Does the City of London Corporation have a plan?
I warn you now Eric Galbraith is away, tackling a black run somewhere in Colorado. Before his departure, I suggested to Eric that he delegate the writing of this week’s blog to another within Biba as time was pressing – it’s thanks to that momentary flare of initiative that I’m addressing you today.
I’ve left insurance compliance and regulation behind this week to focus on a more pedestrian topic – the perilous state of the pavements in some parts of the City at the moment.
I used to enjoy my daily trot from Cannon Street station to Biba House and back, but how times have changed. My walk is now fraught and filled with obstacles. Plastic barriers, hoardings, scaffolding, yellow pipes and blue pipes, loitering builders, detours, pneumatic drills, dust when it’s dry and mud when it rains. It’s clamour with a capital "C".
Once wide pavements have been narrowed, like so many clogged arteries on a heart ward. Whether it’s tripping over fallen barriers on the corner of Fenchurch Street, dodging diggers on St Mary Axe, or a twisted ankle on uneven pavement in Lime Street – this building boom must be a personal injury claims farmer’s fantasy realised (but hey, at least they’re regulated now – sorry I lied about this week’s blog being a compliance free zone).
I realise that this building work is creating a tremendous boost to the economy and is bringing much needed revitalisation to certain areas of the City. But, please spare a thought for the poor pedestrian caught up in all of this. I’m sure someone, somewhere in the City of London Corporation must be planning and co-ordinating all these works – it just doesn’t feel like it at the moment. We need some respite from this cacophony.
I will be writing to the Corporation to voice my concerns. Mind you if the Highways department works as slowly as the Corporation department that manages BIBA House then it’s little wonder we’re in this pickle (but that’s a whole different story).
Vannessa Young is compliance co-ordinator at BIBA.
She can be reached at youngv@biba.org.uk.
