Is this art?

All I really know is that I saw this on the back wall of Boradhurst Gardens, from West Hampstead Tube station and thought wow!

It stands out and is impressive and colourful - I was also interested to be joined by three other travellers who were admiring it...

The reality is railway graffiti is the norm now but with some basic imagination it could be developed... some of the graffiti is abusive and incredibly tatty and undermines a building and the area.

So perhaps as part of the London elections next year there could be an intelligent engagement on the issue and the tat cleared away and the space yielded up for better, more artistic features - such as this one?

Why the bridge is so crucial...

This is one side of the many railway bridges that straddle the Kilburn High Road - it taken looking south from the footfalls of Shoot-Up-Hill.

This is the main railway bridge of the Metropolitan Line and is gloriously impressive in both it's scale, decor and condition.

One of the crucial elements with this bridge is it is the only one that has beendesigned to be painted and then by reflection has been painted - and though this angle doesn't show it off at it's best the painting is crucial.

Yet the other bridges of Kilburn High Road lays dirty and graffiti'd - there is a growing body of opinion and annoyance at the rail network's inability to maintain their bridges and understand the effect there bridges have on the street environment.

They may have become a magnet for street art, but their lack of maintenance makes them a visual drag on the atmospherics - come on rail networks - get your act together or does it require some street initiative from us to climb up and paint the bridges ourselves?

When 'street art' amuses you...

This is one of the better bits of street art (graffiti?)around.

This is clearly a genre - Banksy and others now - or perhaps more of an industry...

http://474towin.blogspot.com/2008/08/political-art-on-streets-is-that.html

This pic is captured in England's Lane, Belsize Park and I think it's very funny.

Note the CND badge which has become incredibly iconic over a relatively short period of time. Amazing where that crops up in pictures and badges and now - in graffiti.

Second largest man in the world?

Yep, it's back to that Kilburn mural - one of the more impressive pieces of street art around.

A full insight into the mural and the project indeed can be found here http://www.signalproject.com/kilburn/

But this little pic capture the podium statue of one of Kilburn's legendary characters, William Thomas Ecclestone. He was famed for his cheer and his size and became quite simply 'Jolly Jumbo'.

He had previously been landlord of the Coach and Horses in Stonebridge before taking over the Canterbury Arms in Kilburn. Presumbly near Canterbury Road, just down from the currently Kilburn Park Tube station.

William died in 1915 and it is reported that it took 10 men to carry his coffin and the grave was the widest and deepest dug in the cemetery - he had had the distiction of being classified at the second largest man in the world at the time!

It is great that as someone so large he is credited with having introduced standard training exercises in the arms and was a trainer of running and boxing at his pubs.

A Users Group for the North London Line?

For too long the North London Line has sat neglected and tatty. It is without a doubt one of the most useful lines of transport in London - for starters it goes across London (east west) rather than the perennial north south, second it stops in places people live in rather than just shopping centres (such as Brondesbury Park) and third it goes to really useful places (connecting at Willesden Junction, down to both Stratford and Kew).

However, for a long time now it has felt low grade - unstaffed at night, poorly lit, subject to a lot of graffiti - a general air of neglect.

The North London Line is now being transformed in reputation as part of Overground - there are staff (albeit a bit security led - there's some need for some customer service training in places) and ticket barriers and with these elements the re-paint jobs.

The effect is to restore some confidence and tackle the back-log of works.

With that end in mind there has been an ongoing conversation with the regional station manager about setting up a users group for the 6 stattions along the bit of the line that runs from Kensal Rise to Hampstead Heath (Kensal Rise, Brondesbury Park, Brondesbury, West Hampstead, Finchley Road & Frognal, Hampstead Heath). If you're intersted and up for this then please do drop me a line ed.fordham@hampsteadandkilburn.org.uk - it's hoped to have a a meeting in the next few weeks to get a group going - it's not rocket science, we don't want to to make it too onerous, but just a chance to be the eyes and ears on the line, making things better, giving suggestions and where useful working with TfL and Overground to push forward enhancements.

Please do get in touch.

Overground improvements needed and quickly

The North London Line (now Overground) is for me one of the most impressive bits of London transport links - it goes across London (everything else runs up and down, in and out of the City), it stops in useful places (residential as well as shopping and commercial), it's pretty quick and efficient and for me [sentimental] it feels like a good old fashioned railway line. (Pic of Brondesbury Park station to right)

This is not to say that it is without problems - tatty, neglected, poorly staffed, vulnerable to graffiti and slightly shambolic. But it needs investment and attention and we 'users' need it to work better.

I'm especially keen that the anomaly that is Hampstead Heath in zone 3 should be removed and placed back into zone 2 - Mayor Ken Livingstone has promised it but is now enforcing zone 3 fares (another broken promise?)...

Most of all I think we users need a sustained dialogue with Overground (used to be Silverlink) and so if anyone wants to help with that then drop me a line at ed.fordham@hampsteadandkilburn.org.uk or start the debate below in the coments section.