London Dig Uncovers Roman-era Skulls

OShea said: Chris said he didnt feel right and wanted to come off. He got a whack in the head and it was felt the right decision was to bring him off. Related Articles Cipriani inspires Sale to win 04 Oct 2013 A surprise loss at jubilant Irish follows on from home defeats to Northampton and Saracens, and OShea knows he must try to find a cure for his sides poor displays. Irish desperately needed this win having lost their previous two home clashes with Saracens and Exeter Chiefs. And to beat a team they usually struggled against will do their confidence and morale a world of good. Having George Skivington back leading the team for the first time since leaving the field in a pre-season match against Munster with severe concussion chad a major impact. Irish were full value for a hard fought victory against opponents who were a shadow of the team which swept all before it to lift the title 17 months ago They shrugged off the early blow of losing flanker Kieran Low as the first half produced a kicking match with Shane Geraghty and Nick Evans nailing two apiece by the interval. Fortunately, the second half was a contrast to the first with the game opening up. Losing their inspirational skipper rattled Quins as they were caught sleeping by decisive Irish attacks. This match turned quickly as Cowan forced his way over followed by Lewington in the corner. Care replied by darting over for Quins only try but Irish held out. OShea refuses to push the panic button despite the poor start but insisted: Its too early to write us off but the important thing is to see how the guys react. You get nothing easy in life and we knew Irish would scrap for their lives. Its really frustrating seeing a performance like that. We cant expect to win games playing with that lack of direction and physicality. Delighted Irish director of rugby Brian Smith said: We knew Quins would throw the kitchen sink at us and they did.

London air pollution ‘dangerously high’

It has been a great privilege being part of the Crossrail project, as it has given us unprecedented access to the capital’s past. We are unlikely to have ever got access to excavate sites like the busy roadway at Liverpool Street, outside one of London’s mainline railway terminuses. In London, history is everywhere you look, and Liverpool Street has certainly not disappointed. How has it changed your perception of London? It makes you realize the great impact that people in the past had on their environment, and that we are just one small part of a very long story. As well as contributing to these big questions, these excavations give us a series of snapshots of the life of Londoners over 2,000 years: a carter in Roman Britain, struggling to get his horse up the road to a bridge over the Walbrook, and losing his horse’s shoes in the deep, muddy wheel-ruts; medieval ice-skaters shooting across the frozen Moorfields Marsh; someone in the 16th century with a small gold Venetian coin used as a pendant, aping the much more expensive jewelry of their betters; a family burying their young girl in the Bedlam burial ground, wearing her beaded necklace despite Christian customs; or the local craftsmen, sneaking into the same graveyard to dump the waste pieces and failed items of bone, shell, and even elephant tooth from their nearby workshops. Subway tunnelers have uncovered archaeological artifacts everywhere from Athens to Istanbul to Mexico City. We also asked Jay Carver, lead archaeologist for the Crossrail project, to discuss such finds in London. What other significant Roman-era finds have been unearthed by the Crossrails project? One of the things we are always testing is assumptions about the activities in the Roman period in areas outside the core area of the Roman city. Liverpool Street is the focal point for that research into the road network, extramural burials, local industry, and management of natural resources, and we are finding a wealth of finds there to elaborate on these topics. At places like Whitechapel out along the London Colchester Road, and at Tottenham Court Road and Bond Street which are alongside the Silchester Road (now Oxford Street), evidence for burial, suburban, and roadside settlement has been absent.

London steals title of best city in the world from Paris

Or its reputation for rudeness. But the City of Light, one of the most visited cities in the world, has been knocked off its perch as best city in the world by London and Sydney in a new index released this week. According to the latest edition of the Anholt-GfK City Brands Index which measures a citys brand image, power and appeal, Londons stock has gone up in the world as it took the top spot in the biennial ranking. Possible reasons could include the fact that the city continues to bask in the afterglow of a successful Summer Olympic Games and has maintained a presence in the international spotlight with a string of historic milestones that include the Queens Coronation ceremony and the highly anticipated birth of a new royal with the arrival of Prince George. London also took the top spot as the city where individual cultures are appreciated and where foreigners can “easily fit in.” The Aussie capital of Sydney, meanwhile, enjoys a stellar reputation around the world for being the safest and friendliest city. The City Brands index measures the value of a citys international reputation across six dimensions: its international status and standing; esthetic; a category called pre-requisites such as affordable accommodations and the standard of public amenities; people; pulse (interesting things to do) and its economic and educational potential. More than 5,140 interviews were conducted in Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Russia, South Korea, the US and the UK for the index. And while Paris was able to take the top spot in the category of Pulse, where the city failed to crack the top 10 ranking was in categories such as Friendly People and Safety. This summer, in a bid to shed their longstanding image of being rude and surly, the citys chamber of commerce published an etiquette manual for Parisian restaurateurs, taxi drivers and sales staff on how to welcome international tourists. …despite its indisputable charm, the capital has work to do when it comes to welcoming visitors, the chamber admits. And earlier this year, high-profile muggings of Chinese tourists robbed of their passports, plane tickets and cash shortly after landing in Paris tarnished the citys image, as did footage broadcast worldwide of soccer-related riots which broke out not far from the Eiffel Tower. Meanwhile, other notable movements on the index include Tokyo, which suffered a 7-spot drop from tenth place in 2011 to 17th place in 2013. Amsterdam, meanwhile, shot up the ranks from 17th spot to 11th position this year. And while Rio de Janeiro was ranked the third friendliest city on the list, the city fell to the bottom of the heap when it comes to safety (47 out of 50) — a particular concern given it’s set to host the World Cup and the Summer Olympics, the report points out.

London Irish 18 Harlequins 13: match report

Local environment groups placed 36 diffusion monitoring tubes on structures close to parks, bus stops, busy roads and in residential areas, to measure emissions in more than 30 streets. They were left for four weeks and only four were removed or stolen.Analysis by a laboratory used by government found that concentrations of the toxic exhaust pipe gas nitrogen dioxide (NO2) exceeded EU levels by over 50 per cent in some areas, and was over the safety limit in 15 out of 32 places tested. The results are alarming, say the groups, because colourless, odourless NO2 pollution is cumulative and the 15 sites surpassed the annual safety limit after only four weeks. The experiment suggests that official testing of roadside air pollution is limited and insufficient. Many of the tubes measured emissions in streets that are never monitored, and those placed near official monitors mostly recorded levels above those published by government. Air pollution from traffic in east London is considered by health experts to be some of the worst in Britain, mostly affecting the old and young and linked to respiratory and heart diseases. It is estimated that air pollution kills over 4,000 people in the city each year. The Green party assembly member Darren Johnson said on Friday that Londonas air pollution was an aabsolute crisis.a Environment groups expect air pollution to deteriorate further in east London if two major infrastructure developments are permitted. City airport has submitted plans which could allow it to add 50,000 more flights a year. The mayor of London, Boris Johnson, also wants a new Thames road crossing that could massively increase traffic. aOur sampling showed that in key public locations readings are breaching EU guidelines. We are being asked to believe that the massive expansion of London city airport will have only a negligible impact on air quality. This shows it is simply not the case,a said Alan Haughton of Stop City Airport.