The green wooden huts that served as shelters for London's coachmen in the Victorian era are now all protected, with the 13th and last of these 19th-century cottages to be included on the heritage list. "This shelter is more than just a taxi shelter. This is like a little hub in this community" says Andrey Armanda-Markovic, who has been the keeper of this west London shelter for the past 18 years.
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00Today, the Wellington Place Cabin Shelter, just behind me, has just been listed at Grade
00:282. It's one of 13 surviving cabin shelters in London, and these are really important
00:35because they are relics of the age of horse-drawn Hanson cabs in London. There's an unbroken
00:42history from 1875 all the way up to the present day of these serving licensed cab drivers
00:48in London. And you always have the end window, which would have been for passers-by to be
01:17able to order tea and coffee. But inside the shelter, it was always reserved for the
01:22cabman. Listing obviously doesn't protect shelters from being crashed into by cars or
01:32buses, as does happen sometimes, but it means they have to be carefully thought about when
01:35there's road widening schemes or there are changes in road layout. So we had to think
01:40about these being important elements of that street scene.
02:05So this shelter is more than just a taxi shop. This is like a little hub in this community.
02:11So we have all sorts of people. We have the workers, the police, the celebrities. They
02:20come here, have a cup of tea, no one bothers them. Everyone's treated equally here. So
02:24it doesn't matter how famous you are, how poor you are. We're a family rather than a
02:32business. That's the difference between this and let's say prêt-à -manger or something
02:36else. This is real.