Finding Out What the Romans Called a Pay and Display Machine

Brentford West councillor Guy Lambert reports back

Brentford West councillor Guy Lambert

June 14, 2024

So a 4 day holiday I suppose, though about 2 days were travelling to Dijon. I will not use P&O after their shocking way of dealing with staff but it’s no hardship using DFDS. Nice staff and I paid a few quid for the luxury lounge – a glass of prosecco, sandwich, coffee, fruit, pastries. I wasn’t going for more booze as I had a long drive but very restful, though whether it would be as good in August I doubt!

Getting through Dover (and Calais/Dunkirk) was painless and there was duty free booze on the ship. I didn’t take advantage, but the first time I’ve seen anything vaguely positive about Brexit. I did get an uninvited passenger but sadly he had not brought his passport.

So down to Reims for a night then on to Dijon. Long time since I drove down France and I’d forgotten what a huge, thinly populated country it is. Also struck by how many wind turbine electric generators (or windmills if you prefer) are everywhere. I saw certainly hundreds, perhaps thousands, something we do very little on land in Britain.

In case you think it’s only here that it rains all the time, turns out to be the same in Dijon.

Never been to this circuit before, but I knew of it because it held the French Grand Prix in the 70s and early 80s, and the Swiss GP once. Yes, but car racing in Switzerland is banned. Reminds me a bit of Oulton Park, which was my home circuit when I was a kid, and neither are as prominent as they were. But the tickets were cheap by UK standards and a nice place to spend a weekend. There was also an amazing collection of Facel Vega road cars. I’m amazed there were so many left but there must have been 100 there for the maker’s 80th anniversary (though they stopped making them in 1964). Not sure that one of them was the one I was excited to see being restored in Romance of Rust opposite the Brewery Tap a few months ago.

Turns out that Albert Camus, the Nobel prize winning author who I recently pointed out came from Wigan, was killed as a passenger in a Facel Vega. Doubt that did anything for their reputation but they had a lot of famous owners from Pablo Picasso (I always thought he had a Citroen that he was named after), Ringo Starr and Brian Rix so I suppose they were the inspiration of the French Farce.

It looked like Rishi Sunak made a quick visit. He apparently got back OK and nobody intercepted his boat and made him send himself to Rwanda. Incidentally, I had a look around from my ferry but I couldn’t see any small boats so perhaps the trips are suspended during the election purdah period, who knows?

I was back in Blighty on Monday afternoon and made it to Brilliant Breighty by the early evening, in time for a Teams meeting with council lawyers about election law. Rather thinly attended but I hope it will stop me going to prison for anything, though to be fair it was only Independent candidates (well, one of them) that caught the umpire’s eye in the May elections.

It’s all been a rather quiet week for me. Of course the work being done round the corner from my home, the Heidelberg site where they are bashing in a new river wall is certainly not quiet, and is causing dismay as far away as Brook Lane South and I understand even Strand-on-the-Green. I’ve got used to closing the windows and sitting still when the floor bounces.

As usual, there is stuff going on and one of my recent queries has been answered and actioned, and I have a wonderful report to mark the achievement, from one of our transport team:

I wanted to ensure I provided you with a further more comprehensive update concerning the breath-taking monument to post-war suburban parking.(see above)

In terms of accurately dating the piece, we took account of the denominations of payment required and crucially the size of the slots provided for on the face of the sculpture, we were able to disregard the notion that it hailed from the period of King Cunobelin or Tincomarus (in the latter days of the roman occupation of the 1 st century) and given the design of modern parking provisions is attributable to William Phelps Eno (1858 -1945), with this in mind and the technology observed within the item, we were able to reasonably date the piece to the late 2 nd Elizabethan period.

Since sending my last update, our curators attended the site in Brentford and removed the misleading “pay here” signage; thereafter an exception was made and (with the comparable delicacy applied to the scurrying away of the Winged Victory of Samothrace from the Louvre in 1939 ) my colleagues also removed the main portion of the pay & display machine or, using the latin label “Facultatem stipendii ostentationem ad vehiculum sine equo”.

 The only remaining job involves severing the power supply or removing the mini pavement lump , but I understand we may wish to not eradicate the powerline entirety as it would be far cheaper and simpler in the future should the need arise to run power to a facility in that particular portion of the footway. I believe all that is visible now, unless removed already, is the following although we did take steps to rule out it being a brutalist version of the Easter Island installations:

 
Are they by any chance related? Defunct P&D Machine in Brentford (left). Easter Island statue (right)

Please let me know if you need any further information or assistance or indeed, if you come across any additional pieces we can help curate.

As to action, on Tuesday we had a FoodBox trustee meeting, which was quite a long one. We think we have a new treasurer – to be confirmed – and there is lot of work going on there to develop the service.

Wednesday morning I went to Boston Manor Park which is always a pleasure. There were a lot of little children which is always lovely to see, plus a few dogs barking at each other in a not very threatening way. Plenty going on there and usually really busy.

This morning, Thursday, I went up to Osterley to knock on some doors, but apparently they have changed the time. So a coffee at the always friendly Café Capri in the High Street, disturbed mainly by a bloke riding an electric bike down the pavement at 50mph (well, probably 15, but it was alarming) with a Just Eat bag on his back. Then there was some bloke in a Volvo parked for half an hour partly on the pavement and partly on a double yellow outside Morrisons and another young man in a very swanky BMW M4 badly parked in front of the Volvo. I know disability is not always visible but a fit looking man in his 20s or 30s didn’t convince me and in this day when I keep hearing of Blue Badge thefts I wonder if the blue badge was used correctly. Whilst I watched all this fun an ambulance and a cop car on blues and twos went down the wrong side of the nearby central island. Obviously a result by lycra-wearing cyclists as usual.

I’ve also been working on the mess around the police station and I am demanding the landlords erect boarding stopping access to the site. Yoofs have been spotted on it, which worries me greatly. It’s a difficult time just outside my ward where they are looking to evict everybody, including some community groups from the Max Factor building and some others unevicting themselves (IE Squatters) in Watermans Centre and of course a small fire.

I will be busy on this and a few other things that have slipped a bit, next week, together with a lot of canvassing locally and further afield.

Councillor Guy Lambert