'So What?'

So...

...it’s just over a week since I completed my self-imposed challenge to visit every station on the London Underground Map in alphabetical order, and – now that I’ve had a chance to reflect on the whole thing – I thought I’d share a few of my musings with you. Was it worth it? Have I learnt anything? Would I do it again? What do I do next? Hopefully I’ll find some of the answers to these questions.

My first thought is to wonder whether – in fact – anyone has actually been following this journey alongside me (metaphorically at least) by reading this blog. The thing about blogs is that you write them without the least knowledge of whether or not they’ll get an audience. I know there are ways of gathering statistical information, and indeed I can tell you that over the course of its existence, this blog has had a total of 8046 ‘pageviews’, and that well over half of these are unsurprisingly from people in the UK.

Slightly more unexpected is the fact that I’ve had a smattering of views from people from Romania, Canada, Ukraine and Spain, and a whopping 1132 pageviews from Russia. Clearly Eastern Europeans are fascinated by the London Underground.

On the other hand, I have no base-line by which to make a comparison as to whether this is a reasonably high – or pathetically low – level of traffic in blog terms.

What I do know is that I have the rather laughable total of just three followers.

Clearly this doesn’t reflect the actual number of people who have been reading the blog – I’ve posted links on Twitter and Facebook for every blog entry, and I know that my friends and family have been using those to keep up to date with my progress – though how many people unknown to me have been reading it regularly, I have no idea.

But there was something rather heartening about getting my first few followers. I hoped for a kind of rolling dialogue between us as we travelled the tube lines together (always accepting that this might include some less than complimentary comments on my literary style or my bias for or against a particular locale). However, despite a few initial comments, I have for the most part been sending out the blog equivalents of a message in a bottle – never knowing whether or not it will be picked up and read.

So do feel free, if you haven’t already, to get in touch with me and let me know what you think of this whole malarkey – I’m genuinely interested in your thoughts.

My next area of pondering centred around what I might have learnt on this journey.

Well, the first and most obvious thing I’ve learnt is that if I were head of Transport for London I’d institute a comprehensive and wide-ranging review of the way they name their stations. In particular (you won’t be at all surprised to hear me say, if you’ve been following this blog with any regularity) I would rename any station currently introduced by an epithet such as “North”, “South”, “East” or “West” so that this locational descriptor comes after and not before the name of the place.

Thus:

East Acton – becomes Acton East

North Acton – becomes Acton North

South Acton – becomes Acton South

West Acton – becomes Acton West

Which therefore means that they fall neatly (and more logically) into the alphabetical progression begun by their neighbours Acton Central and Acton Town:

Acton Central

Acton East

Acton North

Acton South

Acton Town

Acton West

Far more sensible!

Oh, and as a side-issue – do we really need a new tube map to be published every six months or so?

Maps - from start to finish

Not only does it waste a heck of a lot of paper, but it also gives them the excuse (shamelessly seized at every opportunity by the powers that be at TFL) to stick a load of new stations onto the map while no-one’s looking – completely buggering up the alphabetical list I’ve so lovingly prepared.

(Not that I paid any attention to these arriviste upstarts – I had my original list and was sticking to it!)

In total, since I started my journey, a further 7 maps have been issued following the December 2013 map I used as the basis of my list. On the latest of these the number of stations now in existence which weren’t on the original map is 71 – or (If I were tempted to visit them all, which I’m definitely not. Absolutely no way. Under no circumstances. I mean it. Forget it. Shush now!) approximately another 3½ month’s travelling.

Of course, if any of you wish to take up my mantle, please feel free to visit them yourselves. They are, in alphabetical order (what else?):

Addington Village

Addiscombe

Ampere Way

Arena

Avenue Road

Beckenham Road

Beckenham Junction

Beddington Lane

Belgrave Walk

Bethnal Green (OG)

Birkbeck

Blackhorse Lane

Brentwood

Bruce Grove

Bush Hill Park

Cambridge Heath

Centrale

Chadwell Heath

Cheshunt

Chingford

Church Street

Clapton

Combe Lane

Dundonald Road

East Croydon

Edmonton Green

Elmers End

Emerson Park

Enfield Town

Fieldway

Forest Gate

George Street

Gidea Park

Goodmayes

Gravel Hill

Hackney Downs

Harold Wood

Harrington Road

Highams Park

Ilford

King Henry’s Drive

Lebanon Road

Lloyd Park

London Fields

Manor Park

Maryland

Merton Park

Mitcham

Mitcham Junction

Morden Road

New Addington

Phipps Bridge

Rectory Road

Reeves Corner

Romford

St. James Street

Sandilands

Seven Kings

Shenfield

Silver Street

Southbury

Stamford Hill

Stoke Newington

Therapia Lane

Theobalds Grove

Turkey Street

Waddon Marsh

Wandle Park

Wellesley Road

White Hart Lane

Woodside

The next thing I’ve learnt is that blog-writing, and in particular this specific type of blog-writing, takes a lot longer than you might think.

When I set out on this journey – three and a half years ago – I foolishly envisioned it being completed in about four to five months.

I imagined I could average about four or five stations a day, and – assuming time off for weekends, holidays, and the like – would therefore expect to tick off approximately 100 stations a month.

What I hadn’t reckoned on was the time it takes to both research each location in advance of my travels, and to then edit the photos and write up my blog following each trip. It turned out that – while I was indeed averaging 4-5 stations a day – each of those days would require an entire week of pre- and post-travel work. Hence the project taking rather longer than initially imagined.

However, the one thing I think I’ll truly take away from this whole experience, and a lesson for all of us in these hectic modern times, is best expressed in this quotation from that great philosopher of the late 20^th Century – Ferris Bueller:

“Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and take a look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

And with that – I’ll take my leave of you for the final time.

Or at least – until I think of some other ridiculous project to undertake……..