"Dave Plowman (News)" wrote in message
...
In article ,
Iain Churches wrote:

I dread to think what the commuter traffic is like now
in London. Back in 1980 I lived in Richmond, and
often had to drive to a studio in Finsbury Park N.London.
The North Circular Road was a nightmare so I took a
cross-town route which a cabbie showed me. Even then,
on a bad it day took 2hrs. When you are scheduled to
start recording at 0900 hrs the team needs to be at the
studio at least 2 hrs before to set up.

I never cease to be surprised about people complaining of journey times by
car in London rush hour.

I had to be there at 0700 hrs. That's probably rush hour now, but
it wasn't back then. My return journey was made in the early hours,
long after public transport had ceased.

I long ago realised it made more sense to use
public transport. Especially for that sort of journey where the north
London line would have made things easy.

Does the Richmond to Broad Street still run? I used to use it to get
to West Hampstead. Quite a good service.

However, I've never found traffic bad if having to get somewhere by car
for an 0700 start. When I drive to Scotland, I leave south London at 0630
and am across London before the rush hour starts.

I had no choice but to take my car to Finsbury Park. Four recording
sessions a day takes you into the the early hours of the morning, after
the underground had closed, and night buses were few and far between.
It was a pretty unsafe area in which to walk about at that time. Later
we could put the cab fare on the studio tab.

Iain