Field trip to London 30 Jan 2013

30 January 2013: On a sunny bright January day, we had a one day trip to London for a Tall Buildings Walkabout. We had 18 from the Tall Building Studio and 15 from the Long Span Structures Studio, using the same bus.

	Both studios started at the Building Centre in Store St. We almost always do this because it has a vast model of London, frequently updated, that shows the existing proposed and recent architecture of London.    The Long span people went on from here to see the British Museum, the Excel centre and footbridge and cablecar, the Millennium Dome and the Thames Barrier.
	While there, we had the chance to see the mini-version of the Prototyping Architecture exhibition that had been created by Prof Michael Stacey and some helpers, mostly from his 6th year studio in Nottingham. It looked better in the tighter and darker environment of the Building Centre exhibition space.
	We moved on to the offices of MAKE, the architect's practice founded by Ken Shuttleworth after he left Norman Foster's. John Prevc spoke to us, and we heard a lot about the master planning project for the Heygate area, adjacent to our site. Although we are not using Heygate, the lecture revealed a lot about the area, but for the students, I thought the more useful revelation was the methodology used by Make to compose and to communicate their proposals.
	Here we are in Whitfield St, having heard John and about to depart for the Elephant and Castle. The Red hat is a great benefit because it is so very visible in daylight. We started with 18 students, and despite walking the plan of London, using the Tube for several journeys, walking through subways and using a bus, we somehow managed to finish up with 18!
	At the Elephant, we had a good look at the site with the two possible locations for building Tall, over the [now demolished] hotel or the [now demolished] leisure centres. The park [churchyard] is likely to stay intact, with its mature trees.
	A year ago, this view looking north was dominated by two functioning leisure centres. I like the circle of standing stones in the park.
	Looking north from our site, we can see the shopping centre in the distance, and the edge of a highrise on the right that is the neighbour to the Strata and is being comprehensively refurbished.
	The London cyclists' 'superhighway' goes right through our site, and we would want to keep this too (I hope the students agree). In the distance is the Strata, residential tower.
	Just before it got too dark to take any more photos, here is the group in the Broadgate Circus - looking at the ice-rink. We had a hurried time seeing everything and getting back to the tube station in time, so there wasn't time to have a coffee and watch the students skating!

Field course in London

MAKE architects web page on Heygate Master plan

The Elephant and its new castle, the Strata tower

2nd Feb 2012: We had a day out in London, with students seeing the site and more. We started at the London Building Centre, seeing the large model of London, and viewing the exhibition of projects in the region... although these didn't include the Elephant and Castle probably because these are still at a consultation stage. We walked on to MAKE architects who have produced the most recent master plan for E&C and whose plan has been the subject of consultation in 2011 and 2012. John Prevc of Make delivered a talk about the area and about the proposals, and helped to paint in the context for the work we are doing on the St Mary churchyard site. We then took the Tube to Elephant and Castle, had a lunch in the E&C shopping centre, and then viewed our site. Although we can't get on to it, the site is flat, and we can see through viewslots in the hoardings. We had a good walkabout of the site and the locality, checking out Dante Road, the Leisure centres, the Strata tower, the Heygate estate, the railway arches and the Metro Centre flats.

The Shard is well under way, and has a baby shard being built nearby,
in the foreground

 We took public transport to the London Bridge Shard, admiring it from below, but not have had much luck yet with getting a ride up the tower while it is being constructed. That will come in future field trips.

From the Elephant, two thirds of the group took the classic London
Red Bus route to London Bridge, along the old Roman road line.
The others went by tube.....

We had a long walk from there, over the London Bridge, past the Monument, past the Fenchurch St tower building site. We enjoyed seeing the Leadenhall tower site and Lloyds building, and had a tea-stop under the Gherkin. It was about as windy and cold as many of us could bear, with Siberian winds blowing through London. Moving on north, we admired the Heron tower (with its megaframe, PV wall and giant fish tank), and then continued up past Liverpool St to the Broadgate Tower... from where we took the bus home. A good day out!

The group at the Broadgate Tower in freezing conditions, waiting for the bus!