Me Time

 

You'd think I'd be bored of the cave stations by now, but no.  Each one was still as exciting as the last.  Although, if I'm honest, Stadshagen was a little uninspired compared to some of the others.  The rock appeared bare and grey and The Art was restricted to some pieces along the platform wall.

Ironically this was almost the template for the whole Blue Line.  Stadshagen was where they tested various different types of lighting and decoration, and the idea was that all the stations would look like this but with unique art on the walls.  It was only after setting this one up that they realised giving each cave station its own look would actually be an advantage.  It would help with the sense of place around each stop and make them unique.  

I was back on Kungsholmen, the island across from Gamla Stan and in the proper city again.  Rising up to street level I could hear the sounds of the city getting louder and louder.

The roads around the station were a mess.  Traffic and building works saw pedestrians being shuffled from one side of the street to the other, through temporary traffic lights and barriers.  Further on the busy road opened up for St Görans Hospital, or, to use the Swedish term, sjukhus.  The Swedish for hospital is "sick house".  I find that stupidly funny.  

Beyond the church of St Göran there were dense blocks of apartments, thick against one another and the street.  A school across the way was a beast of a building, rising to five stories and remarkably unfriendly looking, a red porch the only hint of fun or colour.  More traditional blocks followed in yellows and oranges, with cafes and shops at their base.  One cafe was called Greasy Spoon; apparently it offers a "modern take on a British institution".  I'm not sure whether to be pleased that British cuisine has been exported to the Continent or embarrassed that it's bacon sarnies and the fry up.

Crossing at a busy intersection, where a policeman in some of the tightest trousers I've ever seen was giving friendly advice to a young boy on a scooter, I ended up in a square of parkland.  The reason for this not being built on became immediately obvious as I clambered up a steep slope to reach the centre.  This wasn't so much "let's leave a green space for the people", more "bugger only knows how we're going to build on this".

On the other side I was emptied out into a mirror image of the street I just left, although I spotted one of the turns was Celsiusgatan;  Anders Celsius, of temperature fame, was from Uppsala and the Swedes are naturally proud of him.  It was quiet here, but there were more squad cars, and I realised that I was right next to the police headquarters.

They weren't very friendly around the Police HQ.  Signs in Swedish and English warned me that photography was strictly forbidden, while patrols wandered up and down outside.  Normally you don't care about this kind of thing - one Government building is much like another - but the police building happened to be very attractive and so, at great personal risk, I took a photograph.  If I'm arrested for this, I want you to know it was worth it.

There's another park outside, the Polishusparken - again with the Swedish that sounds like an English person being patronising - and on the opposite side of that sat the Rådhuset: the City Hall.  It was an impressive Government axis that didn't overwhelm and intimidate.

Tucked into the corner of the park was a pavilion to take you down to the Tunnelbana station.  Once again, I was excited to see the escalators carrying you straight down to the subway below.  I'm inordinately impressed by outdoor escalators.

Given that we were now in the heart of Stockholm, it was unsurprising that Rådhuset station took the history of the area as its theme.  In true Tunnelbana style, however, what resulted was a twisted version of it, that was simultaneously all about the past, and not at all.

Sigvard Olsson's idea was that the station was filled with historical artifacts, and yet, all of these artifacts were made by him.  The baskets there, for example, were created as an homage to the workers who would've carried their goods all over the island in the 18th century.  There's a stack of birch logs, which the artist said are from World War II, but of course were put there by him.

Embedded in the ceiling of the cross passage are a pair of boots, supposedly as a tribute to a nearby cobbler which has existed for centuries.  Or does it?

It was all a bit self consciously whimsical for me.  It all felt a bit pleased with itself, like a clever child in school who takes the assignment but then twists it so he gets to write about what he wants to write about instead.  It didn't seem like a station that lived up to its grand surface.  I'm not saying it should've been pomp and circumstance, nor that it should be dead serious and dull, but this all seemed a bit much.

The next station on the line was T-Centralen, but T-Centralen is the hub round which the whole network revolves, a three-layer cake of station delights, and so it needed to be studied at length.  Instead I went to the current end of the line, Kungsträdgården.  Sorry, when I say end of the line, what I actually mean is slutstation.  I love Swedish.

Kungsträdgården also has a historic theme for its station, but while Rädhuset was "the past, but oh so witty?" Kungsträdgården is "the past, but insane?"

Artist Ulrik Samuelson's principal inspiration was the Makalös palace, which once stood on the Kungsträdgården.  Makalös means incomparable, and was the nickname given by the citizens to the elaborate stately home built by the De la Gardie family.  The palace was then passed to the Crown, and eventually became a theatre, before burning down in 1825.  Kungsträdgården station incorporates elements of the palace, copied from the originals preserved in Stockholm's museums.

It means that Kungsträdgården is pretty makalös itself.  Every niche, corner and inch of ceiling is decorated with colour and sculpture.  Everywhere you look is a new, bonkers vista.

It must be handy if you're meeting friends.  "Where will you be?"  "By the bright red naked bloke."

I wandered up and down the platform, marvelling at it all.  It was brilliantly mad.  I genuinely didn't know what I was going to see from one moment to the next.

Samuelson also drew inspiration from the gardens that give the station its name.  That's the reason behind the green ceiling, but it's also why there's a water feature.  Normally in an underground station a trickling sound means seepage from above; stand on the platform at James Street and listen to the drips and try not to think about the billions of tonnes of Mersey very close by over your head.

Here the water trickles over rocks and down into a well.  Meanwhile, around you is a weird, fascinating confection of statues.

The exit has been crafted to look like a bridge in a grotto, and over the parapets are archaeological relics mixed with neon and colour.  It was absolutely delighting a young girl, who leaned over the wall and pointed out elements to her dad.

It's considered the jewel in the Blue Line's crown, and while I might prefer one of the others myself - Solna Centrum perhaps, or Tensta - you couldn't deny its ambition or ability to amaze.

Incidentally there was a small sign near the exit from SL apologising that some of the artwork had been taken away for restoration.  I was gobsmacked.  You mean there was more?

The Kungsträdgården itself is Stockholm's Piccadilly Circus or Times Square, the place where the city gathers and revolves around.  It means it also carried the problems of those places - in the eighties it was notorious for its drug addicts - but on a sunny day in July it seemed like a perfect city park.

Almost perfect.  By this point I was, to be frank, in need of a wee.  I decided to use one of the public toilets I'd seen dotted around the city, tiny Tardises that charged 5kr (about 37p) for access.  I swiped my card and went inside to find a nasty, stinky box that had only a passing acquaintance with hygiene.  Toilets are never my favourite place, but if I have paid to get into them, I expect a certain standard.  I did my business and left, resenting every penny of that 5kr.

With the Blue Line completed, the question was, what should I do with the rest of the day?  I'd planned for this.  Kungsträdgården is served by the Spårväg City, a tramline which connects T-Centralen with Djugården, an island known for its luxurious houses and its tourist attractions.  The Spårväg City was a historic tram that ran heritage vehicles to Norrmalmstorg until, in the 2000s, it was converted to a proper tram and extended to the Central Station.  You'd think this would be a popular move, but the residents weren't too pleased about a line that served the city's richest residents being improved while the poorer citizens were left without.  It gained a nickname of the NK-Expressen, because it ferried the well-off Djurgårdenites to the luxury department store Nordiska Kompaniet.  There are now plans to extend it to Ropsten through the docklands, as a way of encouraging regeneration in that area, but the plan has been on and off for years.

There was a tram just pulling into the Kungsträdgården stop, so I leapt aboard and managed to find a seat.  My plan was to go to the terminus at Waldemarsudde then visit all the stops on my way back to T-Centralen and my hotel.  Simple.

I rode the packed tram through the city streets and over the bridge to the island.  There wasn't much sign of the exclusive department store shoppers among my fellow passengers; most of them were tourists headed for the ABBA Museum.  As we got closer, an automated voice broke in, first in Swedish and then in English.  Due to engineering works, the tram was terminating at Skansen - everybody off!

I stepped down and wandered over the road to a small parklet.  I didn't know what to do with myself.  I had a plan, a well-thought out, intricate plan, to collect a tram line.  I had a spreadsheet and everything.  What was I meant to do now?  And then it occurred to me.  I could do... nothing.

I want to make it very clear that I was really enjoying my trip to Stockholm.  It was a beautiful city and everywhere I'd gone had been delightful or, at least, interesting.  I am so lucky that I was able to travel to a foreign city and indulge my weird little hobby.

Saying all that, I'd not really taken on board how relentless it was going to be.  Amsterdam, last year, was a much smaller network, and its stations weren't quite so overwhelming.  It's also, famously, very flat.  Stockholm was huge and hilly.  I'd not really realised, until I stood in that park, how intense it had been.  How I'd been pushing myself, daily, to collect station after station after station.  There are 165 stations on the West Midlands Railway map, and it's taken me years to get close to finishing that; I was doing 100 stations in five days.  

I walked down to the waterside, where a boathouse had been converted into an expensive restaurant and there was a marina.  I stood for a few minutes and simply stared at the view.  I could visit one of the attractions on the island - one of the many museums, the circus, the fairground; Djugården is where Stockholm comes to play.  But I realised that instead I could just... wander.  

There was one transport related thing I wanted to do, though.  As you'd expect for a city built around an archipelago, Stockholm has a huge network of commuter ferries.  I wanted to go on at least one of them, so I headed down to the pier for the number 80.

Living on Merseyside means I have a prejudicial idea of what a ferry looks like.  It's a massive thing, a ship basically, with a funnel and decks and probably a bar or a shop.  I forget that in the rest of the world ferries are simply something people use, a handy way to get around, and they're nimble little vessels that whisk you over the water.

The boat that came in was just that: a boat.  It wasn't designed as a pleasure cruiser or a money maker.  It had an open top deck for the tourists, but when I boarded there were simple commuters - people wearing headphones, reading books and newspapers.  They're building new ferries for the Mersey at Cammel Laird as I write, but the design hasn't been released yet.  I hope they're smaller and more modern, and encourage Mersey Ferries to build a couple more piers and make the service more of a transport link than a Gerry Marsden Nostalgiafest.  A pier at New Brighton, for example, would add an attraction for daytrippers, while another at Wallasey Town Hall would give a direct link to Liverpool for an area that's unserved by Merseyrail.  Pipe dreams, of course, because they won't spend any money they don't have to, but the little trip across the bay to Nybroplan was fast and fun and relaxing.  Merseyside would do well to copy it.

I wandered up from the quayside, through the Nybroplan until I found myself back on the tram line.  Opposite me was the elaborate gilded Baroque of the Swedish National Theatre.  It's over the top grandeur indicated that I was entering the territory of rich people.

Beyond Ingmar Bergmans Gata the shops were Louis Vuitton, Chanel, Prada; the men were in suits and the women were in tightly wrapped designer ensembles.  I took a side street and there were restaurants with signs so discreet you only knew they served food from the glimpse of white tablecloths through the windows.  Every piece of greenery was topiaried to death.  At Norrmalstorg a small cafe dispensed expensive coffees.  There was also, delightfully, one of the old trams, which run inamongst the newer ones as a heritage bonus.

I walked past Nordiska Kompaniet, thinking that maybe those people who complained about the tram extension had a point, and entered Norrmalm.  This was perhaps Stockholm's most controversial district.  Until the 1960s, there had been an old town here, known as Klara, with small traditional buildings dating back centuries.  However, there was a feeling that Stockholm needed a modern business district suitable for the Twentieth Century.

In most of Europe, some combination of the RAF and the Luftwaffe had created a need for post-war redevelopment.  Neutral Sweden, of course, avoided being levelled by bombing, and so they decided they would have to do it themselves.  Inspired by American city planning - never a good idea - they levelled the entire district to build new, modern office towers.  A motorway was carved through, alongside the railway.  There were some benefits - this was what finally brought both sides of the Tunnelbana together - but in the main, Stockholm was rebuilt in a way that was completely alien to its traditions and style.

It certainly feels like you've stepped into a completely different city - the back end of Prague, perhaps, or East Berlin.  Brutalism and concrete are everywhere and the buildings go high.  At Sergels torg, a sunken plaza sits beneath the Kulturhuset, Stockholm's own Barbican or Pompidou Centre.

Containing a cinema, a theatre, a library and a conference centre, it was opened in 1974 and has been controversial ever since.  The locals have a love-hate relationship with it, since it's architecturally stark, but has some wonderful features.  It's one of those buildings people like being inside, rather than looking at.

I avoided the Sergels torg itself because there was some kind of dance performance there, put on by a lot of enthusiastic youths, the kind of thing that makes me want to rip out my own teeth so I can jab them in my eyes and ears to stop me taking it in.  Instead I followed the pedestrianised street towards the Central Station, the spire of the Klara Church constantly appearing behind another Sixties building.  Norrmalm would be perfectly acceptable if it came in amongst a mix of styles and buildings.  The difference with the rest of the city was so jarring, though, it was easy to dislike it.  An overpass took the road over the street and the railway tracks but I dropped down a level, heading to my hotel for a well-earned rest.  

That was the end of the Blue Line, easily one of the most beautiful metro routes on the planet.  If you go to Stockholm, for whatever reason, I'm imploring you to ride it from one end to the other.  You don't even have to get off the train.  But it'd be better if you did.

Two lines.  Five branches.  Then it's done.