Croydon, England
Created | Updated Jan 28, 2002
Twinned with a nightmare vision of the future, Croydon is either the southernmost edge of London or the point where Surrey begins to become the capital. Depending on where you're coming from, which - although obvious - deeply affects the town you will see.
The Inner Londoner, travelling south, will view it as a place to work, to walk quickly through in order to queue in sandwich bars (i.e. an expensive cafe with no seats) and to leave again via the wind tunnel that is East Croydon station. It is functional, not to be taken seriously. Not even the local football team, Crystal Palace, can garner any kind of emotion (hatred or otherwise) from rival fans across the metropolis.
To those heading in from Surrey and Kent, however, it is Gotham City without Batman. A neon lit and tantalising departure from the introversion of their own villages and hamlets. And easier to get home from than Leicester Square. There are pubs with bouncers, a club with table dancers, a venue called 'The Buddha Lounge' where karma can be bought at £2.50 a bottle. It is a destination rather than a daily pit-stop.
The town itself is pitching for city status, in a desperate bid to validate its post-sixties skyline (i.e. some tall buildings stuck at random amongst smaller ones). To boost this, a newly opened tram system bears down on unsuspecting pedestrians with an eerie silence.
London Underground want to extend the tube here. Buses patrol the streets in battallions (perhaps the biggest novelty of all). All of which, you'll notice, are measures to take people in and out.
And therein lies the point.
The Inner Londoner, travelling south, will view it as a place to work, to walk quickly through in order to queue in sandwich bars (i.e. an expensive cafe with no seats) and to leave again via the wind tunnel that is East Croydon station. It is functional, not to be taken seriously. Not even the local football team, Crystal Palace, can garner any kind of emotion (hatred or otherwise) from rival fans across the metropolis.
To those heading in from Surrey and Kent, however, it is Gotham City without Batman. A neon lit and tantalising departure from the introversion of their own villages and hamlets. And easier to get home from than Leicester Square. There are pubs with bouncers, a club with table dancers, a venue called 'The Buddha Lounge' where karma can be bought at £2.50 a bottle. It is a destination rather than a daily pit-stop.
The town itself is pitching for city status, in a desperate bid to validate its post-sixties skyline (i.e. some tall buildings stuck at random amongst smaller ones). To boost this, a newly opened tram system bears down on unsuspecting pedestrians with an eerie silence.
London Underground want to extend the tube here. Buses patrol the streets in battallions (perhaps the biggest novelty of all). All of which, you'll notice, are measures to take people in and out.
And therein lies the point.
