View allAll Photos Tagged Telephony
… Eckersley started off with the Royal Flying Corp as a Wireless Equipment Officer working on speech communication (telephony) to and from aircraft. After the First World War he joined the Marconi company and in February 1922 he became an announcer, broadcaster and engineer at 2MT Writtle, the first radio station in Britain permitted to broadcast scheduled programmes. In February 1923 he was appointed as the first Chief Engineer of the British Broadcasting Company Limited. His leadership, vision and energy were instrumental in establishing a network of BBC main stations (including 6BM Bournemouth) and, later, a series of relay stations. He also had a pivotal role in conceiving the regional ‘twin-wave’ stations that were constructed in the late-20s …
… he gave an amusing lecture to the BBC Engineering Society in 1960, luckily recorded for posterity (and IMHO well worth a listen), confirming his not inconsiderable ego and talent as a speaker albeit marred by some misogynistic quips. Regrettably, he also dabbled with the National Socialists in the early 30s although I think he saw some light and redeemed himself in the Second World War …
Eckersley quotes:
“Broadcasting, so it seemed to me, would allow amusing and interesting people to get in touch with an amused and interested audience.”
“The B.B.C. was formed as the expedient solution of a technical problem; it owes its existence solely to the scarcity of wavelengths.”
A slightly different take on the iconic telephonics building, and an excellent example of the sharpness of the 70mm Limited at f2.8!
This image has been digitised from Queensland State Archives, Series ID S2149: Railway Glass Plate Negatives - Queensland Rail Heritage Collection. It is one of the images depicting the many stations, bridges and tracks that people and goods travelled from, on and through all over the Queensland Rail network.
Roma Street Railway Station occupies a 0.55ha site within the extensive Roma Street Station transit complex, located on the western side of the Brisbane central business district. The substantial masonry station building (1875) is set back from and faces Roma Street (although partially obscured by later development), and has a prominent centred entrance to the front (south) and a platform along the rear (north). A later platform and awning to the south is associated with the former Country Station development (1939/40).
Features of Roma Street Railway Station of state-level cultural heritage significance are:
Station building (1875)
Platform (1875)
Country Station platform and awning (1939)
Views
The state-level periods of significance of the place are layered and relate to its origins and use as a passenger station (1875-1940) and railway design, traffic and management offices (1875-1974), and the establishment of the former Country Station (1939/40).
A large iron-roofed shelter (c1980) to the east of the station, small buildings to the west, and a lift, stairs and escalators accessing the modern subway below, are not of state-level cultural heritage significance.
The Roma Street Railway Station was opened in 1875 as the first Brisbane Terminal Station for use on the Brisbane end of the Southern and Western Railway Line from Ipswich. The two-storey station building was designed by Francis Drummond Greville (FDG) Stanley, the Colonial Architect and Superintendent of Public Buildings, in 1873 and built over the next two years by Brisbane builder, John Petrie. The station operated as the Brisbane terminal station until 1889, as a major passenger and administration station until 1940, and Brisbane’s primary railway goods facility until 1991. It served as offices for the Queensland Railway Department (later Queensland Railways, later Queensland Rail) staff for over 100 years, and is the one of the oldest surviving railway buildings in Queensland.
In the Australian colonies, governments fostered the development of railways as a means of developing the country and encouraging settlement. It was argued that rail would reduce freight costs and save travel time for passengers.[1] Queensland’s first railway survey was undertaken by the New South Wales Government in 1856, and following separation, Queensland Parliament passed the Railway Act in 1863, enabling railways to be constructed in the colony. The railway network developed along decentralised lines extending from ports to pastoral and mining centres. The first line, between Ipswich and Bigge's Camp, 34km west of Ipswich (later Grandchester, QHR600729), was opened in 1865. This was the first stage of the four-stage Southern and Western Railway project which linked Ipswich to Toowoomba in 1867, Warwick in 1871, and Dalby in 1878. New railways opened west from Rockhampton in 1867 (the Northern Line, later renamed the Central Railway), west from Townsville in 1880 (the Great Northern Line), Cairns in 1887, and south from Normanton in 1891.
The Southern and Western Railway served the pastoralists and industrialists of Ipswich and the Darling Downs, and was primarily for goods, rather than passengers. With the railhead at Ipswich, a railway to Brisbane was not initially considered essential, as goods could be shipped from Ipswich to Brisbane’s port for export. However, the Bremer and upper Brisbane rivers could not cope with large shipping, and lobbying began for an extension to Brisbane. A preliminary survey of possible lines was completed in 1865,[4] but concerns over the extension’s financial viability put work on hold. A Royal Commission on Railway Construction was called in the 1870s, and recommended the extension: the business generated by it was likely to be profitable, and the colony’s economy, which had collapsed in the mid-1860s, had been bolstered by the Gympie gold rush and was better able to afford new infrastructure.
The extension between Ipswich and Oxley was approved in August 1872,[6] and, the first sod on the extension was turned at Goodna in January 1873. From Oxley, two lines had been surveyed, terminating either at North or South Brisbane. After extensive debate, the route to North Brisbane, via a bridge at Oxley Point (Indooroopilly), was chosen as more cost-effective. The terminus of this route, selected by Railway Department Chief Engineer HC Stanley, was located within the Grammar School reserve at the base of the ‘Green Hills’ (Petrie Terrace). The site was unused by the school and was large enough for a major passenger station and goods yard.
The section between Oxley and Brisbane was approved in October 1873,[9] and the Government called for tenders for the construction of the railway terminus station in Brisbane. FDG Stanley, the recently-appointed Colonial Architect and Superintendent of Buildings within the Public Works Department, was the designer of the building. Stanley had commenced with the Public Works Department in 1863, serving as Superintendent of Buildings after Charles Tiffin vacated the Colonial Architect’s position. He was the official Colonial Architect from 1873-1883, when the colony, recovering from the economic collapse of the 1860s, began to invest in public buildings. Stanley’s designs, balancing classical styles and stylistic features with climate-appropriate adaptations and economic restraint, helped define public architecture in Queensland. Extant examples of major works, designed while he was Colonial Architect, include the original State Library (1876-9, QHR600177); Toowoomba Court House (1876-8, QHR600848); Townsville Magistrates Court (1876-7, QHR600929); Townsville Gaol (now part of Townsville Central State School, 1877, QHR601162); Brisbane’s Port Office (1880, QHR600088); Toowoomba Hospital (surviving kitchen wing 1880, QHR601296); post offices at Gympie (1878-80, QHR600534), South Brisbane (1881, QHR600302) and Toowoomba (1880, QHR600847); as well as the Brisbane Supreme Court (no longer extant). As Superintendent of Buildings he designed the Toowoomba Railway Station (1874, QHR600872), Government Printing Office (1873, QHR600114) and Lady Elliott Island Lighthouse (1872-3).
The Brisbane Courier provided a detailed description of the proposed Terminus Passenger Station in October 1873:
The general style of the building will be that known as the Italian Gothic order of architecture. The material used...will be pressed brick with cut stone facings, this being chosen on account of its durability and as also affording the greatest consonant with economy. The station will consist of a main building, two storeys high, flanked at each end by a single storey wing.
The building was designed to house both a passenger station and railway administrative offices. Passengers would access the station from Roma Street via a carriageway, disembarking at the station’s central carriage porch. The porch fronted a 10ft (3m) wide arcade running the length of the main building. From the arcade, passengers would enter either the first-class booking office on the east or the second-class booking office on the west, both served by a semi-circular ticket office on the rear (northern) wall. Female passengers travelling on second-class tickets could wait in a small room located along a western passage, while separate waiting rooms for first-class male and female passengers were east of the first-class booking office. Doorways in the rear wall of the booking offices and waiting rooms led directly onto the 190-foot (58m) long departure platform. Arriving passengers exited the station via a second platform across the rail line. Luggage was loaded onto trains via the luggage passage, on the eastern end of the building. The guards and porters room, staff facilities, a lamp room and stairs to the upper floor were situated in the eastern wing. The western side of the building held public services, including the telegraph office, station master’s office, and parcel and book office, accessible via a public lobby at the end of the arcade. A private staircase to the traffic managers’ office, a staircase to the traffic department, and toilet facilities were located in the western wing. An office or book stall space, in the northwestern side of the building, was accessible from the platform.
Upstairs, the offices of the traffic department, clerks, accountant, draughtsmen, Railways Engineer, Resident Engineer and contractors were accessed from a central passageway which ran almost the length of the building; with a small S-bend in the western end. An arch in the centre of the corridor marked the separation of the traffic department from the Chief Engineer’s office. Both wings hosted staircases.
The building included adaptations for the climate. The arcade sheltered the ground floor rooms from the sun, while skylights in the ceiling and a ventilated lantern provided light and ventilation to the upper floor. All public rooms and most of the offices were fitted with fireplaces. A platform shade, installed on the northern wall of the building over the platform, sheltered passengers from the weather, and was composed of material from an iron station building imported from England for use at Toowoomba. It was supported by brick buttresses at both ends of the building (extant) and on the arrivals platform (no longer extant).
Commensurate with Stanley’s design approach, materials used for the station reflected elegance but economy. Apart from the recycled iron roof trusses and columns, the building was constructed of machine-pressed bricks made from locally-sourced clay, more affordable than stone, and praised as ‘cleaner, sharper [and] finer’ than Brisbane bricks used in earlier buildings. Freestone for the building dressings and columns was sourced from Murphy’s Creek.
Construction work took place over two years, after contractor John Petrie’s tender of £11,845 was accepted in December 1873. Progress was slow, with the stonework foundations underway in June 1874, and the building only ten foot above the ground by September. The line from Ipswich to Brisbane was opened without ceremony on 14 June 1875. The platform at Brisbane Terminus Passenger Station was half-paved, the rooms and corridors incomplete, the roofing over the platform in progress and there was no permanent lighting. Nonetheless, an interested crowd gathered to watch the first outbound services leave the station. The building was sufficiently complete by August 1875 for the Brisbane Courier to describe it as ‘in all respects convenient, handsome, and well-designed’. The station’s arcade was later highlighted as one of Brisbane’s valued architectural features.
The Brisbane to Ipswich route quickly became the busiest section of line in Queensland. Merchandise and imported goods from the ports were despatched along the line, while produce from the Darling Downs and surrounds – including coal, flour, wool, hay, maize, livestock, vegetable and dairy produce – was brought to Brisbane. A central goods handling facility was opened at the Terminal Station, including a large (64m long) goods shed and two sidings, erected in 1875-6 (no longer extant), while railway produce markets opened outside the station, along George and Roma streets. A maintenance yard also operated at Roma Street, including locomotive and carriage sheds. By 1882 the Terminal Station platforms had been extended to cope with the traffic and trade. Traffic reduced slightly after some export goods were diverted to South Brisbane in 1884,[32] but expanded again.[33] Cattle yards, produce sheds, carriage sheds, gas works, goods sheds, coal stages, cold stores, additional locomotive sheds and siding extensions were all added to Roma Street’s goods yard. None of these structures survive in 2020.
Passengers also used the line. Residential occupation of Toowong and Indooroopilly boomed as middle-class city workers took advantage of the four daily train services. In 1882 rail lines were opened from the Terminal Station to Sandgate and the Racecourse, taking day-trippers to the seaside and races, and bringing northern suburbs passengers into Brisbane. In January 1888, the first through-service to Sydney departed from the Terminal Station. However, travellers criticised the lack of direct access from the Terminal Station to the central business district, and in 1889, the Brisbane Central Railway Station was opened. Central Railway Station (QHR 600073) – located closer to the General Post Office and city office buildings – became Brisbane’s main passenger station, and the original Terminal Station was renamed Roma Street Railway Station.
Despite its diminished status, Roma Street remained a major centre for passengers and travellers. Through the 19th and early 20th centuries, guards of honour lined Roma Street to greet and farewell significant visitors and figures, including premiers Morehead and Griffith, governors Norman and Lamington; Governor-General Munro-Ferguson; the late politician JM Macrossan, who had died in Sydney; singer Nellie Melba; Lord Kitchener; and Salvation Army General Booth. Roma Street continued to operate as the Sydney Mail terminus until 1931, when the service shifted to South Brisbane. Crowds thronged to Roma Street Station as soldiers departed for the South African War and World War I. Travelling circuses performed in the Roma Street yards, and an historic parade in 1936 included a ‘Puffing Billy’ locomotive, which was displayed at the yards until 1959. Roma Street also continued as the city’s primary goods terminus.
The station building played an important role as office accommodation for Queensland railway staff. Internal rearrangements were made to the building to accommodate growing staff numbers, and improve their working conditions. It was one of the first buildings in Queensland to feature electric light, installed in 1884.[50] The Chief Engineer vacated the building in 1901 and was replaced by the general traffic manager’s department, with a telephonic system of communication installed the same year. Bunker, lumber and message rooms were added to the wings by 1907; a traffic collector’s office and new strongroom were installed in 1911; and parcels, printing offices and machine rooms replaced the first-class waiting rooms, guards’ room and lamp room by 1920. In 1915, an additional storey was constructed atop the central carriage porch, providing more accommodation for the Traffic Branch on the first floor. A traffic control system, coordinating trains between Brisbane and Gympie, was installed and operated from the additional storey in 1927.
Queensland’s railway network extended dramatically in the 20th century. The North Coast line connected Brisbane to Gladstone in 1898, Rockhampton in 1904, and Cairns in 1924, providing a direct rail link between Brisbane and Mackay, Townsville, Winton, Forsayth, Cloncurry and Blackall. Southern and western trains reached Dirranbandi, Surat, Cunnamulla and Quilpie. Central Station initially hosted ‘country’ services, but it lacked room for expansion, and Roma Street’s larger site was earmarked for a new country station. Roma Street’s locomotive, carriage and marshalling yard facilities were transferred to the Mayne Rail Yards between 1911 and 1927, and work began on the new station. A 350ft (106m) reinforced concrete, tiled passenger subway was constructed from Roma Street to the platforms in 1936-7, replacing an overhead walkway. A new steel awning was installed above the southern platform (Platform 3 in 2020), in approximately 1939. It was used in conjunction with two platforms at the new country station (no longer extant) for country and other passenger services.
On 30 November 1940 the Country Station was opened at Roma Street Station. This low-lying face brick building and its additional platform sat directly between the 1873-5 building and Roma Street. The new passenger station relieved congestion at Brisbane Central Station and made Roma Street the chief station for long distance travel north. The original station was refurbished, its roof re-clad with corrugated fibrous sheeting; and its brick walls painted red and lined in cream to match the new station building. The southwest pediment was removed and replaced by a new storey on the western end of the building. A covered area was added east of the building where the subway stairs emerged. The original station building was turned over to the General Manager, with offices for clerks, traffic-, livestock-, coach- and wagon staff, maintenance and locomotive staff, telephone and telegraph exchanges, and the train control section.
Further plans to upgrade and alter the building were postponed by World War II, during which time troop trains departed from Roma Street, and the pedestrian subway served as an air-raid shelter.[66] In 1945, plans were drawn to alter doors, windows and stairs in the wings, and partitions on the first floor. A second storey was added over the west wing in 1953 (later removed), and the General Manager’s staircase was repositioned in 1961. Externally, the iron carriage shed platform shade over the northern platform was removed in 1959.
Extensive change was undertaken at Roma Street around the original station building in the late 20th century. The southern and northern Brisbane railway systems were directly connected in the 1970s, with the opening of the Merivale Bridge in 1978. In 1985, the country railway station (1940 building) was demolished and replaced by a multi-storey centre incorporating new railway and bus facilities, a hotel, offices and function centre. The original station building was left intact, and two new interstate platforms with standard gauge rails were built on its southern side. The pedestrian subway was refurbished in 1986, with a broom finish concrete and expansion joints, and grated drains were laid on the floor, and a ceramic tile finish on the wall faces to match the subway tiles at Central Station. Roma Street’s rail freight facility was moved to Acacia Ridge in 1991. During the mid-1990s the platforms north and south of the early station building were re-arranged and extended. A bricked waiting area and new roof were added east of the station. Underground, a new concourse was constructed to replace the pedestrian subway, and a 19m section of the original subway converted to a storage room.
The station building remained the General Manager’s Office until 1974. The station master, staff workers and archive storage occupied the building in the 1990s. By 1993, Roma Street was acknowledged as the oldest surviving railway station building in an Australian capital city, and one of the oldest surviving railway buildings in Queensland. A new office fitout was installed on the ground floor for Queensland Rail and the Queensland Police Rail Squad in 1999. Stabilisation, waterproofing and reconstruction works commenced in 2012, including restoration of the brick, plaster, lead flashings, window joinery and stone works. Replacement bricks were custom made in England; Welsh slate was imported from the UK; replacement stone came from Helidon; and rolled lead from England was installed. In 2015, a new steel beams and suspension system was installed between the two storeys, to lift a 65mm bow in the timber floor beams fit amongst the existing timber structures. The second storey of the west wing was removed and the roofline reconstructed to its original configuration. The restoration received an Australian Institute of Architects Queensland award in 2015.
In 2020 the building is vacant, pending further repairs.
A vintage candlestick telephone, characterized by its distinctive and elegant early-20th-century design. The phone's age is apparent in the texture of its metal surface, worn and partially stripped of paint, revealing a mix of black paint and aged brass beneath, giving it an authentic antique charm. The mouthpiece is large and funnel-shaped, slightly tilted downward, while the slender, cylindrical body rises prominently from a round, weighted base. A coiled cord snakes away from the receiver, emphasizing the phone’s analog nature.
The scene is illuminated with a warm, ambient glow, casting gentle highlights and shadows across the phone and accentuating the metallic textures. In the background, hints of soft orange light enhance a cozy, nostalgic atmosphere, while blurred objects such as vintage containers, jars, and greenery subtly decorate the scene, contributing to the overall antique ambiance. The entire composition evokes a sense of history, nostalgia, and timelessness, capturing a relic of past communication technology in a richly detailed and moody setting.
A restored green Albion Post Office Telephones utility vehicle, dating from the early to mid-20th century, is showcased indoors. The vehicle, displaying the registration CXN 247, is positioned next to another vehicle and a display board featuring various badges and plaques. Information boards about "Vehicle Restoration" are visible on the wall behind.
The multifunctional complex "Vita" invites you to cooperate!
Property Description
Hello, dear Ladies and Gentlemen, who are making a decision to rent office space, we present to your attention the Vita Multifunctional Complex, located at the address: Voronezh, Lenin Street, 104B (in the historical part of the Central District of Voronezh), which is a detached 11-storey building.
The Vita multifunctional complex is located in the historical part of Voronezh at the intersection of seven roads, two of which are powerful transport arteries connecting three residential areas of the city with its center. The mixed-use complex, successfully fitting into the historical part of the city, provides new opportunities for reorganization and prospects for this area. Such an advantageous location provides not only an excellent image for the office owner, but also convenience for its staff, partners and customers.
Thanks to its convenient location, modern architectural solutions, and open-plan office space capabilities, Vita meets the most stringent requirements for top-level commercial real estate.
The multifunctional complex "Vita", being an innovative organization, was one of the first in the region to pay attention to the ecological state of the region and the health of the population. Based on many years of experience in the field of commercial real estate management, as well as improving the conditions and quality of human life, the concept of development of the Vita multifunctional complex was adopted, based on the principles of safety, comfort and eco-development.
Green development is the latest development concept based on the use of environmentally friendly natural materials and the desire to preserve the environment, both during construction and in the process of subsequent operation.
MFC "Vita" is:
High percentage of landscaping of public places
Convenient location
High-quality finishing of office premises (made of environmentally friendly materials)
Free planning of office space
Round-the-clock operation of the building
Ample parking
High-speed Internet
Telephony services (own PBX)
Independent providers (Beeline, South-East TransTelecom, Kvant Telecom, TransTelecom, Rostelecom)
Reception service
KONE's comfortable Finnish elevators
Comprehensive security system
Modern ventilation and air conditioning system
Guarded area with video surveillance system
Access control management system (with the ability to provide a report on the passage of employees)
Building Monitoring and Management System
Cafes for employees, vending machines, ATMs
Own transformer substation
Professional management and operation of the multifunctional complex "Vita"
Alarm and fire extinguishing system
MFC "Vita" is a new generation business center that takes into account not only the need of organizations for renting office space, but also the care of the management for the well-being of employees and visitors. For this purpose, high-quality and environmentally friendly materials were used in the construction of the building and its decoration.
Parking
In addition to the classic ground and underground parking, the VITA multifunctional complex provides a large bicycle parking lot and charging points for electric vehicles.
Fire safety and access
control systems Round-the-clock access control system (ACS) with a video surveillance system, a guarded area, a modern warning and fire extinguishing system allows you to ensure peace of mind for your life and property.
Elevators
of the multifunctional complex "Vita" are equipped with modern vertical communication systems of the KONE company: 5 passenger elevators. In order to reduce the spread of infectious diseases, air recirculators with closed ultraviolet ozone-free irradiation with a wavelength of 253.7 nm are installed in each elevator cabin, with the help of which the air is purified.
In Voronezh, the VITA multifunctional complex is the first "healthy" building where the health of visitors and tenants of the VITA multifunctional complex is taken care of.
Reception
The waiting area and the reception area divide the office hall into two parts. The waiting area includes sets of upholstered furniture, coffee tables, payment terminals, ATMs, racks and stands for advertising and information products. The reception area itself is made taking into account ergonomic requirements for the maximum convenience of visitors to the Vita office center.
Lighting
The complex provides: working lighting, emergency lighting, lighting of the facades of the building, lighting of the sidewalk and outdoor parking lots. Emergency exit signs are installed throughout the building to ensure safe movement and evacuation from the complex, as well as decorative lighting in the surrounding area.
Telecommunications
The complex will feature at least three telecom operators and a dedicated Internet channel. Beeline, TTK, Kvant Telecom.
Electricity supply
The first category of power supply. Power supply is provided from 2 independent sources. In the heating, ventilation, air conditioning and glazing systems, all the latest energy saving systems were used.
Fiber optic cable ad from a 1982 Telephony magazine. Use of fiber optics in the telephone industry was still in its infancy then, mostly used for trunk lines between central offices.
From Wikipedia:
Piccadilly Circus is a famous road junction and public space of London's West End in the City of Westminster, built in 1819 to connect Regent Street with the major shopping street of Piccadilly. In this context a circus, from the Latin word meaning a circle, is a circular open space at a street junction. [1] It now links directly to the theatres on Shaftesbury Avenue as well as the Haymarket, Coventry Street (onwards to Leicester Square) and Glasshouse Street. The Circus is close to major shopping and entertainment areas in a central location at the heart of the West End. Its status as a major traffic intersection has made Piccadilly Circus a busy meeting point and a tourist attraction in its own right. The Circus is particularly known for its video display and neon signs mounted on the corner building on the northern side, as well as the Shaftesbury memorial fountain and statue of an archer popularly known as Eros (sometimes called The Angel of Christian Charity, but intended to be Anteros). It is surrounded by several noted buildings, including the London Pavilion and Criterion Theatre. Directly underneath the plaza is Piccadilly Circus London Underground station.
Piccadilly Circus connects to Piccadilly, a thoroughfare whose name first appeared in 1626 as Pickadilly Hall, named after a house belonging to one Robert Baker, a tailor famous for selling piccadills or piccadillies, a term used for various kinds of collars. The street was known as Portugal Street in 1692 in honour of Catherine of Braganza, the queen consort of King Charles II of England, but was known as Piccadilly by 1743. Piccadilly Circus was created in 1819, at the junction with Regent Street, which was then being built under the planning of John Nash on the site of a house and garden belonging to a Lady Hutton. The circus lost its circular form in 1886 with the construction of Shaftesbury Avenue.
The junction has been a very busy traffic interchange since construction, as it lies at the centre of Theatreland and handles exit traffic from Piccadilly, which Charles Dickens, Jr (Charles C. B. Dickens, son of Charles Dickens) described thusly in 1879: "Piccadilly, the great thoroughfare leading from the Haymarket and Regent-street westward to Hyde Park-corner, is the nearest approach to the Parisian boulevard of which London can boast."
The Piccadilly Circus tube station was opened March 10, 1906 on the Bakerloo Line, and on the Piccadilly Line in December of that year. In 1928, the station was extensively rebuilt to handle an increase in traffic.
The intersection's first electric advertisements appeared in 1910, and from 1923 electric billboards were set up on the facade of the London Pavilion. Traffic lights were first installed in August 3, 1926 at the junction.
At the start of the 1960s, it was determined that the Circus needed to be redeveloped to allow for greater traffic flow. In 1962, Lord Holford presented a plan which would have created a "double-decker" Piccadilly Circus, with a new pedestrian concourse above the ground-level traffic. This concept was kept alive throughout the rest of 1960s, before eventually being killed off by Sir Keith Joseph and Ernest Marples in 1972; the key reason given was that Holford's scheme only allowed for a 20% increase in traffic, and the Government required 50%.
The Holford plan is referenced in the short-form documentary film "Goodbye, Piccadilly", produced by the Rank Organisation in 1967. Piccadilly Circus has since escaped major redevelopment, apart from extensive ground-level pedestrianisation around its south side in the 1980s.
The Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain in Piccadilly Circus was erected in 1893, to commemorate the philanthropic works of Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury. During the Second World War, the statue atop the Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain, The Angel of Christian Charity, was removed, and was replaced by advertising hoardings. It was returned in 1948. When the Circus underwent reconstruction work in the late 1980s, the entire fountain was moved from the centre of the junction at the beginning of Shaftesbury Avenue to its present position at the south-western corner.
Neon signs
Piccadilly Circus used to be surrounded by illuminated advertising hoardings on buildings, starting in the early 1900s,[citation needed] but only one building now carries them, namely the one in the north-western corner, between Shaftesbury Avenue and Glasshouse Street. The site is unnamed (usually referred to as Monico after the Café Monico which used to be on the site); its addresses are 44/48 Regent Street, 1/6 Sherwood Street, 17/22 Denman Street and 1/17 Shaftesbury Avenue, and has been owned by property investor Land Securities Group since the 1970s.
The earliest signs used incandescent light bulbs, these were replaced with neon lamps, as well as moving signs (there was a large Guinness clock at one time). From December 1998 digital projectors were briefly used for the Coke sign [1], while the early 2000s have seen a gradual move to LED displays. The number of signs has reduced over the years as the rental costs have increased.
As of 2008, the site has six illuminated advertising screens above three large retail units, facing Piccadilly Circus on the north side, occupied by Boots, and GAP and a mix of smaller retail, restaurant and office premises fronting the other streets. A Burger King located under the Samsung advert which had been previously a Wimpy Bar until the late 1980s had closed in early 2008 and is presently being converted into a Barclays Bank.
Coca-Cola have had a sign at Piccadilly Circus since 1955. The current sign dates from September 2003, when the previous digital projector board and the site formerly occupied by Nescafé was replaced with a state-of-the-art LED video display that curves round with the building. On November 23 2007 the very first film was broadcast through the board. Paul Atherton's film The Ballet of Change: Piccadilly Circus was allowed five minutes to show the first non-commercial film depicting the history of Piccadilly Circus and the lights. The former Nescafé advert site had also been occupied by a neon advertisement for Fosters until about 1999 and for three months in 2002 between the display of the Nescafé advert and the enlarged Coca Cola advert this part of Piccadilly Circus had featured the quote "Imagine all the people living life in peace" by the late Beatle John Lennon. This was paid for by his wife Yoko Ono who spent an estimated £150,000 to display an advert at this location. [2]
Sanyo's sign is the oldest out of the six, the current incarnation having been installed in the late 1980s and remaining unchanged ever since. However, earlier Sanyo signs with older logos have occupied that position since at least 1980.
TDK replaced the space formerly occupied by Kodak in 1990. Their sign has remained almost unchanged since, although in 2001 the colour of the background lamps were changed from green to blue, and the words 'Audio & Video Tape' and 'Floppy Disks' under the logo was removed.
McDonald's added a sign in the mid-1980s, replacing one for BASF. In 2001 the sign was changed from neon to an animated LED screen, which was further changed to a bigger, brighter LED screen in 2008.
Samsung replaced a sign for Panasonic in November 1994 [3], and the sign was upgraded from neon to LED in 2005.
Piccadilly Lite was added on 3 December 2007, placed under the Samsung and McDonald's signs. This is an LED screen that allows other companies to advertise for both short and long term leases, increasing the amount of advertising space but using the same screen for multiple brands. [4]
The British mobile telephony company Vodafone used to have a neon sign installed on the roof of Coventry House, which diagonally faces Piccadilly Circus. In addition to the logo of the company, the sign displayed personal messages that could be submitted on a special website and displayed at a certain time and date. As of February 2007, this has been replaced by a new, larger LED video-advertising display for LGE, the British arm of South Korean electronics group LG. The new display also incorporates a scrolling ticker of Sky News headlines.
On special occasions the lights are switched off, such as the deaths of Winston Churchill in 1965 and Diana, Princess of Wales in 1997. On 21 June 2007 they were switched off for 1 hour as part of the Lights Out London campaign.
Shaftesbury Memorial and Eros
At the south-western side of the Circus, moved after World War II from its original position in the centre, stands the Shaftesbury Monument Memorial Fountain, erected in 1892-1893 to commemorate the philanthropic works of Lord Shaftesbury, who was a famous Victorian politician and philanthropist.
The monument is topped by Alfred Gilbert's winged nude statue of an archer, sometimes referred to (inaccurately) as The Angel of Christian Charity and popularly (also inaccurately) known as Eros after the mythical Greek God of Love. The statue has become a London icon: a graphical illustration of it is used as the symbol of the Evening Standard newspaper, and appears on its masthead.
The use of a nude figure on a public monument was controversial at the time of its construction, but it was generally well-received by the public. The Magazine of Art described it as, "...a striking contrast to the dull ugliness of the generality of our street sculpture, ... a work which, while beautifying one of our hitherto desolate open spaces, should do much towards the elevation of public taste in the direction of decorative sculpture, and serve freedom for the metropolis from any further additions of the old order of monumental monstrosities."
The statue was the first in the world to be cast in aluminium and is set on a bronze fountain, which itself inspired the marine motifs that Gilbert carved on the statue.
The statue is generally believed to depict Eros, but was intended to be an image of his twin brother, Anteros, as confirmed by the contemporary records of Westminster City Council[citation needed]. The sculptor Alfred Gilbert had already sculpted a statue of Anteros, and when commissioned for the Shaftesbury Memorial Fountain, chose to reproduce the same subject, who as 'The God of Selfless Love' was deemed to suitably represent the philanthropic 7th Earl of Shaftesbury. Gilbert described Anteros as portraying 'reflective and mature love, as opposed to Eros or Cupid, the frivolous tyrant.' The model for the sculpture was Gilbert's studio assistant, a 16 year-old Italian, Angelo Colarossi (born 1875)[3]. The fountain, when originally placed, was meant to have Anteros pointing his bow south towards Wimborne St Giles in Dorset, which was the Earl's country seat. The archers arrow was also aimed so as to bury its shaft in Shaftesbury Avenue.
When the memorial was unveiled, there were numerous complaints. Some felt it was sited in a vulgar part of town (the theatre district) and others felt that it was too sensual as a memorial for a famously sober and respectable Earl. Some of the objections were tempered by renaming the statue as The Angel of Christian Charity, which was the nearest approximation that could be invented in Christian terms for the role Anteros played in the Greek pantheon. But the name never became widely known, and the original name came back, erroneously under the shortened form Eros, signifying the God of Sensual Love; quite inappropriate to commemorate the Earl, but just right to signify the carnal neighbourhood of London, into which Soho had developed.
Building Radio Kootwijk, Veluwe NL - 1922 - architect Julius Maria Luthmann.
The housing accommodations of Radio Kootwijk arose as a result of the building of a shortwave transmitter site with the same name, starting in 1918. The transmitters played an important role in the 20th century as a communication facility between the Netherlands and its colony of Dutch East Indies. In 1923 Dutch PTT (Post, Telegraph and Telephone Company) started trans-oceanic telegraphy using a longwave transmitter, a 400 KW high frequency alternator, from the German Telefunken company under the call sign PCG, in the 24 kHz and 48 kHz. By 1925 the longwave transmitter was changed by a shortwave tube based, electronic transmitter which had a much better performance due to the better propagation of short waves. With this new technology, in 1928 a radio-telephonic connection was established. At the end of World War II, the German occupying forces blew up the transmitter. Afterward some of the radio towers were rebuilt. Due to the development of new technologies like satellite communication, Radio Kootwijk lost its position as main overseas wireless connection point of the Netherlands. In 1980, the last transmission mast was blown up. In 2004 the park lost its last transmitter functions, and was transferred from the telephone company to the State Forestry Commission, which started attracting new buyers. The main building of the former transmitter park and named 'Building A', 'The Cathedral' or sometimes 'The Sphinx', was officially appointed as a monument. It is used as venue and scenery for several cultural events and productions, including the American film Mind Hunters in 2004.
Avenue de Flandre 12/05/2023 08h49
The corner of the Avenue de Flandre and the Boulevard de la Villette in the 19ème arrondissement. The street on the right is the Rue Gaston-Rébuffat.
Avenue de Flandre
Avenue de Flandre (formely « rue de Flandre ») is one of the main thoroughfares in the 19th arrondissement of Paris, 1,500 m long.
It connects Place de la Bataille-de-Stalingrad to Avenue Corentin-Cariou and provides access to the Paris ring road via Porte de la Villette.
Traffic is organized around a central parterre lined with trees.
Before 2019, the avenue was composed, in each direction, of 2 traffic lanes (including a lane reserved for public transport and bicycles on only part of the avenue) bordered by 2 parking lanes (one on each side) .
Since 2019, a cycle path has been created in each direction in place of the parking lot on the central side.
The avenue is bordered on most of its length by various shops, practically all services being available: general food, cafes, catering (fast, traditional and foreign), mass distribution (traditional and hard-discount), DIY, services banks, pharmacies, sale and repair of automobiles, bicycles and mopeds, optics, bookstores, telephony, libraries, real estate agencies, etc.
There are 4 métro stations under the Avenue de Flandre:
Corentin Cariou (M) (7)
Crimée (M) (7)
Riquet (M) (7)
Stalingrad (M) (2) (5) (7)
The multifunctional complex "Vita" invites you to cooperate!
Property Description
Hello, dear Ladies and Gentlemen, who are making a decision to rent office space, we present to your attention the Vita Multifunctional Complex, located at the address: Voronezh, Lenin Street, 104B (in the historical part of the Central District of Voronezh), which is a detached 11-storey building.
The Vita multifunctional complex is located in the historical part of Voronezh at the intersection of seven roads, two of which are powerful transport arteries connecting three residential areas of the city with its center. The mixed-use complex, successfully fitting into the historical part of the city, provides new opportunities for reorganization and prospects for this area. Such an advantageous location provides not only an excellent image for the office owner, but also convenience for its staff, partners and customers.
Thanks to its convenient location, modern architectural solutions, and open-plan office space capabilities, Vita meets the most stringent requirements for top-level commercial real estate.
The multifunctional complex "Vita", being an innovative organization, was one of the first in the region to pay attention to the ecological state of the region and the health of the population. Based on many years of experience in the field of commercial real estate management, as well as improving the conditions and quality of human life, the concept of development of the Vita multifunctional complex was adopted, based on the principles of safety, comfort and eco-development.
Green development is the latest development concept based on the use of environmentally friendly natural materials and the desire to preserve the environment, both during construction and in the process of subsequent operation.
MFC "Vita" is:
High percentage of landscaping of public places
Convenient location
High-quality finishing of office premises (made of environmentally friendly materials)
Free planning of office space
Round-the-clock operation of the building
Ample parking
High-speed Internet
Telephony services (own PBX)
Independent providers (Beeline, South-East TransTelecom, Kvant Telecom, TransTelecom, Rostelecom)
Reception service
KONE's comfortable Finnish elevators
Comprehensive security system
Modern ventilation and air conditioning system
Guarded area with video surveillance system
Access control management system (with the ability to provide a report on the passage of employees)
Building Monitoring and Management System
Cafes for employees, vending machines, ATMs
Own transformer substation
Professional management and operation of the multifunctional complex "Vita"
Alarm and fire extinguishing system
MFC "Vita" is a new generation business center that takes into account not only the need of organizations for renting office space, but also the care of the management for the well-being of employees and visitors. For this purpose, high-quality and environmentally friendly materials were used in the construction of the building and its decoration.
Parking
In addition to the classic ground and underground parking, the VITA multifunctional complex provides a large bicycle parking lot and charging points for electric vehicles.
Fire safety and access
control systems Round-the-clock access control system (ACS) with a video surveillance system, a guarded area, a modern warning and fire extinguishing system allows you to ensure peace of mind for your life and property.
Elevators
of the multifunctional complex "Vita" are equipped with modern vertical communication systems of the KONE company: 5 passenger elevators. In order to reduce the spread of infectious diseases, air recirculators with closed ultraviolet ozone-free irradiation with a wavelength of 253.7 nm are installed in each elevator cabin, with the help of which the air is purified.
In Voronezh, the VITA multifunctional complex is the first "healthy" building where the health of visitors and tenants of the VITA multifunctional complex is taken care of.
Reception
The waiting area and the reception area divide the office hall into two parts. The waiting area includes sets of upholstered furniture, coffee tables, payment terminals, ATMs, racks and stands for advertising and information products. The reception area itself is made taking into account ergonomic requirements for the maximum convenience of visitors to the Vita office center.
Lighting
The complex provides: working lighting, emergency lighting, lighting of the facades of the building, lighting of the sidewalk and outdoor parking lots. Emergency exit signs are installed throughout the building to ensure safe movement and evacuation from the complex, as well as decorative lighting in the surrounding area.
Telecommunications
The complex will feature at least three telecom operators and a dedicated Internet channel. Beeline, TTK, Kvant Telecom.
Electricity supply
The first category of power supply. Power supply is provided from 2 independent sources. In the heating, ventilation, air conditioning and glazing systems, all the latest energy saving systems were used.
The Dove was used extensively as a messenger in the past, & even today it is used in postal services in some remote rural areas. But modern telephony has replaced it almost completely.
Here I got a chance to capture a dove on the telephone pole --- a combination of the Past & the Present!
It was heaviest fall of snow experienced here for 10 years. All telegraphic and telephonic communication between here and Sydney was cut off. The passenger train from Sydney was three hours late.
(The Sun newspaper 20 July 1910)
I happened to be in Bury yesterday and, on the tram north, I realised that this was the glorious day I needed to retrace my steps and find a landscape I have passed at speed for years. Parallel to the Metrolink tracks, in what was the borderland between the Urban District Council of Radcliffe and the County Borough of Bury, along the old Manchester, Bolton & Bury Canal and bisected by the River Irwell, is one of those slightly forgotten landscapes. A century ago here was a small colliery, with a loading stage on the canal, and mills along the river. Today it is mostly green alongside the ribbon development of the 1930s that followed the road between the two towns.
Along the lane are the vestiges of the long abandoned street lighting and this control box, on an old cast iron gas lamp colum, with a later swan neck adaptation, is now a rare survivor. Cast with the logo of ATM, the Automatic Telephone Company (later the AT&E) , the Liverpool based manufacturer of telephonic equipment. ATM expanded into some allied technologies, such as the control of traffic signals, and used an early form of remote switching for street lighting known as "Rythmatic". Not many of these still exist.
Rising 195 metres above the summit of Black Mountain, the Telstra Tower presents 360 degree views of the city and the Brindabella Ranges. Visitors taking advantage of he two open viewing platforms or the enclosed viewing gallery are presented with striking views of the city by day. From every angle at night the theatrics of the city's lights under the darkened sky provide a spectacular show of natural beauty and entertainment.
As well as offering visitors education, entertainment and spectacular views, the Telstra Tower has a functional role. The Telstra Tower provides essential communications facilities for the National Capital, including major trunk line radio telephony facilities, television transmitters for national and commercial services, FM radio transmitters, mobile radio telephone, and cellular phone base stations.
This elegant Tower on the summit of Black Mountain has won two awards for outstanding design. The first in 1979, for imaginative and effective use of concrete in a building. The Tower won its second award, the 1980 Civic Design Award of the ACT Chapter of the Royal Australian Institute of Architects.
The Tower incorporates a theatrette, cafe and gift shop and the Executive Briefing Centre; meeting rooms with state of the art AV, spectacular views and free parking.
Since opening in 1980, Telstra Tower has continually created an attraction of immense fascination and appeal, marking it one of the National Capital's most popular tourist and local attractions.
Source: Telstra.
Elberon Memorial Church
70 Park Avenue
Elberon, New Jersey 07740
(732) 870-2241
The Elberon Memorial Church is a beautiful summer sanctuary located one block from the beach in Elberon, NJ. All denominations are welcome. Located one block from Ocean Avenue in the Elberon section of Long Branch, NJ, it opened on June 16, 1886 as a summer church for the many members of wealthy New York society that summered in the Long Branch area. The church was built by the widow of Moses B. Taylor, Catherine Wilson Taylor as a memorial to her late husband.
The architecture of the building was designed by the eminent New York architect Stanford White. White was a friend of Louis Tiffany of Tiffany Glass. The rose window at the narthex of the church is an original Tiffany Glass Window. Experts have described the other windows in the church as the finest 14th Century style stained glass in the country. Each window is a memorial presented by a child of Moses Taylor. The beautiful cobalt window could not be replaced today because the manufacture of blue stained glass of that type has become a "lost art".
A gothic structure, it boasts unusual woodwork, an historic tracker action pipe organ built by Hilborne Roosevelt, a cousin of Theodore Roosevelt, and windows executed by the Mayer Brothers in Munich, Germany. It should be noted that it was through his work as an organ builder that Hilborne Roosevelt applied his knowledge of mechanical organ switches to the new field of telephony and developed an early switching system for the newly formed New York Telephone Company of which he was also a founding member. The Mayer Brothers windows have been described by experts as among the finest examples of fourteenth century stained glass window design in America.
Moses Taylor (January 11, 1806 – May 23, 1882) was a 19th-century New York merchant and banker and one of the wealthiest men of that century. At his death, his estate was reported to be worth $70 million, or about $1.7 billion in today's dollars. He controlled the National City Bank of New York (later to become Citibank), the Delaware, Lackawanna & Western railroad, the Moses Taylor & Co. import business, and he held numerous other investments in railroads and industry.
Building Radio Kootwijk, Veluwe NL - 1922 - architect Julius Maria Luthmann.
The housing accommodations of Radio Kootwijk arose as a result of the building of a shortwave transmitter site with the same name, starting in 1918. The transmitters played an important role in the 20th century as a communication facility between the Netherlands and its colony of Dutch East Indies. In 1923 Dutch PTT (Post, Telegraph and Telephone Company) started trans-oceanic telegraphy using a longwave transmitter, a 400 KW high frequency alternator, from the German Telefunken company under the call sign PCG, in the 24 kHz and 48 kHz. By 1925 the longwave transmitter was changed by a shortwave tube based, electronic transmitter which had a much better performance due to the better propagation of short waves. With this new technology, in 1928 a radio-telephonic connection was established. At the end of World War II, the German occupying forces blew up the transmitter. Afterward some of the radio towers were rebuilt. Due to the development of new technologies like satellite communication, Radio Kootwijk lost its position as main overseas wireless connection point of the Netherlands. In 1980, the last transmission mast was blown up. In 2004 the park lost its last transmitter functions, and was transferred from the telephone company to the State Forestry Commission, which started attracting new buyers. The main building of the former transmitter park and named 'Building A', 'The Cathedral' or sometimes 'The Sphinx', was officially appointed as a monument. It is used as venue and scenery for several cultural events and productions, including the American film Mind Hunters in 2004.
Resume, cover letter and telephonic conversation; all done! Now it’s time to go and meet the HR officials.
"Spiderwebs" ~ No Doubt
"You think that we connect
That the chemistry's correct
Your words walk right through my ears
Presuming I like what I hear
And now I'm stuck in the
The web you're spinning
You've got me for you prey
[Pre-chorus:]
(Yeah) Sorry I'm not home right now
I'm walking into spiderwebs
So leave a message
And I'll call you back
A likely story, but (Yeah) leave a message
And I'll call you back
You're intruding on what's mine
And you're taking up my time
Don't have the courage inside me
To tell you, "Please let me be"
Communication, a telephonic invasion
I'm planning my escape...
[Pre-chorus]
[Chorus:]
And it's all your fault
I screen my phone calls
No matter who calls
I gotta screen my phone calls
Now it's gone to deep (Now, it's gone too deep)
You wake me in my sleep (Wake me in my sleep)
My dreams become nightmares (Dreams become nightmares)
'Cause you're ringing in my ears
[Pre-chorus]
[Chorus]
Oooh, the spiderwebs
Leave a message and I'll call you back
I'm walking into spiderwebs
So, leave a message and I'll call you back
I'm walking into spiderwebs
It's all your fault, no matter who calls
I gotta screen my phone calls
It's all your fault, it's all your fault
No matter who calls, no matter who calls
I'm walking into spiderwebs so,
Leave a message and I'll call you back
I'm walkin into spiderwebs
Leave a message and I'll call you back
Ooh, it's all your fault
No matter who calls
I gotta screen my phone call
It's all your fault
No matter-matter-matter who calls
I screen my phone calls
[Fading:]
I'm walkin into spiderwebs
Leave a message and I'll call you back."
Tampa Bay Comic Con 2015 #TBCC2015
Tampa Convention Center, 333 S Franklin St, Tampa, FL 33602, US
Mobile telephony arrived in Burkina Faso in 1996 through the national operator ONATEL, which created the TELMOB branch on this occasion. It will then face competition from two other operators, Celtel and Télécel, the first of which has since become Zain, Airtel, and Orange. In the interest of a stronger identity and to better face the competition, TELMOB developed a new, more aggressive branding in the early 2010s using pink and yellow as the primary colours. In 2021, mobile phone services are switching to Moov Africa colours with blue and orange tones.
All means are reasonable to encourage subscribers to use mobile services to consume units, especially by offering the prospect of winning sums of money, equipment, or even a villa. In this case, these are Yamaha Crypton motorcycles certified CFAO (Corporation For Africa & Overseas) of excellent quality and adapted to traffic routes, especially in the bush.
La téléphonie mobile est arrivée au Burkina Faso en 1996 premièrement par l'opérateur national ONATEL qui a créé la branche TELMOB à cette occasion. Il sera ensuite concurrencé par deux autres opérateurs Celtel puis Télécel le premier étant entretemps devenu Zain, Airtel puis actuellement Orange. Dans le souci d'une identité plus forte et pour mieux faire face à la concurrence, TELMOB développe un nouveau branding plus agressif au début des années 2010 avec l'utilisation du rose et du jaune pour principales couleurs. En 2021, les services de téléphonie mobile passent aux couleurs de Moov Africa avec des tons bleus et orange.
Pour inciter les abonnés aux services mobiles à la consommation d'unités, tous les moyens sont bon surtout en offrant la perspective de gagner des sommes d'argent, de l'équipement ou même une villa. Dans le cas précis, il s'agit de motos Yamaha Crypton certifiées CFAO (Corporation For Africa & Overseas) qui étaient d'excellente qualité et adaptées aux voies de circulation surtout en brousse.
Urbex Benelux -
The rapid development of the Internet and technologies such as telephony and personal digital assistants that allow people to work from home since circa 1995 has blurred the division between vacation property and a primary residence. Some business people, including the British entrepreneur Richard Branson, use their luxury real estate for both business and leisure purposes.
Take a look at the road to work, large and dark.
Early morning and a view of Victoria Street looking towards Blackfriars with a loan lone figure making her way to work. I particularly liked this view because of the lines of the building to the right, Faraday House.
The Southern counterpart to "Faraday Buildings North", the now demolished home of the first telephone exchange in London, it was opened in 1933 and contained the world's first international telephone exchange. The opening was not without controversy since, at 11 floors, it obscured the view of St Pauls... a direct consequence of the outrage caused was the introduction of legislation to protect key views across London and it's interesting to note that as a result a subsequent exchange on the opposite side of the road (Baynard House) was limited to three floors.
The building has some rather interesting features - if you're in the area take a close look at the keystones above the arches as they illustrate various "telephonic" themes such as cables surrounding the world and the head of Mercury, the messenger of the gods.
Being something of a 'telephone nerd' in my youth I still find the history of the International Switching Centre (Faraday ISC, if you wish) absolutely fascinating - the building once bulged with switchgear... the original Strowger equipment was extended 17 times. Despite this automation there was always the need for operators and or those of us of a certain vintage dialling the International Operator and hearing "International Service, which country please" was a rare experience and speaking to someone in another country was typically reserved for birthdays and Christmases.
In the early 1970's nearly all international calls which couldn't be dialled directly went through the now demolished northern building and there's a fascinating first-hand account of what it was like to work there by Helena Wojtczak which is a fascinating read.
The early eighties saw the end of the ISC and the International Call Centre in the North building - the former moving to the much lamented Mondial House and the latter to other nearby Wren House and Wood Street. Faraday House is now home to "BT Commercial" and pieces of telephone-technology can still be seen through the windows... although I'm sure it's nowhere nearly as exciting as electro-mechanical equipment and the building is all the poorer for the absence of the people required to make the connections work.
Enjoy
India has the fastest growing telecom network in the world with its high population and development potential. However, rural India still lacks strong infrastructure. India's public sector telecom company BSNL is the 7th largest telecom company in world. Airtel, Vodafone, Idea, Reliance, Tata DoCoMo, BSNL, Aircel, Tata Indicom, MTNL and Loop Mobile are the major operators in India.
Telephony introduced in India in 1882. The total number of telephones in the country stands at 960.9 million, while the overall teledensity has increased to 79.28% as of May 31, 2012 and the total numbers of mobile phone subscribers have reached 929.37 million as of May 2012. The mobile tele-density has increased to 76.68% in May 2012.[1] In the wireless segment, 8.35 million subscribers were added in May 2012. The wire line segment subscriber base stood at 31.53 million.
Indian telecom operators added a staggering 227.27 million wireless subscribers in the 12 months between Mar 2010 and Mar 2011 averaging at 18.94 million subscribers every month. To put this into perspective, China which currently possesses the world's largest telecommunications network added 119.2 million wireless subscribers during the same period (March 2010 - March 2011) - averaging 9.93 million subscribers every month (a little over half the number India was adding every month). So, while India might currently be second to China in the TOTAL number of mobile subscribers, India has been adding nearly twice as many subscribers EVERY month until March 2011. Mobile teledensity increased by almost 18.4 percentage points from Mar 2010 and Mar 2011 (49.60% to 67.98%) while wireline subcriber numbers fell by a modest 2.2 million. This frenetic pace of monthly subscriber additions means that the Indian mobile subscriber base has shown a year on year growth of 43.23%. According to recent reports, India was purported to overtake China to become the world's largest mobile telecommunications market by the year 2013. It was also predicted that by 2013, the teledensity will shoot up to 75% and the total mobile subscriber base would be a colossal 1.159 billion. Wikipedia
Here is one of the popular tour packages to tour Yellow Mountain and neighboring Hui old Villages.
5 Days Yellow Mountain Tour Package
Day 1 Climb Yellow Mountain China
Enter Yellow Mountain Scenic Area via Mercy Light Temple
Step 1 Mercy Light Temple to Jade Screen (Yuping Scenic Area)
There are 2 ways to climb the Yellow Mountain from Mercy Light Temple to Jade Screen
1 Hike the Yellow Mountain via Mercy Light Temple-Crescent Moon Pavilion-Stand Horse Bridge-Banshan Temple-Carp's Backbone-Three Islands at Penglai-Welcoming Guest Pine-Jade Screen, which takes about 3-4 hours. Basically speaking, I do advise you take this way for challenge your mind and body if time available. However, if your time is tight and body doesn't allow you to do this, please take 2nd way.
2 Take telpher from Mercy Light Temple Telpher to Jade Screen Telpher, which takes about 10 minutes. Different angle has different scenery. Besides, you have to walk from Jade Screen to Cloud-Dispelling Pavilion in 1.5-2 Hours today, so if your body doesn't allow you to do this trek, please take telpher.
Then, enjoy the most perilous peak-Celestial Capital Peak(pass to the peak will be sealed in Winter for safety), Lotus Peak (pass to the peak will be sealed in Winter for safety) in the distance.
Step 2 Jade Screen to Cloud Dispelling Pavilion(Xihai Scenic Area)
Lotus Staments Peak-Ladder On the Clouds-A Thread of Sky-Turtle Peak-Tianhai, Haixin Pavilion-Bright Top Peak-Flying Over Rock-Cloud Dispelling Pavilion(one of the ideal places to watch sunset on Yellow Mountain).
There are two nice hotels
3 Star Paiyunlou Hotel and 4 Star Xihai Restaurant
3 Star Paiyunlou Hotel
located in the Xihai scenic area, Yellow Mountain Paiyunlou Hotel offers comfortable standard and triple rooms, all of which are equipped with international direct dial phones and satellite TVs. Chinese Cuisines, Business Center with typing, fax, international telephony and photocopying services, Bar, Sauna and Massage Center and Karaoke are available here. I do advise you take this hotel, save both time and money.
4 Star Xihai Restaurant
Xihai Hotel is located in the West Sea Scenic Area. It takes 15 minutes walk to a peak for watching the sunrise.
It is very tiring after you reach the peak, so it would be nice near the peak to see sunrise tomorrow.
Day 2 Enjoy the Scenery of Yellow Mountain China
Step 1Enjoy the scenery of Beihai Scenic Area
Dawn Pavilion(one of the best places to see sunrise on Yellow Mountain-Beihai Scenic Area-A Monkey Gaping at the Sea-Scattering Flowers Dock-The Flower Grown out of a Writing Brush Rock-The Eighteen Arhats Worshiping at South Sea-White Goose Peak
Step 2 Down hill and Enjoy Yungu Scenic Area
There are 2 ways go from White Goose Peak to Yungu Temple
1 Take telpher from White Goose Telpher Stop to Yungu Telpher Stop, which takes only 10 mintues and CNY 80. I do advise you take this way, if you want to tour the Emerald Valley or have Xiangxi Stream Rafting and wandering at Tunxi Old Street at night. However, typically, most people choose doing nothing later for trembling legs and painful feet. What they choose is to have foot massage.
2 Taking the downhill road from White Goose Peak to Yungu Temple via Fascinating Pavilion, which takes about 3 hours.
All in all, different angle has different scenry, pick one suits you better.
In the afternoon
You can take shuttle from scenic area to Tangkou Coach station and take coach to downtown Huangshan and rest yourself on the bed, or you can take more activities if you are willing to do.
No.1. The Emerald Valley (Valley of Love, AAAA, CNY 80) is a nice place to see blue water hidden in green mountains with Hui pavilions and interesting suspension bridge. It is also one of the scenes of movie Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
No.2. Xiangxi Stream Drifting (CNY80) would be nice to have a close touch with Yellow Mountain in a different Way. The best season to have Xiangxi Rafting should be Summer.
No.3. Huangshan Zui Hotspring Holiday Resort (CNY188): Various kinds of outdoors Hotspring, indoor SPA, Swimming pool, Fish Recuperating Hotspring are all available here.
In the evening
Enjoy the wonderful handicraft works, taste the Hui Cuisine and buy some interesting souvenirs in the Tunxi Old Street. Or, you can have Hui Opera prformance(CNY188) featuring song, dance and acrobatics in Xiangming Theater.
Day 3 Feel the ancient Xidi and Hongcun Charm
In the morning
Xidi(CNY104), a designated World Heritage Site, is worth visiting for the many well-preserved Ming and Qing Dynasties residences and many archways in the village definitely. Besides, the carved stone- and woodwork that decorates the houses and larger halls are so exquisite and vivid. Moreover, as you wandering in this ancient village, you can find many vendors selling quite tasty snacks, and many student have sketch of these old houses, stone streets and rapeseed flowers. Main attractions in Xidi are the Huwen Prefectural Governor House 胡文刺史坊,Horse Race Building 跑马楼,Respect and Love Hall 敬爱堂 and Reacll Hall 追慕堂.
In the afternoon
Hongcun(CNY104), a UNESCO World Heritage Site, is the largest and most crowded old village in Huangshan. There are over 140 well preserved Ming and Qing Dynasties residences, such as the Folk Palace Museum-Chengzhi Hall承志堂. The pround history atmosphere, ancient buildings, beautiful landscapes and honest people here earn this village a world known reputation. Hongcun is also one of the scenes of movie Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon.
Day 4 Hui Merchant's Birthplace-Shexian County
Shexian County
Today is the highlight of Hui culture tour. You will have the idea of Hui Merchants' history and their honors.
In the morning
Tour Tangyue Memorial Archway and Bao Family Garden.
Shexian County is definitely the hometown of Memorial Archway. It has 250 memorial archways in past dynasties, and about 82 are survived. Standing in front of a village, of ancestral temples or residences, the Tangyue Memorial Archway consists of 7 archway, 3 archways of Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and 4 of Qing Dynasty (1644-1911). Delicate carvings with touching stories and ancient male ancestral temple and female ancestral temple of Bao Family nearby set incredible mysterious atmosphere to Hui history. The nearby Bao Family Garden is a Potted landscape resort, setting a noble manor with elegant pavilions, bridges, rockworks and various kinds of potted landscape.
In the afternoon
Tour Old Shexian County seat and 6 main attractions, Orient Triumphal Arch-Xuguo Stone Memorial Archway- China's only one Octagonal Memorial Archway, Educator-Tao xingzhi Memorial Hall, Doushan Street-Hui Noble Manor Street, Huizhou Town's God Temple-Huiyuan, Birthplace of Hui Merchants-Yuliang old Wharf, Hui Merchants Garden-Xin'an Stele Garden and so on.
Day 5 Cruise Via Xin'an River to Qiandao Lake
Yellow Mountain to Qiandao Lake (Thousand Islands Lake)
In the Morning
Drive from downtown Huangshan to Shexian Shendu Wharf (60 kilometers, ) at take boat at about 08:00 via Xin'an River to Qiandao Lake. It takes about 3 hours.
Arrive at Chun'an Wharf of Qiandao Lake near 15:00. From here, you can take bus to downtown Hangzhou (2 hours) or take boat back to Huangshan. Usually, I Do not advise tourists take this way to Hangzhou for there are direct coach and train between these two cities, and 3 hours on a boat would be boring for kids and young people, except you are really water fan.
One of the many things that we're trying to sell is this Northern Electric radio from the 1950s.
It's a Midge model 5508, made of the then new material bakelite. Bakelite is the very first-generation plastic invented by Belgian scientist Dr. Leo Baekeland.
The radio is in perfectly working conditions. Quite amazing.
Just as I was posting this photo, Nortel Networks, which for decades was one of the world's major wireless and telephony giants, announced that it's being sold to Nokia. Nortel Networks had been in bankruptcy protection for some months.
A mobile phone (also known as a cellular phone, cell phone and a hand phone) is a device that can make and receive telephone calls over a radio link whilst moving around a wide geographic area. It does so by connecting to a cellular network provided by a mobile phone operator, allowing access to the public telephone network. By contrast, a cordless telephone is used only within the short range of a single, private base station.
In addition to telephony, modern mobile phones also support a wide variety of other services such as text messaging, MMS, email, Internet access, short-range wireless communications (infrared, Bluetooth), business applications, gaming and photography. Mobile phones that offer these and more general computing capabilities are referred to as smartphones.
The first hand-held mobile phone was demonstrated by Dr Martin Cooper of Motorola in 1973, using a handset weighing around 1 kg.[1] In 1983, the DynaTAC 8000x was the first to be commercially available. In the twenty years from 1990 to 2011, worldwide mobile phone subscriptions grew from 12.4 million to over 5.6 billion, penetrating the developing economies and reaching the bottom of the economic pyramid.-Wikipedia.
This image has been digitised from Queensland State Archives, Series ID S2149: Railway Glass Plate Negatives - Queensland Rail Heritage Collection. It is one of the images depicting the many stations, bridges and tracks that people and goods travelled from, on and through all over the Queensland Rail network.
www.archivessearch.qld.gov.au/items/ITM3579772
Roma Street Railway Station occupies a 0.55ha site within the extensive Roma Street Station transit complex, located on the western side of the Brisbane central business district. The substantial masonry station building (1875) is set back from and faces Roma Street (although partially obscured by later development), and has a prominent centred entrance to the front (south) and a platform along the rear (north). A later platform and awning to the south is associated with the former Country Station development (1939/40).
Features of Roma Street Railway Station of state-level cultural heritage significance are:
Station building (1875)
Platform (1875)
Country Station platform and awning (1939)
Views
The state-level periods of significance of the place are layered and relate to its origins and use as a passenger station (1875-1940) and railway design, traffic and management offices (1875-1974), and the establishment of the former Country Station (1939/40).
A large iron-roofed shelter (c1980) to the east of the station, small buildings to the west, and a lift, stairs and escalators accessing the modern subway below, are not of state-level cultural heritage significance.
The Roma Street Railway Station was opened in 1875 as the first Brisbane Terminal Station for use on the Brisbane end of the Southern and Western Railway Line from Ipswich. The two-storey station building was designed by Francis Drummond Greville (FDG) Stanley, the Colonial Architect and Superintendent of Public Buildings, in 1873 and built over the next two years by Brisbane builder, John Petrie. The station operated as the Brisbane terminal station until 1889, as a major passenger and administration station until 1940, and Brisbane’s primary railway goods facility until 1991. It served as offices for the Queensland Railway Department (later Queensland Railways, later Queensland Rail) staff for over 100 years, and is the one of the oldest surviving railway buildings in Queensland.
In the Australian colonies, governments fostered the development of railways as a means of developing the country and encouraging settlement. It was argued that rail would reduce freight costs and save travel time for passengers.[1] Queensland’s first railway survey was undertaken by the New South Wales Government in 1856, and following separation, Queensland Parliament passed the Railway Act in 1863, enabling railways to be constructed in the colony. The railway network developed along decentralised lines extending from ports to pastoral and mining centres. The first line, between Ipswich and Bigge's Camp, 34km west of Ipswich (later Grandchester, QHR600729), was opened in 1865. This was the first stage of the four-stage Southern and Western Railway project which linked Ipswich to Toowoomba in 1867, Warwick in 1871, and Dalby in 1878. New railways opened west from Rockhampton in 1867 (the Northern Line, later renamed the Central Railway), west from Townsville in 1880 (the Great Northern Line), Cairns in 1887, and south from Normanton in 1891.
The Southern and Western Railway served the pastoralists and industrialists of Ipswich and the Darling Downs, and was primarily for goods, rather than passengers. With the railhead at Ipswich, a railway to Brisbane was not initially considered essential, as goods could be shipped from Ipswich to Brisbane’s port for export. However, the Bremer and upper Brisbane rivers could not cope with large shipping, and lobbying began for an extension to Brisbane. A preliminary survey of possible lines was completed in 1865,[4] but concerns over the extension’s financial viability put work on hold. A Royal Commission on Railway Construction was called in the 1870s, and recommended the extension: the business generated by it was likely to be profitable, and the colony’s economy, which had collapsed in the mid-1860s, had been bolstered by the Gympie gold rush and was better able to afford new infrastructure.
The extension between Ipswich and Oxley was approved in August 1872,[6] and, the first sod on the extension was turned at Goodna in January 1873. From Oxley, two lines had been surveyed, terminating either at North or South Brisbane. After extensive debate, the route to North Brisbane, via a bridge at Oxley Point (Indooroopilly), was chosen as more cost-effective. The terminus of this route, selected by Railway Department Chief Engineer HC Stanley, was located within the Grammar School reserve at the base of the ‘Green Hills’ (Petrie Terrace). The site was unused by the school and was large enough for a major passenger station and goods yard.
The section between Oxley and Brisbane was approved in October 1873,[9] and the Government called for tenders for the construction of the railway terminus station in Brisbane. FDG Stanley, the recently-appointed Colonial Architect and Superintendent of Buildings within the Public Works Department, was the designer of the building. Stanley had commenced with the Public Works Department in 1863, serving as Superintendent of Buildings after Charles Tiffin vacated the Colonial Architect’s position. He was the official Colonial Architect from 1873-1883, when the colony, recovering from the economic collapse of the 1860s, began to invest in public buildings. Stanley’s designs, balancing classical styles and stylistic features with climate-appropriate adaptations and economic restraint, helped define public architecture in Queensland. Extant examples of major works, designed while he was Colonial Architect, include the original State Library (1876-9, QHR600177); Toowoomba Court House (1876-8, QHR600848); Townsville Magistrates Court (1876-7, QHR600929); Townsville Gaol (now part of Townsville Central State School, 1877, QHR601162); Brisbane’s Port Office (1880, QHR600088); Toowoomba Hospital (surviving kitchen wing 1880, QHR601296); post offices at Gympie (1878-80, QHR600534), South Brisbane (1881, QHR600302) and Toowoomba (1880, QHR600847); as well as the Brisbane Supreme Court (no longer extant). As Superintendent of Buildings he designed the Toowoomba Railway Station (1874, QHR600872), Government Printing Office (1873, QHR600114) and Lady Elliott Island Lighthouse (1872-3).
The Brisbane Courier provided a detailed description of the proposed Terminus Passenger Station in October 1873:
The general style of the building will be that known as the Italian Gothic order of architecture. The material used...will be pressed brick with cut stone facings, this being chosen on account of its durability and as also affording the greatest consonant with economy. The station will consist of a main building, two storeys high, flanked at each end by a single storey wing.
The building was designed to house both a passenger station and railway administrative offices. Passengers would access the station from Roma Street via a carriageway, disembarking at the station’s central carriage porch. The porch fronted a 10ft (3m) wide arcade running the length of the main building. From the arcade, passengers would enter either the first-class booking office on the east or the second-class booking office on the west, both served by a semi-circular ticket office on the rear (northern) wall. Female passengers travelling on second-class tickets could wait in a small room located along a western passage, while separate waiting rooms for first-class male and female passengers were east of the first-class booking office. Doorways in the rear wall of the booking offices and waiting rooms led directly onto the 190-foot (58m) long departure platform. Arriving passengers exited the station via a second platform across the rail line. Luggage was loaded onto trains via the luggage passage, on the eastern end of the building. The guards and porters room, staff facilities, a lamp room and stairs to the upper floor were situated in the eastern wing. The western side of the building held public services, including the telegraph office, station master’s office, and parcel and book office, accessible via a public lobby at the end of the arcade. A private staircase to the traffic managers’ office, a staircase to the traffic department, and toilet facilities were located in the western wing. An office or book stall space, in the northwestern side of the building, was accessible from the platform.
Upstairs, the offices of the traffic department, clerks, accountant, draughtsmen, Railways Engineer, Resident Engineer and contractors were accessed from a central passageway which ran almost the length of the building; with a small S-bend in the western end. An arch in the centre of the corridor marked the separation of the traffic department from the Chief Engineer’s office. Both wings hosted staircases.
The building included adaptations for the climate. The arcade sheltered the ground floor rooms from the sun, while skylights in the ceiling and a ventilated lantern provided light and ventilation to the upper floor. All public rooms and most of the offices were fitted with fireplaces. A platform shade, installed on the northern wall of the building over the platform, sheltered passengers from the weather, and was composed of material from an iron station building imported from England for use at Toowoomba. It was supported by brick buttresses at both ends of the building (extant) and on the arrivals platform (no longer extant).
Commensurate with Stanley’s design approach, materials used for the station reflected elegance but economy. Apart from the recycled iron roof trusses and columns, the building was constructed of machine-pressed bricks made from locally-sourced clay, more affordable than stone, and praised as ‘cleaner, sharper [and] finer’ than Brisbane bricks used in earlier buildings. Freestone for the building dressings and columns was sourced from Murphy’s Creek.
Construction work took place over two years, after contractor John Petrie’s tender of £11,845 was accepted in December 1873. Progress was slow, with the stonework foundations underway in June 1874, and the building only ten foot above the ground by September. The line from Ipswich to Brisbane was opened without ceremony on 14 June 1875. The platform at Brisbane Terminus Passenger Station was half-paved, the rooms and corridors incomplete, the roofing over the platform in progress and there was no permanent lighting. Nonetheless, an interested crowd gathered to watch the first outbound services leave the station. The building was sufficiently complete by August 1875 for the Brisbane Courier to describe it as ‘in all respects convenient, handsome, and well-designed’. The station’s arcade was later highlighted as one of Brisbane’s valued architectural features.
The Brisbane to Ipswich route quickly became the busiest section of line in Queensland. Merchandise and imported goods from the ports were despatched along the line, while produce from the Darling Downs and surrounds – including coal, flour, wool, hay, maize, livestock, vegetable and dairy produce – was brought to Brisbane. A central goods handling facility was opened at the Terminal Station, including a large (64m long) goods shed and two sidings, erected in 1875-6 (no longer extant), while railway produce markets opened outside the station, along George and Roma streets. A maintenance yard also operated at Roma Street, including locomotive and carriage sheds. By 1882 the Terminal Station platforms had been extended to cope with the traffic and trade. Traffic reduced slightly after some export goods were diverted to South Brisbane in 1884,[32] but expanded again.[33] Cattle yards, produce sheds, carriage sheds, gas works, goods sheds, coal stages, cold stores, additional locomotive sheds and siding extensions were all added to Roma Street’s goods yard. None of these structures survive in 2020.
Passengers also used the line. Residential occupation of Toowong and Indooroopilly boomed as middle-class city workers took advantage of the four daily train services. In 1882 rail lines were opened from the Terminal Station to Sandgate and the Racecourse, taking day-trippers to the seaside and races, and bringing northern suburbs passengers into Brisbane. In January 1888, the first through-service to Sydney departed from the Terminal Station. However, travellers criticised the lack of direct access from the Terminal Station to the central business district, and in 1889, the Brisbane Central Railway Station was opened. Central Railway Station (QHR 600073) – located closer to the General Post Office and city office buildings – became Brisbane’s main passenger station, and the original Terminal Station was renamed Roma Street Railway Station.
Despite its diminished status, Roma Street remained a major centre for passengers and travellers. Through the 19th and early 20th centuries, guards of honour lined Roma Street to greet and farewell significant visitors and figures, including premiers Morehead and Griffith, governors Norman and Lamington; Governor-General Munro-Ferguson; the late politician JM Macrossan, who had died in Sydney; singer Nellie Melba; Lord Kitchener; and Salvation Army General Booth. Roma Street continued to operate as the Sydney Mail terminus until 1931, when the service shifted to South Brisbane. Crowds thronged to Roma Street Station as soldiers departed for the South African War and World War I. Travelling circuses performed in the Roma Street yards, and an historic parade in 1936 included a ‘Puffing Billy’ locomotive, which was displayed at the yards until 1959. Roma Street also continued as the city’s primary goods terminus.
The station building played an important role as office accommodation for Queensland railway staff. Internal rearrangements were made to the building to accommodate growing staff numbers, and improve their working conditions. It was one of the first buildings in Queensland to feature electric light, installed in 1884.[50] The Chief Engineer vacated the building in 1901 and was replaced by the general traffic manager’s department, with a telephonic system of communication installed the same year. Bunker, lumber and message rooms were added to the wings by 1907; a traffic collector’s office and new strongroom were installed in 1911; and parcels, printing offices and machine rooms replaced the first-class waiting rooms, guards’ room and lamp room by 1920. In 1915, an additional storey was constructed atop the central carriage porch, providing more accommodation for the Traffic Branch on the first floor. A traffic control system, coordinating trains between Brisbane and Gympie, was installed and operated from the additional storey in 1927.
Queensland’s railway network extended dramatically in the 20th century. The North Coast line connected Brisbane to Gladstone in 1898, Rockhampton in 1904, and Cairns in 1924, providing a direct rail link between Brisbane and Mackay, Townsville, Winton, Forsayth, Cloncurry and Blackall. Southern and western trains reached Dirranbandi, Surat, Cunnamulla and Quilpie. Central Station initially hosted ‘country’ services, but it lacked room for expansion, and Roma Street’s larger site was earmarked for a new country station. Roma Street’s locomotive, carriage and marshalling yard facilities were transferred to the Mayne Rail Yards between 1911 and 1927, and work began on the new station. A 350ft (106m) reinforced concrete, tiled passenger subway was constructed from Roma Street to the platforms in 1936-7, replacing an overhead walkway. A new steel awning was installed above the southern platform (Platform 3 in 2020), in approximately 1939. It was used in conjunction with two platforms at the new country station (no longer extant) for country and other passenger services.
On 30 November 1940 the Country Station was opened at Roma Street Station. This low-lying face brick building and its additional platform sat directly between the 1873-5 building and Roma Street. The new passenger station relieved congestion at Brisbane Central Station and made Roma Street the chief station for long distance travel north. The original station was refurbished, its roof re-clad with corrugated fibrous sheeting; and its brick walls painted red and lined in cream to match the new station building. The southwest pediment was removed and replaced by a new storey on the western end of the building. A covered area was added east of the building where the subway stairs emerged. The original station building was turned over to the General Manager, with offices for clerks, traffic-, livestock-, coach- and wagon staff, maintenance and locomotive staff, telephone and telegraph exchanges, and the train control section.
Further plans to upgrade and alter the building were postponed by World War II, during which time troop trains departed from Roma Street, and the pedestrian subway served as an air-raid shelter.[66] In 1945, plans were drawn to alter doors, windows and stairs in the wings, and partitions on the first floor. A second storey was added over the west wing in 1953 (later removed), and the General Manager’s staircase was repositioned in 1961. Externally, the iron carriage shed platform shade over the northern platform was removed in 1959.
Extensive change was undertaken at Roma Street around the original station building in the late 20th century. The southern and northern Brisbane railway systems were directly connected in the 1970s, with the opening of the Merivale Bridge in 1978. In 1985, the country railway station (1940 building) was demolished and replaced by a multi-storey centre incorporating new railway and bus facilities, a hotel, offices and function centre. The original station building was left intact, and two new interstate platforms with standard gauge rails were built on its southern side. The pedestrian subway was refurbished in 1986, with a broom finish concrete and expansion joints, and grated drains were laid on the floor, and a ceramic tile finish on the wall faces to match the subway tiles at Central Station. Roma Street’s rail freight facility was moved to Acacia Ridge in 1991. During the mid-1990s the platforms north and south of the early station building were re-arranged and extended. A bricked waiting area and new roof were added east of the station. Underground, a new concourse was constructed to replace the pedestrian subway, and a 19m section of the original subway converted to a storage room.
The station building remained the General Manager’s Office until 1974. The station master, staff workers and archive storage occupied the building in the 1990s. By 1993, Roma Street was acknowledged as the oldest surviving railway station building in an Australian capital city, and one of the oldest surviving railway buildings in Queensland. A new office fitout was installed on the ground floor for Queensland Rail and the Queensland Police Rail Squad in 1999. Stabilisation, waterproofing and reconstruction works commenced in 2012, including restoration of the brick, plaster, lead flashings, window joinery and stone works. Replacement bricks were custom made in England; Welsh slate was imported from the UK; replacement stone came from Helidon; and rolled lead from England was installed. In 2015, a new steel beams and suspension system was installed between the two storeys, to lift a 65mm bow in the timber floor beams fit amongst the existing timber structures. The second storey of the west wing was removed and the roofline reconstructed to its original configuration. The restoration received an Australian Institute of Architects Queensland award in 2015.
In 2020 the building is vacant, pending further repairs.
This room held seecret telephony equipment that allowed Top Secret conversations to be held with 'the powers that be'. To think Churchill could well have frequently used this room.
Down Street, also known as Down Street (Mayfair), is a disused station on the London Underground, located in Mayfair, west London. It was opened in 1907 by the Great Northern, Piccadilly and Brompton Railway. It was latterly served by the Piccadilly line and was situated between Dover Street (now named Green Park) and Hyde Park Corner stations.
The station was little used and trains often passed through it without stopping. Its lack of patronage coupled with its proximity to other stations resulted in its closure in 1932. During the Second World War it was used as a bunker by prime minister Winston Churchill and his War Cabinet. The station building survives today and is close to Down Street's junction with Piccadilly.
This gravestone in the Hog Bay Cemetery (later Penneshaw) is In Loving Memory of Rev T Ray Caust, beloved Minister of Kangaroo Island Methodist Circuit 1907 – 1908.
Died 30 March 1909. Aged 27 years.
“Erected by his KI Friends”
Australian Christian Commonwealth (SA : 1901 - 1940), Friday 30 April 1909, page 15
________________________________________
THE LATE REV T RAY CAUST
A Suggestion. To the Editor.
Sir—I have just read the "Memoir" of our late brother appearing in the columns of last week's issue of The Commonwealth. The reference to his work on Kangaroo Island has recalled my very pleasant association with him in connection with the erection of the new church at Kingscote. I still have some of his correspondence in relation to the undertaking, and gladly bear my testimony to the self-sacrificing and hopeful spirit manifested by him right from the beginning of the work. Nothing could have been better than the whole of the arrangements made by him in connection with the interesting ceremony of laying the foundation-stone, and this was typical of all his work. When, however, a few of us visited Kingscote a little later for the great occasion—the opening of the church—it was evident that Ray had achieved a very wonderful success, but at a price which it is now painfully sad to reflect upon. The strain had been abnormally great, and the poor fellow seemed but the shadow of his former self. No small part of this strain was occasioned by his intense desire that Methodism should be worthily represented in Kingscote, and he laboured with almost excessive zeal to complete the undertaking, and leave the building finished, and furnished in a suitable way. His letter to me stating that "owing to insufficient funds" it had been decided to open the church unplastered and unseated shows how greatly he was disappointed here, but it is all to his credit that he bore this disappointment cheerfully, rather than leave our few loyal people at Kingscote with a heavy-burden in the shape of interest-bearing debt. The building has remained unfinished, but I am sure it would be an easy task and a most fitting thing for the Methodists of South Australia to complete it, and furnish it in a suitable manner, and let it be dedicated as the "Caust Memorial Church." I do not know quite how much will be needed, as I have not been in communication with our Kingscote friends recently, but I am writing to ascertain their position, and in the meantime I hope this suggestion will be favourably received and the proposal soon assume practical shape. Thanking you in anticipation, I am. etc.,
T. Geddes White.
Goodwood Park, April 24, 1909. [Until a committee is appointed to deal with the matter suggested by Mr. White, the publishers of The Commonwealth will be pleased to act as custodians of any subscriptions which friends may be disposed to send. The proposal has our hearty approval, and will, we are sure, commend itself to our readers.—Ed.]
Kangaroo Island Courier (Kingscote, SA : 1907 - 1951), Saturday 3 April 1909, page 3
________________________________________
ECHOES FROM HOG BAY.
(From Our Own Correspondent)
Tuesday, March 30. OBITUARY
DEATH OF THE REV T RAY CAUST
Words are often inadequate to express deep feelings and I am sure by their medium the friends of the Rev T Ray Caust cannot utter the sorrow they feel at the news of his death which occurred at Hog Bay this morning. The Rev gentleman worked amongst the Islanders for a considerable time, earning the respect and esteem of all with whom he came in contact. On Saturday he arrived by the Karatta and was to have performed the marriage ceremony for two young couples during his sojourn here. Although the trip across was rather an unpleasant one Mr Caust who, it will be remembered, has been ailing for a long time — stood it remarkably well, but on arriving here felt considerably weaker. This condition became so alarming to his friends that on Monday morning a messenger was sent to Cape Willoughby to wire Kingscote for medical aid. The doctor arrived at midday by the Karatta to attend the sufferer and gave no hope of recovery and this morning early he passed away. Our heart-fell sympathies go out to his bereaved parents and relatives who could not be near to soothe his last hours.
Mr Caust was a brother to the gentleman of the same name who heroically met his death by drowning at Henley Beach while saving the life of a comrade a few years ago. It is at times like this when the necessity of telephonic communication is most keenly felt.
In wiring for medical aid the distance of 18 miles to Cape Willoughby had to be covered before sending the message. It is scandalous that Hog Bay should be so neglected by those in authority—when our money for the necessary guarantee is in the depositary of the Bank. Hog Bay people should rise as one and demand an explanation of the injust delay.
squizzy
In 2004, Sam Ibrahim was charged with the Kneecapping of two men in Newcastle. He was also charged during the late 1990s, over a cocaine distribution ring involving the Nomads. Sam Ibrahim was acquitted on both matters.[20] In 2009, Sam Ibrahim was charged over the alleged kidnapping of a teenage boy and held in custody for four months until bail was granted in July 2009. At the time of the bail hearing, it was reported that police were also investigating a second suspect in the alleged incident, Nimilote Ngata. Ngata (b. ca 1988) is the son of John Ibrahim's bodyguard, Semi "Tongan Sam" Ngata.[22] In July 2009, "Tongan Sam" Ngata, was arrested following a raid on his home by a special gang violence taskforce that netted bulk quantities of a methamphetamine precursor
and imbrahim has a lawyer FUNG modelling...$400 k per week lawyer
can't rub off I and abbot says the Musle..standover..NOmads...and a knifing scars see wiki...that's right the muslce..and they say lieth likes the musle IS that him when i was playing 8 year old soccer with LOvelock..why didn't you pass the ball and they all laugh at cap
and then a signal PIttwater RSL soccer club forgooten LOST
Peter is the Deputy Director of the Telecommunications Research Project at the University of Hong Kong ( www.trp.hku.hk ) and a partner in the quarterly Telecoms InfoTechnology Forums (TIF). He has a long background in telecommunications and Internet research, analysis and consulting, having worked on regulatory assessment, implementation and execution projects, as well as due diligence and market entry strategic guidance projects in China and Asia over the last 17 years.
Between 1999 and 2004, Peter built and ran China 's leading IT research consultancy, MFC Insight. Headquartered in Beijing , Insight provided strategic guidance to clients such as Ericsson, Vodafone, China Mobile, Agilent, Nokia, Google, Huawei, PWC, White & Case, the Singapore Government, as well as to China 's State Council.
During 1997-98, Dr Lovelock worked as a policy analyst at the ITU in Geneva, where he was a contributing author on the World Telecommunications Development Report, amongst a number of other publications, as well as many of the Secretary General's speeches from the period. Subsequently, Peter was a leading contributor to the ITU's IP Telephony initiatives, and has run training courses for a number of Asian regulatory bodies as part of the ITU's Regional Center of Excellence (CoE).
Since disbanding Insight, Peter has provided consulting advice to RAND, Novell, Accenture and others on developments in China, provided regulatory and broadband advice to the governments of India, Japan, and Singapore, worked on restructuring projects for Alcatel in Paris, and authored reports on fixed-mobile convergence, alternate operator strategies for mobile, and Huawei's 3G expansion.
Most recently Peter has established a new regional consulting operation based in Singapore, and working with the emerging IT companies in China, India and Vietnam .
that's what they don't understand cap just wanted the simple life THE MUSCLE he knows the muscle standover bristow....he has to remeber everything DEFECT and then BEST forget...has to remeber everything imposibble for man HE held the baton didn't he...
and tilly laughed just like squizzy how much money OH that stings IBrahim the life blood of the drug market up the cross FUNg and save ljb we'll all be fung...and in underbelly I want what you have MR freeman NANA capper's BOOKie of course a freeman would bet with a freeman...but DAYB won't freeman you say not of the jewish persuaion shindlers they are a very persuavive people TOM kennely Jane kennely FTTCIL a channel ten christmas party the aristiocrats with penny spence BURT and IT"S TIME GOUGH...and now EYption police guy and his military THE HOMELANd a stargem and rverand keith where odgers...stewopid country people actually speach like this says jess good looking doesn't care if they do BEST forget and it comes...it's all perty messed up in here SKITZ i'm having a [pirsig breackdown or something HE held the baton in the elction I don't know is there a pamphlet move up from "magics" to masonery..Operation Gladio (Italian: Operazione Gladio) is the codename for a clandestine NATO "stay-behind" operation in Europe during the Cold War. Its purpose was to continue anti-communist actions in the event of a Soviet invasion and conquest. Although Gladio specifically refers to the Italian branch of the NATO stay-behind organizations, "Operation Gladio" is used as an informal name for all stay-behind organizations.. The name Gladio is the Italian form of gladius, a type of Roman shortsword.[1]
Operating in many NATO and even some neutral countries,[2] Gladio was part of a series of national operations first coordinated by the Clandestine Committee of the Western Union (CCWU), founded in 1948. After the creation of NATO in 1949, the CCWU was integrated into the Clandestine Planning Committee (CPC), founded in 1951 and overseen by SHAPE (Supreme Headquarters Allied Powers, Europe), transferred to Belgium after France’s official withdrawal from NATO's Military Committee in 1966 – which was not followed by the dissolution of the French stay-behind paramilitary movements.
The role of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) in sponsoring Gladio and the extent of its activities during the Cold War era, and its relationship to right-wing terrorist attacks perpetrated in Italy during the "Years of Lead" (late 1960s to early 1980s) and other similar clandestine operations, is the subject of ongoing debate and investigation but has never been proven. Switzerland and Belgium have had parliamentary inquiries into the matter
everyone must have one a stay at "home" operation and the cia walk up to asif I could have been a contender IF it wasn't for the MURdochs CRAZY cofee guy he held the baton..YOU know i can't franco...and then the "feds" before the hilton bombing and a traffic stop I work for DPI a just going to the british embasy libray archive...and that's more of the telling the engines of that plane were idal NO Incident the box of death HE CAN't get out OH KNOW says the coinoperated boy NOT the box of DEATH..where's denmarks BARBIe CIA walks up to YOU and introduces themselves and to philby DOOM=nixon you wanted in really? and a first national eveicted "in" $3003 dollars what he still doing around to the end of lease you held the baton in the where's denamrks operation BARBIE with them LINING them up on the east german wall CHILDREN OF THE REVOLUTION..that sort of fan JOHN lennon
IF it wasn't for the murdochs you'd already be dead..and they laugh at cap..
I"M have a pirsig type breakdown..skitz..noone gets that sick so quickly take youre "slip"
When he died, Peter Peterson left behind the trappings of a seemingly charmed life: a vast fortune, two children, and a stately Park Avenue address. But he left something else behind: a sheaf of confessions about a dark period of his youth. In pages written weeks before his death, he reveals a crime of passion, committed in the throes of unrequited love, that has burdened him for his entire life. Yet as he finishes his story, he encounters a surprise that will shake the very foundation of his past. Spanning a boyhood in Iceland to the Nazi occupation of Denmark to a cunning business career in modern-day Manhattan, Absolution echoes Dostoevsky and Ibsen as it masterfully plumbs the darkest corners of a sinister mind and a wounded heart
income stream and gen from pequin laughs KEEP laughing gen cause in NCIS you rang the US ambasitor so you MUst be some form of operative THat how GIbbs investigates at FIRST..we just have to find out who your with HUNgarian uncle yuko/hungarian socity of the black hand..UNcle llyody He'll end up ALONE
Fuck I hate them and at nine accounts smoke break and geoff harvey comes in the side door
The weather was simply divine in Sydney on Sunday afternoon, sunny but brisk. Not the sort of day to be spending inside St Mary’s Cathedral listening to an organ recital – or later drinking fine French champagne, good beer and eating exquisite finger food at the Quay Central. But around 100 people braved the bracing Sydney afternoon. The occasion: the 70th birthday of Geoff Harvey, former music boss of the Nine Network and, most notably, its Midday program.
It’s become something of a tradition for Harvey to celebrate a major birthday with a recital and then good food and wine amongst friends. Harvey rattled off a number of musical numbers at the Cathedral: four or fives pieces by Bach (including the Toccata in C), the Saint-Saëns Organ Symphony, as well as some joke pieces.
The occasion was notable for the cast of heavyweights who fronted. Ros Packer, wife of Kerry, and Sam Chisholm and wife Sue were there, Ray Martin made a speech, as did Gerald Stone, former boss of 60 Minutes and now an SBS board member. He described Harvey as a “young man,” being around four years older himself. Mike Williams, a former warm-up man for Midday also spoke, following Martin. Penny Spence, Harvey’s first wife was also present, as was Vicki Jones, Nine’s stylist, who also spoke.
But there were two other quite notable speakers. Glenn Pallister, formerly a cameraman with Midday who went on to The Footy Show in Sydney, and ended up as an executive in charge of light entertainment on the third floor, before falling victim to the first round of Chisholm’s purges at the end of June.
He was some ten metres away from Chisholm as he spoke, no doubt remembering the rather flint-hearted manner in which Chisholm sacked him. The other notable, who surprised a number of people by his appearance, was Trevor Kennedy, the former CEO of PBL and a man keeping a very low profile after all those Swiss banking account and share trading deal claims made by the late Rene Rivkin.
Ray Martin showed no signs of any worries after reports surfaced in the Annette Sharp gossip column in the Sydney Sun-Herald that he was facing replacement by Tracy Grimshaw. The story (or “tale”) followed a claim a week earlier that Grimshaw was all glum at the prospect of losing her gig fronting the Today Show, should Nine bite the bullet and hire Ms Congeniality, Juanita Phillips, the still-contracted ABC Newsreader in Sydney.
The claim by Sharp that Grimshaw was going to replace Martin had all the hallmarks of a suck job and make-up fable after two solid whacks at Grimshaw the week before and a fortnight earlier.
you'd think the producer ascom nira let me talk the hospital pager guys and the state govt announces everybill will be bought back into three months copy of press realses to mona vale hospital and jugs grand mother ANDRE MURRY wins scotmans says MY Craig..older...and the GMA producers money RUP...I could have been a contender CAp done stuff..criminal...eypet NO mater what your affilation...just trying to difuse the situation make LIGHT of the issues..strick..and accuso says the police chief BATMAN your batman..and cause we are at war FEIGN a twain death and they have to come back bruce your back dayb cat collects death certificates TWAIN reports of my death and swami they have to die..and nods at geoff harvey should have said "honest" john cappers sone from rosters at seven and ten langoliers
An official First Day Cover (FDC) from the Netherlands, issued on May 19, 1981. This envelope commemorates the centenary of three major Dutch postal and telecommunication services: Parcel Post (45c stamp), Telephony (55c stamp), and the State Post Office Savings Bank (Rijkspostspaarbank, 65c stamp). The design features abstract geometric shapes in red, green, and blue, matching the stamps. Catalog number: NVPH E192
Somaliland. www.afrodigg.com/news.php
SOMALILAND: AFRICA'S BEST KEPT SECRET
But the most defining and instructive question remains, how have the people of Somaliland built such a stable democracy, society and institutions in a region that has not known peace in nearly two decades? In order to answer this puzzle, it is important to revisit the history of Somaliland. SOMALILAND: Africa's Best Kept Secret.
With almost daily reports of chaos and violence rocking Mogadishu, the capital city of the failed state of Somalia, the average Kenyan would be forgiven to believe that the whole of Somalia is on fire, to be visited only by those who have signed up with fate! But alas, wait a minute. There is a safe haven in north western Somalia, actually a republican state in every respect but for international recognition. Welcome to the peaceful and beautiful state of Somaliland, one of the states Simon Reeve, in his popular award winning five-part BBC Four series, refers to as Places that don't exist.
I was in the city of Hargeisa, the capital city of Somaliland, two weeks ago on an assignment. This trip was in many ways an eye opener to me. It drastically changed my perceptions about Somalia, and Somaliland in particular, perceptions largely informed (misinformed) by a transnational western press eternally unfavorable to Africa and especially Islamic Africa.
After my brief visit, I now fully appreciate the support Somaliland is receiving from her visitors including the admiration of acclaimed scholars such as Prof. Ali Mazrui, Prof. William Reno, Prof. George Eshiwani, Gerard Prunier, Bernard Helander, I'M. Lewis, and the courageous Prof. Equal Jhazbhay of South Africa to mention just a few.
The first thing that strikes a foreigner against his/her expectations is the peace, tranquility and order in the city. Unbelievably, one can walk or drive on the streets of Hargeisa by night without the slightest fear of muggings, carjacking and armed robberies, much unlike Nairobi and other major towns of Kenya where the government has nearly ceded control to organized crime. A robust and lively city, it is in many ways similar to the sprawling Eastleigh estate, in terms of aggressive commerce and social lifestyles.
However, the similarity ends there. Where eastleigh is crime prone, water and sanitation services stretched to the limit and burst sewers releasing raw human waste onto pot holed streets, Hargeisa is neat and with a working system of social services. The ordinary Kenyan accustomed to heavy police presence on our city streets, occasionally falling victim to their harassment, will not believe his luck to find unarmed and unobtrusive, though poorly dressed policemen, patrol the streets of Hargeisa. The popular thinking is that every Somali Lander has an obligation to safeguard the freedom and territorial integrity which they valiantly fought for and reclaimed at great human sacrifice.
Somali Landers are united in their love for country irrespective of political affiliation.
This love for country immediately became evident to me upon landing at Legal airport. At the prompting of the Somalia embassy in Nairobi, my colleague and I hesitantly obtained visas even though we had already secured referred Somaliland visas to be issued on arrival in the country. The immigration officers were so enraged on seeing Somalia visas endorsed in our passports that they immediately refused us entry. We came to learn later that the head of a UN agency in the country and his entourage were furiously turned away on account of the same problem, two days ago. They considered Somalia's alleged authority to issue visas for entry into Somaliland, an affront on their sense of nationhood as a separate and sovereign state. We were kept waiting at the airport for our return flight to Nairobi for three hours.
It took the intervention of a smooth talking driver to end our ordeal and secure our entry. Looking back on that incident, I salute the fierce display of patriotism by those seemingly poorly paid officers. I was left questioning the feeble sense of patriotism me and many of my compatriots, some with genuine continuing and historical grievances against the state we have for Kenya.
Somaliland has made huge strides in expanding social services to its people since reclaiming its independence on 18th May 1991, despite a limited revenue base. Without formal international recognition as a sovereign state and therefore ineligible for funding by international lending institutions, it has been handicapped in undertaking large scale reconstruction programs. With few revenue streams, the economy is heavily dependant on monthly remittances from the Diaspora and international NGOs whose involvement spreads across a range of social sectors such as health, education and skills development etc
In a span of 16 years, primary school enrolment has shot up from a dismal figure of 10,000 to 150,000 in 2007, while enrolment in secondary schools increased by 56 % over the same period. There is a renewed impetus for modernization within the universities of Hargeisa, Burao and Amoud, churning out freshly minted professionals in as diverse fields as medicine, engineering, sciences and education.
Social services such as water, electricity and mobile telephony are partly privatized. Indigenous businessmen team up in partnerships and joint ventures to provide these services at profitable but affordable costs to their people. The leading mobile phone companies Telecom and Telecom charge a fraction of what Safaricom charge its customers in tariffs, thereby increasing connectivity to a large segment of the population.
Though the economy is heavily dependent on imports due to a non-existing manufacturing sector, often only shipping out livestock to the Middle East, prices of basic foodstuffs and other commodities are comparatively cheaper.
While it is a nightmare for the average middle class Kenyan to import a secondhand car owing to prohibitive custom duties, an average Somali Lander can buy a well conditioned Toyota Mark II, the popular car of choice from anything between 1500 - 2000 dollars, with the more powerful 4-wheel drive Toyota Surf changing hands for anything between 3500 - 5000 dollars in the local used car bazaars. I'm already seeing images of the typically aggressive kikuyu car dealer sniffing a lucrative business opportunity, if only he can find ways of going round the tax man.
Somaliland has established a strong and robust multiparty democracy in which the opposition has a majority in the House of Representatives. With the support of the international community, the country held its first multiparty elections widely praised as credible, free and fair in 2003, following the death of the second caretaker president, Mr. Mohamed Egal. In order to tap into the positive values of a clan system which plays an important role in regulating intra and inter group relations in much of Somalia, and also the principal culprit behind the failed state in Central and Southern Somalia, Somaliland has an upper house called the " Guurti."All clans select their representatives to the exalted ‘house of lords'. A similar proposal in the initial CKRC draft was shot down in Bomas in our failed experiment at constitution making. The role of this house of elders is to moderate partisan acrimony in the legislative process, in a system of checks and balances aimed at promoting unity in diversity.
A robust and free media unafraid to criticize the establishment when necessary complete the picture.
There is in place a code of conduct, akin to our own IPPG deal of 1997, to which political parties subscribe in competition. Parties nominate representatives to the National Electoral Commission, are allotted equal airtime and space in the nation's electronic and print media to sell their respective manifestos and programs during elections.
The fabric of the state is founded on the twin pillars of devotion to the cardinal Islamic principle of Taw heed (unity of Allah) and social justice. A very proud people by nature, the search to find the existence of a class society characteristic of a capitalist economy is tenuous and elusive. It would appear that the emergence of a conspicuous class system is suppressed by religious imperatives and the clan system which serves as a focal point of group insurance. It is not quite uncommon to find a commoner engaging and interacting with a cabinet minister on the streets. To my consternation, I found a senior government official later introduced to me as the Minister for Youth and Sports , in an animated after lunch conversation with a group of people in front of a hotel, something of a rarity in Kenya. I mean, how many times have you seen Dr. Mohamed Kuti, his Kenyan counterpart, mingle freely with the youth on the streets of Nairobi. The humility of the political class in Somaliland has convinced me that we create leaders with cult like tendencies and then cry foul when they ride roughshod over us.
As other Muslim countries in or neighboring the middle east experiencing unbearably hot temperatures, official working hours ran from 7.30 am to 1.00 pm with the remainder of the day mostly devoted to miraa/chat chewing. As is the case with many pastoralist communities, the Somalis are a socially egregious and oral people with a strongly developed tradition of social affiliation. The miraa/ chat chewing sessions provide an appropriate forum to discuss debate and even argue over common issues in their trademark loud and garrulous manner. Friday is the only designated prayer and rest day.
Practicing a moderate form of Islam, the Somali Landers are a liberal lot, with smoking a national pastime and an entrenched habit unlike in other African countries including Kenya, where the practice is frowned upon on account of its emerging health implications.
Hargeisa has a vibrant informal roadside business much like the hawkers paradise of Eastleigh's Garissa lodge. The money changers stand out from the crowd. Countless moneychangers sitting behind meshed boxes containing wads of blue colored notes in denominations of 500 Somaliland shillings dot the streets. During prayer times, the note holding boxes are left unattended without the slightest fear of theft. In a country where the Somaliland shillings and the US dollar are the currencies of choice, a stranger will be tempted to conclude that every resident of the city is a money changer, considering the bulky notes in everyone's possession.
Trading at 6000 shillings to the dollar, one needs to carry a bagful of Somaliland notes to make routine purchases at the local supermarket.
But the most defining and instructive question remains, how have the people of Somaliland built such a stable democracy, society and institutions in a region that has not known peace in nearly two decades? In order to answer this puzzle, it is important to revisit the history of Somaliland.
Somaliland was a British Protectorate for nearly 80 years before attaining independence as the state of Somaliland on 26th June, 1960. The Southern part under Italian rule became independent five days later on 1st July, 1960. In pursuing a grand dream of greater Somalia which envisaged the re- unification of all territories occupied by the Somali's, including Ethiopia's Ogaden province and Kenya's Northern Frontier District, the newly independent and sovereign state of Somaliland rushed headlong against the wise counsel of the first prime minister Mohamed Ibrahim Igal, into a union with the South. It was an experience they would live to regret.
The British press at the time described Somaliland as the colony that rejected its independence. When the late Said Barre took power in a military coup; he embarked on an ambitious public works programmed and an expansionist adventure to annex the Ogaden province from Ethiopia. The ramifications of the war soon spilled over to Kenya culminating in the infamous shifta wars of the late 1960's and 1970's in which ethnic Somali dissidents took up arms in a war of secession to unite the present day North Eastern Province with the Greater Somalia.
The effect of this war on ethnic Kenya Somalis is best captured by the infamous Wagalla massacre of 1980 in which the Kenyatta government cracking so hard on innocent citizens causing massive displacement, confiscation of livestock and indiscriminate killings as a way to suppress the emergency. Survivors and relatives of victims of that massacre are still crying out for justice.
While the abrasive Barre initially appeared to have an upper hand in the territorial war with Ethiopia, capturing the strategic towns of JigJiga and Dirre Dawa, he was soon vanquished and humiliated by an Ethiopian onslaught reinforced by superior air power provided by Cuba and Russia.
Following this monumental disillusionment and a severely bruised ego, Barre soon became paranoid and captive to the wishes of his marehan clan, banning dissent to his rule. Barre's growing politics of exclusion soon bred discontent among the population and particularly in Somaliland which felt that it had been dealt a back handed compliment for its voluntary decision to join the Union.
Somaliland bore the worst brunt of Barre's military actions at muzzling dissent. In 1988, he ordered a series of air strikes against the city of Hargeisa from the nearby military air base, reducing the city to debris. A war memorial featuring the fighter plane used to flatten the city today stands out conspicuously in the freedom park in honor of the veterans and as a historic reminder to the present generation.
Unlike the Rwanda genocide very little is known about the ethnic cleansing of the tens of thousand Somaliladers between 1988 and 1991.
The Somaliland National Movement (SNM) together with other popular forces in the south, joined hands against Barre's dictatorship leading to the fall of Mogadishu in 1991. While the warlords in Mogadishu soon turned against each other over control of power, the people of Somaliland quickly organized to bring stability to the entire territory falling within the borders of an independent pre-unification Somaliland.
It is argued that Somaliland successfully managed the transition because they fell back on their experience of administration and governance for which they had been adequately prepared by the British. On the other hand, it is the butt of local jokes that the Italians trained soldiers instead of administrators in the south, hence the continued infighting and violence among the warlords of Mogadishu whose several attempts at forming a central government have proved elusive.
Smarting from the bitter experiences of unification, the people of Somaliland quickly secured and reclaimed their pre-unification borders and installed a caretaker government. Somaliland held its first multiparty elections widely regarded as credible, free and fair in 2003. The three main parties UDUB, Kulmiye and UCID have seats in an opposition dominated parliament. Sixteen years on, they are yet to get formal recognition as a sovereign state despite enjoying uninterrupted stability since 18th May, 1991.
However, it has established agreements and co-operation with several African countries including Ethiopia, Ghana, South Africa, Rwanda and even Kenya. In Europe, it has either established co-operation agreements or contacts with Belgium, U.K., Sweden, Ireland, the European Union and lately Norway, which the president, Dahir Rayale Kahin recently toured on an official visit.
The Arab states, led by Egypt and Sudan, have not been forthcoming in supporting Somaliland's statehood endeavor. Probably this has to do with the Ethiopia's Blue Nile. A strong united Somalia - and a member of the Arab League - is obviously an excellent proxy in the war for the Blue Nile.
It is not clear, though, why the rest of the international community is not forth coming in recognizing Somaliland as a sovereign state and fail to recognize the inviolable right of the Somalilanders to revert to their original pre-unification status. We have seen the international community especially Western Europe, offer support to liberation fronts such as SPLA/M in Southern Sudan resulting in autonomy and self rule. It has further supported the separation of previously single countries such as Senegal and Mali, Egypt, Sudan and Syria, Pakistan and Bangladesh, Malaysia and Singapore and the disintegration of the former USSR into several distinct nation states.
As you read this the US and most other members of the UN Security Council are pushing for "supervised independence" of the province of Kosovo.
It would appear that the major powers in global politics especially the veto wielding permanent members of the UN Security Council, have failed to read the strategic benefits of recognizing the republic of Somaliland, as a way of bringing peace to the troubled horn.
With repeated US claims of the existence of Al Qaeda cells in Mogadishu, the international community should move fast and confer recognition on Somaliland and seal it off from possible terrorist infiltration. Terrorist elements can easily infiltrate and recruit membership in Somaliland by whipping up popular anti-American sentiments and tapping into the frustrations of an unfulfilled dream of recognition. Such recognition will also be in the best strategic and security interests of Ethiopia, Kenya and Djibouti.
In my view, the way to go will be to divide Somalia into original two separate states to bring any semblance of order and stability. At least for Somaliland, this is the way to go. In any case, I don't see why Somaliland should be forced to remain part of Somalia against the popular wish of its people. The people of Somaliland will definitely stand to lose a lot if forced to remain part of Somalia, after painstakingly having rebuilt their war shattered economy, democratic institutions and cities.
I think the starting point in Somaliland's audacious and treacherous journey in securing international recognition would be for brave individual states to come forward and affirm its right to self determination to reclaim its sovereign past. This way, international opinion would progressively change to favour its position. For historical reasons, the United Kingdom should take the lead in the effort to help restore Somaliland's sovereign past after the ill fated attempts at unification.
Despite differences in policy, the government and the opposition in Somaliland are singularly united in their resolve to become a sovereign state separate from Somalia. This presents them with a unique challenge to bridge the gap that divides them and instead harness their collective energies to rally the international community around their nationalistic cause.
This would entail the formation of a bipartisan network of think tanks and informed lobbies in Somaliland and the Diaspora to champion the cause of statehood at regional, continental and international levels.
Kenyan Somali Landers have an equally moral duty to support the cause of their kith and kin. The upcoming general election presents them with a rare opportunity to petition and influence policies of mainstream Kenyan political parties with regard to the thorny issue of Somaliland's recognition. As a focused interest group, they can throw their combined support behind one of the leading parties in return for the recognition of Somaliland.
An entry point would be to petition the Paul Muite led parliamentary committee on the administration of justice to push a motion in parliament calling on the Kenya government to recognize Somaliland as an independent and sovereign state. Hon. Muite led a parliamentary delegation to Somaliland in December 2006 which found and reported overwhelming evidence of a functioning democracy.
Do you know that Raila Odinga, once addressed a mammoth rally at the freedom park in the middle of the city of Hargeisa? Perhaps the ever courageous Agwambo, and fourth president of Kenya, can be approached for support. Are you listening Somalilanders?
If Somaliland has satisfactorily fulfilled the basic duty of any republican state, which is to protect the lives and property of those living within its borders, what else does the international community require of it? If the streets of Hargeisa are absolutely safer than any you can find in other African capitals, what justification does the African Union have in its dithering about recognizing Somaliland?
In spite of the formidable odds stacked against it, I have a feeling that Somaliland will finally reclaim its rightful place among the family of nations - (my prediction is this will happen around its 2010 - Somaliland's 50th anniversary of independence from the British rule) It would appear that Somaliland has failed to attract international attention for all the right reasons while the international community has failed to recognize Somaliland for all the wrong reasons.
The challenge for Somaliland is to keep stoking the fire of nationalism burning while maintaining peace and stability within its borders. This will prick the unfeeling conscience of the international community to act faster than it should. And finally, the hypocrisy of the southerners who pretend to favor a united Somalia should be exposed and dismissed for what it is. If they cannot keep peace within their own backyard, why else would they want to drag Somaliland into their never ending cycle of nepotism, violence and lawlessness, other than envy?
By Michael Torome
toromemichael@gmail.com
You think that we connect
That the chemistry's correct
Your words walk right through my ears
Presuming I like what I hear
And now I'm stuck in the
The web you're spinning
You've got me for you prey
(Yeah) Sorry I'm not home right now
I'm walking into spiderwebs
So leave a message
And I'll call you back
A likely story, but (Yeah) leave a message
And I'll call you back
You're intruding on what's mine
And you're taking up my time
Don't have the courage inside me
To tell you please let me be
Communication, a telephonic invasion
I'm planning my escape...
(Yeah) Sorry I'm not home right now
I'm walking into spiderwebs
So leave a message
And I'll call you back
A likely story, but (Yeah) leave a message
And I'll call you back
And it's all your fault
I screen my phone calls
No matter who calls
I gotta screen my phone calls
Now it's gone to deep (Now, it's gone too deep)
You wake me in my sleep (Wake me in my sleep)
My dreams become nightmares (Dreams become nightmares)
'Cause you're ringing in my ears
(Yeah) Sorry I'm not home right now
I'm walking into spiderwebs
So leave a message
And I'll call you back
A likely story, but (Yeah) leave a message
And I'll call you back
And it's all your fault
I screen my phone calls
No matter-matter-matter-matter who calls
I gotta screen my phone calls
Oooh, the spiderwebs
Leave a message and I'll call you back
I'm walking into spiderwebs
So, leave a message and I'll call you back
I'm walking into spiderwebs
It's all your fault, no matter who calls
I gotta screen my phone calls
It's all your fault, it's all your fault
No matter who calls, no matter who calls
I'm walking into spiderwebs so,
Leave a message and I'll call you back
I'm walking into spiderwebs so,
Leave a message and I'll call you back