SELFISH

So who pays for clogging up London when roads and public areas are closed to the public to allow sponsoring companies to promote themselves by putting their names to events held there? Who pays for all the lost business due to missed appointments? Who compensates for all the cancelled journeys? Who compensates rate-paying Londoners who can’t access parks and squares in their own city because of transport problems and closures? And who would be responsible for tragedy when ambulances can’t get through to hospitals? Continue reading

PERFECT FOR A SAFE CORPORATE EVENT?

An 18 year old male passenger was killed and seven people were injured when the 17 year old Fire Ball ride at the Ohio State Fair shed one of its carriages, on the opening day (July 26) hurling people to the ground. The “aggressive thrill” experience features carriages that swing backwards and forwards like a pendulum, carrying thrill-seekers up to 40 feet in the air and rotating at 13 revolutions per minute. Continue reading

CASH COWS AND STRIKE FODDER

London’s commuters by train are currently getting a very poor deal from our railway system, it seems.

Firstly the cost is a serious rip-off, with prices far higher than those in some cities in mainland Europe. A 36 mile journey from Luckenwalde, Germany to Berlin costs £99.80 (112 euro), per month whereas the 35 mile journey from Maidstone to Cannon Street costs £402.50 per month, more than 400 per cent more. Before the collapse in the value of sterling the differential was 500 per cent more. In Italy a 48 mile trip from Orte to Rome costs £116 (130 euro) per month whereas a similar journey from Milton Keynes to Euston costs £482.70 per month, or 242 per cent more. Continue reading

EXTRAS AT THE MARRIOTT

Well-heeled guests using the twelve premier suites at the London Marriott County Hall hotel are offered a Silver Lining package for £300.

This is designed to help them make the most of their stay in the capital and its changeable weather and provides the services of an in-house meteorologist to provide rainy and sunny day itineraries, The service also supplies a hair stylist for when it is windy, coats and wellies for when it rains and skincare for sunny days.

DESTINY

Is love stronger than death? This is a question explored in Destiny, the 1921 silent expressionist and allegorical film from director Fritz Lang, his first notable success released five years before his futuristic science fiction classic Metropolis and ten years before his crime film noir M.. Destiny – Der mude Tod (“The weary Death”) – has been overlooked in favour of the better-known yet it was cited by English and American director Alfred Hitchcock and Spanish director Luis Bunuel as being influential to their own films. Continue reading