Tag Archives: geotagged

Transport Scotland/ ScotRail refuse plaque marking Jordanhill Station as subject of one-millionth Wikipedia article

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A railway station in Glasgow, Jordanhill, is the subject of , as noted in Wikimedia’s 1 March 2006 press release.

Screenshot as of 19 January 2012

Because of this, the article has been translated into Wikipedias in many other languages, including:

Screenshot of language links

Alemannisch, Arabic, Welsh, Danish, German, Greek, Spanish, Esperanto, French, Indonesian, Italian, Latin, Dutch, Japanese, Polish, Romanian, Russian, Simple English, Finnish, Swedeish, Thai, and Chinese

(you can see links to these in the left-hand column of the article; please let me know if you can translate it into other languages).

Last December, I wrote to , an executive agency of the Scottish Government’s Enterprise, Transport and Lifelong Learning Department and as such accountable to Scottish Ministers, suggesting a plaque be erected on the station, noting this milestone, in collaboration with WikimediaUK, the registered charity that supports Wikipedia and related projects in the United Kingdom. I proposed that the plaque would include a barcode, allowing overseas visitors to see the article in their preferred language.

I have today received their reply, which appears to employ a stereotypical bureaucratic lack of imagination.

Jordanhill station is owned by Network Rail and leased along with the vast majority of all other railway stations in Scotland to First ScotRail to manage and operate on a daily basis.

I have discussed with ScotRail your proposal to install a plaque at the station to mark the one-millionth article on Wikipedia about Jordanhill. We do not wish to take this forward.

ScotRail has been delivering a comprehensive station re-branding programme which began in 2008 and will be complete in 2014. There are Brand Guidelines in place for this programme which aims to simplify and unify all station branding and this includes the removal of information from third parties.

I’m open to suggestions as to how to proceed, and who (and whether) to lobby to have the matter reconsidered. What do you think?

Unusual behaviour of Blue Tit at nest site

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During a walk in , Birmingham, this morning, organised by the RSPB Walsall Local Group (of which I am a committee member, webmaster and speakers’ secretary — I multitask!) we observed what may be unusual behaviour. A bird (or possibly a pair) were entering as nest site in a dead tree stump (probably Silver Birch (Betula pendula) ) by one hole, near the ground, but instead of leaving by the same hole, exiting via another, higher up.

The two holes are marked on my photograph:

Nest holes about 18 inches and 36 inches from the ground.

The adult was (or were, if both parents were involved) obviously bringing in food to feed nestlings inside the tree trunk. We observed five visits to the nest, and on four occasions the adult left by the higher hole. On the other visit, it left by the hole used as an entrance. At no time did we see more than one adult at once. Did each member of the pair perhaps favour one exit over the other?

I managed to grab a brief video of the final visit, using my , which I subsequently cropped heavily using Avidemux video editing software. The entrance is used in the first second or two, so you’ll have to pay close attention! Then there’s not much to see until it leaves 12 seconds later.

Unfortunately, pressure of time prevented further study.

Presumably, the nest was below the bottom hole — so why did the bird(s) pass that hole to leave by the higher one?

The mysterious case of Birmingham’s missing Victorian cast iron urinal

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My recent post about a metadata standard for syndicating information about public toilets, reminded me of an incident that occurred over 20 years ago, and questions about it, which have vexed me for years since…

In late 1986 and early 1987, to make way for the construction of the International Convention Centre in Birmingham, a number of older buildings had to be demolished, and entire streets disappeared.

West to East: St Martin's Place, Edward Street and Alfred Place, running parallel, between Broad Street and Cambridge Street

1949 map showing St Martin's Place, Edward Street and Alfred Place

On one of those, Edward Street, was a cast-iron street urinal. This was a listed structure: despite its mundane function, it was an impressive and decorative piece of Victorian engineering. The (then) Department of the Environment only gave permission for its removal on the condition that it was re-erected elsewhere. At the time, I was a volunteer at Birmingham Railway Museum, and so in January 1987 I wrote, formally, on behalf of the museum, with the approval of its management, to the City Council, offering a home for the urinal at the museum.

This request was refused by a council officer.

It was with some surprise, therefore, that we read in the Birmingham Evening Mail on 14 February 1987, an appeal from “Birmingham council chiefs” for a new home for the urinal:

Yellowing press clipping from 14 Feb 1987, showing the urinal

Birmingham Evening Mail, 14 February 1987

There were suggestions from members of the public that the urinal could go to the Black County Museum, or Avoncroft Museum of Historic Buildings — neither of which, unlike the Railway Museum, were in Birmingham, or had indicated any interest in the structure:

Yellowing press clipping from 21 Feb 1987, showing the 'Philip Colmore' column logo

Birmingham Evening Mail, 21 February 1987

I wrote to the Evening Mail, and to the Council, pointing this out:

Yellowing press clipping from 128 Feb 1987

Birmingham Evening Mail, 28 February 1987

Eventually, after reconsideration, the council’s Technical Services Committee (made up of elected members) agreed that the Railway Museum could after all have the urinal.

It was about this time that my ten years of volunteering at the museum came to an end, but I was told that the urinal had been dismantled and delivered to the museum, where it was placed in store.

Remarkably, the museum now tell me:

It is believed that the urinal was disposed to another museum … but I regret that at this length of time there is no record of where

So, where is our listed urinal — part of the City’s cultural heritage — now? Did the museum obtain — or need — the council’s or English Heritage’s permission to give up this object? Why were the public not consulted about the change of location, as they were the first time around? And did the council fail its legal duty to see that it was re-erected?

Update, 25 May 2011: One of my moles has suggested to me that the urinal may never have been delivered to Birmingham Railway Museum, and that it may even be languishing in a Birmingham City Council store. Are either of these things true? Let’s hope we find out. Meanwhile, the mystery deepens!

Update, 3 June 2011: The Birmingham Mail have written about this post, and there’s a Birmingham Post article about this post, too.

Update, 22 September 2011: Birmingham City council have just informed me that the urinal they have in store (referred to in my 25 May update) is not the one from King Edward’s Place, which their records say was sent to Birmingham Railway Museum. They are trying to locate the relevant paperwork for me. So the issues remain: where is our urinal, and was the legal requirement to reinstate it complied with?

Ian Emes’ ‘French Windows’ and Pink Floyd’s ‘One of These Days’ at Ikon

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This evening, I went to the opening of a new exhibition at Birmingham’s Ikon gallery, ““.

The exhibition celebrates Ikon’s artistic programme from 1970 to 1978, and I particularly enjoyed Peter Sedgley‘s hypnotic Corona and David Hepher‘s No. 21.

David Hepher's 'No 21', painted in 1973, and Becky, who wasn't even born then.

But for me, as a Pink Floyd biographer, the highlight was undoubtedly the chance to see not only Ian Emes’ 1972 animation for the band’s One of These Days, projected onto the wall of a room the size of my living room (and in better quality than the YouTube version below), but also several cells from the animation, allowing close inspection. The film is accompanied by Pink Floyd‘s music (or is that vice versa?); sadly the sound system isn’t up to the job.

I had been told that my new book, Pink Floyd: The Music and The Mystery , would be on sale, but apparently there was a supply issue. Maybe soon?

Ian Emes will be giving a free talk on 18 August (booking essential); the exhibition itself runs until 5 September 2010.

Update: Spelling corrected; it’s “Emes” not “Eames”. Thanks to Matt Hogan of Ikon for pointing that out. Sorry, Ian!

Update 2: I wrote a Wikipedia article about Emes.

Location: 52.477597, -1.912346

Wine REPugnant

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I love The Rep in Birmingham. It’s a great theatre, with a noble history (as the civic Birmingham Repertory Theatre), and the staff are invariably helpful and friendly. But I’ve been disappointed recently to see that they’re using six seven “Heatstore” electric heaters (four pictured) outside the building.

Picture shows four of the seven electric heaters outside Birmingham Rep's Wine Rep

Every evening when I pass by there, the heaters are on, over empty tables, with no-one benefiting from them. This is madness, from an environmental and a financial point of view.

I decided to let them know that I thought so, not least since Jon Bounds tells me that I’m good at complaining (I think he meant that as a compliment, and that any complaints I make are always well-founded and cogently-expressed, but I could be wrong…). The heaters actually belong to wine REPublic (see what they did, there?) the trendy wine bar within (and owned by) The Rep, so I phoned and spoke to their manager.

He told me that they’re only [sic] on for three hours each night — we don’t use them during daytime (so that’s the equivalent of having one heater on for 75% of the time 21 hours a day, then), that they are low voltage [sic] and that we aren’t allowed to discriminate against smokers, we have to give them somewhere to smoke.

230-240 volts, 1350-1500 watts'

Which leads me to ask the question, since when has discrimination against smokers been outlawed? Why have no pubs or wine bars been fined for doing so?

And if smokers are protected, why are the Rep allowed to discriminate against them in the daytime, when the temperature is still below freezing?

(Bus) stop this madness!

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One afternoon last week, I had cause to catch TWM‘s 997 bus from central Birmingham to Great Barr, while my car was in the garage, for its annual MOT test (it passed, I’m pleased to say).

I have mixed views on public transport: on the one hand it’s a good thing (TM), in that it’s available to all, environmentally friendly, and so on, but on the other hand, it usually involves the kind of user-experience which makes it undesirable for anyone who doesn’t have to use it through lack of choice.

I had already used the 997 into Birmingham that morning. It’s a limited stop service, and I must say I had been impressed that the level of comfort was higher than I was expecting.

I wasn’t sure when where to catch the bus for my return journey, so looked up the route on the Transport Direct website.

The way that site works makes it impossible to link to the relevant timetable, but as this screenshot shows, they clearly say that the service departs from Carrs Lane in Birmingham City Centre.

[Transport Direct web page showing Carrs Lane as start of route 997]

I arrived in good time for the advertised departure, but none of the three bus stops in Carrs Lane listed the 997 as stopping there.

Purely by chance, I happened to see the 997 turning into Carrs Lane, from High Street, only to stop at a pedestrian crossing. I indicated to the driver that I wished to board, and he kindly opened the doors and allowed me to do so.

I subsequently found that the 997 does not stop in Carrs Lane, but around the corner — and earlier on its route — at stop DG, on High Street (map here).

[showing corner of High Street & Carrs Lane]

The above picture shows the corner of High Street and Carrs Lane. The bus stop on the extreme left is stop DG, on High Street. On the extreme right, it is just possible to see stop DH, the nearest on Carrs Lane. Note also the pedestrian crossing at the start of Carrs Lane.

The bus I boarded had already departed from its stop. Had it not been for the pedestrian crossing and the kindness of the driver, I would have missed the bus, and thus missed the chance to pick up my car before the garage closed.

TWM and Transport Direct need to work together to eliminate erroneous information from the latter’s service, not least if they expect to entice car drivers onto public transport.

[997 at stop DG on HIgh Street, Birmingham]

Triple tags on Twitter

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Triple tags (known as Machine Tags on Flickr) are a way of tagging web content with tags having three parts: a namespace, a predicate and a value. This means that we can differentiate between content about a (tagged taxonomy:vernacular=beagle) and (tagged maritime:vessel=beagle). Of course, that relies on everyone using the same tagging schema (my two examples could also be tagged with, say, pet:dog=beagle and history:ship=beagle). Fortunately, communities of web authors are agreeing on such schema.

One schema that is widely used is for geo- (or location-) tagging, where posts such as my picture of a Kingfisher on Flickr are tagged with (in that case):

  • geo:lat=-1.56403
  • geo:lon=53.60913

In other words, the coordinates of the place where I took the picture (pages using that schema are also often tagged with ““).

Kingfisher at Bretton Lakes, South Yorkshire

It is then possible for Flickr to display that picture overlaid on a map of the location.

The Flickr page is also tagged:

taxonomy:binomial=Alcedo_atthis
taxonomy:genus=Alcedo

which gives the scientific name (binomial or binominal) of the Common Kingfisher, Alcedo atthis, including the Genus, Alcedo.

Another form of tagging, using hash tags, is used by the social media text-messaging service Twitter. Tags in twitter are prefixed with a hash symbol (#), hence the name. A “hash-tagged” message might look like:

I live in #England

Hash tags are parsed by three sites that I know of (there may be others — if so, please let me know): Hashtags (e.g. ), Summize (Summize for “#blog”) and Twemes ().

All well and good.

It occurred to me recently that it should be possible to use Triple tags in Twitter messages, so I posted these “tweets” as they’re called (I find that rather, er, twee):

#tagged post about #Kingfisher #taxonomy
( #taxonomy:genus=Alcedo,
#taxonomy:binomial=Alcedo_atthis )

(See
http://twitter.com/pigsonthewing/statuses/849630924)

and:

Is anyone is parsing #geotagged posts like this: #geo:lat=52.478342 #geo:lon=-1.895389 ( #birminghamuk #rotunda #geo #geotag #tripletag)

(See
http://twitter.com/pigsonthewing/statuses/853592240)

(line breaks have been inserted to improve readability)

Disappointingly, none of the three hash tag parsers above managed to understand these. They all see “#geo:lat=52.478342” as just “#geo” and “#taxonomy:binomial=Alcedo_atthis” as just “#taxonomy”.

Worse still, Hashtags wrongly displays my two posts without the second two-thirds of the tag content, as:

#tagged post about #Kingfisher #taxonomy ( #taxonomy #taxonomy )

(see http://hashtags.org/tag/taxonomy/)

and:

Also wonder if anyone is parsing #geotagged posts like this: #geo #geo ( #birminghamuk #rotunda #geo #geotag)

(see http://hashtags.org/tag/taxonomy/).


See also:

Wouldn’t it be great if services which parse hash tags in Twitter messages also recognised “hash-triple-tags”?

[Update: Summize was bought by Twitter and is now absorbed by them as Twitter’s own search.]

[Update: Hashtags.org now parses the triple tags as, for example, just “#taxonomy”]

[Update: David Carrington of Dabr tells me that some of these triple tags are too long for Twitter’s search API. I’ll try to find out what the limit is, and raise the matter with Twitter’s support people]

[Update: There is now a tool to automatically generate tags for Flickr images of living things; iNaturalist tagger.]

Oops

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A WindowsXP error message, projected onto a building in Birmingham, for all to see.