Framework

The new  C4DI building is coming along nicely and is due to open in October.

Block of colour

Anlaby Road, Hull

The Weekend in Black and White is here.

Turner Prize

I suppose I must mention that the Turner prize will be hosted by the Ferens in 2017. The announcement yesterday came with full reporting from the BBC arts and farts correspondent as well as national press coverage. As the head honcho of the upcoming Culture fest says; if you want to see it you must come to Hull. That's if ...

Meanwhile a story in the local rag the other day said that the Council intend to put a glass atrium over the entrance to this building. All part of the many million pounds of sprucing up that is going on. (Where is this money coming from?) It's incomprehensible vandalism; there's absolutely no need for an atrium of any sort on this building. It is symptomatic of the crass inanity of Hull City Council. I'll have more on this stupid organisation's activities in the near future.

Escape Route

You know that old joke about the best thing in a place is the road out of it; well this is the road out of here. Seems I forgot to post yesterday; oh dear, how sad, never mind...

Brickwork

I'm thinking they had a job lot of bricks that, erm, fell of the back of a lorry, as it were, and well it's a shame they don't all match but who is going to notice? No-one ever comes down here and certainly no-one with a camera ... here's Park Street bridge in all its colourful glory.

Brand Name Recognition

I wondered if it was only in this country that a transport company has a spotters fan club that reports sightings of its lorries as they go about their business on the highways and by-ways. A little searching on the web (it's a bank holiday that's my excuse!) finds a lorry spotting website with over 4,000 paying members (£25 a year) who try to report the make and number of as many lorries as possible; a somewhat eccentric pastime but harmless I feel sure. As for myself I'm no great Stobart fan I prefer a Norbert Dentressangle any day but better still that rara avis Prestons of Potto ...

A fondness for orange

I think it's the stated aim to be the "best education a creator will have" that kinda sticks in the craw. To my unimaginative nose there's a strong whiff of old fashioned baloney about this place.

That place once again

I think they sell Apple computers ("More power behind every pixel" ??!!!) in this shop  but that doesn't stop there being a good reflection of the Maritime Museum.

Weekend Reflections are here.

HUL1/1

Park Street bridge is not just Park Street bridge; it is bridge HUL1/1 and not to be confused with any other bridge.

The weekend in black and white is here.

Rusty railings

With some time to spare before an appointment a small diversion along Park Street may not be everyone's idea of entertainment but there a few things to catch the eye and pass the time. 

Girt big pylon

Beside the bridge on Park Street this pylon serves to carry a couple of antennas to keep us in touch with the world and all its goings on.

Conversion

What to do with a no-longer wanted masonic hall? Turn it into a Hindu temple and cultural centre seems like as good an idea as any. The temple opened four years ago and is, so I've read, the only one "east of Leeds". The remarkably symmetrical facade has been left unaltered save for covering up a freemason sign with the sign you see above.  The building is on Park Street, off Anlaby Road.

Pendulous Racemes

Thwaite Street, Cottingham

It's that time of year when those botanical cousins, Laburnum and  Wisteria, seem to vie to produce the most flowers.

Hull Road, Cottingham

Cleminson Gardens

The renovation and make-over of Cleminson Hall is now complete at long last and apartments are on the market. A two bed flat is advertised at £275,000 which seems like a lot to me especially as the photos don't seem to show anything special just a dull flat in an old house. Still there's some nice trees around the place. Oh and while I'm here the new housing development has a street name: Cleminson Gardens, how sweet.

All white now

This is the former Port-Side restaurant that I posted a long while back. Then it's sole point of interest was the purple decor; now it's just boring.

Propping up the facade

Oh dear the scaffolding has gone up on the recently fire-damaged Lambert Street Chapel. The side walls have been knocked down by half and I hear the rear wall will have to come down too. Scaffolding means the facade might be saved, it could also mean a long, long wait. On Beverley Road scaffolding has been up on one building since 2011 . Hopefully the facade can be incorporated into whatever new building arises in much the same way as the old Cooperative Institutes facade which stood for decades in splendid isolation was eventually incorporated into a new apartment block on Kingston Square.

The Weekend in Black and White is here.

Timeless Hallgate

I thought I'd give Margot's photo of Hallgate an antique aged makeover to make it seem like was taken a hundred or so years ago. Apart from the TV aerials, satellite dish, multiple rubbish bins, the road markings and safety barrier for little Cottinghamites, neon street lights and the scar on the road left by the installation of fibre-optic cable I think I managed quite well. I honestly don't know how the old folks managed without all these boons to life.

Looks like the back end of a bus

This is not just any bus parked up outside City Hall, no this is a Beat the Street bus, a luxury coach for the entertainment industry complete with bunks, kitchens, every conceivable mod-con for the comfort and ease of the hard worked artistes. I think the artistes in question were a band known as Texas who come not from the USA but from Glasgow in the newly independent state of Bonnie Scotland.

To see the cherry hung with snow

I don't know if A E Housman ever came to the City of Culture but if he did I'm sure he'd have appreciated these loveliest of trees even if they are on Clough Road which is as far from a woodland ride as you can get.

Margot, who is quite possibly Mr Housman's number one fan, took this.

Perhaps Wendy Cope is a bigger fan.

I think I am in love with A.E. Housman,
Which puts me in a worse-than-usual-fix.
No woman ever stood a chance with Housman,
And he’s been dead since 1936.

Wendy Cope

Two car family

There's a fashion these days to turn your front garden into a car park. Of course not every household has two of these beasts lurking on the lawn or what's left of it. 

The traditional result

"They came on in the same old way and we defeated them in the same old way." ...

Arthur Wellesley, First Duke of Wellington

Well my election predictions were accurate as far the local constituencies were concerned. How was I to know that the rest of England, for this was an English phenomenon, was to swing to the Conservatives in such a way? So we'll have five years of  cuts to public services, increased privatisation of the NHS, tax cuts to the already rich, benefit cuts to already impoverished, probable exit from the EU, more devolution to Scotland (effectively independence). Oh how could I forget the future gerrymandering of constituencies to ensure 20+ more Tory seats in England. This is democracy at work they say. Well this is the votes of 37% of those who voted outweighing everyone else in this medieval, first past the post, crap shoot that passes for democracy in this country that has given us, yet again, a House of Commons that lacks legitimacy. This may sound like sour grapes but even with proportional representation the Conservatives would most likely have won. So Labour goes off once again to pick the meat off its bones and study its bellybutton, the Lib-Dems crash back to the position they were in fifty or more years ago (never, ever go into coalition with a right-wing party!), and the little Englander party, UKIP, learns the hard way that democracy in the UK is not about winning votes.

 *Here endeth the lesson*

" a traditional left-wing party competes with a traditional right-wing party, with the traditional result”.

Tony Blair

A beck runs through it

Taken by Margot K Juby

If you wander through the snickets of Cottingham you'll come across this little beck. It may look fairly harmless but some idiot built houses right next to it and becks being becks have a tendency to spill over now and then flooding said houses. Well D'oh!

Arson about

...and that makes three. Following fires at the Cornmill Hotel and then Lambert Street chapel it seemed only a matter of time before yet another derelict building got the ordeal by fire. Investigators says they cannot rule out a link between these fires. So far no-one's been injured but give it time ....

I have posted several times  the sad tale of this place the latest is here.

I think I may have jinxed Joynsons, the shop with the scaffolding in the background. Shortly after mentioning they had been trading here since 1890 a large piece of masonry fell off the building, no-one was hurt. Ooops!

The weekend in black and white is here.

Vote grey today!

So it's finally here, the happy, glorious day. After six weeks or so what is called campaigning the great demos get to vote for their favourite teddy bear, no sorry member of parliament. I know of no-one who has changed their minds in this time, so maybe they could just cut out the BS and get down to the X on paper time in a couple of weeks.

It's roughly midday on Thursday 7th and already I can tell you the result in this constituency and the neighbouring three, without a vote being counted. The Tory will win where I live, Haltemprice and Howden. Tories have won in this constituency since the 1830's without fail. It's the second safest Tory seat in the country in this regard. Consequently I shall not be bothering to make a choice or rather I shall write in 'None of the above'. In the three Hull constituencies Labour will win as they have done since the 1960's. Does this remind anyone of the old rotten and pocket boroughs? Well it does to me. 

When it's all over then the horse trading starts and that might be passably interesting/entertaining with the present lot appointed by a Civil Service coup in 2010 (and voted for by no-body, let's be clear) claiming the other lot lack legitimacy. Pots and kettles! And when it all falls apart we'll be back here again within a year with any luck.  This is why it's known as the Mofo of Parliament.

Devil's Music

On Saturday in town there was a choice between evangelical rap (or was it hip-hop? my ignorance of pop genres is vast) renditions of bible verses or the good old devil's music; rock 'n' roll. Hmmm. No choice really. This trio were not too bad; that is to say they kept in time with the drummer which is unusual even for professionals. They drew a small appreciative foot-tapping crowd and applause (again almost unheard of for buskers) One thing I did notice is that every song they did began with "Well ...." I think that must be a fifties thang.

Dundee Chambers

Dundee Chambers, on Princes Quay, used to be the offices of the Dundee, Perth & London Shipping Co. Ltd. This company ran ships up and down the coast from Dundee to London with all ports in between as well as other destinations.(DP&L History) Hull seems to have had good connections with the bonnie City of Dundee as this company took over an existing Dundee & Hull Shipping Company in 1857. Dundee is famed for its three J's: Jam, Jute and Journalism. I can see Hull benefiting from the first two but it's clear, if you've ever read the local paper, that the third J never made it.

This building is now part of the Sugar Mill nightclub on the corner of Posterngate

I'm just a walking the dog

'For what do we live, but to make sport for our neighbors, and laugh at them in our turn?'

Jane Austen

I caught this couple walking their pet just across the road the other evening. For some reason I don't think this puppy will win any prizes at Crufts. 

Bank Holiday Sunday

Bruiser is always touched by our presence

.... and a Bank Holiday Monday to come, so many exciting things to see and do ....

Margot took this. And don't tell me he's lost most of his teeth he still eats more than is imaginable.

For the union makes us strong

"People of the same trade seldom meet together, even for merriment and diversion, but the conversation ends in a conspiracy against the public, or in some contrivance to raise prices."

Adam Smith

Workers' unions, as we all know, are a Bad Thing, but associations of employers are a boon to the economy and strengthen trade and business and are therefore a Good Thing. Here on Queen Street the glowing future of the region is being forged by the great leaders of enterprise. Solidarity Forever!

Weekend Reflections are here.

12 Floréal CCXXIII

"The French Revolution caused great loss of life, liberty, fraternity, etc., and was, of course, a Good Thing, since the French were rather degenerate at the time; but Napoleon now invented a new Convention that the French should massacre all the other nations and become top nation, and this, though quite generate, was a Bad Thing."

Sellar & Yeatman, 1066 and all that

Next Thursday the voters of this land go to chose members of one of the most successful revolutionary institutions in the world. Yes I do mean Parliament, which was formed to restrain Plantagenet excesses,  and which has led two revolutions, beheading one king and overthrowing another and creating the means to hold Government to account. Well that's what it says in the textbooks and they wouldn't lie to me would they? Obviously all thought of revolution has gone out of the place, I hear the old building is nearly falling down (perhaps with the members still inside, perish that seditious thought!). But we live in troubled times, so they say, and this next parliament could see the exit from the EU, the break up of the UK and the immiseration of millions. Or not, as the case may be. Probably not, but I doubt heads will fall in any case that's not the style these days instead a place in the Lords awaits any failed minister.
Personally I’ll just sit here and watch the river flow, I hear Chelsea will win the Premier League this year, Hull look like staying up and did you see England win the cricket the other day, and will it be a Royal boy or girl and ain't it cold for Spring?

Today's image for the City Daily Photo theme of Revolution is from a ghost ride at Hull Fair, a celebration for the local yokels of things going round and round and getting nowhere at their own expense.