Anotherth ing that these channels do well, particu -larly Channel 4, sto show a widevarietyofprogram mescatering t o mi nority in terst s - i nclu ding, even, su btitled foreign soap ope
Trang 1Questions and suggestions I6I
successful soap p roducers and directors , it was a com plete fa ilure.
Viewersfound the complicatedstorylinesandthe Spanishaccents
toodifficult to follow, and could not iden tifywith thesitua tionsin
which the charactersfoundthemselves Itwas all just too glamorous
for them.It was abandone dafteronlya year
Itbecameobviou sin the early 1960sthat thepopularity of soap
operas and light entertainment shows mean t hat there w as less room
forprogrammeswhichlived up tothe originaleducationalaimsof
television Since 1982Britain has hadtwo channels(BBC2 and
Channel 4) which actasthemainpromoters oflearning and
' culture' Both have been successful i n prese nting p ro grammes on
ser i o us and weighty topics w hich are n evertheless att ractive to
quitelargeaudiences.BBC2 isfam ou sfor itshighly acclaimed
dra matizations of grea t works o f li terature a nd for ce rtaindocu
-mentary ser i es t hat h ave b ecom e wo rld -fa mous 'class ics' (t he a rt
history series Civi li sat ion and t he n atural h istory se ries Li fe O n E arth
are examples) Anotherth ing that these channels do well, particu
-larly Channel 4, sto show a widevarietyofprogram mescatering
t o mi nority in terst s - i nclu ding, even, su btitled foreign soap operas!
QUES TIONS
1 Itis easytotell by thesize andshapeof British
newspap erswhatkindsof readers they are
aimedat Whatare the two maintypes called,
and wh reads them?Whatotherdifferences
are t he re between news papers? A re t here
sim-ilarly cleardistinctionsbetw eentypes of
n ewspaper in yo ur co untry?
2 The dominantforce in British Broadcasting is
the BBe Whatenabled it toach ieve its position,
a nd h ow doe s i t m aintain t his? C an you desc ribe
some of the characteristicswhichgivetheBBC
i ts special pos ition i n B ritain an d i n t he r est o f
theworld?
3 Thereisone aspectof newspaperpublishing
which, in the 1980s and 1990s, received alot
ofpublicandparliamenta rycritic ism Peop le
SUG GES TI ONS
felt that the invasionof privacyof privateindi
-vidualsand public figures (such asmembers of
theroyal family) had reachedunaccepta ble
levels Legislation wasdrafted ,bu tthere was no
n ew la w pa ssed to con trol the press's activities Wha t p roblem s are there i n Br itain w ith getting
legislationlikethis approved ' Whatargum ent s
canbe put forward infavour ofk eeping the
s tatus q uo ? How is t he press contro lled in yo ur
c o untry?
4 What doesthetelevision ratings chart tell you
about Britishview in g habits'Does this tell you anythingaboutthe British ' What are themost
pop ular t elevision p rogranlmes i n your
coun try?Whatdoesthisreveal,if anythin g,
about yo ur natio n?
• Have alook at a coup leof examplesof each type ofnationalnews
-paper.Try to get holdof examp lesfrom the same day
• If you don' talreadydo so, listen totheBBC WorldServiceif youcan
Trang 2The romance of trav el: th e steam e ng ine
Perhaps because the)' were the first means of masstransportauon.
perhap s becausethey go t hrough t he
heartof thecountryside, t here i s a n aura of romanc e att ached to t rains i n
B ritain M any thou sand s o f p eo ple
a TC e nthus iast ic ' train spo tters' wh o
s pend a n asto nishing a mou nt of time at statio ns and a lo ng the s ide s
o f railway lines tTying to ' spo t' as many diffe rent engines as poss ible Steam t rains sym bo lizing th e
coun-try'slost indust rial p ower, ha ve t he
gr eates t ro ma nce of all Many ent h usiasts s pe n d their free time
k eepi ng the m i n ope ratio n a nd fin ance this by offering rides ( 0 t o ur-ists In '993 more than 10 m illion journeys w ere taken on steam trains
in Europe More t han 80% o f hose journeyswereta ken i n B ritain.
• TheAAand theRAe
These are the in itials of the A uto -mobile Assoc iatio n and the Royal Automobile Club A driver who joins e ithero f them (bypaying a subscriptio n) ca n g ctemergency
help whe n h is or h er ca r b reaks
do w n The fact thatb ot h
organize-tions arc very \vell- k no wn is a
in d icati on of the im po rtance o f th e car i n modern Bri tish life
17
Transport
The Britisharee thusiastic abo utmobility.Theyregardthe o
ppor-tuni ty to tr avel far and fr equen tl y a s a rig ht So me co m m ute rss pend
up to two o r thr ee h ou rs e ach da y gell ing to wo rk in L o ndo n o r so me
o ther big cit y and back ho me to t hei r subu rban o r country ho mes i n
th evening Mostpeopled notspend quite solong each daytra
vel-ling,b titistak nfor grantedthat fewpeopl eliveneareno u gh to
t h e ir w o rk o r sec o n dary sc hoo l to ge t t here o n foo l.
A s e lsewhere in Europe, t ranspor t i n mod ern B ta in i s d ominated
b the motorcar and thereare theattendan tprobl em s oftraffic
conges tion a nd po llution Th ese pr o blem s a re, in f act, more a cute
th an they a re i n m any ot her coun tries bo th b ecause B ritain i s d ensely
populate and alsobecau se a very highproportion ofgoodsare
tran sporte d b y road Th ere i s a n additi ona l r ea s o n for co nges t io n i n
Britain WhiletheBritishwantthe freedomtomove around easily,
theyd no t like living nearbigroadsorrailways.Anyproposednew road orrailproject leadsto 'housin g blight' The value ofhouses
along or near th proposedroutegoesdow n Everysuchproject is
attendedb anene rgeticcam paignto stopconstruction Partl y for
t hi s eason , Brit ain ha s , in proport ion to i ts popu lation, fewer kil o
-m etres of main roa d and r ailway th an an y o ther co untry in no rthern
E urope.
Tra nspo rt p o licy i s a ma tter o f con tinua l d ebat e Durin g t h e 1 9 80 s
the govern me nt'sattitudewasthatpublictransportshould payfor
iself (and shouldnot be givensu bsidies) and road building was
gi ven priorit y H owever , t he o pposite poi nt of v iew , which arg ues
in favour of publictransport,has becomestronger durin g the 1 9 9 0 S,
partly a s a r s ult of p r ess ur e fro m e nviro nment al gro ups It i s now
generallyaccept edthat transportpolicy sho uld attempt tomorethan
m e rel y a ccommo date t he p re di cted do ubling in t h e num ber of car s
i n t he nex t t hirt y year s, b ut s ho u l d co nsider w ider i ss ue s.
O n t he road Nearlythree-quartersofho useh olds in Britainhaveregular use ofa
c ar an d a bout a qua rter h ave mor e than o ne c ar Th e wi despread
enthusiasm for carsi s, a s el s ewhere ,partlya r esult of p eop l e u sin g
t he m t o p ro jec t an i ma geof themselves.Apa rt f rom the o bv io us s ta tu s
indic atorssuchas size andspeed, theBritish systemofvehicleregi
Trang 3tratio n introduce s a nother Registration plates, known as 'number
plates' givea clear indication of the age of cars Up to 1999 there
wasa differentletter ofthealphabet for eachyear and in summer
t h er e we re a l o t o f a dvertiseme nt s f or c a rs o n t el ev i si o n and in th e
newspape rs because t he new r egistration ' year' beg a n i n A ugus t.
Another possiblereasonfor the British being so attach edtotheir
cars is the opportunitywhich they prov ide to i ndulge t he na tional
pass ion fo r privacy B n g in a ca r i s lik e ta king yo ur ' castle' w ith y Oll
wherever you go (seechapter 19) Perh apsthisis why theoccasiona l
attemp tstopersuade people to 'car poor (toshare the usc of a car to
andfromwo rk) have met w ith litt l e s uccess.
Theprivacyfactor may alsobethereasonwhyBritishdriversare
less ' com mun icative ' t han t he drive rsof manyother count rie s They
use their hornsvery little are not in the habit ofSignalling their
displeasureat the behaviour of othe rroad users withthe irhandsand
a re a littl e n l o r t olerantofbothoth er dri ve r a nd p e de strians T hey
are a lso a li ttlemoresafe ty conscio us B ritain has the best road sa f ety
record in Europe The speed limit on motorways is a litt le lower than
in most other countries(70 mph = t12 kph) and peoplego overthis
li mit to a so mew ha t l e sse r e xte nt I n a dditi o n , th e e a r e f reque nt a nd
cos tly gove rnmentcampai gns to enco u r age ro ad s afety B efore
Christmas 1992.for instance.£2.3 million was spent on such a
campaign
An other i ndi ca ti on th at t h e car i s p er c i ved a s a p ri vate s pace i s
t h a t Brita in was o ne of t he l ast co untries in w estern E uro pe t o int ro
-duce the compulsorywearingofseat belts (in spiteofBritish concern
forsafety).This measure was.andstill is considered by manytobe
ab of aninfringement of persona l liberty
The Britishare not verykeen on mopeds or motorcycles.They
ex ist , of course , but they are not private eno ugh fo r B ritish tas tes.
Eve ry year twent y times as many new cars astwo-wheeledmoto r
vehicles are registered Millions ofbicycles are used especiallyb
you nge r p eop l e , but exce pt i n c e rtai n un i versity t ow ns s u ch as
Oxford and Cambridge.they are not as common astheyare in
othe r p arts of north-weste rn Eu rope Br itain h as been rather slow
to organize spec ialcycle lanes.The comparativesafetyoftheroads
m eans t hat pare nts a re n o t t o wo rried ab ou t t he i r c hildren cycl ing
on t he road a long wi th cars a nd lo rries.
Publi c tran sp ort i n t owns a n d c ities
Publi c tran sport servi ces i n urb an ar eas , a s e lsew here i n E ur o pe, s uffer
from the fact that thereis so muchprivatetraffic on the roadsthat
the y arenotas cheap.as freque ntor asfast asthey otherwisecould
be.Theyalso stop running inconveniently early at night Effortshave
been mad e to s peed u p j ou rn ey t im es b y r ese r ving cer tainl anes f or
buses, but so fa r there has been no wi despread a ttemp t to give
prioritytopubli c transportvehiclesattrafficligh ts
Public tran spo rt in t own s an d c ities I 63
The declin e of th e lollip op l ady
1O s chool For th is r eason , s chool
' patrol' cons ists o f a nadul twearin g
a bri ghtwa terproofcoa t a nd
carry-i ng a r ed-an d-white stick with a
ST O P C H ILDREN Armed w ith
t his 'l ollip op' ,t head ult wal ksout
t he traffi c a nd a llows ch ildren to
c ross ' Lollipo p l adie s ' ( 80% o f
t hem ar e women) are a fa milia r p an
are now driven t o s chool b y car t hat
l o c alauth oritiesa re le ss w illing t o
are not driven 1O sc hoo l ne ed the m more th an ev er The m odernl oll i
co m mercial! I n 1993 Volkswagen
s igned a de al to dr ess L o ndo n's
r,000l o llipop ladies in co ats wh ich
b ear t he co mpany's l o go Ma ny
Alollipop lady ata zebracrossing
Trang 4[64 17Transport
Th e road t o h ell
The M21) is the rnotorway which circl es L o nd on Its history exempli -fies the transport crisis in Brita in.
When the first section was opened
in 1963 it was seen as the answer to the area's traffic problems B ut by
the earl)"! 1990S the congestion on it
was so bad that traffic jams had become an everyday occurrence A rock song of the time called it 'the road to hell' In an effort t o relieve the congestion, the government announced plans to \ iden so me
parts of i t to fourteen lanes - and thus to import from America \ hat wou ld have been Europe's first 'super highways" This plan pro -voked Widespread opposition.
W hat t he Briti sh motorist
h ate s mos t
Traffi c warden s are not police officers, but they have t he fo rce of law behind them as they walk aro und leaving parking tickets on the windscreens of cars that are illegally parked B y convention, t hey are wide ly feared and disliked by B ritish motorists Every year there are nearly a hundred se rious attac ks on them In 1993 go vernment advisers decided that thei r im age shou ld
change They w ere o fficially
renamed 'parking atten dants'
(although everyone still calls the m
traffic wardens).
Traffic cones are orange an d
white, about a me tre tall and ma de
of plastic Their appeara nce S ignals
that some part of the road a head ( the
pan marked out by the cones) is
be ing repaire d and there fore ou t o f
usc, and that therefore t here i s p ro
b-ably going to be a long d elay.
Workers pl acin g them i n position have had eggs thrown at t hem a nd lorry drivers have been accused b
police of holding competitions to run them down On any one da y at least 100,000 of them a re in use on the country's roads.
Aninteresting modern development isthat trams,which di sap-pearedfrom thecountry'stownsduring the 19 50Sand 1960 s, are
now makinga comeback Researchhas show nthat people seem to
have moreconfidencein the reliabili tyofa service whichruns on
tracks,andare thereforereadi erto use a tram tha ntheywould be to
usean ordinarybus
Britainisoneofthefew co untriesin Europe wheredou ble-decker
buses (I.e.withtwofloors) are acom m o nSight Alth oug h siu gle-deckers havealsobeen in use since the I960s ,Londo nstillhasmore
than3,000double-deckersinoperation Inthei r originalform they
were 'hop-on, hop-off'buses.That is,th re were nodoor s,just an openingat thebackto theou tside There wasa conductorwhowalked
aro undc llecting fareswhiletheb swasmoving How ever,most busesthese days, ncluding double-deckers,have separate doorsfor getting o andoff and noconductor (faresare paid to thedriver) Thefamo s LondonUnderground,known as 'th e tube ' , isfeeling
th effectsof its age (itwasfirst opene din 1863).Itis now one of
th dirtiestandleastefficientof allsuchsystems in European cities
How ever, t is still heavilyused becauseit provides excellen tconn
ec-tionswith the mainline trainstatio nsand withthesuburbs
surroundingthecity
Anothersym bol ofLo ndon is the distinctive black taxi (in fact,
theyare no t allblackthesedays,norare they confinedto London)
A traffic wardengiving a parking ticketto
a motorist
Traffic coneson the Mr motorway
Trang 5Publict r~ nsportbetween towns and cities J61)
According to the traditionalstereo type , the owner-driversof London
taxis, knownas cabbies , arefriendlyCockneys(see chapter 4) who
never SlOp talking.Whileit may not be true that they are all like this,
they all haveto demonstrate,in a difficult examination,detailed
familiar itywith London's streets and buildingsbefore they are given
theirlicence (Th isfam iliarity isknown sim ply as 'the knowledge'.)
Normall y,the setraditionaltaxiscannot be hiredbyphone You
sim ply haveto find oneon thestre et But thereare also man taxi
companieswho get most of theirbusinessoverthe phone Theirtaxis
are known as'minicabs '.Theytend to have areputatio n , notalways
justified , for unreliabilityaswell asfor charging unsuspectingtourists
outrageousprices(in conunon with taxisall over the world)
How ever, taxisand minicabsare expensive and mostBritish people
rarely usethem,except , perhaps,when goinghome late at night after
publictran sp ort hassto ppe d running, especiallyiftheyhavebeen
drinkingalco hol
Public tran sport between towns and ci ties
It ispossibl eto travelon public transportbetween lar ge towns or
cities b road or rail.Coach services are generally slowerthan train s
butarealso muchcheape r In somepartsofthe coun try , particularl y
the south-eastof En gland,there is a dense suburban rail network,
but themost comm erciallysu ccessful trainsare the Inter -City services
thatrun betw een London andthe thirty or so largest citiesin th
country
Thedifferenc ebetweencertain trainsis afascinating reflection of
Britishinsularity.Elsewherein Europe, the fastest and smartesttrains
are the internation al ones But in Britain, they are the Inter -City trains
Th internationaltrainsfrom Londonto the Channelportsof
New haven , Doverand Ramsgate are often uncomfortablecommuter
trains sto pping at several different stations
Thenumber s oftrainsandtrain routes wereslowly but con
-tinuou sly reduced over the lastfo rty years ofthe twentie thc ntury
In October 1993the nationaltrain timetableschedule d 1 0 , 0 0 0 fewer
trainsthan inthe previous October.The changes led tomany com
-plaints The peopleof Lincoln in eastern England, for example,were
worried about theirtourist trade.This town, which previouslyhad
fifteen trainsarriving on a Sundayfrom four differentdirections,
foundthat it had onlyfour,allarrivingfro m the same direction The
Ramblers' Association (for people who liketo go walking in the
coun tryside) werealso furiousbecause the ten trainso a Sunday
from DerbytoMatlock,near the highes t moun tains in England ,had
all beencancelled Atthe lime,however, the governmen twanted
very muchto privatizethe railways Therefore, ithadto make them
look financiallyattractivetoin esto rs, andthe way to do thiswas to
cancelasmanyunprofitable servicesas possible
iii'- Queuein g
for ms a n orderly queu e of one.
GE ORGE MI KES Wai ting for buses allows the British
to indulge their supposed passion for queueing Whe ther this really signifies civilized patience is debat -able (sec chapter 5) But queueing is certainly taken seriously When buses serving severa l different num-bered routes stop at the same bus stop, i nstru ctions on it sometimes tell people to queu e on one side for some of the buses and on the other side for others And yes, people do get offended if anybody tries to 'jump the queue'.
Th e d omi nance o f Lo ndon
The arrangement of the country's
t ransp ort network illustrates the dom inance of L ondon London is at
t he centre of the network, with a 'web' of roads and railways com ing from it Britain's road -numbering system, (M for motorways, then
A, Band C class roads) i s based on
t he di rection out of London that roads ta ke.
It is notab le that the names of the main L ond on r ailw ay stations a re
k nown to a lmost e verybody in the country, whereas the names of
sta-t ions in other cit ies are only known
t o t hose w ho use them regu larly or live nearby The names of the
L ond on stations are: Channg Cross, Euston King's Cross, Liverpool Street, Paddington, St Panc ras,
vtc-ro na Waterloo Each runs trains
on ly i n a certa in direction am of
London If your journey takes you
through L ond on , you ha ve to use the Unde rground to get from one of these stations to another
Trang 6I66 1 Transport
Lecomprom ise
One small but remarkab le success of the chunncl (the Channel tunnel) enterpr ise seems to be linguistic.
You might think that there would have been some argument Which language would be used to talk about the chunnel and th ings con-nected w ith it? Eng lish or French?
No problem ! A working co m
prom-ise w as soon established, in wh ich
English nouns a re combined wi th
French words of other gramm atical
classes For example, t he c om pany
t hat built the chunnel is calledT
rans-mcnche Link (lc Mcnche is the French name for the Channel) and the tr ain
which carries vehicles through the tunnel is officially called Le Shuttle.
This linguistic mix ing quickly became popular in Bri tain O n 1 2 February 1994 hundred of vol un-teers w alked the ')0 k ilom etr es through the chunne l to raise mo ney
for charity The Daily M ail, t he B riti sh news paper that organized th e ven t.
publicized it a s 'Le walk' an d th e British me dia reponed on the p ro -gress of 'Les walkers'.
On Friday 6 May '994, QueenElizabeth II of Britain and Preside nt
Mitterand of France travelledcerem onially under the sea that s
epar-atestheir two countriesandopene dthe Channel tunnel(oftenkno wn
as'the chunnel') betweenCalais and Folkestone.For the first time
ever, peoplewere ableto travelbetween Britain and the continent
without takingtheirfeet off solid ground
Thechunnel was by farthe biggest building projectin which
Britain wasinvolved inthetwentiet hcentury The historyof this
project, however, was not a happy one Several workers werekilled
during construction,theprice of construction turned outto be more than doublethe £4-5 billio n firstestimatedand thestart of egular
gone onsale On topofallthat , the publicshowedliule enthus iasm
(andin France , only 12' ) Onthe nextday,an informal telephone
poll found that only 5%of those calling said that theywoulduse
thechunne!' Therewereseveral reasonsfor this lackof enthusiasm At firstthe chunnel was open only to those with private transport.Forthem,the
small savingin traveltimedid not compensate for thecomparative
disco m fort oftravelling on atrain with no windowsandno facilities
-ies hadmade their shipscleaner and more luxurious.In addition,
some peo ple felt itwasunnaturalandfright enin g to travelunderall
that water There were also fears about terroristattacks.However unrealistic such fearswere, they certainly interested Hollywood
Every major studio was soonplanning a chunneldisastermovie!
slowly.The directtrain servicesbetweenParisand Londonand
tim e whe nCOI npared to travelover the sea, andthis enterprisehas been moreof a success.At the time of wri ting,however,the high
-speedrail link to takepassengers betwee n the British endof the
A ir and w ater
A very smallminority,of mostlybusinesspeople, travelwithinBritain
-allyto Britain Heat hrow, on the western edge of London, sthe
used by 1110rethan 30 millionpassenge rs In addition, Gatwic k Airport, tothe south of London , isthe fourth busiestpassenger airport inEuro pe There aretw o otherfairly largeairports close to