On Tue, 31 Jul 2007, Jarle H Knudsen wrote:

On Tue, 31 Jul 2007 10:16:36 +0100, James Farrar wrote:

On Mon, 30 Jul 2007 18:47:18 +0100, Tom Anderson
wrote:

- I take it you know we do have a planetarium, but just think it's rubbish
- which is fair enough.

Closed last year, was it not?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/London_Planetarium

But there is a new one in Greenwich:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Harrison_Planetarium

I must confess to the dual crimes of not knowing the London Planetarium
had effectively closed, or that the Harrison Planetarium had opened -
happily, crimes which for this purpose cancel out!

tom

--
I'm not quite sure how that works but I like it ...

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Mon, 30 Jul 2007, Michael Hoffman wrote:

Peter Robinson wrote:
Michael Hoffman wrote:

Luton does not have a one-seat rail journey to the centre--you have to
take a shuttle to Luton Airport Parkway first.

Eh? Half FCC train stop at Luton Airport Parkway. Or am I missing the
point?

Graham Harrison said that all London airports have direct rail links
to the centre, as opposed to NYC where the "rail link" to two airports
involves getting a rail shuttle from the mainline rail station.

Actually, i think it was me who said that.

I was pointing out that Luton is not any better than that.

Using Google Maps' routes, Luton Airport Parkway to the terminal (well,
the bus station) is 1.5 miles, Howard Beach or Jamaica to JFK is 4.9. I
wouldn't say that was 'no better', but you're right, it's still not a
distance you'd want to walk, so it's a two-seat ride.

I've never taken the Luton bus, but the AirTrain is the same system used
for intra-airport travel at both EWR and JFK. If you're going to count
it as being a two-seat ride, perhaps you should also count the terminal
at LGW that doesn't have a rail station (can never remember which is which).
--
Michael Hoffman

David of Broadway wrote:
PigPOg wrote:

Found this site very interesting. I'm a Londoner yet know nothing of
NYC. I've never been able to find (or have someone explain) the
Uptown/Downtown concept. I mean, where exactly is Uptown New York?

In general, downtown refers to the central business district. In NYC it
refers specifically to lower Manhattan (our /original/ central business
district, which has since grown quite a bit northward). The area called
downtown is alternatively referred to as lower Manhattan.

There is no location called uptown.

There is certainly a downtown and a midtown though. Where does midtown
stop? I would have said 59th Street. That doesn't mean that anyone calls
the Upper East/West Side "Uptown" though.
--
Michael Hoffman

24 hour running and express services are things I really wish we had.
New York also has its 2nd Avenue line under construction now, while we
still need to wait for our biggest project - Crossrail - to be given
the go-ahead.

When it comes to buses, it seems that New York's street traffic is a
lot less bad than London's, making buses a bit faster.

A point where I think London does much better is connections between
lines. There are quite a few cross-platform ones, and walks between
stops seem to be shorter. There also seem to be more of them. New York
for example, has so many lines crossing each other in Western Brooklyn
without any connections between them.

On Tue, 31 Jul 2007 07:56:12 -0400, David of Broadway
wrote:

PigPOg wrote:

Found this site very interesting. I'm a Londoner yet know nothing of
NYC. I've never been able to find (or have someone explain) the
Uptown/Downtown concept. I mean, where exactly is Uptown New York?

In general, downtown refers to the central business district. In NYC it
refers specifically to lower Manhattan (our /original/ central business
district, which has since grown quite a bit northward). The area called
downtown is alternatively referred to as lower Manhattan.

There is no location called uptown.

However, downtown and uptown are both very commonly used as directions
within Manhattan. They are essentially synonymous with south and north,
respectively. (So in about a half hour, I'll be getting on a downtown -
that is, southbound - train to go to work, since I live in Manhattan
north of where I work.) The same terminology can be extended to the
Bronx. In modern usage, it is never extended to the other boroughs,
although mosaic tiling (installed when the line was built in the 1920's)
in some of the 4th Avenue line subway stations in Brooklyn directs
passengers to the uptown (southbound!) and downtown (northbound!) platforms.

Well done David - perfectly clear now!
Kind regards,
Simon

On Tue, 31 Jul 2007, David of Broadway wrote:

PigPOg wrote:

Found this site very interesting. I'm a Londoner yet know nothing of
NYC. I've never been able to find (or have someone explain) the
Uptown/Downtown concept. I mean, where exactly is Uptown New York?

However, downtown and uptown are both very commonly used as directions
within Manhattan. They are essentially synonymous with south and north,
respectively.

Whereas the Manhattan grid doesn't actually run dead north-south. They're
a sort of a local approximation to north that's more useful than what a
magnet has to say about it.

In Silicon Valley hacker culture, the same concept exists, based on an
axis running along El Camino Real - towards San Francisco is "logical
north", and away from it is "logical south":

http://catb.org/esr/jargon/html/L/logical.html

And indeed, and on-topically, not entirely unlike the 'up' and 'down' used
on railways!

tom

--
22% Essential Components, 22% Repetitive Patterns, 56% Pauses

On Tue, 31 Jul 2007, Michael Hoffman wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Mon, 30 Jul 2007, Michael Hoffman wrote:

Peter Robinson wrote:
Michael Hoffman wrote:

Luton does not have a one-seat rail journey to the centre--you have to
take a shuttle to Luton Airport Parkway first.

Eh? Half FCC train stop at Luton Airport Parkway. Or am I missing the
point?

Graham Harrison said that all London airports have direct rail links to
the centre, as opposed to NYC where the "rail link" to two airports
involves getting a rail shuttle from the mainline rail station.

Actually, i think it was me who said that.

I was pointing out that Luton is not any better than that.

Using Google Maps' routes, Luton Airport Parkway to the terminal (well, the
bus station) is 1.5 miles, Howard Beach or Jamaica to JFK is 4.9. I
wouldn't say that was 'no better', but you're right, it's still not a
distance you'd want to walk, so it's a two-seat ride.

I've never taken the Luton bus, but the AirTrain is the same system used
for intra-airport travel at both EWR and JFK. If you're going to count
it as being a two-seat ride, perhaps you should also count the terminal
at LGW that doesn't have a rail station (can never remember which is
which).

Fair enough. The criterion should probably be how many seats there are
between baggage reclaim and city centre - i take it the reclaim (and
check-in) for that terminal is in the terminal itself, and not the main
bit? I've never used Gatwick myself ...

tom

--
22% Essential Components, 22% Repetitive Patterns, 56% Pauses

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Tue, 31 Jul 2007, Michael Hoffman wrote:

Tom Anderson wrote:
On Mon, 30 Jul 2007, Michael Hoffman wrote:

Peter Robinson wrote:
Michael Hoffman wrote:

Luton does not have a one-seat rail journey to the centre--you
have to
take a shuttle to Luton Airport Parkway first.

Eh? Half FCC train stop at Luton Airport Parkway. Or am I missing
the
point?

Graham Harrison said that all London airports have direct rail links
to the centre, as opposed to NYC where the "rail link" to two
airports involves getting a rail shuttle from the mainline rail
station.

Actually, i think it was me who said that.

I was pointing out that Luton is not any better than that.

Using Google Maps' routes, Luton Airport Parkway to the terminal
(well, the bus station) is 1.5 miles, Howard Beach or Jamaica to JFK
is 4.9. I wouldn't say that was 'no better', but you're right, it's
still not a distance you'd want to walk, so it's a two-seat ride.

I've never taken the Luton bus, but the AirTrain is the same system
used for intra-airport travel at both EWR and JFK. If you're going to
count it as being a two-seat ride, perhaps you should also count the
terminal at LGW that doesn't have a rail station (can never remember
which is which).

Fair enough. The criterion should probably be how many seats there are
between baggage reclaim and city centre - i take it the reclaim (and
check-in) for that terminal is in the terminal itself, and not the main
bit? I've never used Gatwick myself ...

There are two terminals in Gatwick. I've never thought of either of them
as being the "main bit." One happens to have a rail station, but they
both have access via road (and coaches stop at each one).
--
Michael Hoffman

On Tue, 31 Jul 2007 15:28:21 +0100, Tom Anderson
wrote:

The criterion should probably be how many seats there are
between baggage reclaim and city centre

Right, so Heathrow to central London by Piccadilly line is a zero-seat
ride, then