Up to Sheffield and back in a day.
On arrival at some or other station there was a PA announcement to be careful leaving the train because of the step or gap or whatever. It's a perennial problem. I have problems at Clapham Junction, and if I sit too far forward, I can almost not get off at Streatham Hill. I wonder why, in the nearly two hundred year history of railways, no one has considered standardising train/platform heights. I appreciate it would take time and money. But they've had two hundred years to work towards it.
I walked from the office in Sheffield to the rail station. A lot has changed since I was last there and I was slightly confused. I came upon the 'Interchange', a bus station alongside a tram station. I was a bit dubious about walking through it. I followed the signs and suddenly realised that I was walking under perspex shelters all the way to the rail station. Bloody hell, what a good idea. Well done Sheffield! I remember trips in times gone by when negotiating the route from town centre to railway station in Ipswich and Southampton was a kamikaze mission. Ipswich involved crossing a busy road, full of lorries going to the port, without a pedestrian crossing and, in places, a pavement. So, that's really going to encourage people to use public transport, isn't it? Why is it that time after time Sheffield and South Yorkshire manages to do the right thing and other places can't. We only have a planet to save.
I had time to spare so I browsed around WH Smiths. I thought for a moment about buying Girl With a Onetrack Mind, but decided there is something bizarre about buying a book based on a blog when the blog's there. (Okay, Scaryduck's oeuvre is on my wishlist, but I regard Alastair as a friend and anyway I've already commented that I'm waiting until 'New and Used' falls below a fiver...)
I went out and lurked in that very 'station' way. Then I spotted the BBC Music Magazine from afar, so I thought I would see what the CD is, and have a browse through on the train. I walked over and reached up to get it. Four times I tried and I was about to squawk for help when, with a hop, skip and a jump, I managed to grab it (I never get the front copy, always go to the back). I got quite light headed and dizzy in the effort; I know it had Anna Netrebko on the front cover, and, although she's the soprano I'd fancy if I fancied sopranos, I really don't think that was the cause of my dizziness.
I had a bit of a good-natured moan to the woman on the till, saying that it's ridiculous that the pornographic mags are within easy reach and yet something like the BBC Music Magazine, which is hardly high brow intellectual, is out of reach. I said I don't like pornography being so blatantly displayed, and anyway, surely most of the consumers of that sort of stuff can reach the top shelf, whereas I can't. She made some comment that apparently the magazines to which I refer count as 'normal' despite the porn on the cover, and it's all decided by a designer. Disparagingly, she said "A man, no doubt..."
Some few hours later the train arrived at St Pancras. I hate St Pancras with a vengeance. What in god's name have they done to it. I was there last year, but never got round to blogging my distaste. It used to be a beautiful station, redolent of a bygone age, where the waiting traveller could revel in the cathedral-like architecture. My memory tells me it was designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel; if not him, clearly by someone under his influence. Beautiful brickwork, arches, iron.
Now it has been totally horribilised. The graceful arches are gone and the station is a cheap eyesore of chrome and plastic. Rather than strolling in off the street and onto the concourse, it is now a labyrinth of airport-style consumer's paradise, and up the escalators to get to the trains. I can't quite work out what they have done, but I think they have completely rebuilt the platforms a level higher than they used to be.
And guess what, for all the so-called glories of 21st century design, it doesn't work. There is far too big a step/gap from the train. Not too bad for me, I just had my rucksack. But I saw people struggling with luggage, disability and pushchairs. This is the reality of the 21st century...and, let's not kid ourselves, the 19th century, too. But this massive engineering project has failed in one basic test. It does not simplify the boarding of and disembarkation from trains. I am truly puzzled about this. And it looks dreadful.
