Streetlife

I shall be avoiding every aspect of the event.

Not only is it costing me a great deal of money it will also cause me great inconvenience.

All the best

Ian Bull

Oh Ian - I am sorry you feel that way. For my part I am really looking forward to it. We are lucky enough to have tickets to a few events (due to my husbands diligent searching out of tickets from as many different countries a possible since we got none from LOCOG!), so can't wait to see them. It's a once in a life time event. I hope those those that go enjoy a safe games, and tat those who want to avoid it can.

I know this is a bit late in asking, but does anyone actually know the route of tomorrow's cycling race? I know there should be a website and yes am aware they have been talking about it for ages. I just haven't been following. I just wanted to see a map of sorts. My husband has decided it would be quite nice to watch live. I'm being a bit of a scrooge and would rathe stay and watch it on the tv. Mind you it only happens once so I better stop being so grumpy about it...

Any info would be great. Thanks

I found a map but it only shows Surrey, I want to see the London bit of the route...

http://www.london2012.com/documents/venue-documents/cycling-road-race-route.pdf

Here it is

i'm excited about the olympics.  like you ian i didn't like paying for it either but now that it's here i will enjoy it.  i'm going to the swimming finals tonight (having been a former competitive swimmer myself) with 400 IM finals with the big duel between michael phelps and ryan lochte.  hannah miley with a good chance of a medal in the women's 400 im so it will be an exciting start.  i also got water polo tickets as well.  would have gotten more if they weren't so expensive.

apparently it cost us about 48p each.  Which isn't bad.  My main complaint about the Olympics is the ticketing shambles and the involvement of some questionable companies, as well as the ridiculous 'ownership' of words and phrases by the sponsors.  I took part in a show which was part of the 2012 festival and related to the Olypmics and Paralympics, had to sign some Orwellian disclaimer in which I had to not refer to the Olympics or LOCOG in connection to the show.  Thought the opening ceremony was ace, especially the Akram Khan piece and the homage to the NHS!

Ian,
i'm interested in how much of 'your' money you think the games have cost.

folk basing their arguments around some vague notion of hypothecated taxes really do make me laugh

Can we spare a thought for all those small businesses who are losing money at a time when they can least afford it?  The bus stop outside my local paper shop has been disabled.  This means that those people who would have got off the bus and gone into the shop may well be getting off at the earlier (or later shop) and going into Tesco's instead.

The shop gives an excellent service all year round, every year - not just for the Olympics - but always is struggling to compete with the impersonal service of the large chains.  Let us just hope they survive.

48p per head is ok with me because I've been enjoying the games. Not great about your paper shop Jane. I feel sorry for them. Why does a bus stop in Battersea need to be disabled out of interest???

Christopher, to answer your question, I'm watching it on the tv rather than going to see. I have an aversion to crowds and travel delays. I did drive right past the Olympic site and over Tower Bridge on the day of the opening ceremony and that was really memorable and exciting.

I've become curious today about the Olympics-branded cars I've seen around Balham today and yesterday. Balham, gateway to the south and nowhere near the Olympics. All 3 were gorgeous bmws, buffed up to the nines and all with only one man in them. I hope that us taxpayers aren't having to pay for those. Does anyone know anyone about this?

Mungomuffit the BMW's are the official vehicles of London 2012. They are used for officials and athletes alike. When not in use they are parked in the carpark at Westfield Stratford which LOCOG have taken over completely for this the green games

Mungomuffit: the shop is on York Road which has an "olympic" lane.

I am fairly sure BMW have donated the vehicles (in exchange for the product placement benefits, obviously!).

Mungomuffit ... York Road is on the ORN with specific Olympic Only lanes.  Most of the road between Vauxhall and Wimbledon has no right turns across the olympic only lanes.  Bus stops have been disabled - crossings have been removed and the traffic lights are under local control  at 21.00 on Tuesday of last week, York Road was clear - not a vehicle in sight but Lombard Road had traffic jammed back under the rail arch.  The traffic light sequence was so fast that nothing was able to cross from Lombard Road into York Road.

The main routes are clear .. yayyyy .. it worked.  Turn the cameras around to the roads which cross or join and that's where the traffic is folks.  Burntwood lane onto Trinity Road .. 2 vehicles if you are fortunate.

But I have been assured that I am wrong.  So you can choose to think that I am speaking from experience or .. sour grapes lolol ;-)

Thanks Viv - yes I can now see what you mean about the lanes. There is a map in today's Brightside. That junction at Burntwood Lane and Trinity Road is terrible now.

Yes I do hope that bmw isn't being paid anything for the cars. They are all really swank and the guys driving them look pretty happy with themselves, as would I!

I for one am looking forward to Saturday when I will be at the athletics session. Our tickets cost a pretty penny, but it was that or nothing, and I would never have paid so much to buy tickets to any event or show, in fact I had asked for much cheaper tickets, but considering that I am unlikely to see any Olympic event in person in the future, we did think that we would stick with the tickets and take this as our holiday spend.

However I do think that the ticket sale was a huge confusion and not to be repeated ever by any future Olympic organiser, it was totally unfair that other countries could buy the tickets they wanted immediately and at the price they wanted to pay while we in the UK had to do this by extraction. I hope that the UK organisers of any future event will see that this system is utterly ridiculous and unfair.
What a blunder by Coe and co.!!! 

I realy wished I'd had Christopher's map - the best I've seen, but too late!

Today spent the day with the family at Stratford, and thoroughly enjoyed it, even though there's no way to get tickets to get into the Olympic Park itself. Yes, the ticketing has been really bad and we're very frustrated - as were many thousands of people like ourselves who were being turned away from the Park entrance. However, if you just stay round the area, avoiding the ghastliness of Westfield, there's a fantastic atmosphere - open air restaurants with excellent food, bars, people milling about from every nation in the world, smiling volunteers and policemen. And lots of hunky athletes wandering around in their country's colours who are happy to talk to you and pose for photos. I really recommend spending a few hours there, and by the way you can get there direct on the overground from Clapham Junction.

My daughter's main boggle with the tickets and applying for them was giving the agency permission to play fast and loose with her credit limit/bank account overdraft.  A chap she works with nearly got divorced because of the ticket allocations and the price.  One lot of tickets which didn't cause too much of an argument was to the diving .. they were in the cheap seats at the Pringle and couldn't see much until the divers hit the water.  That (apparently) caused another argument.

Mungomuffit - but it will all be a huge success because they are only concentrating on the ORN roads.  Spin and Statistics Department will be working at its best.

Sprout Arts, a non profit arts organisation are currently running a fantastic exhibit called 'Movement and Sport' in keeping with the Olympics. Various local artists have all contributed through different artistic genres (photography, illustrations, paintings, ceramics, sculpture to offer a really diverse exhibit. This exhibit is by local people for local people so we warmly invite the community to come and see it for themselves. The exhibit runs from 31 July -11 August 2012, 11am-5pm.

We are based in Furzedown at 74 Moyser Road SW16 6SQ
www.sproutarts.com

Here are a few examples of what you could see at the 'Movement and Sport' exhibit at Sprout Arts:

To me, the best part is to meet more outside UK people. They are here to enjoy the games and usually friendly. Looking at those people's happy faces reminds me of the fact we are hosting the Olympics. But hope the results on telly will show a bit more winners from non-UK. Or was I simply in bad luck to watch only UK's part? Overall, better Olympic feelings than I had expected.

How very joyful it was to be able to celebrate Games with colleagues, friends and strangers alike. I think the Olympics were a wonderful success and showed London a new way forward.

Hopefully the positivity caused by the Games will rub off to make businesses stronger, and improve the economy.

10/10