Category: Transport

Flying Another Flag in Cyprus Is All Greek To Me

While enjoying a recent holiday in Cyprus, one thing which seems to still be around is the sight of the flag of Greece fluttering on buildings here and there.

This lovely island has been divided since 1974 into two separate entities.  Two thirds of this island, mainly in its south, comprises of the Republic of Cyprus, an EU member, populated by Greek Cypriots.  Whereas the northern third of this island is made up of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC).  A territory populated by Turkish Cypriots, but not recognised as a sovereign country anywhere, except by Turkey itself.

As we approach 50 years since Cyprus was partitioned, attitudes amongst some people on both sides seem as entrenched now as they were when Turkey invaded in 1974.  One of the main factors behind this division was many members of the Greek Cypriot population wanting union with Greece.  This situation was unacceptable to its Turkish Cypriot diaspora.  They wanted Partition rather than being part of Greece and it looks like they got what they wanted – but at a price!

That price is almost total isolation from the rest of the world, apart from Turkey.  All exports and imports to TRNC have to go through their Turkish benefactor across the Mediterranean Sea.  Calling Turkey a benefactor, apart from saving Turkish Cypriots from being massacred, is starting to wear a bit thin now as we approach 50 years since their armed intervention.

Flag flying Greek Cypriots also seem to be missing a trick here.  Turkey has encouraged mainland settlers to cross the Med to help boost TRNC’s population to try and outnumber their southern neighbours.  But this may be starting to backfire.  Turkish Cypriots tend to be secular and hold liberal views.  Whereas many of these settlers are farmers who tend to hold right-wing points of view, along with embracing a traditional religious way of life.

This may lead to a situation where Turkish Cypriots see themselves as having more in common with their southern rather than northern neighbours.  Many Cypriots lived together in peace and harmony across the island up to 1974.  There are still some places where it happens to this day.  Pyla is an example of this.  Situated inside the United Nations buffer zone separating both Cypriot territories and near Britain’s Sovereign Base Area of Dhekelia (my birthplace), Pyla has had a long tradition of cross community friendship and co-operation between its mixed Greek and Turkish Cypriot population.  It also hosts a campus of the University of Central Lancashire.

Pyla shows there is still hope for unity amongst both sets of Cypriots.  So Greek Cypriots continuing to wave the flag of a foreign country, which has no interest in them, doesn’t seem a very appropriate or helpful way of bringing these two communities together.  It’s a bit like Austrians waving the German flag.  This was done in their recent past, creating much regret.  Sadly, Germany’s most well-known leader was an Austrian.

Blackburn River Tunnel Hazards

Blackburn’s River Blakewater through the town centre became a magnet for illegal kayakers some years ago.

Many of these kayakers would try their luck following the course of Blackburn’s river as it flowed underneath our town centre.  This gave a new meaning to the term Whitewater kayaking.  It was more like Blakewater kayaking. 

To try and deter these kayakers, hundreds of gallons of seized beer was flushed down drains and into the brook.  This beer had been confiscated from some of the town’s shebeens.  These are illegal drinking clubs which are not licenced to sell alcohol products but do so anyway.  Licencing authorities are fighting an endless battle against these illegal drinking clubs.

It seems this beer was so badly made; it gave people rotgut and other ailments.  One man’s drink is another man’s poison, but in this case, it was every man’s and woman’s poison.  But for some reason this liquid was like nectar to midges which lived in the river tunnel.  For our local council it killed two birds with one stone.  Not only did it dispose of this illegal booze, it also created an explosion in the number of midges breeding in this tunnel.   It was enough to put off illegal kayakers from using this water course for their highly dangerous and unlawful sporting activities.

Unfortunately when you try to interfere with nature, not everything always goes to plan.  Due to this explosion in the midge population, it was decided a predator was needed to reduce their vast numbers.  This led to laboratory bats being introduced to feed on these tunnel midges.  Having bats in our River Blakewater tunnel also had by-products, such as their guano and a way of studying their radar.

One by-product which nobody wanted was what happened when these bats started feeding on the tunnel reared midges.  Their diet of rotgut beer affected the bats, causing them to mutate into aggressive blood sucking predators.  They started attacking kayakers passing through the tunnel, leaving grisly remains in the river.  Fortunately these didn’t last long in the water as mutant Piranha fish, also living in the river, disposed of any remains.

Due to well-known fears of this infamous fish, it wasn’t felt to be such a good idea informing the public a creature like this had somehow been introduced to the Blakewater.  It is thought Piranha fish were introduced to our town’s central river by accident.  Some tourists may have brought a few home, didn’t like them, so flushed them down their toilets.  A bit like what allegedly happened with alligators in New York City’s sewers.

Good news is kayakers seem to have been put off using Blackburn’s River Blakewater in pursuit of their sport.  A small matter of biting Midges, mutant Vampire Bats and Piranha Fish may have left them thinking they might end up the Suwannee without a paddle.

Blackburn’s Other Aqueduct

Nearly everybody from Blackburn, especially Rovers fans, will know where Ewood Aqueduct is located.  This 200 year old Grade 2 listed building carries the Leeds Liverpool Canal over both the River Darwen and appropriately named Aqueduct Road.

But what many Blackburners might not realise is the Leeds Liverpool Canal also flows over an aqueduct on the east side of town to traverse Blackburn’s other river – the Blakewater.  It’s quite understandable why this structure is not very well known.  This aqueduct looks like an ordinary wall.  You have to look over the top of it to see why it is an aqueduct.

There can also be confusion trying to find its exact location on a map.  It is next to the oldest of Blackburn’s three Whitebirk bridges, this one is now closed to traffic and only used as a footpath.  It is Bridge Number 104B, not to be confused with Bridges 104, 104A, 104AA and 104C in this neck of the woods along the cut.

Just to add even more confusion, nobody seems sure what name to give the brook which flows underneath this aqueduct and what it is called officially round here.  It certainly is known as the River Blakewater as it flows through most of Blackburn and under its town centre.  But from its source near Guide it is known as Knuzden Brook.  When it reaches Intack it becomes known as Abbott Clough.  Though maps have it still called Knuzden Brook when it reaches Whitebirk.  Eventually it becomes the River Blakewater, flowing down to Witton Park, for its confluence with the River Darwen.

From where our multi named trickle starts, to somewhere near Greenbank Police Station, it also serves as an official boundary between Blackburn and Hyndburn.  It’s looking like our smaller populated neighbour has had a good land grab here.  Spending £1 buying Whitebirk Power Station’s old site turned out be money well spent by Hyndburn Council.

As for the Whitebirk Aqueduct, it continues a Blackburn tradition of blanking out views of this little river which gave our town its name.  But you can see the river when looking down from this canal vantage point.  Access to the riverbank from Bridge 104B is difficult due to it being overgrown and across a fly-tipped rubbish strewn terrain.

Whitebirk Aqueduct is not as large or spectacular as its fellow structure at Ewood.  But it has the distinction of being older and in use before Blackburn’s better known aqueduct.  This was because the Leeds Liverpool Canal was finally completed to the west of Blackburn, years after reaching Eanam Wharf.  So we can thank the Romans – and the navvies – for giving us not just one, but two aqueducts, carrying Britain’s longest canal through Blackburn.

Blackburn Homeless Pods Canal Mooring Option

Following last winter’s successful use of homeless pods based at Shadsworth in Blackburn, suggestions have been put forward to store future similar accommodation at the town’s Nova Scotia Wharf.

In Blackburn with Darwen, our local authority has always provided accommodation to rough sleepers throughout the months of November to March.  This has been in place whether or not the Government’s Severe Weather Emergency Protocol (SWEP), where sub-zero degrees temperatures are forecast for consecutive nights, has been put into operation.

Things were complicated last winter due to Corona Virus.  Rough sleepers in previous years had been housed in communal accommodation.  But the pandemic brought a need for isolation of rough sleepers, due to a risk of further infection spreading in a place with one of Britain’s highest rates of Covid-19.

Homeless pods have been used as a way of providing shelter to our borough’s most chaotic rough sleepers who had been excluded from existing accommodation in Blackburn.  Funding for sleeping pods was provided through the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government (MHCLG).

These homeless pods can be utilised not only for possible emergency accommodation, but for many other uses too.  These could include sporting events taking place in Blackburn, along with potential future pop and rock music festivals.  The pods themselves are almost like a version of shipping containers.  They can be brought in for many uses and are very easy to store.  Due to their compact size, they can be transported all over the country.  This is usually done on trailers pulled by lorries, but they can also be adapted for trains and even floated on water.

This latter form of conveyance has been closely studied due to its favourable environmental impact.  It seems if you tilt these pods sideways, their dimensions mean they are capable of being transported along parts of Britain’s canal network.  This would include our very own Leeds Liverpool canal running through Blackburn.  There is also an ideal storage place for these pods at Nova Scotia Wharf in the town.

Storing these pods at this location, would also mean mass transport able to take place to sites along the canal where accommodation may be needed urgently.  Blackburn is the largest intermediate town on the Leeds Liverpool canal.  But this waterway also flows through large towns like Wigan and Burnley, whilst terminating at the very large cities of Leeds and Liverpool.  This canal also has a branch which connects it to the canal network in Manchester.  So Blackburn could become an ideal staging post to help homeless people right across the north of England.

Blackburn Travel Agent Offering Trips To Chernobyl

Chernobyl Dropov

Sick of stopping in during the Lockdown?  Fancy visiting a place which used to attract interest from all over the world?  One of Blackburn’s travel agents could have just the kind of trip you really need to give you a glow and radiate happiness.

At first I thought it was a joke when I looked in their window and saw an advert for four days in Chernobyl next August.  Some of us of a certain age remember the name of this place with horror.  It made Fukushima look like a drop in the ocean.  The Americans we’re lucky to get away with their own near miss at Three Mile Island.  But there was no escape for the Soviets when Reactor 4 overheated at Chernobyl.

Since that year of 1986, those Cold War days have been and gone.  The hatchet has been buried and new intercontinental destinations for tourism are always being explored.  Many people from those days will still have trepidations about going to this place.  No doubt travel agents will say people shouldn’t overreact.  Unfortunately this kind of description will probably still bring tinges of horror to many of us who remember it happening.

If you decide to go to Chernobyl, in present day Ukraine, there may be a few surprises in store for you.  Sunglasses used to be in great demand over there for many years and those on sale have extra thick lenses.  You may also hear the clicking of Geiger counters everywhere.  There is even talk of a Disneyland being built there.  Unfortunately their six foot Mouse is a real one.  They also have a duck.  It’s nowhere to be seen but signs in Ukrainian say Duck and Cover.

Chernobyl’s residents are known for their friendliness.  But western tourists are warned not to say certain things otherwise there may be a fallout.  This latter word must never be used.  Also when paying compliments to people, never mention their radiant smiles, otherwise they may have a meltdown.

With lockdown restrictions including certain travel abroad, perhaps we could see holidays of a similar nature in Britain.  After all, we have plenty of nuclear installations in this country.  Punk Rock fans could have weekenders at Sellafield.  There could even be a bit of Heavy Metal thrown in too.

Perhaps holidays in Chernobyl are becoming a new trend – known as Dark Tourism.  After all, there seems to be a fascination with the Titanic.  Hiroshima receives two million visitors a year and a similar number visit Auschwitz.   Maybe we could find something in Blackburn from our dark past to bring in the punters.

Blackburn’s New Penny Farthing Village

Plans are being considered over land adjacent to Blackburn Bus Station for building mixed-use housing.

This development’s name comes from its proximity to the much sought-after Penny Street which owes its own name to the price of property rental on this street back in 19th century Blackburn.

Along with rented accommodation, affordable 25% shared ownership property could be available to buy.  There is also an exciting option of hostel dwellings being included in the mix.  This could help satisfy our town’s growing demand for homeless accommodation and ease pressure on finding units for housing remand clients, currently on bail.

A novel approach is to be put in place where all residents who move into these dwellings agree to have a small tracking chip injected into their shoulder.  This would be painless and would biodegrade into their body after two years, before following nature’s process of removal.  There would be no need for tag wearers to feel embarrassed anymore when somebody asking them the time wants to know why they wear their watch on their leg.

Some wags though have likened the name Penny Farthing Village to Portmeirion in Wales, home of 1960’s TV series: ‘The Prisoner’.  They say most of its residents will probably be living there at Her Majesty’s pleasure anyway.  But people behind these proposals say whoever made these kinds of comments needs locking up.  They are proud to announce their intention to take residents under their wing.

Diversity is the key to Penny Farthing Village.  Entry to each dwelling will be by use of retinal scanning.  It was thought a similar method using fingerprints may put off some potential residents, reminding them of the process they went through to give them board and lodging in their previous accommodation.

But in a similar vein for people with experience of identifying by numbers, properties on this development will follow the same model as Blackburn’s innovative Romney Walk experiment.  This is where every house and flat has its own individual number and these follow each other in sequence around the estate, despite the road names changing.  They may have been named after the Cinque Ports, but nobody has ever been left out of sync finding their bearings around Romney Walk.

Proposals for Penny Farthing Village are expected to be submitted at the council’s next housing committee cycle.  If the committee doesn’t back-pedal with these plans, a chain of events could soon be put in place to set the wheels in motion.

The Vampires Of Zakynthos

Roving Mick and Sylvia recently had an enjoyable holiday in Zakynthos. Their one regret from this trip was how popular they were with the local flying insect life. This inspired Mick to use his great understanding of aesthetics and culture to write a poem about being bitten everywhere by mosquitoes – apart from one place!

The first day of our trip to Zakynthos
Was tastier than Blackpool Rock
But this was for the mosquitoes.
At least they didn’t bite my stick of rock.


They bit me all over my body
My feet while still in their sock.
At least they didn’t in one place
They didn’t bite my hock.


My legs looked like currant cake
With spots a leopard would mock
Yes I would like to change them
But they didn’t bite my springbok

We may as well have been in Africa
With lions and hippo who shock
But worse things are in the river
At least didn’t bite my croc

This biting from these Mosquitoes
Was like a peck from a giant Roc
Sinbad the Sailor couldn’t save us
But they didn’t bite my hammock

Lancashire lads and lasses
We’re very fine Northern stock
Clogs and shawls at the ready
At least they didn’t bite my smock


My timing wasn’t so brilliant
Fascinating said Mr. Spock
The mosquitoes were so logical
At least they didn’t bite my clock


We never took any precautions
Made ourselves a right laughing stock
The Chinese have a remedy
At least they didn’t bite my wock

But something’s started to appear
In a place that’s given me a shock
The little blighters have finally got me
Yes, they’ve bitten me on my c#ck!

Blackburn Bus Station Needs To Get Its End Away

Blackburn Bus Station has lived up to expectations since its opening in May 2016.  Compared to the cold and windy Boulevard, our new bus station is clean and modern with real time information and helpful staff on hand.

Unfortunately there is one thing they have done which hasn’t gone down well with everybody.  This is their erection of a Hollywood style Blackburn sign on Penny Street.  What has upset people is its letter ‘n’, at the end of ‘Blackburn’, being written in lower case.  Whereas the rest of our town’s name is in upper case letters.

For those with a keen eye, letters advertising the Mall’s ‘Next’ store can be spotted high above our bus station.  Like the bus station’s Blackburn sign, their letters are also all in white.  But they share only one letter in their respective names.  This is the letter ‘n’, which both of them have in its lower case – albeit in different fonts.

Could this be a coincidence, or did their letters come in one job lot?  Or could it be their suppliers had run out of the letter ‘n’ in this sign’s font and were sent two capital ‘U’s instead?  A bit of improvisation may have been put into action here and one of these ‘U’s may have been turned upside down and used to finish off the Blackburn name.

It’s quite appropriate that our new bus station sign is just across the road from Thwaites’ closed Fleece pub.  This pub is just below another well-known sign, also belonging to Blackburn’s local brewery.  Its sign has been known to raise a few eyebrows and even turned faces red on one particular occasion.  If this pub was open its landlord would probably say to the red-faced sign designer: “We don’t serve your type in here.”

But perhaps our mysterious lower case letter ‘n’ is really a master stroke of genius from the sign designer after all.  Following so many lengthy delays in building our new bus station and subsequent transport cutbacks, what better a subject for discussion than this alternative version of the Blackburn End?

It deflects attention away from problems affecting our bus station and transport problems in general.  This gives us something unusual to moan about.  We should class ourselves lucky they didn’t send us a small ‘r’ to go with their ‘n’.  Shoved together, this sign would have attracted even more hilarity to our new bus station.

Blackburn’s 200 Year Old Canal Anniversary

October 2016 marked the 200th anniversary of the completion of the Leeds Liverpool Canal.  This stretch, between Blackburn and Whittle-Le-Woods, was the final piece of the jigsaw in Britain’s longest waterway.

A cut above the rest

A cut above the rest

Our old ‘cut’ has changed over the years, mostly for the better.  As a teenager in the 1970’s I first enjoyed walking along the towpath through Blackburn and beyond.   In my pocket was a copy of a Nicholson Waterways Guide to the North West.  Unfortunately our waterway was like an open sewer back then, as industrial decline had finished off its commercial usage.  It wasn’t unusual to see the odd dead dog or cat floating by, along with all sorts of dumped waste items.  But there was a silver lining to this cloud.  A burgeoning leisure industry was starting to open up to the public.  Pleasure boats were replacing commercial traffic.

We even had a marina back then, which we could do with now.  Moorgate Marina was owned by a chap called Joe Bolton and its clubhouse eventually became a nightclub.  There used to be lots of cabin cruisers moored at the marina back them, but narrow boats were a rarity.  This reflected the situation on the canal at the time.  Now the narrowboat is king, but plenty of cabin cruisers are still to be found on the canal.  And in a reverse of fortunes, it is the canal which has become the place to be in Blackburn.  Housing has been built along its meandering western route.  Also the towpath has been resurfaced in such a way as to enable walkers and cyclists the ability to enjoy using it as a thoroughfare.  Anglers also park themselves at the towpath and watch the world go by along with the one that got away.

The canal eventually arrived in Blackburn in 1810, but took a further six years for the ‘missing link’ to Johnson’s Hillock to be completed.  It actually joined what was the old southern section of the Lancaster Canal, but the Leeds & Liverpool eventually took over this stretch to Wigan and continued on to its finishing point at Liverpool itself.  Sadly, the canals fell into decline during the 19th and 20th centuries due to the growth of railways and road transport.  But it is ironic that things started to change following our Blackburn MP, Barbara Castle’s 1968 Transport Act.  This encouraged canals to embrace leisure purposes and became the turning point in the fortunes for many of Britain’s waterways.

Many canals which shut down have since reopened.  This was thanks to the work of enthusiasts and a change of attitude towards their leisure and environmental value from the public and powers that be.  In Blackburn and along the rest of the Leeds Liverpool Canal, our waterway continued to operate where others closed down.  200 years of ‘the cut’ helped make our town into the large industrial base it became.  Hopefully our canal will continue to serve the town and add to its amenities and rich heritage for many more years to come.

Blackburn Bus Station : Open At Last!

Blackburn’s new £5M bus station finally opened on Sunday, May 1st 2016, after several false starts and over a year behind schedule.BS Open

We now have our new modern bright bus terminus open and ready for Blackburn’s travelling public.  First impressions outside look very nice and shiny, a bit like a giant greenhouse, when the sun is shining.  There are even flower beds and concrete slabs which suffice as benches for a sit down while waiting for your bus.  These are already proving popular with smokers and should give extra work to the street sweepers.  At least the Ainsworth Street shops will be pleased, the first thing you see, when looking at the bus station windows are mirror images of their signs.

Inside the building, it is bright and clean, though feels a bit cramped and claustrophobic.  This is down to the usual Blackburn town centre custom of trying to fit everything into as small a space as possible.  Being in a river valley and having the Blakewater flowing underneath – some things never change.  We were also used to having had a large open air facility on the old Boulevard, followed by something similar with the temporary site next door on Brown Street.  But there is always going to be room for improvement with such a new facility, though maybe not too much room to play about with.

My first impression was the design theme of the bus station and the preponderance of these rounded ‘V’ shaped structures everywhere.  Its ceiling reminded me of an upturned toast rack.  There also seem to be other obstacles in your way as you make your way through the building.  These are the information monitor stands and other new facilities added to help bus users.  But having facilities to assist the bus travelling public is something we’re not used to in Blackburn.  An information desk with helpful staff, large monitors giving departure times and bus service numbers and destinations are all very welcome indeed.  One of my old pet hates was sitting in a bus shelter on the ‘Bouly’ and people coming up to me asking if I was waiting for a bus.  And then asking me which one I was catching.  No excuse now, it’s all there in easy to read real-time.

We have a strange situation with our buses these days.  When I first saw the shape of our new bus station, I thought it was going to be too small for a place as big as Blackburn.  Now, after various withdrawals of council and county council subsidies and subsequent cutbacks of services, our new bus station might end up being too big!  On the bright side, Blackburn’s new bus station has opened during an unusual run of warm sunny weather.  Remember winter and the cold weather won’t be long in coming.  Then we will really start to appreciate our new transport facility and especially its handy sliding doors, keeping the cold, the rain and the wind out.