London 2012 twilight tour

The bus left from Stratford Station. I was meant to go with my cousin, but some sort of snafu meant that she forgot her photo ID. How frustrating, as this meant she, who had invited me, couldn't get in! I asked at the end of the tour, and it's not clear at all if there will be future tours in the coming months as the construction intensifies. Her best option might be to enjoy a cup of tea and the view from the ViewTube that is meant to open next month on the Greenway elevation between Fish Island and Stratford High Street. I mean, there is so little built on site, and what's there is so massive, that you'll probably see mostly everything I saw from up there.

Anyway, on e va! The bus went up an A road and through what looked like a customs point, swung right and went to the Velodrome. Seen below.

Yup, some concrete supports there. Then over to the Olympic Village.

This will be configured as small dormitories for the games with a massive canteen. After the games, the dorms will gain kitchens and become thousands of flats, while the canteen will become a secondary school. To the right of the village next to Stratford station is a Westfield shopping centre, called Stratford City. It's gonna be massive innit? Bigger than Westfield Shepherd's Bush, bigger than Bluewater!

Who will shop there, who will shop there

Voulez-vous, voulez-vous

Locals got no money

I ain't got no money

Nor do you, nor do you.

I'm sure the economy will have bounced back by 2012, though. And now the news:

The world media centre is as big as an airport terminal, truly big, and square, and permanent. They are looking for mee-dya tenants like the BBC, pretty please. We drove down past a mountain of mud to learn that the mountain was not slag but evidence of a massive decontamination activity removing oil, arsenic and other nasties through washing, and other natural cleaning methods, I think she said bugs. Clean mud, eh?

Then the stadium:

What a relief, apparently this isn't how it will look. The horrid darkness at the base will be covered in a designer fabric, hopefully brightening it up a treat. They going to recycle the fabric into fashion umbrellas or something. Just next door is the aquatic centre. Next door because swimming is the focus of week 1 and athletics, week 2. So everything is concentrated together. I've seen this swooping rook a few times now:

But not the view from underneath. I got a good sense, despite the failing light of the delicate thinness of the roof. It's hideously complex, but despite looking a bit small, it's deceptive, holding at least 2, 50m pools underneath. I look forward to trying it out after the games.

And that was that.