterfall and look out over the Japanese Garden.

The Japanese garden is located on its own small island, which I had all to myself!

So the next time you find yourself in Regent’s Park, I highly recommend checking out this small corner of it. Hopefully it will be as quiet for you as it was for me.

The post Did You Know There’s a Hidden Waterfall & Japanese Garden In Regent’s Park? appeared first on Randomly London.

Yesterday, I thought I’d try and give Alex Chinneck’s Floating Covent Garden installation artwork a visit before it was taken down. Given the photo above, you can see I was a little too late. While I’m disappointed I missed it, I have only myself to blame.

These sorts of things come and go so quickly in London, that you have seize the opportunity when it arises.

Fortunately, can still see 3 of Alex’s other installations around London:

1. A Pound of Flesh for 50p aka The Melting House

The melting house is Alex’s latest, and arguably most interesting, work to be found in London. Created for the Merge Festival, it’s a full size house made from 8,000 wax bricks that will slowly melt over the course of 30 days.

Location: 40 Southwark Street, SE1 9HP (near Borough Market and London Bridge Station)

On Until: November 18th, 2014

2. Under The Weather But Over The Moon aka The Upside Down Building

This one has been around for almost a year now and you may have spotted it (or walked right past it) if you’ve been on the south side of Blackfriars Bridge in that time.

Location: 20 Blackfriars Road, London, SE1 8NY (Just passed the intersection with Southwark Street)

On Until: November 18th, 2014 when it will be demolished to make way for high-rise development.

3. Telling The Truth Through False Teeth aka The Smashed Building

So I haven’t had the chance to see this one yet either, but is’ described as “312 identically smashed windows using 1248 pieces of glass.” You can see photos on his website here.

Location: Tudor Road, Hackney, E8 3SG

On Until: Unknown

To see some of Alex Chinneck’s upcoming work be sure to visit http://www.alexchinneck.com

The post Missed Covent Garden Floating? Here Are 3 Other Alex Chinneck Creations You Can Still See For A Limited Time appeared first on Randomly London.

For those of you who missed it, last weekend was Open House London 2014, which offered a chance to see inside 800 buildings across the capital that are not normally open to the public.

The most popular options this year included: The Gherkin, The Cheesegrater, The Bank of England, 55 Broadway (London Underground HQ), Houses of Parliament, and 10 Downing Street, among others. As you’d expect, they were incredibly busy, which meant you either needed to get a ticket well in advance, or be prepared to queue for hours.

However, there’s a whole world of interesting building to explore besides the most popular ones. Better yet, you can often see two or three of them in the time it would take you to see one of the others.

Just to give you an idea of the types of buildings you can get access to, here is summary from what I managed to see this year:

A Flat in the Alexandra and Ainsworth Estate

The Alexandra and Ainsworth estate is one of London’s unique, brutalist icons. I’ve walked through it several times and I thought this would the perfect chance to actually see inside one of the flats.

Unfortunately, there was a 1 hour queue, since they were only letting 4 people in at a time, which meant I had to pass as I was off to my next site.

St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel & Chambers

Stop number two was a guided tour around the lobby of the St. Pancras Renaissance Hotel and the private Chambers flats. This was a ticketed event with guaranteed entry and no waiting outside. Here are a few photos from the inside:

280 Gray’s Inn Road

This was an impromptu stop on my part as I just happened to notice it while walking to my next location. It’s a shop to house conversion that is unique because it allows in much more light than you’d find in other similar projects. The flip side is that people can see into the flat, including those on Double Decker buses that frequently travel along Gray’s Inn Road.

Freemasons’ Hall

Freemasons’ Hall is an Art Deco masterpiece that all Londoners should visit at least once. They had a huge number of Masons on hand to dispel myths and answer questions from the public.

While these photos don’t do the Hall justice, they give a bit of the flavour of what you can find inside:

The Cally Park Clock Tower

The Caledonian Park Clock Tower is all that remains of the once vast Metropolitan Cattle Market and is the perfect place to get breathtaking views of London. It was another ticked event, although they were allowing people on waiting lists for no-shows.

Here a just a few things you can see:

Apothecaries’ Hall

Apothecaries’ Hall is the home of the Worshipful Society of Apothecaries, one of the City’s many livery companies. From their website they are described as:

The Worshipful Society of Apothecaries lies at the heart of the early foundations of modern-day medicine and remains an important, active and innovative medical institution today. The Society plays a key role in the advancement of specialist areas of medicine, and in the ongoing post-graduate education and qualification of practitioners.

Steeped in history and tradition, the Society was founded by Royal Charter in 1617 and is one of the few livery companies in the City of London to remain professionally based with over 85 per cent of its membership belonging to professions allied to medicine.

Here is just a sample of what their hall looks like:

Wander Around Smithfield Market

While I didn’t manage to get a ticket to the Farringdon Crossrail site, I thought I’d try my luck and see about getting put on a waiting list. Fortunately, for me there had been a cancellation and I was able to book a space on the next tour in an hour. So to kill time I had a wander around the Smithfield Market site, which is one of the odder parts of London.

Again here are a few photos:

Farringdon Crossrail Site

Farringdon is about to become one of the busiest stations in London. It will be the only station to link Crossrail, Thameslink and the London Underground. Moreover, the station will actually span two underground stations (Barbican station will be accessible from the eastern ticket hall).

Thus, while it might not look like much today, you’re almost certainly going to end up here at some point.

Canary Wharf Crossrail Station

The last stop of the weekend was the unfinished Canary Wharf Crossrail station. Unlike Farringdon, this station is almost complete and you didn’t need to pre-book tickets. In fact by the time I arrived there wasn’t even a queue.

For more photos see the full album here and if you want to get involved next year be sure to check out the Open House London website.

Visit any noteworthy sites this year? If so please let me know about them, so I can add them to next year’s list:

The post Open House London 2014: A Randomly London Summary appeared first on Randomly London.

If you haven’t already watched the video above, do it now! It solves the age old question: “Can someone actually run faster than a tube train?” Want to find if they can?

Then watch as James Heptonstall races a circle line train between Mansion House and Cannon Street while his friend Noel Carroll stays on-board and films the dramatic conclusion.

Update: For an even more impressive feat watch as the same duo complete the even more ambitious run from Moorgate to St. James’s Park to beat the train. Not to take anything away from achievement, but it should be noted they don’t follow the circle route directly, but instead take the most direct route. Still pretty incredible it can be done.

The post Race The Tube: Can A Person Run Faster Than A London Underground Train? appeared first on Randomly London.

On Sunday September 14th, 2014 I completed walking the London Overground as part of my ongoing attempt at walking the Tube (done), Overground and DLR. I believe I’m the first and, at this point, only person to have walked all of the London Overground (unless of course anyone knows of anyone else).

In a slight shift of focus, I’m now aiming to be the first person to walk the entire Standard Tube Map, which means I’ll also have to add the Emirates Airline into the mix (and more Overground if I don’t finish before the end of this year). Fortunately, mainline trains and the tram network don’t make it onto the map, which saves me walking them.

Overground Walk Stats

Total distance walked: 109.45 miles (176.14km) – 27% of the Tube’s distance
Time spent walking: 34 hours and 52 minutes – 23% of the time spent walking the Tube
Total number of walks: 5 (although I did walk the former East London Line as part of my Tube walks)

Shortest walk: New Cross Gate to West Croydon via Crystal Palace – 13.32 miles (21.44km)
Longest walk: Walking the Overground Circle from Kentish Town West to Kentish Town West – 34.48 miles (55.49 km) – Will be the longest walk of this whole adventure

Average walking speed: 3.14 miles/hr – 20% faster than walking the Tube
Average walk length: 21.89 miles (35.23 km) – 28% longer than the average Tube walk
Average walk time: 6 hours 58 minutes – 6% longer than the average Tube walk

Grand total distance walked to date (Tube + Overground): 503.75 miles (810.7 km)

Fundraising Reminder

Just a reminder that I’m doing the walks to help support Bowel Caner UK. So far I’ve raised £1,773.43 but am aiming to raise £16,013 – so please donate here

Blog Post Updates

You may have noticed that while this blog has been relatively active lately, there have been few posts about the Overground walks and none from my past Tube walks. The reason is that those posts take a long time to compile and I don’t really have a lot of free time.

However, my goal is still to publish photos from each of my Tube walks, just without the long winded prose to go along with them. So look out for those and photos from the rest of my Overground walks (and upcoming DLR walks) here soon.

You can read more about my Tube Challenge here.

The post Walking The London Overground: Done, and I Think I’m The First! appeared first on Randomly London.

Here’s something you probably don’t see on your daily commutes, a nightclub on the Tube. The prank seems to have been created by Trollstation and the video above was caught on camera by reddit user BurnSpeed.

You can watch the full video below, including when the police show up:

The post Watch as a Tube Carriage is Transformed into a Nightclub appeared first on Randomly London.

I think for many people (myself included) Art Deco is an architectural style associated more with American cities than with London. Yet, look around just a little bit and you’ll find Art Deco buildings popping up all over the place, including several dozen Tube stations and London Underground’s Headquarters at 55 Broadway.

However, it always helps to have a guide to show you the buildings and tell their stories. So it was great to go along on Yannick Pucci’s Art Deco in Bloomsbury Walking Tour (Architecture in the Machine Age) because he has such an obviously passion for Art Deco architecture and history.

Unsurprisingly, given the tour’s name, the focus is on Art Deco in Bloomsbury. I was already quite familiar with Bloomsbury before going on the tour and thought I knew a bit about Art Deco as well. Going on Yannick’s tour demonstrated how much I’d been missing on both counts.

His tour is a wonderful combination of factual information, along with interesting anecdotes about the people who built, worked in and/or lived in the various buildings along the route. I was impressed with how much I learned about the architecture of the area in just over 2 hours.

Since tour guides generally like to protect their trade secrets, I won’t reveal too much of what’s included on the tour itself, you’ll just have to go find out for yourself. However, I will say that if you have even the slightest interest in either Art Deco and/or Bloomsbury you should go on Yannick’s tour. One of the best values in London at only £8 per person (or just £6.50 for students and seniors).

You can book his tours via Eventbrite here, follow his blog London Unravelled and follow on twiter @ypldn.

Here is just a small sample of what you may see along the way:

Full Disclosure: Yannick offered to take me on the tour free of charge and we’ve previously worked together on my Bloomsbury Guide (in fact he provided the bulk of the local information). I think he’s a fantastic guide and you should definitely go along to one of his next tours.

The post Art Deco in Bloomsbury Walking Tour By Yannick Pucci Review appeared first on Randomly London.

Seems every other day I publish another tube map. These can include anything from past London Underground Ghost Stations to What The Tube Map Could Look Like In 2050.

So when Daniel Botcherby, a former co-worker of mine, got in touch and said he’d created something different using the Tube map, I have to admit I was somewhat skeptical. However, Tubenav is actually really cool.

Basically, it claims to be the first fully interactive Tube Map, which you can use to find local businesses close to any of London’s Underground stations. And yes, they’ve licensed the map from TFL.

I found using the web app relatively straightforward and it worked well for me on both my laptop and my mobile. All the stations I checked seemed to have listing; surprisingly even far flung ones such as Chesham (not even in London):

However, the web apps’ real strength lies with listings in central London:

Since I’m a fan of both the Tube and entrepreneurship, I thought I’d let Daniel (Tubenav’s COO) explain it in his own words. I sent him nine questions by e-mail and here are his responses:

1) Where did the idea for the app come from?

Well, it all started from the idea that there’s a huge innovation gap we’re seeing in the transport system. We’ve got hybrid buses, oyster cards, contactless payments, journey mapping api’s with live transport information but we’re still using the same static Tube Map! It’s a fantastic design that we all know and love but we really wanted to do more with it!

2) Who should use the app?

I think if you’re new to London or a tourist looking to get around the city – This app is for you. For tourists we can help you navigate to your hotel and get you used to that area with what’s around you worth checking out.

When you start moving around the city, our web app lets you simply search for places you want to go to and how to get there and we even help you discover new and exciting things to do to get you used to the city.

3) Why use this app over other alternatives (e.g. Google Maps, Yelp, Foursquare, etc.)?

We are combining the best elements of Google Maps and Foursquare with the best discovery elements of Yelp, Timeout and Yplan! We have a superior directory of places than Google Places – with more relevant content and a far more user friendly experience. We’ve combined searching and navigating to a place within two clicks – so you don’t have to bounce between all these apps that only serve one piece of the puzzle of how to get to somewhere!

4) Where are you getting you ‘recommended places’ data from?

We spent a year researching the best places in the capital and in addition to that we have 3 years of data from a previous venture. So this formed the basis of our recommended places – and with London changing as rapidly as we add the data, we’ve got a team of tastemakers with their ear to the ground so that we can be the real-time provider of what’s going on in the city.

5) How is the app going to make money?

Right now our focus is to provide the best experience possible to our Tubenav community. We want to provide you, if you’re new to London or even if you think you know-it-all, something of value and show you how exciting London is.

Just the other day I was invited to a break-dance event which was absolutely incredible but there was not nearly enough people as I would have imagined for the quality of the dancers, it’s these kind of fresh events that go under the radar that we will be bringing to the forefront to highlight London’s diverse cultural heritage.

6) When can we expect iPhone and Android versions of the app?

This is happening soon – we’re currently raising funding through Seedrs to help us get to this stage and beyond. In the meantime our web app is fully optimised for your mobile phone and tablets.

7) Was it difficult/expensive to license the map from TFL?

Yes! TFL have a great team in charge of who they let and don’t let use their map and we went through several stages of approval before we were even authorised to fully build our working prototype. We’re a brand new case for them since we’ve built London’s first fully interactive Tube Map, and we’re proud to have that relationship.

8) What new features do you plan on adding in the future?

In line with our idea of making London Real-Time… we’ll be launching something called ‘Hot Spots’ and these will be beacons flashing on the Tube Map that will alert you to the ‘hottest’ things happening in London and even some free giveaways! So definitely keep an eye out for that!

10) Anything else you’d like to add?

Well, if you liked the sound of what we’re doing, join us on our journey and be a part of London’s history by checking out our Seedrs campaign: https://www.seedrs.com/startups/tubenav And our web app: http://tubenav.com

You can also watch their promotional video here:

So what do you think of Tubenav? Feel free to leave your comments below:

The post Tubenav: The First Fully Interactive Tube Map appeared first on Randomly London.

The map above was created by Brian Butterworth at Uk Free TV and is an attempt to include all current and future planned upgrades to TFL’s services on one map.

On first glace it looks a bit of a mess. However, looking a little closer you’ll find a few interesting things such as:

• High usage stations have a slightly larger font size and are highlighted in yellow.
• Stations outside of Greater London are shown with a lighter text colour.
• The Map includes Crossrail 1 & 2, High Speed 1 & 2, Thameslink, the R25 and even the Northern City Line but not the current Tram services in South London or the Emirates Air Line.
• Distances between out-of-station interchanges are shown
• A slew of new stations have been added including: Battersea, Nine Elms, Cassiobridge, Watford Vicarage Road, Junction Road, Old Kent Road, Camberwell and I’m sure lots more.
• Euston-King’s Cross-St. Pancras looks like it will be one crazy interchange station.
• The River Lea is included along with the Thames (not sure why)
• The Beckton curve is shown on the map

I doubt a map like this would ever be used by TFL as it’s simply too complicated. However, I think Brian has done an incredible job highlighting the issues that TFL will (hopefully) soon have to address. Mainly how much more can you add to the current map before it becomes unreadable.

The genius of Beck’s 1933 Tube Map was that it made everything simple. While the map above uses Beck’s techniques of straight, vertical and 45 degree diagonal lines, there are simply too many of them and geographical accuracy is further sacrificed. When all these services do open, it will take another genius like Beck to help use navigate our way around them. Until then, this is a great attempt in my opinion.

What do you think?

The post What The Tube Map Could Look Like In 2050 appeared first on Randomly London.

This post is part of my continuing series of walking the Overground & DLR, now that I’ve successfully walked the entire Tube network. The walks are in continued support of Bowel Cancer UK.

Euston is probably the ugliest mainline station in London, but at least it was a sunny day.

My second Overground outing was a somewhat ambitious trek from Euston all the way out to Watford Junction. I completed the 22.27 mile (35.84km) walk on a very sunny June 21st, 2014 in just under 7 hours.

A significant portion of line uses the same tracks as the Bakerloo line. This meant I ended up walking some of the same streets I had previously, although this time going in the opposite direction. In fact, until 1982, the Bakerloo line used to run all the way up to Watford Junction, which means this walk could also be considered a tube walk extension.

Here are just a few of the photos I took along the way. As always, I hope you enjoy!

My favourite Euston secret is this abandoned Leslie Green Northern Line station building

The Former National Temperance Hospital

Greater London House, formerly the Carreras Cigarette Factory

A familiar sight

Not what I expected to find in the backstreets of Camden

Dylan Thomas’ former home

Overground track heading north

The Rotunda Building, Camden

Looks like a Banksy knockoff

The Pirate Castle

Mandatory Canal shot. LMS stands for London, Midland and Scottish Railway which used to own the goods yard where today’s Camden Market stands.

The Stables housed and treated injured horses who worked moving goods off and onto the trains that used to call at Camden

The world famous Roundhouse

Art at the top of the Roundhouse

Another familiar sight

Former Primrose Hill Station, which annoyingly for me no longer exists

Unfortunately, I couldn’t get a clear shot of the ornamental stonework at the mouth of the Primrose Hill Tunnel

Ventilation shaft for the Jubilee and Metropolitan lines

I finally make it to the second station on the line. If you follow the line as closely as possible, the walk is about 2.7 miles, one of the longer distances between stations in Central London

The Alexandra and Ainsworth Estate

The back of the Alexandra and Ainsworth Estate

Some interesting “street-art” in Kilburn

Another candidate for London’s ugliest station. Queen’s Park is also where I begin following the Bakerloo line

The back of the phone booth I used for the cover photo of my Bakerloo line walk

Still say this station looks like a barn

Another visit to Tubbs Road Pocket Park

World Cup time

My favourite random sign of the day

Didn’t expect to find a Windrush Road this far north in London

Grim looking empty market at the base of the former Unisys Towers

River Brent

Wonder how long before they change this signage?

Argenta House, opposite Stonebridge Park station

Secret entrance along a shaded footpath

Lots of tracks

Wembley

Wembley Central Station under extensive renovation

Amazingly, this pub with tenuous Canadian connections has still not been redeveloped since the last time I was here.

Wembley really dominates the skyline of North London

My favourite Bakerloo line station

Harrow Central Mosque

The kings and queens of Britain

Harrow & Wealdston station seems to be missing a few letters. This is the end of the Barkerloo line, but I still had further to walk

Ghost sign

This pub has seen better days

Letchford House

Hatch End station has possibly the nicest exterior of any station along the line

It even once had a dedicated parcel office

Still further north to go

The pavement suddenly ended and it was time to go cross-country

You know you’re out of Central London when you have to use a stile to cross a field…

…full of horses

Another clue I’d left London was that the buses were no longer being run by TFL

This might also have been a clue

Love this name

St Matthews Church, Bushey

Bushey Station

Who doesn’t love a railway viaduct? This one is located in The Dell.

The River Colne

Watford High Street Station

It was then just a short walk to the final stop of Watford Junction

This walk was even more enjoyable than my last one. It had all the elements I look for in a great walk: good weather, interesting sights and a little bit of the unexpected. This was especially good as I ended up spending a fair bit of time in areas I’d already walked through before.

The three most surprising lessons I learned from this walk were the following:

1. You can never predict when you’ll end up walking through a field full of horses.
2. That Watford, while outside of London, is still within the M25. I kept expecting to cross over or under it at some point (as I did during my Metropolitan and Central line walks) but never did.
3. You can get from Watford Junction to Euston in just 17 minutes if you catch the non-stop train. This made my nearly 7 hour walk seem somewhat less impressive.

You can read all of my Tube, Overground & DLR walking related posts on my Walking the Tube page and you can donate to help support Bowel Cancer UK here. Finally, I’d leave to hear your thoughts on the walk so please leave your comments below:

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