A Funny Thing Happened To Me On The Way to Work...

Laughter and commuting are words that rarely co-habitate in the same sentence. Words like mundane, repetitive and annoying are more likely verbal bedfellows when recalling your morning journey. The rare exception to this rule occurs on those the days when you happen to get on the Chiltern Line train that happens to be operated by that driver who happens to have a lunch-box full of one-liners beside him in the wheelhouse.

If you haven't heard this guy's morning soliloquies I won’t hold your skepticism against you. I majored in Skepticism, with a double-minor in Cynicism. The truth is, this type of unsolicited banter and observational commentary is the sort of self-indulgent intrusion I normally detest. Even now each time he starts with the jokes I find myself thinking 'Oh, leave it out…'. But half way through his act I start smiling a little bit. Even stranger, I find myself actually looking at other commuters and sharing a smile with them, too! Wow. On the commuter circuit that’s about as common a sight as seeing someone flossing their teeth. It just doesn’t happen.

The truth is, this guy isn't that funny. It's all really a rather pedestrian attempt at comedy. But that's just it…at least he's attempting it. It's more than most people do. And let's be honest...this is a tough crowd. You’ve never seen longer, greyer, less-ready-to-laugh faces than on a rainy Tuesday morning commuting in to Marylebone.

So, put your skepticism away, turn your Blackberry off and enjoy this guy while you can before someone reports him. Reports him for what, you might ask? Heaven knows? But he surely must be breaking some kind of rule! Using Official Property To Electronically Distribute Personal Opinions That Do Not Necessarily Reflect The Policies And Opinions Of Deustche Bahn, maybe?

You know what…I’m only half joking.

Commuter Roulette

It’s a rare Chiltern Line regular who doesn’t dabble in a spot of Commuter Roulette now and again. It's all done very quietly and no money ever changes hands (that I know of) but that doesn't mean it's not happening. Believe me, it is. In between furiously typed emails and in the split second gaps when newspaper pages are turned a committed and growing number of homeward-bound passengers are sizing up their neighbors and making their calculations.

It’s a simple enough game to play; you merely look at the commuters around you and guess which stop they will get off at. There are myriad variations depending on which train you're on. For example, if you are on the 7:33 to Stratford-Upon-Avon and you live in Beaconsfield the extent of your game is to guess who is continuing onward and who is getting off at Beaconsfield, the train's first stop. On the other hand, if you are on the 8:06 milk run to Aylesbury you will experience the maximum challenge. I'm talking Wembley, Northolt Park, The Ruislips, Denham, Gerrards Cross, Beaconsfield and beyond. Only with the full compliment of stops can you properly test your skills of observation and intuition.

So, what are you looking for? What is it that indicates a person’s provenance? Well, age plays a role, as does time of travel, type of newspaper being read and type of electronic device being used. Depth of tan tells you something, as does accent, cut of suit, presence of cycling gear and degree of spatial courtesy shown to neighbors. All these seemingly innocuous little clues can, to the well-trained eye, be converted into raw data which can then be applied to your betting.

So, lets get started. The key focus when trying to spot someone likely to alight at the first few stops (Wembley, Northolt Park and Sudbury Hill and Harrow) is age, style/quality of clothing, proximity to the doors and quality of case. If you see a young man in a High Street leather jacket standing by the doors with a carrier bag he is not going farther north than the southern-most Ruislip...at best. Dead cert. Bet heavily.

Next up are the Ruislips themselves, South and West. Ruislippers are tough to nail and are, by and large, an instinct call. Haircut and footwear (neither any good) can provide guidance for a would-be Ruislip spotter, but the sharper eyes are focusing for what’s not there. The jacket not hanging on the little bolt on the back of the chair in front. The lack of food and drink in hand or cupholder. The absence of a three-inch thick Wallander novel. It is this sense of impermanence, this lack of even the most temporary signs of nesting that marks out the abbreviated journey of a Ruislipper.

Now it gets a bit tougher. Post-Ruislip we enter an area I call the Fairway, a continuous string of posh Golf Clubs around which have sprouted the towns of Denham, Gerrards Cross and Beaconsfield, with the tough-to-pin-down Seer Green and Jordons sandwiched in the middle.

For what it’s worth, I don’t really have a tip for SGJers. Like their town, I am at a loss to find anything interesting or remotely distinguishing about them and so usually just thumb my chips at this point.

As for the other three, as I say, it’s tough. By and large commuters from all these places look similar. My advice is something like a spread bet. Break the carriage down into three groups: Comfortable, Well-off and Loaded. Then put all you’re your money on the Well-offs bailing at Denham. Oh, and ignore anyone on board who looks uncannily similar to Ruislippers as you now know the remaining people on board with bad hair and bad shoes live in High Wycombe.

OK, all that’s left now (if, like me, you live in Beaconsfield), is separating the Gerrards Cross lot from the Beaconsfield crowd. Posh and Becs.

As rule GXers are a bit fatter, have deeper tans, wear a better quality (though more predictably cut) suit and are considerably louder than their Beaconsfield cousins. If you hear a South African accent, you are hearing a GXer. If you see slicked-back hair, you are seeing a GXer. Honestly, it’s not hard. If you feel a sort of inexplicable loathing…put your money down.

As for the Beaconsfield lot. Bromptons are a bit of a giveaway. Slightly younger, cooler professionals tend to get on and off here. As do, sadly, a lot of long-skirted women with a briefcases and trainers. There seem to be more oldies getting off here, too. It’s not the best-looking lot but (and I admit to being a bit biased) there is something reassuringly genuine about us Beaconsfielders, I’m sure you’ll agree.

Change For a Pound, Guv?

They say everything has its price. Well the price to relieve yourself at Marylebone Station is 30p.

Not 40p. Not 25p. But 30p.

I'm not sure how they arrived at this price, but one can only assume that after a series of studies, focus groups and heated debate between senior ranking Chiltern Line officials and various transportation ministers, 30p was adjudged to be the optimum tariff for these services. Debatable, of course. But surely in greater need of debate is the reason to charge at all?

Should this not be a free service provided to passengers? Are we not right to feel exploited when our biological needs are seen as another opportunity to generate increased cash flow? Furthermore, are we to believe this dribble of earnings has any noticeable effect on the bottom line of such a transportation behemoth (and Chiltern Line owner) as Deutsche Bahn?

No, there must be another reason. But what? We can probably assume it's not to discourage commuters who need a wee from having one (what would be their motivation be for doing that?). So who are they trying to discourage going in there? Drug dealers? Gangs of unruly youths? Prostitutes? If they are, it's working. I go to Marylebone station twice a day and have yet to see a single hooker or junkie hanging around making deals...just commuters. And the spiciest thing most of us are looking for is a bag of Thai Chili crisps from M+S.

The truth is I actually wish they'd bump the price up to a pound. What happens when you arrive with only a 20 pound note and a few pound coins in your pocket? Then what? You're a grown man with a briefcase and a bag of groceries and now you either have to sneak into the Victoria and Albert pub and use their facilities (which incidentally are the world's most disgusting) or hop over the turnstiles at the pay toilets. I opted for the latter a few months back when this happened to me and while I took a certain satisfaction at giving two fingers up to the man, I also very nearly crashed to the floor when my trouser leg got caught on one of the turnstile bars. If that had happened I almost certainly would have expressed my growing frustration by kicking one of the stall doors, which would have been captured on CCTV, which would have been watched by a security guard, who would have been waiting for me outside and taken me to some depressing office to issue me a fine.

I know there are far more important issues to be resolved in the world right now, but nineteen quid for a peak return ticket and I can't even have a free wee? I've had enough. It's time to take to the streets. Come on! Who's with me?

Super-Aggressive Public Keyboard Fingering

It is a sound that is only twenty years old and yet already it has broken into the top 50 annoying sounds of all time, surpassing bubble gum popping and closing in rapidly on public whistling. And secondly only, in commuting terms, to the despised earphone-spillage. It is the rapid-fire tip-tap of that Next-wearing, middle-management-aspiring boffin with the 5 year old Dell laptop who always seems to sit two seats away from you.

Clearly the noise alone this thrusting young Turk makes is quite bad enough, but it's actually the layers of subtext so easily read into his furious fingering which so amuses and annoys.

The palpable sense of urgency. The wave of importance pulsating off him. The focus, the flare, the obvious potency. And, of course, the speed. Few people can type as fast as me. Ever. You don't even have to look at me, just listen. Hear that? Sure you do. That's the sound of my urgency. Others may play at committing their important thoughts to electronic paper, but not me. No, I am executing this contact report on yesterday's meeting the way an Olympic sprinter executes a race...with focus, commitment and savage speed. Blackberrys? iPhones? Way too small. Way too quiet. Don't make me laugh.

Don't I know you?

The commuter's life is one of repetition. What happens today is, more or less, what will happen tomorrow. And what will happen tomorrow is, more or less, what happened three days ago...on the train, at least. You get used to it. You come to expect it. In time you even start to like it. That nothing new will happen sort of removes any responsibility to pay attention. Why waste time looking out the window when nothing changes?

The other day, however, this Groundhog Day-esque ritual moved on to a new level of surreal duplication when the person who sat beside me on the way into London in the morning sat beside me on the way back up to Beaconsfield that night. This same-day seating dopio is among the most unnerving and, indeed, rarest of on-train coincidences. Most will go a whole working life commuting without experiencing it, but I am no longer a member of that club. I have been blooded.

In this situation the question that comes to mind first is does my repeat seating partner know what's happening or not? Secondly, do I mention it? It feels weird not to, and yet exactly what conversation is meant to commence whether he has noticed or not...one about coincidences? How deep could that be, especially when we both know we'd rather be reading World Cup predictions in our Evening Standards?

No, as you might expect, neither of us said a word to each other about the coincidence or, for that matter, about anything else.

Plus ca change.

Departure Board Personality Test

Marylebone is not a big station but it still offers the homeward bound commuter a number of options when choosing a place to stand and wait for the big board to announce the platform number for his or her train. To be precise there are five main waiting positions in the station and while the one you choose may not seem significant to you, the subtle difference in each position speaks volumes about the personality type of the commuter. What follows is a handy way to find out what your chosen standing position says about you as a person.

DIRECTLY BELOW THE BOARD:
A simple and honest, if somewhat unimaginative choice. This entry-level waiting position does exactly what it says on tin. There is the board, I'm standing under it and waiting. Boom. Nothing wrong with that. People who stand directly below the board are mostly straight-forward, clean-living people, if a bit dull. Few, it must be said, are high achievers. But that's no surprise. Especially to them. Bless.

UP NEAR THE TURNSTILES:
Interesting. While not prepared to stray too far from the safety of the big board, this subtle shift toward the platform effectively removes these commuters from the fray and puts them one step closer to the turnstiles when their track number is finally assigned. If this is your standing place you are fractionally smarter than a Below the Boarder...but not much. Your puny evolution in standing position scarcely disguises a distinct lack of ambition unlikely to be limited to train stations.

THROUGH THE TURNSTILES, TO THE RIGHT AT THE BASE OF TRACKS 1 AND 2:
Ah...I see what you did there. Initiating a pre-emptive move through the turnstiles but still within viewing distance of the big board provides these canny commuters with a decided advantage in train proximity (and therefore prime seat choice) over their more conservative co-commuters. And tucking out of traffic's way behind the wide goods gate shows a degree of courtesy not often found in modern train travel. If this is where you stand, congratulations. You are a sharp, ambitious mover with a caring side. Doff of the cap, sir.

THROUGH THE TURNSTILES, TO THE LEFT AT THE BASE OF TRACK 3:
You noticed that little mini-board hanging there, did you? Well spotted. Sure, it's intended use is for the station master, whose office it's attached to and sure, you're blocking the way a bit, but what the hell, you've paid for a ticket and it's a free country. These controversial commuters tread a narrow path between ambitious and irritating with, quite frankly, irritating pipping it most often. If this is your patch you are bold, strong-willed and highly, highly annoying. Now move out of the way you selfish bastard so we can get by!

HALFWAY UP THE PLATFORM ON TRACK 3:
Wow. These bad boys aren't afraid to roll the dice. Yes, they're farther up the tracks than any other clutch of waiting commuters and yes they have located another blurry mini-board...but it's risky up there. People who wait here know their train usually arrives on one of the higher number platforms...but not always. It's precisely this uncertainty, this potential for mayhem that a rebel commuter like this lives for. This dangerous game of platform poker exposes the maverick side of his personality. It's not for everyone, but these Adrenalin junkies feed off the risk and reward of such a ballsy waiting position. More power to you.

Norms, Observations and Annoyances: No. 7 - Tin Soldiers

Tin Soldier is the name given to a commuter who chooses to drink canned beer on his return journey to the suburbs.

While this is perfectly legal, makes no noise and certainly, within the confines of the train carriage, isn't harming anyone there is still something mildly disturbing about open on-train commuter beer drinking.

University students on their way home from a gig is one thing. But it's something altogether different when it's a businessman heading home on the 7:06 for dinner with his family. Tin Soldiers are usually a pretty uniformed lot: suited, mid-40s, large of body, ruddy of face. And they always drink the same beer...M+S specials. The green tins of lager being by far the most popular.

So what is it that makes this so disturbing? It's not a fear of drunken behavior as there's not enough time to get properly wankered on a commuter train. And it's not the oddly misplaced smell of alcohol, though that is pretty off-putting. In truth, it's more the smell of desperation which is a bit disconcerting. How great is your need for beer that you will publicly consume a semi-warm can of own-label lager rather than wait until you get home? Furthermore, how little do you care that the everyone around you thinks you're a bit of a dick?

Actually, that last bit makes me like him a tiny bit more.

Annoyance Ranking: 5

Look Away Now

Train journeys into major cities are rarely the prettiest of trips. Usually the tracks wind their way past old industrial areas and the backside of unfortunately placed apartment blocks covered in amateurish graffiti. The Chiltern Line into Marylebone Station is no exception. In fact, by the time a London-bound train passes Denham there's really not much of beauty to see out either side of the train save for maybe the view of Hampstead off in the distance to the left as you roll over the rooftops of Kilburn.

There should be one very notable exception to this, however. Wembley. As home to the national game the new Wembley was expected to project a certain power. It was intended to be a building that would transfix and inspire all those who saw it. To fill arriving opponents with fear and fans with pride. It was intended to do all these things..but it doesn't.

What it does do is stand as garish a reminder of what a visionless country England has become. That a nation able to design and construct architectural diamonds like St Paul's, The Houses of Parliament, the BBC headquarters, the Lloyds building, St Pancras station old and new, could have permitted the building of such an enormous tribute to averageness speaks of a loss of something at the higher levels of society. Perhaps confidence. Perhaps creativity.

Either way, what commuters passing by each morning see is a very expensive and very forgettable national symbol. The truth is, if you took away that silly and quite meaningless arch few people in this country would be able to tell the difference between the new Wembley and countless other instantly dated glass and concrete sports stadiums around the world, from Dusseldorf to Durban to Dayton, Ohio.

And that's a pity.

Norms, Observations and Annoyances: No. 11

Bag-Blocking refers to the act of placing one's bag or briefcase on the seat beside you in the hopes that it will dissuade new joiners to the train from taking that seat into consideration. It is widely considered to be the most offensive of all commuting annoyances for several reasons.

Firstly, it's just plain rude, greedy behavior. Secondly, it's a mild form of intimidation in that a Bag-Blocker is forcing an innocent commuter to ask the rhetorical question of whether or not the seat is free. Thirdly, and most annoyingly, this behavior involves play-acting on behalf of the Bag-Blocker. Initially it's the I'm-so-caught-up-in-what-I'm-doing-that-I'm-not-even-noticing-the-train-is-rapidly-filling-up false gaze they give their laptop. This is then followed up with faux surprise when someone asks them to move their bag. Oh yes. Of course, goodness me. What was I thinking?

Arse.

Annoyance Ranking: 10

Seating Rituals

Studies show that people follow the same predictable pattern when choosing where to stand in a lift depending on how many people are in the lift ahead of them. If there is nobody in the lift a passenger will stand at the back directly behind the button board. If a second passenger gets on, he/she will almost always choose to stand at the back in the opposite corner. If a third person enters, he/she will stand in front of the second passenger. And if a fourth passenger enters he/she will stand in front of the first passenger. So, all four corners now being taken, when a fifth passenger enters he/she will take the center. If a sixth or seventh passenger joins we now enter that terrifying phase (especially for Brits) where talking to (in the form of 'scuse me and pardon me) and, God forbid, even touching other passengers comes into play.

A similar, but possibly even more labyrinthine, game of human sudoku is played out by commuters each morning on trains all around the country as they unconsciously make their seating choices. Here is how it unfolds on the Chiltern Line (Note: these observations apply only to the 'Networker' Class of train. AKA...the older ones).

Before we start...the seating plan: on the Networkers there are by the doors and in the mini-cabins at either end of the carriage, a series of double seats on both sides of the aisles which face the backs of the seats in front (doubles). In the central part of the carriage the bulk of the seating consists of double seats facing double seats (quads), and across the aisle, triple seats facing triple seats (sixers).

The accepted (yet unspoken) rule in this daily game of elimination is to choose a position in the carriage which places you in the best available and most desirable seat (window/leg room/no obstructions) which is also the farthest away from anyone else. Decisions are made on the go as static calculations will cause loss of ground (and seat) to your hungry rivals. Once a passenger sits down it's game over as it's very bad form to get up and move again, though this does happen a bit on homeward-bound journeys where trains start full and get emptier stop by stop.

So...here's how it plays out: Two people entering an empty carriage will invariably choose a front facing window seat in a quad or a sixer at opposite ends and opposite sides of the central part of the carriage. If the first of these two is really in the zone, he/she will select the side of the train least likely to be 'greenhoused' by the morning sunlight.

As more people enter they will make the same selection as the first two, soon filling all the remaining prime seats. For passengers joining after all the prime seats are gone, the trade-offs will begin.

Those boarding the train at the next stop will now select aisle seats in the quads and sixers so as to avoid sitting opposite or beside the people in the window seats.

At the following station new passengers face a deeper dilemma; despite only 2 out of 4 places in the quads being taken, and only 2 of the 6 in the sixers, it is now no longer possible to sit in one without being beside or opposite someone. As the last compromise to be made in this game is usually direct contact with another human being, the doubles now start to get popular. The double guarantees only one person beside you (and potential none if the train does not fill to capacity) but the leg room is reduced and they're a bit claustrophobic.

When the first seats in the doubles are gone you have a train still less than half full and yet has no more free seats that aren't beside or opposite another passenger. With distance from others now removed from the selection criteria, the hierarchy of desire shifts back to the original priority list. So now any remaining front facing or aisle or window seats go, rendering the quads full.

With quads full and the sixes now full at their four corners (leaving only the dreaded middle seats free), the remaining seats in the doubles are now quickly gobbled up.

Passengers joining at the next stop are now confronted by a carriage with only middle seats in the sixes reaming. As direct contact with 3 other passengers is now unavoidable (one on each side and one opposite) one must quickly calculate which of the available middle seats offers the best chance at personal comfort. The experienced commuter is quickly scanning for a tiny woman vs a fat man. Someone reading a paperback as opposed to a newspaper. Perceived odors from food or drink and perceived noise from mobiles or headphones come into play in this phase of the game.

This is not quite the end game, though. That comes when there are literally only 2 or 3 seats reaming in the whole carriage. With passengers pouring in from both sets of doors you must now simply dive for any seat you can as you absolutely positively do not ever want to stand.

Norms, Observations and Annoyances: No. 8

Door Entitlement refers to the belief held by some Door Hunters (see: Norms, Observations and Annoyances No. 3) that once positioned on the bit of platform where the doors normally come to a stop you are entitled to your 'first in' status even if the train deviates from its normal stopping position and drags the doors further down the platform thus rendering you out of position. You can easily spot commuters with a sense of Door Entitlement by their desperate efforts to elbow past the lucky (and far less arsed) commuters who while initially out of place now find themselves, as a result of the driver missing his mark, in a lucky pole position for carriage entry and the choice of seat that goes with the privilege.

Annoyance Ranking: 8

The 7:33 to Somewhere Else

Trains and the great stations that marked the beginning and end of their routes once held a magical allure for most people. The very sight of them brought to mind images of adventure and escaping to unseen far-away places. No more...at least not for the weary modern commuter. To him there are no more unknown bends in the track, nothing beyond that horizon he hasn't seen before all too many times. To him a train is merely a rolling waiting room from which he will soon alight onto the exact same bit of asphalt as the day before and the day before that. Train travel to him isn't about adventure, it's about tedium and predictability.

But even the most jaded of daily commuters into Marylebone Station must certainly permit themselves just a moment of escapist fantasy when glancing over at the Wrexham and Shropshire Line's 7:33 to Wrexham General purring away on track 3 as it prepares to depart. Unlike the brightly coloured modernist stock most of us travel on these days, which have more in common stylistically with European street trams than genuine trains, the Wrexham and Shropshire is a proper passenger train.

Who among us has not looked over at the grey, vaugely old school locomotive idling away with the large and largely empty carraiges behind it and not thought, even just fleetingly, of turning around and escaping the daily treadmill by simply climbing aboard? Where is it going? Who knows? Who cares?

As a foreigner to these shores I must admit to having absoutley no idea where Shropshire is or what it looks like...but in my mind I am quite clear. It must be a place of rolling hills and over-grown grass where cows graze and insects dance in the air. A place where dark, tree-shaded rivers wind their way slowly along the outer edges of lush pastures. A part of England locked in time, untouched by the forward march of hideous progress.

If commuter trains have slowly drained all the romance from train travel, The Wrexham and Shropshire is doing it's best to single handedly put it back.

A few months back, the line survived a legal battle against the financial might of Virgin for control of the service between London and Wrexham. A real broad-gage David and Goliath story. Thankfully...David won again, and for a while the Wrexham and Shropshire became the most talked about line in the land.

Here are a few of Ian Jack's words about the line taken from his column in the Guardian:

April's morning in the hour after daybreak. A kipper is brought to the table, with toast and marmalade and a pot of coffee. Through the carriage window, blossom shoots from the hedges like upward-growing snow. Gymkhana fences and allotments lie idle, waiting to be jumped over or dug. A woman in a headscarf walks two terriers towards some woods. We are on-board the Wrexham and Shropshire line train to Wrexham.

Steadily we moved north through the Chilterns. The carriages smooth- and quiet-running 30-year-old bogeys and as steady as a rock. The cutlery refused to rattle and the coffee never escaped its china. "The full English or the full Welsh, madam?" the steward asked of the woman behind. "What's the difference?" "No difference, just served with a different accent."

Not a new joke, one suspects, but lets be honest, new is not really what you're after on a journey like this.

When Clever Met Silly

As a life-long cyclist who rides his bike to Beaconsfield station every morning I should really be an outspoken champion of the Brompton bicycle set. Those dedicated eco-friendly suburbanites proudly flying the nuclear-yellow flag of enlightened commuting (in the form of a reflective rain resistant riding jacket) who ride/carry their fold-up Bromptons to work each morning...but I'm not. And I don't know why I'm not. On paper it all makes sense. It saves them parking costs at their home station. It saves them clogging up the country roads so the school run mums can drive faster. It saves them taking a cab or the tube on the London end of their trip. All of which saves them money and shaves a few inches off the carbon foot print they leave on the world. So why I am so cynical?

I can't find one reason in particular...so here are seven:

1) Wet bikes on crowded trains are dirty and annoying.

2) Persistent wiff of self-satisfaction and superiority oozes from all Bromptonites.

3) Not sure I would trust a banker whose suit traveled with him to work in a ruck-sack.

4) As a rule...English men are way too pale to wear shorts in public.

5) Impossible not to look ridiculous riding a bike designed for children and circus clowns.

6) Hard not to be suspicious of suburbanites who insist on screaming 'Look....I'm alternative'.

7) No one really needs to see middle-management in Lycra.

A Very English Construction Project

Any seasoned commuter will tell you that over time you learn to calculate the distance remaining to your stop not by looking up at the scrolling on-board screen or by swinging your head left to right to catch station names as platforms flash past, but by using your peripheral senses to keep a constant monitor on your whereabouts. A bend in the track, A highway passing beneath you, a clearing in the trackside brush. Anyone of these minor deviations from the norm can be detected while reading the paper or sending emails and will act as a nearly subconscious indicator as to your whereabouts. None are easier to read along the Chiltern Line than the low-lying horizontal halogen lighting which illuminates the Gerrards Cross tunnel.

Ah....the Gerrards Cross tunnel. A 300m long never-ending paean to modern English engineering prowess. For those unfamiliar with the original intention, Tesco was to cover a length of track east of the station, pile landfill on top of it (so it's not even really a tunnel) and thereby create a new patch of real estate upon which Tesco would construct a supermarket, and presumably a few hundred much-needed parking spaces. Brilliant.

So in the face of 90% local opposition they moved forward with the project. That was in....2004. In 2005...the tunnel collapsed, narrowly missing a west-bound train which had already departed Denham Golf Course and in full view of passengers waiting on the Gerrards Cross platform. Oops. The mess, which was blamed on a torrential rainfall the previous day, was tidied up and after a period of assessment and consultation the project resumed again. Five years on and the site still looks like...well, a site, and the good citizens of Gerrards Cross are no closer to having a new Tesco, the added parking spaces or even just the absence of a gigantic eye-sore in the middle of the town. In fact, it doesn't even look as though they have fully buried the concrete tubing over the tracks yet. I'm no engineer...but how hard can this be?!

A quick comparison for you. The Channel Tunnel connecting Britain to France took six years to complete and covers a distance of 38kms. The Gerrards Cross tunnel connecting Gerrards Cross to, erm, Gerrards Cross has thus far also taken six years to complete and covers a distance of roughly 300m.

We all know these things are never as easy as they look, but surely this project cannot be nearly as hard as they're making it look.

Warm, Unwelcome Smells

Any homeward-bound journey is rife with hazards which may offend and upset the commuter. The risks vary in a sort of sliding-scale manner depending on the hour of your return. Between 5pm and half seven you will deal with the annoying crush of crowds. Between half seven and 9pm trains run less frequently, so being two minutes late to the station will ensure you are 30 minutes late getting home. Post 11pm you will obviously be sharing the car with loutish drunks and their bad breath, loud voices and frequent trips to the loo. By far the worst window to choose is the 9 to 11pm slot. Why? Because travelers in this window are too early to have been out for dinner and too late to make it back for supper with the family. The result is a carriage full of commuters (usually male, usually in suits) indulging in the most grotesque and inconsiderate of evening meals...the publicly consumed hot Cornish pasty.

The first indication of what's coming your way is the crinkle of the West Cornwall Pasty Co. bag. How will you recognize it? Simple. Most everything else these days is carried in plastic, so the sound of a hand manipulating paper can only mean on thing. Any doubt is immediately laid to rest by the on-rushing smell-wave of hot, wet meat which very quickly envelopes your head, chair , clothes and, indeed, the whole carriage. What is it about the smell of other people's food that is so disgusting? Is it possible for smell to have a temperature? Why is the sound of people breathing through their nose and chewing so vile? You will be tempted to move seats but don't waste your time. Remember, you are traveling in an enclosed space often with heater fans on full blast shifting the food stink back and forth from one end of the car to the other. And secondly, these inconsiderate West Country carnivores travel in packs. No, all that's left for you to do is breath through your mouth and try and channel your anger and disgust into something positive. Like remembering to leave earlier tomorrow.

The Psychology of Free

The commuter's pleasures are few. Occasionally an interesting conversation with a stranger. Occasionally an orange sunset sneaking through the trackside trees on the journey home. But mostly it is a study in the layers of dullness. It's no wonder then that whole carriages of grey men stare into their Blackberries the entire length of the workward journey to avoid, one suspects, having to look up and face a sea of unwanted reflections in the mirror.

So, thank heavens for the Evening Standard. For generations a familiar source of end-of-day news and b-grade gossip. Unlike all the other London dailies (some newsier, some gossipier) the Standard has a genuine point of difference beyond its editorial slant; it prints during the day, not over night. It is precisely this difference in timing which allows it to so regularly scoop the next morning's dailies and provide commuters with a first crack at the big story of the day.
Above and beyond, it has decent sports writers, a readable TV guide for that night and a small crossword puzzle which perfectly strikes the balance between too easy and can't-be-arsed.

Recently, however, the Evening Standard became the 'Free'vening Standard, joining the ranks of Metro, the London Paper and various other forms of waste paper jamming up the city's rubbish bins.

The thinking behind the shift in business model is not hard to understand. Free equals more readers. More readers equals higher circulation. Higher circulation equals more expensive advertising rates. Which equals more profit.

Considering the Standard was well on its way to bankruptcy one can't really blame the new owners for trying something fairly radical. However, in their efforts to fatten the goose I wonder if they aren't sewing the seeds of its arterial clogging and inevitable (and now far less honourable) death.

The first change I noticed in a post paid-for Evening Standard world was that they're not where they used to be. In the case of Marylebone Station, the newsagent's. Why? Because the newsagent was getting tired of the entrance to his shop being jammed up by the hordes of people drawn to 'free stuff'. The second was you can never get one anymore! If you take the train home any time past 7pm the vendors are all packed up and gone. Sold out - or whatever the free equivalent of sold out is. Never mind the late-working long time customer.

In truth, that last point is a lie. You can get them past 7pm...you must just be willing to pick one up off the floor or out of a bin because that's where so many of them wind up.

Which brings us to the bigger, more serious consideration in all this...what role does paying for something have in raising it's perceived value?

To my mind it plays a very big role. When something is free it is, by definition, of no value. I don't ever remember garbage-picking Evening Standards when they cost 50p. No, you read it, you held onto it, you finished it at home. And beyond just a very evident willingness to toss Evening Standards aside, has this perceived lack of value not also carried over to the ideas and opinions contained within? I suspect it has. Who dreams of writing for a paper that gives it opinions away free of charge? Who trusts or values the content of a paper that is trying to appeal to everyone? Are its notions balanced and fair or are they of whichever sort will attract the most readers, however fleeting those readers may be?

In a period of seemingly constant change one comes to depend on the comfort of small, familiar things. A friendly pub, a local market and, for me, an Evening Standard...that I pay for.

Oh...and one with a glossy magazine on Friday, too. My wife will never forgive them that one.

Beaconsfield to London

A funny thing happened to me on the way to work the other day...I realized that whether I liked it or not (and in spite of my wearing trainers, T-shirt and big dark sunnies), I had become a suburban overland commuter. I knew the train schedule. I knew how long it took to cycle to the station. I knew where to position myself on the platform so as to be perfectly aligned with the doors when the train came to a stop. I knew which carriage was most likely to have a free seat (the rear one). I knew which seats had more shoulder room and more knee room. I knew all the things a suburban commuter knows because...I was now one of them.