A bit of a filler as I haven't had much time to continue my research or go visit building sites.
Actually, that's a complete and utter lie. I've just been lazy.
Here's the filler: an article from skyscraper news confirming that investment has been attracted to build the Bishopsgate Tower.
I've started researching the genesis of the current 'let's build lots of tall buildings in London' policy. I'm disappointed to report that the word 'skyscraper' is very much lacking in the vocabulary of the committees that decide such things. For shame.
It's a hefty task (I plan on registering with the British Library), so not much to report yet... bar this slight anomaly.
As reflected in the summary of this blog, Ken Livingstone is seen as being largely responsible for the high-rise boom. The earliest public, official record of this is in October 2000:
I support high buildings, both as clusters (such as in the City, Canary Wharf and Croydon), and as stand-alone buildings (such as the Post Office Tower and Millbank Tower), where they are in close proximity to a major public transport interchanges and contribute to the quality of London's environment. I have no objection in principle to London having the tallest of buildings.
Sorry. Did I say 'kills fascists'?
I meant to say 'assists me in my quest to chase down skyscrapers in the city of London, and only cost me £130 off a guy called Lee in Peckham. Bargain!'
My camera did a weird perspective effect. I can assure you that everything about the bike is in order.
I had a notion when I started this blog that things which somehow had the feel of skyscrapers about them would count as relevant. Yes! I am a long way from home by Mogwai definitely has that feel.
I can be pretty pretentious with music, but have got less so over the past few years. Despite this I feel I should point out that Mogwai's early stuff really was far superior to their later dirges. Young Team, on which Yes! I am... is the opening track, seems to have vanished into obscurity, with many people thinking Come On Die Young is their first album.
I've included it in the blog because the middle bit reminds me a bit of standing at the base of a cluster of skyscrapers and looking up, turning on the spot. The song as a whole makes me think of flying through the window on a boring train journey; one of the few songs to instil in me such a crisply formed image.
Here's the luminescent blue glass of the building next to the mayor's office which I thought was the shard of glass until a few weeks ago:
As I recall, it was cloudy, so god knows how it got to be such a bright blue colour as the glass looked pretty plain from most angles. I blame refraction.
Is it a real word? I hope so as it's better sounding than dubiousness.
For those who don't know, ad-sense is the service which adds those little adverts at the top of the page. I skimmed through the terms and conditions of having them on my blog, and one of them stipulated that I'm not allowed to click on them, as every time someone clicks on them I get paid a small fee; seems reasonable.
But what if I'm interested in what it advertises. The loop Google don't seem to have considered is as follows:
So a pretty poor photo, but as I remarked and videoed earlier, the most aesthetically pleasing of the new buildings I visited. Here's a better photo. Notice the gap in the netting around the top - that's for the crane to hoist things (possibly 2 men in a bucket) up. The building opposite is pretty unusual. The closest London comes to the Pompidou Centre. My feelings towards it are vague.
So, the Pompidou-esque building is built where - presumably - once stood an English bank or insurance firm building of the classical tradition. Here's what's left:
I've missed the start of Lead Balloon, so to finish quickly, here's a rather lovely image I ran 100s of yards and dropped my camera case in a puddle for. It's a crock of Willis Building construction site at the end of the Rainbow.
Continuing with the mission of remembering and writing down things I saw a few weekends ago in and amongst London's skyscrapers. Tonight I'll be concentrating purely on Broadgate Tower. It's not a stand-alone thing, but comes as part of a complex with 201 Bishopsgate. It's located where the derelict ground in the middle of this satellite map used to be. I think it's the closest of the new developments to my home, at 1.7miles. I'm not sure why it's called the Broadgate Tower as there's no street called Broadgate in the area; another thing to investigate.
When I went there a few aspects of the building caught my eye. There were these struts 
which twist between the sides of the buildings. I've now noticed that if you look at the poster of the finished building the plan is to paint them white. I had thought that maybe they'd be beginnings of a plush atrium. They're currently very rusty so will need some polishing up.
There were some segments of metal tubing, which I presume will be an air vent or something. A took a photo of a bucket builders climb into to be hoisted aloft by the cranes. It says a maximum of 2 people, but I reckon it could just about take 3. I forgot to make a definitive count of the cranes, but from looking at the photos from different angles I'd say there were 6. All red. Here's a link to a photo taken from the position I intend to take a documentary photo from on every visit, no matter how brief. Hopefully one day it will result in a short time lapse film, but here is the best photo from the day:
Yes - I've changed the heading of the blog to all lower case, partly coz this looks cool and google, but partly because I've decided to capitalise one letter at a time as new tall buildings go up in the City. Will have to decide what constitutes tall, if 2 tall buildings in one project count as 2 or 1, and a methodology for selecting letters.
This is the sort of thing I should be writing about, but haven't as the internet is dead on Brownlow road.
http://www.londonist.com/archives/2006/11/gherkin_all_ove.php
