History
Mancs, Marx and Mill Towns
More notes from 45 years of cycling If you are following this series, you will know that my kind of curiosity is one that is still making money, or at least providing a public service [more…]
Architecture
History
Rail Trails
More notes from 45 years of cycling In its day, Tinsley Marshalling Yard in Sheffield was the world’s most advanced railway-wagon sorting centre. It specialised in computerised hump-shunting, which is not a fetish category on [more…]
History
Steeple-chasing
Whenever anybody says Britain has the best TV or the best health service in the world, I tend to bridle. I have seen a fair bit of TV overseas, and have found it much the [more…]
History
Still in business, after all these years
I don’t know how fast you can cycle from Land’s End to Berwick. I dare say there will be a few people who have done it in two or three days, or even 24 hours. [more…]
Arts
The Northern Ireland Housing Trust & Rathcoole estate (1945-1971)
Between the wars, a big public housing build in other parts of the United Kingdom was not replicated in Northern Ireland. Nor had there been grants for slum clearance. What public housing there was, had [more…]
Arts
Postcard From Vilnius
Background For the last 15 years I have been traveling to Central Europe each month on business. Many of my trips are to Lithuania and Poland, so I have decided to send a postcard from [more…]
19th Century
A Labour of Love
Introduction Hidden away in the heart of France’s Drôme region about 50km south of Lyon is a little known yet magnificently eccentric example of naïve architecture that is well worth a detour or, in my [more…]