[HN Gopher] How London's Crystal Palace was built so quickly
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How London's Crystal Palace was built so quickly
Author : mhb
Score : 75 points
Date : 2024-10-08 12:46 UTC (4 days ago)
(HTM) web link (arstechnica.com)
(TXT) w3m dump (arstechnica.com)
| jazzyjackson wrote:
| Is the a good source for the complete blueprints of the palace?
| Digital models? I've always enjoyed visiting glass houses but
| never thought much about how the framework is put together
| Oarch wrote:
| I was recently in Alexandra Palace in North London and couldn't
| help but think the foyer is very close to how the Crystal
| Palace must have looked. Complete with palm trees and
| everything.
| tim333 wrote:
| Not sure but it's quite similar to the palm house at Kew. David
| Attenborough on that https://youtu.be/-ChP6OeNmBE
| Simulacra wrote:
| There's a great story about this in Bill Brysons book "At Home".
| That's how I learned in 1851 the glass window TAX was repealed.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Window_tax
| twelvechairs wrote:
| One thing worth noting is lack of fire safety. Not only did the
| crystal palace burn down but also most of the similar steel and
| glass exhibition centres built internationally (of which the
| crystal palace was the first very large one)
| lukasb wrote:
| Odd. I wouldn't expect these buildings to be an above average
| fire risk ...
| ahazred8ta wrote:
| The contents were flammable and there were no firewalls.
| FerretFred wrote:
| The underfloor heating was to blame: hot flue gases and an
| old and increasingly flammable timber floor...
| https://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/9413492.exhibition-at-
| cry...
| bruce511 wrote:
| Not only that, but construction in general operated in a far
| different regulatory environment.
|
| Imagine King Charles today proposing a 990 000 square foot
| structure in Hyde Park. Get Design. Build structure. How hard
| could it be?
|
| Today there are more voices. Queen Victoria simply decreed, and
| it was done. Today building the structure would be fast.
| Getting permission to build it would take decades (even for the
| King) and cost a fortune.
|
| Savehydepark.com would be a domain in seconds.
|
| The mulberry harbours were built in a day with scant regard to
| the views of the locals.
| neilwilson wrote:
| We retain the capacity in the UK to do just that.
|
| Parliament sits above the courts as effectively the Supreme
| Court of the UK, where everybody's interests are notionally
| represented (the current mis-named 'supreme court' is really
| just the Court of the United Kingdom). The King, via the
| Ministers of the Crown, could propose a building as a Bill in
| Parliament. If Parliament then passes that as an Act, then it
| will happen and _nothing_ can stop it from happening.
| Including using the Army to detain and remove protestors if
| necessary. All it needs is the relevant sections in the Act.
|
| Recovering this power is why Brexit was so important. With it
| we can build the green infrastructure we need as we built the
| railways - via dictatorial Acts of Parliament that brook no
| opposition.
|
| Now all we need are MPs prepared to use that power to save us
| from oblivion.
| Angostura wrote:
| Are you unfamiliar with the process known as judicial
| review?
| YawningAngel wrote:
| While the above poster is a little overenthusiastic,
| there is no judicial review of acts of Parliament.
| Judicial review seeks to challenge whether a public body
| reached a decision lawfully, and acts of Parliament are
| always lawful provided they are passed in the property
| manner
|
| https://davidallengreen.com/2023/01/courts-and-politics-
| and-...
| jimnotgym wrote:
| >Recovering this power is why Brexit was so important.
|
| Yet public infrastructure in Britain still costs 2-3 times
| what it costs in continental Europe. It strikes me that
| blaming the EU was a very convenient excuse.
| rsynnott wrote:
| To some extent that explains the current disarray of the
| Tory party. Almost since the UK was brought into Europe
| (by the Tories, mind you!), the British right, and parts
| of the left, have adopted a position of simply blaming
| Europe for everything (including entirely imaginary
| things; see euromyths). After Brexit, this is an
| increasingly implausible platform, so you see a casting
| around for new scapegoats (I'm pretty much convinced
| that's where the Tories' newfound obsession with trans
| people comes from, say), and new fantasies (see Liz
| Truss's great economic plan).
| hnlmorg wrote:
| That power existed before the referendum too. The leave
| campaign was full of intentionally vague statements that
| were emotionally charged but lacked any factual substance.
|
| Our "sovereignty" hasn't changed. The NHS didn't get any
| additional funding. Trade deals have gotten worse not
| better. The whole thing was just smoke and mirrors.
|
| Literally the only thing the referendum was sincere about,
| was David Cameron's desire to consolidate votes and reduce
| the number of his own MPs leaving for other right-wing
| parties.
|
| He succeeded at that, but its cost the economy literally
| billions.
| thedavibob wrote:
| > Recovering this power is why Brexit was so important.
| With it we can build the green infrastructure we need as we
| built the railways - via dictatorial Acts of Parliament
| that brook no opposition.
|
| Like, for example, the High Speed Rail (London-West
| Midlands) Act, which passed in 2017 and was pootling
| through parliament from 2013? i.e. almost entirely before
| even the Brexit referendum, and definitely before Brexit?
| MichaelZuo wrote:
| Have you skimmed through the Act?
|
| It was passed, deliberately, with thousands of pages of
| legalese, riders, caveats, opt-outs, etc...
|
| Very different from a one page Act that would delegate
| supreme power to some HSR committee with the power to
| destroy anyone who resists.
| youngNed wrote:
| Mate, Britain can't lay 80 miles of rail track, brexit or
| no brexit
| badgersnake wrote:
| Brexit was, and always will be utter folly.
| aryonoco wrote:
| I see it's 2024 and fantasies are still going strong
| amongst brexiteers.
| rsynnott wrote:
| ... I mean, if whoever proposes it never wants to be
| elected again, then sure. However, the EU in no way stopped
| the UK from doing that; common sense stops it from doing
| that. It would simply be politically untenable.
|
| The UK has a severe problem with NIMBYism; not being in
| Europe wouldn't just make that magically go away. In
| practice, the UK leaving the EU will likely hurt
| infrastructural development; doing so has damaged the
| British economy, and the UK now simply can't afford it
| (big, forward-thinking infra work is about the first thing
| to get defunded when budgets are tight, generally, and the
| British budget isn't just tight, it's a black hole).
| rkosk wrote:
| Victoria didn't decree anything. There was a commission set
| up by the government a year or two before the Great
| Exhibition to oversee things and the purchasing of land and
| funding for construction was subject to parliamentary debate
| and approval.
|
| Your comment about the Mulberry harbours is quite baffling.
| Are you seriously suggesting that a modern day military
| operation on the scale of Overlord would be subject to local
| consultations?
| crop_rotation wrote:
| > Victoria didn't decree anything.
|
| I think there is a tradition in the UK to assign all
| government actions to be by the crown. As if the crown
| takes decisions on everything and everyone else just
| recommends.
| rsynnott wrote:
| ... No, insofar as anything like that exists it's the
| _crown_, not the person, but no, no-one really thinks of
| it like that.
| ignoramous wrote:
| > _Savehydepark.com would be a domain in seconds_
|
| Right... https://www.savewimbledonpark.org/
| rsynnott wrote:
| > Queen Victoria simply decreed, and it was done
|
| People seem to get incredibly confused about British
| constitutional history... No she didn't, don't be silly, she
| wasn't a dictator. About the only European monarch who could
| got around decreeing stuff left right and center in this
| period was the Russian tsar; there just weren't that many
| absolute monarchs left.
|
| You're correct that they didn't have, like, modern planning
| law, but it was nothing to do with Victoria.
| tim333 wrote:
| >Opponents of the scheme lobbied strenuously against the use
| of Hyde Park (and they were strongly supported by The Times).
| The most outspoken critic was Charles Sibthorp; he denounced
| the exhibition as "one of the greatest humbugs, frauds and
| absurdities ever known"
|
| (reaction from 1851, wikipedia)
| lostlogin wrote:
| > The mulberry harbours were built in a day with scant regard
| to the views of the locals.
|
| One lasted just weeks before it was destroyed in a storm. The
| other did better, and was used for 10 months.
|
| https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mulberry_harbours
| fecal_henge wrote:
| British standard whitworth lives on as the thread which attaches
| cameras to tripods I think.
|
| I once liberated some simmilar bolts from a broken out tunnel
| wall at Tottenham Court Road. We machined into tensile coupons
| and they just stretch out like pulling a toffee bar!
|
| It's amusing these days to think of imperial measurements as a
| great standardising force in the world in light of our inability
| to go metric.
| bunabhucan wrote:
| Hercules in India still sells roadster bikes with Withworth
| threads.
| analog31 wrote:
| Yup, and the eternal Sturmey-Archer AW 3-speed gear hub uses
| Whitworth threads too. I've got a couple on bikes. It's not a
| problem because the parts are unique anyway -- there's no
| other use in the world for an indicator rod, or guide nut,
| and the outside of the nut is close enough to 15 mm.
| jimnotgym wrote:
| >It's amusing these days to think of imperial measurements as a
| great standardising force in the world in light of our
| inability to go metric.
|
| As always it is not quite so simple. Another early standard
| thread was the British Association. Proposed 1884, and adopted
| 1903. It was the recommended thread for small diameters (even
| by the British Standard institute), and is still seen in
| electrical terminals, and some small instruments.
|
| BA threads are metric!
| fecal_henge wrote:
| I didnt know that. I kept all my BA eyelet crimp terminals as
| they were a pretty good fit for metric threads, I see this is
| not a coincidence now!
| _fizz_buzz_ wrote:
| > British standard whitworth lives on as the thread
|
| And pipe fittings
| fecal_henge wrote:
| Thats BSP no?
| tim333 wrote:
| Also in the ending of Cars 2 https://youtu.be/9WSNKsgVsfk?t=5
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(page generated 2024-10-12 23:02 UTC)