The Blooming Tube

At this time of year on the Tube staff are feverishly planting, hoeing and watering to prepare to enter that hardy perennial the “Station Garden Competition.” Amongst other things it serves to remind us of the impact the Tube has on the fabric of London.

For instance few realise that Underground trains run across 220km of overground track on 10 different lines. The Underground is one of the biggest landowners in London and as around 55 per cent of the Tube network is above ground it manages approximately 10 per cent of the wildlife habitat in London. Over 1,000 different species of plants and animals have been recorded on LU land since 1999. The 200 sites on the Tube network have been identified as Sites of Importance for Nature Conservation by many of London's local authorities. Indeed the famous (or notorious!) Underground mouse is actually a protected species even though many Tube staff harbour thoughts of Mousecide! It has fastracked the evolutionary process by developing characteristics in around a 100 years (a mere pimple on the face of evolution) which have adapted it to live in Tube tunnels and live on the eeerr, eeerr food!


The mice on the Underground are famous!

Anyway back to station gardens or Underground in Bloom as it has been rebranded as part of the overall London in Bloom initiative. Images released today hail the biggest ever Underground in Bloom competition as the Mayor of London and Gardeners' World's Joe Swift toasted the handiwork of the Tube's green-fingered staff. Images which show the Tube as an exotic and colourful location were released to herald the launch of Underground in Bloom, the Tube’s gardening competition. Pictures of commuters going about their daily lives in stations have been transformed into dramatic and striking urban oases - revealing the Tube in a way passengers have never seen before.

Rosie Boycott, Chair of London Food, who visited a station garden today, said: 'The standard of gardens being created at London's Tube stations for this competition is just incredible. These gardens are showcasing to millions of people the pleasure of gardening and even, in some cases, showing how easy it is to grow fruit and vegetables in the heart of an urban environment.'



Some entrants have, for weeks, been working on their blooms in their spare time, while others are just beginning the process. Many devote weekends and holidays to tend to plants and flowers and bring the Underground into bloom for summer. Most staff are novices, adding to the challenge of creating plant life in a busy public space. Many of the Tube’s green spaces are some of London's best kept secrets as they are not accessible to the public for safety reasons, and are home to over 1,000 different animal and plant species. The work of staff for the Underground in Bloom competition helps to protect and enhance the life of this bio-diversity.


Pinner Station Garden - Winner 1966

Tube Staff are encouraged to use methods which protect wildlife such as minimising the use of pesticides as well as being water efficient and keeping a note of the wildlife they see. London Underground Chief Operating Officer, Howard Collins, said: 'The Underground in Bloom competition shows that there is a lot more to London Underground than tracks, trains and tunnels.

'The work of staff, beyond the call of duty, helps to create a more colourful and pleasant station environment, which can benefit passengers while protecting and maintaining the variety of wildlife and plants on the Tube for the benefit of London as a whole.'

The Underground in Bloom competition is a well established tradition on LU. Ever since Tube stations started running above ground, wildlife habitats and gardens have formed part of the stations and the competition has been run to judge the efforts of staff who spruced them up.




Canary Wharf -Inside and out with the "Green Roof"

Indeed the Underground is happily one of the last bastions of these initiatives in the whole railway industry in the UK. In their heyday the competitions on the railways were legion between station Garden competitions, Best Station, public speaking, debating, choral, etc; A lot of these took place in a more benevolent periods where enrich the lives of staff and the public was a question of duty, not obligation. It is good to see this initiative being maintained on the Underground along with other less visible initiatives to maintain bio-diversity of which the “Green Roof” at Canary Wharf station is but one example. Nobody can say the World’s Oldest and Greatest Metro doesn’t grow on you!

See also;

http://daithaic.blogspot.com/2008/01/great-circle-line-journey.html