Parliament Square : 無料・フリー素材/写真
Parliament Square / Leonard Bentley
| ライセンス | クリエイティブ・コモンズ 表示-継承 2.1 |
|---|---|
| 説明 | This is an illustration depicting the first Traffic signalling system installed to regulate the flow of traffic in London and indeed the world. In 1866 John Peake Knight, a Railway Engineer employed by the London, Brighton and South Coast Railway gave evidence to a select committee of the House of Commons who were investigating the regulation of traffic in the Metropolis. Knight proposed a system of traffic signals based on the type of signalling system used on the railways. The resulting Act of Parliament, the Metropolitan Streets Act 1868 made provision for the introduction of a traffic regulating system. Knight approached the Home Office and Sir Richard Mayne, Commissioner of the Metropolitan Police, and an experimental scheme to place the signalling system on a pedestrian refuge at the junction of Bridge Street and Parliament Square was agreed.The site was chosen because of the volume of both pedestrian and vehicular traffic, and it would be a prestigious project just at the gates of the Palace of Westminster.The signal post was installed in early December 1868 and became operational on the 9th December. The octagonal hollow column was made of cast iron 24 feet tall; at the bottom it had gothic motifs in order to blend in with the new Palace of Westminster, it was painted green with gilding and it had a pineapple finial, the semaphore arms were 4 feet in length and painted a bright red with gilding around the edges. A gas supply from the mains was drawn off to feed a gas jet which illuminated a red or green lens at the top of the column. The semaphores were to be used during daylight hours and the lenses during the hours of darkness.The Manufacturer of the column and mechanisms inside it were Saxby and Farmer Co. Ltd who made railway signalling systems for most of the railway companies in Britain, their factory was at Haywards Heath in Sussex.From the very start of the experiment there were reports of a strong smell of gas in the area of the column and on 10th December there was a small gas explosion near the column but no injuries were sustained. However on 2nd January 1869 less than a month since its installation a Police Constable who was operating the mechanism in the column received facial burns when there was a gas explosion in the column itself. How serious the injuries sustained were, I have not been able to ascertain and the name of the Police Constable is lost to history so far. It was believed that the installation of the column had been botched and that gas from a leaking gas main had built up in the column. When the Police Constable opened the door to the mechanism the flue effect sent the gas to the top of the column where it was ignited by the lit gas jet. The explosion ended any further experiments with this kind of traffic regulation until the early 20th Century when electronic traffic systems were introduced. |
| 撮影日 | 1868-12-01 00:00:00 |
| 撮影者 | Leonard Bentley , Iden, East Sussex, UK |
| タグ | |
| 撮影地 | London, England, United Kingdom 地図 |