[Closed] Snow in snowy countries

2" can be significant

That's what I tell 'em

WE had big snow over here at the weekend (Switzerland) and everyone just went skiing in the town or took no notice. Buses still ran and trains no problem. But they get it every year unlike the UK.

From what I'm told, up in the highlands they all chuckle at the southerners (even southern scotland) due to their total inability to cope with a few inches of snow.

Get on with it, its just snow people, carry on with your lives and enjoy the snow...

I used to live in Aberdeen. We had a few winters with some serious snow.
I mean proper, "army called in to distribute food to pensioners - people found dead after abandoning their car and trying to walk" snow.

Life went on pretty much as normal though and it barely made the news outside Scotland.

why bother spending billions on a transport infrastructure to cope with a couple of days snow?

why bother spending billions on a transport infrastructure to cope with a couple of days snow?

I mean proper, "army called in to distribute food to pensioners - people found dead after abandoning their car and trying to walk" snow.

Life went on pretty much as normal though and it barely made the news outside Scotland.

Yeah, cos that's just like normal life. Army distribute food all the time round here, people abandon their cars very day then die too.

Ad probably the only reason it "barely made the news" was that folk in London{where the UK news is controlled} couldn't give a **** about us up here. Thought that much would be clear by now.

Agree with OP's point btw.

I remember a radio interview once a few years back, when there was a few mm on the South east's roads, so of course it was that days headline news...Anyway, the interviewee was the Mayor of some Northern Norwegian town, who was asked whether he found the headlines of the UK amusing. He replied, somewhat surprisingly, by suggesting that even his small town was exactly the same, about October when the first good snows start, he said, every-one has forgotten how to deal with snow, and every-one forgets how to drive, all the schools act as if it's the first time it's ever happened...Then every-one gets into the swing of it, and carries on. The difference he suggested was that they had the infrastructure to cope, whereas if Buckinghamshire (for instance) invested in snow blowers, ploughs, 4x4 ambulances, triple glazing, heated pavements, and so on, people would rightly suspect a misuse of public funds...

In the mid 80s I was in Chicago at Easter and snow unexpectedly fell and there was complete carnage for a day, then everyone got used to it and carried on like normal. But it was totally mad for a day - cars spinning wildly out of control, people being rescued from bridges and the river, power outages.
If we got snow for more than a day or two at a time we'd learn to live with it, however as we have effectively an Edwardian transport infrastructure that due to successive government policies has been totally biased towards an overdependence upon motor vehicles when there's difficult weather it all falls apart.

Edwardian? What would be your alternatives then aP? Hovercars? Skyways? Underground Supermotorways?

Succssive posters have just said that Norway and Chicago can't cope until people get back into the swing of things so surly Britain has no right to expect to either?

We have a railway system that dates back to the late Victorian/ early Edwardian period (mainly because the Americans and us didn't bomb the hell out of it in the Second World War). In Europe they replaced the rail network after the 1940s because it had been systematically destroyed by us - we just carried on in our little superior way and until we realised that it was broken and then shut about half of it down. Then because of media hysteria and a nationwide complete inability to judge and understand risk we have the most regimented rail industry in the world which results in enormous expense to mitigate against risks which are so insignificant that other countries don't bother with them.
We have a road system that on the whole was developed again during the late Victorian/ early Edwardian period as we were the first industrialised nation. Now we the first post-industrial nation which means that we leave the roads as they are but borrow money from China to buy Audi/BMWs.
Does this help to explain where I'm coming from?

folk in London{where the UK news is controlled} couldn't give a **** about us up here

Yep!

London has a resident population of about 7 million people, swelled by a further 6 million or so, who travel in to work here. That's about 13 million people, which is, out of a population of 56 million, for the whole country, roughly 23%.

So, something that affects 23% of the people of the UK, is quite important, and newsworthy. If something affects Leeds, for example, it affects a much smaller number of people, mostly those in and around Leeds itself. If something affects London, it affects the whole Nation.

Make sense?

Come on RudeBoy, thats hardly fair.

Using facts and a reasoned argument against a northerner, thats like kicking a puppy.

😆

where've the smiley faces gone?

Question is, WGAS about Leeds in the first place.

Easy Fred, no-one is starting that argument here. Oh - you are!

Though I'd argue that it dos not affct me if London gets ashit load of snow. It might amuse me to watch folk slipping about and generally being more miserable as they travel to/from work in our mighty metropolis but it dosn't affect me. So that's not the whole nation. Make sense?

ps my "e" key is sticking and I cannot be bothered looking for all missed "e"s.

aP - yes it dos explain where you're coming from with regards to rail system, but not the roads. What would you have in it's place? And how would it cope better with snow?

I'm not a northerner in the technical sense.

And that must the first time anyone has suggested Rudeboy has used "reasoned arguments" on here!

Fred - aahh, the ignorance of the southerners.

The "Leeds" area, as you call it, is also part of an industrial axis covering only slightly more area than the M25, going across to Manchester & Warrington, and has about 15% of the population. Hardly insignificant, but it's given much less weight than than in the national news.

Well so basically why the 77% of the remaining population of the UK have to suffer the news of a city they just don't give a **** about?

Well said Juan 🙂 And just for a note, the entire population (not just working population) of London and the surrounding commuter belt is only 13 and a bit million. You'd think out of all those people there'd be some able to deal with a bit of snow 😀

Well, there we are. A londoner with no concept of the reasoned contempt the rest of the country hold his dear shitty in, and a Frenchman who's hit the nail in the head! Perfect.

You know, I reckon Russia could declare war on the USA and we wouldn't hear about it until it thaws out in Laaandin.

Southerners, a bit of snow and it's panic stations.
Northerners, a bit of snow and they think there hard.

I note schools all over the country are closed, people have not bothered to go to work. Stay home and be safe, don't make an effort.

What a country we live in.

If something affects London, it affects the whole Nation.

I'd suggest there's a working majority who couldn't care less about what happens there.

In fact, seeing as the (w/b)ankers have lost all their money in the giant casino otherwise known as the stock exchange, what does London actually do?

Err, no, actually. By your own figures, the vast majority of the country aren't in London, and I'd suggest there's a working majority who couldn't care less about what happens there.

They seem to not care about it particularly vocally.

This is rare for London, London is more important than you live, deal with it.

What a country we live in.

As the OP said, it's not a "British" thing, quote :

[i]" In Paris, flights were delayed and snow caused several road accidents, although the state forecaster said the quantities of snow were not unusual.

France's road traffic agency urged motorists to cancel non-essential journeys, with roads difficult and in a small number of cases impassable around Paris and in the east near Strasbourg.

Flights were delayed by at least half an hour at Paris's Orly and Roissy-Charles de Gaulle airports. One of Orly's two runways was closed.

In Italy, three people died and 500 people had to be evacuated from their homes amid adverse weather conditions on Sunday.

Snowfalls also snarled traffic in several parts of Spain, including the Madrid area, on Sunday. "[/i]

[url] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/7864596.stm [/url]

Priceless. I create a thread imploring people to stop whining so much, and what does it get? Loads of whining. Brilliant.

Get on with it, its just snow people, carry on with your lives and enjoy the snow...

That's my point.

It makes the news whenever it causes problems anywhere. It causes carnage in London and hence makes the news because things are different there. More people commute to London *every day* than live in Scotland at all. Here in Cardiff, if we get snow a few people who live up in the Valleys can't get home, that's not news. People don't get stranded in their cars etc etc.

Weather is a talking point, snow is cool, that's why it's on the news. Not because we're feeling sorry for ourselves or because we really believe that we're living in some kind of Arctic climate. WE KNOW that it snows more in other countries, honestly we do.

If all you're going to do is moan about how it's only a couple of inches and it brings the country to its knees then [b]SHUT THE F*CK UP[/b]. We dont' care, bugger off and enjoy the snow 🙂

This is rare for London, London is more important than you live, deal with it.

I think london would be screwed without the rest of the country, and likely the same in reverse, however I believe the anger is that while everyone else gets on with it, the media makes it seem like the world is likely to grind to a halt because london is having a few problems.

Southerners, a bit of snow and it's panic stations.
Northerners, a bit of snow and they think there hard.

Possibly true, yup, but I think northerners see london as a slightly "different" group of people, yet supposedly symbolic of the whole country in the face of the media, and it's the shame that brings that makes them wish to revolt!

I got in early this morning so I'm taking an early dart to get up a mountain in the snow!

Err, no, actually. By your own figures, the vast majority of the country aren't in London, and I'd suggest there's a working majority who couldn't care less about what happens there.

So we should care more about what happens in Lower Boggledale instead? RudeBoy's post was pointing out that ONE location holds 23% of the country's population - so yes it matters. What should there be on the news instead, Mr Smart arse know it all? Why not, instead of moaning and complaining, think of a positive alternative? That's the 'British thing' right there.

Well so basically why the 77% of the remaining population of the UK have to suffer the news of a city they just don't give a **** about?

Because, my Gallic chum, this city generates the business around which this Nation revolves...

Funny, how all those who 'don't give a sh1t about London', are commenting on it.

And I love how all the people from little villages get all het up when you suggest that their area isn't at all significant.

You know what? In economic terms, much of Britain is insignificant. Leeds could disappear overnight, with minimal impact on the Nation's economy. Because many of the businesses there could simply relocate elsewhere.

You'd have to knock out Manchester and Birmingham, to have anywhere near the same as if London were disabled.

So, all you little people, London is more important than your town. And gets the headlines. Stop being jealous, and just get over it.

Well, with the exception of the banks (which are now mostly bankrupt anyway) and the ineffectual government, what exactly does happen in london, that couldn't happily relocate to say Birmingham, Manchester or Leeds?

that couldn't happily relocate to say Birmingham, Manchester or Leeds?

"happily" is not a word which I would use 😯

Zokes- stop being so bitter.

I'm not even going to bother explaining the significance of London, in GLOBAL terms, to someone who just doesn't get it.

Go and dig some potatoes or whatever it is you oiks do... 😉

(Flicks two fingers up to all the London-haters, in a 'Rick from The Young Ones' stylee)

"happily" is not a word which I would use

Why? At least when it snows, you get lots of it, and because noone's ever spent any money on our public transport, we don't miss it when 'the wrong sort of snow' AKA snow stops it working. How does it snow in the tube btw?

Go and dig some potatoes

So, you lot in laandin are so important you don't need food then eh?

Anyway, given the fall of the financial sector, [i]really[/i], what does London do that's so exceptional?

'Lower Boggledale'- LOL!

Nope, that's too personally insulting. Sorry, Zokes.

But you do seem quite ignorant of London.

One little example: You know the laws that you, I, and everyone in this Nation has to adhere to?

Where do you think they get passed?

Clue: It's not Uttoxeter...

How does it snow in the tube btw?

It's too complicated to explain.

Zokes, you really are a bit thick, aren't you?

Obviously, because I'm not from London....

Would you actually care to answer my question, or is your descent to petty insults about someone's presumed intellectual capacity all you can manage?

FWIW, this argument is mildly more amusing than the finishing touches to my PhD, which is why i'm giving it slightly more attention than it deserves.

molgrips

Sorry but I've got to disagree with you.

There should be fleets of snow ploughs on 24-hour alert through out the winter, buses should carry snowchains, trains should have snowploughs fitted to them, the railway companies should have hundreds of people ready to sweep the snow off the rails with a handbrush.

So what if we only get serious amounts of snow every few years?

FWIW, this argument is mildly more amusing than the finishing touches to my PhD

A PhD you say ? Oh alright then..............see if you can understand this picture :

[img] [/img]

(only add [i]a lot more[/i] snow)

One little example: You know the laws that you, I, and everyone in this Nation has to adhere to?

Where do you think they get passed?

Clue: It's not Uttoxeter...

Ah, especially the silly ones that we always agrue about on here. I see....

Well, give Gordon a couple more years and we'll have the EU constitution to take care of all that, so there won't be any need for London, Brussels will do it all!

Bloody hell! can you imagine getting up one morning in Leed/Brum/Manc and finding that a bunch of Londoners had moved to your town. Nightmare just listening to them telling you how important they are and how everything they do is better/more important/generates more cash, the list is endless.
All we have to offer is great bike rides, better beer and pies. END OF STORY. Ha!

only true of the pies, sorry dude

LOL @ GG.

Mind you I'm still wondering why the Waterloo and City Line was closed today.

Personally I blame Boris. We never had snow like this when Ken was in charge.

Flogging a dead horse I know, but Londoners might like to consider this satellite photo of Europe at night:

[url= http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/gallery/2007/aug/08/2?picture=330352703 ]Europe at night[/url]

While Paris, Moscow and even Madrid are easy to pick out, London is only one of three major blobs of light in the UK, and the one above it (the Birmingham Liverpool Manchester Leeds Sheffield Nottingham megacity) is much bigger, and clearly one of the biggest population centres in the continent, alongside the others mentioned above and the Ruhr conurbation.

Some Londoners need to get out more...

There is a running joke in Sweden about the chaos when the snow starts; they also have a North/South banter (Well, Rest of Sweden / Stockholm).

Because the Americans made it snow later each year the Swedes resent putting their expensive buzzy tyres on until it actually snows so it's really bonkers the first time it snows, especially with their penchant for turbocharged cars.

Gus - Oh yes, it's an underground train above ground. How quaint! Not that they'd heard that it was going to snow days in advance or anything, but i'm sure trains used to be fitted with snow ploughs in winter conditions, or do Swiss trains simply not run in the winter? Perhaps TFL could have procured some?

On a serious note, snow in London does seem to happen often enough that you lot could do with working out how to get simple things like trains working in it, as opposed to the abject dismay and dumfounded surprise that always seems to be depicted to the rest of the country every time a few flakes fall...

the Birmingham Liverpool Manchester Leeds Sheffield Nottingham megacity

Why are you comparing several cities to London? I don't get your point. They aren't one whole, are they? And there's quite a distance between some of those towns. Not a Megacity.

Zokes- this particular lot of snow is the biggest fall in a long time. London rarely even gets snow that settles. And, we've got more snow than most of the rest of the country, for once!

Lets be honest, there really is nothing special about London, its just a bunch of buildings in a geographically helpful location. There's a reason hundreds of businesses are vacating for offices elsewhere - thats because it the "gain" from being in London is small enough to be negated by the downsides (increased costs, time lost due to commuting/transport etc). Anyone under the illusion that London is indespensible and particularly special is simply that, about the only thing that couldnt relocate from any major port city to any other major port city are the actual buildings, nothing to do with the contents.

(I hate cities, especially crowded ones - why you'd put yourself through living there is beyond me, but they are a necessary evil)

snow in London does seem to happen often enough

Snow in this quantity last occurred 18 years ago. Most sensible and intelligent people consider that investing large amounts of capital to deal with certain inclement weather conditions which only occur about every 18 years, and last no more than 2 or 3 days, is unnecessary.

I tend to agree with them.

And going by your apparent order of priorities, I'm very pleased that you're not part of our 'ineffectual' London government.

Coffeeking- you could say that about any other city, though, really. New York, Paris, Rome, Bradford...

Although I think shifting all the workers and gubbins from London, elsewhere, might be a bit tricky.

why you'd put yourself through living there is beyond me

Fine. That's you. You're not me. I don't expect you to share my views and opinions. I know why I love it here, and don't really care what others think, other than to try and give them an understanding of what it's really like, to be a Londoner.

Funny, how when people are proud of being Yorkshiremen, or Scottish, or whatever, that's seen as ok, but mention London, and people treat you like a leper who's just raped their gerbil...

people treat you like a leper who's just raped their gerbil...

I'd treat a leper who'd lust raped my gerbil with considerably more respect than any londoner, mainly because I can't quite envisage how you'd go about raping a gerbil, so they'd definitely deserve marks for ingenuity!

Bloody hell! can you imagine getting up one morning in Leed/Brum/Manc and finding that a bunch of Londoners had moved to your town.

Happens every year, it's called fresher's week 😉

the Birmingham Liverpool Manchester Leeds Sheffield Nottingham megacity

Why are you comparing several cities to London? I don't get your point. They aren't one whole, are they? And there's quite a distance between some of those towns. Not a Megacity.

But as it probably takes significantly less time to get between them than from one side of London to another, with or without snow, i'd suggest that they would be somewhat more useful

On that logic you should relocate everything to france, as its only 26 miles away I could run there faster than I could could get to leeds on the train.

djglover - Member
On that logic you should relocate everything to france, as its only 26 miles away I could run there faster than I could could get to leeds on the train.

In order to avoid having a bunch of surly londoners turning up in Manchester, that seems like an excellent idea! Or does it snow in the channel tunnel as well?

Zokes- you're in Manchester?

Ah, THAT explains the jealousy!!!

Zokes- you're in Manchester?

Nope....

So, come on; what amazing place are you in, then?

Did I ever say it's amazing? I never even implied it. All I stated was that London really isn't all that...

And you are of course wrong.

And I'm sure your intellectual prowess as a Londoner would have worked out how to view my profile on here. FYI, my research field is environmental science, and my main hobby is mountain biking (pretty exceptional for STW, it seems), so living on the edge of Snowdonia seems a pretty convenient place to be. If I want to pay £5 per pint and go to big(ish) clubs, Dublin is somewhat more convenient than London.

RudeBoy - Member
And you are of course wrong.

But rudepaddedfredboy, can you tell me what's so exceptional about London - something you've singularly failed to do over the afternoon...

On that logic you should relocate everything to france

Coffeeking- you could say that about any other city, though, really. New York, Paris, Rome, Bradford...

Although I think shifting all the workers and gubbins from London, elsewhere, might be a bit tricky.

I know, I just did say that- I said no city is special and you could relocate the contents of any of them anywhere.

why you'd put yourself through living there is beyond me

Fine. That's you. You're not me.

I mean to add that point, then forgot as I got distracted by this pesky work!

Well I wouldn't live in london. But I wouldn't live in Paris either. All big cities are the same. Full of people, you just get stuck in endless queue to get to the tube.
I have been involve in a something with a girl in london for a few month. And to be honest going to visit her was a nightmare. It's almost faster to go from my village to london that from waterloo station to her place (and she was living inside the zone 2).

There is no riding in london and what justifies (honest fred I am not trolling) that you paid exactly the same product in london more than lets say southampton, bristol, cambridge, nottigham, manchester or edimbourg?

what you've all done is got sucked in by mass media hysteria - about the weather, about London and about the North/South divide
it's a self-fulfilling prophecy fuelled by people who are led entirely by their reactions to the media

anyway

the few people who turned up at my office today were either grads who were too scared to stay at home, people who lived <5 minutes walk, non-British nationals and me, a northerner

I can't decide whether those who stayed at home were soft or sensible

it's a self-fulfilling prophecy fuelled by people who are led entirely by their reactions to the media

That, and wonderful political decisions such as [url= http://www.bikeradar.com/news/article/coe-essex-a-better-olympic-mountain-bike-venue-than-wales--17340 ]this.....[/url]

rudeboy, so you'll admit that we have better pies but reckon the bike rides and beer are better. What bike ride from London is better than a bike ride from any city up ere? What London Beer is better than several northern beers?

But rudepaddedfredboy, can you tell me what's so exceptional about London

It's the Greatest City On Earth.

But, you (and others) have made your minds up that it's 'cr4p', etc, so there's no point me wasting my time trying to explain things to you.

Mountain biking is just ONE of the many things I enjoy in life. An many of them, I can only enjoy in a city like London.

mt; where did I suggest that stuff like pies or beer is better in London, than anywhere else? I'm not slagging off any other place. Actually, there are a few decent breweries in London, Meantime being one.

I choose to enjoy a place on it's own merits. I don't go to Snowdonia, and think 'oh, it's cr4p here, 'cos there's no shops/cinemas/museums etc', no, I enjoy what's wonderful and unique about the place.

See, living in such a cosmopolitan and diverse metropolis, you learn to have an open mind...

mt - no single beer is better than several beers, that's an impossible question to answer 😀

It's the Greatest City On Earth.

[i][b]Really?[/b][/i]

Have you spent enough time in many of the world's other 'great' cities to draw a reasoned conclusion, or have you just decided that because you happen to live in London?

Again, all i'm saying is that London really isn't all that. I'm sure there are worse places to live, but as a place to live or as a commercial centre, it's really not all that great. Granted, at present it houses the UK government and the majority of the UK's financial sector. However, seeing as most of the banks are in the process of bringing the western economy to its knees, and pointless policies such as the 2.5 % reduction in VAT aren't exactly helping the UK cope, I really fail to see how important at present it is to the rest of the UK

Have you spent enough time in many of the world's other 'great' cities to draw a reasoned conclusion

Name one, that, in ethnic, cultural, social, architectural, historical, influential, contemporary, artistic and economic terms, is greater.

If you include all those aspects, you will find that London wins, over all others.

So there!

And btw, you've spent a fair bit of time, arguing about a place which you apparently have little interest in...

Come on, you lot are rubbish. I at least expect a decent argument!

Pathetic...

Istanbul?

Given the current woes of the UK economy, it may well end up greater in that respect. I'm certain it is or has been more important on every other front you suggest, and i've not even been there. Berlin would also be worth another shout. In fact, there are plenty places that would qualify.

zokes - Member

FWIW, this argument is mildly more amusing than the finishing touches to my PhD, which is why i'm giving it slightly more attention than it deserves.

Posted 1 hour ago #

You must be easily amused....

Istanbul and Berlin, whilst fantastic cities, still can't match London, pound for pound.

Don't worry about trying to find a greater city, BTW- it's actually an impossible task, for non greater exists.

grizzlygus - Member

zokes - Member

FWIW, this argument is mildly more amusing than the finishing touches to my PhD, which is why i'm giving it slightly more attention than it deserves.

Posted 1 hour ago #

You must be easily amused....

Or easily bored with a topic that has dragged on far too long

Are you a relation of sfb, Fred? Because your inability to argue, substituted by just shouting 'I'm right, I'm right, I'm right', seems very similar...

I'm fairly sure a similarly brainwashed set of German citizens once thought Berlin to be the best city in the world too.

See, I've even invoked Godwin's law too....