The London Snow experience

[ajva]

In my young Scottish days, it was a joke how England failed to cope with a few inches of snow. And yes, it is a joke.

But I bloody love it. :o)

Comments

[dreamsewing.livejournal.com]

Mum says back in 75 or 76 (?) we had bad enough snow they air dropped supplies into Aboyne/Banchory.
All I remember was going out the front window (door was blocked) and nearly drowning in it till Samuel (our black lab Newfie mix) waded his way through to Not save me, but sit on me :) She has photos of me riding him through it.
Oh and stealing sips of Daddy's honey Scotch "toddies". mmmm.
Hope you are frolic-ing in it :)

[adjectivegail]

I've been wondering how much snow would be necessary to not be a joke? Genuine question. We easily had 8"+ by Monday morning, and there was more after that. Some of the points on our railway line were apparently under 2' of snow/ice (according to SWT website on Monday). Personally, given how much travel/taxes/etc/etc/etc cost already, I'd rather the odd day at home once in a while rather than trying to plan for every contingency?? The lack of grit/salt on our pavements in WP have been annoying me, but OTOH it's expensive stuff, so. *shrugs*

(I know it wasn't the same in central London but my understanding was that most of the problems arose from the fact that many people who work in London don't live there...)

Also, my first winter in the UK was 91/92 and I remember several inches fell then as well, and all the buses being off the road for a day. The whole "not even during the blitz" ranting about the buses has been annoying me as, to my mind, the effects of bombs and the effects of snow can be rather different...

[ajva.livejournal.com]

No, I must confess - my post was purely frivolous and I don't really believe what I said here. Apologies - I was posting in snow euphoria but said what I did to try to dampen what I feared might be the annoyance of it for the people who don't share my snow joy. But still, I was being hypocritical, so sorry about that. In fact, I completely agree with you. In further fact, it irks me when people expect miracles from the gritting lorries, and the banal Blitz references are even more risible. I am definitely in the camp that believes that we should bow to the elements for the few days/weeks per decade when this happens rather than spend hundreds of millions on Canada-style snow preparation.

In point of fact, the grit is not just expensive and voluminous, it's also very environmentally unfriendly, being salt and therefore brutal to plantlife. Also, snowploughs are notoriously damaging to road surfaces.

So you see, er, sorry. You're quite right.

[adjectivegail]

Awww, it's okay - evidently I just couldn't hear your tone :-) We still have a bit of snow in our back garden (and an increasingly-lop-sided snowman with a dashing pot lid hat), and it still makes me smile.

I completely agree with your comments about salt --> environment and ploughs --> roads. I was rather surprised to find myself feeling pleased with Boris about this whole thing - I read quotes about, for example, taking the buses off the roads being the right thing to do because otherwise they become several tonne killing machines (or something similar). And that snow ploughs in London would just move the problems from the roads onto the pavements. Which I hadn't thought of but now that I have it's pretty obvious that it wouldn't be a good solution for a city like London.

Still can't believe Stef suggested closing the parks, though!!