C’est Magnifique!

“C’est Magnifique!”

I was leaning against an alley wall outside The Angel on Briggate drinking a cold beer. On a big screen opposite the Pound Shop a thread of cyclists tore in two as they met a roundabout somewhere in North Yorkshire, tracing perfect semicircles left and right, then re-entwined over the other side as neatly as a zip. I struggled to recall anything appropriate from my (failed) French “O” Level to say in response to the chap sharing the ginnel. All I managed was, “bloody grand!” It didn’t seem to matter, he got it.

I hadn’t intended to watch the race. Four hours of the Tour de France would be enough for me I thought, and I’d been in town since 7.30 watching the crowds gather, wandering about from the Town Hall to the bottom of Eastgate just to get a sense of how big this thing was. From first thing I’d seen old people putting out deckchairs, kids standing on windowsills and low walls, whole families arranged around pub tables with the slightest view of the Headrow, and more people in wheelchairs than I have ever seen in town on a Saturday – though I did worry about what they’d get to experience. It was a tight, excitable, knockabout crowd. And even at eleven ‘o clock, just before the race began, people were still pouring into Leeds from every direction.

I missed the start. I’d sauntered back from Eastgate in plenty of time to catch the starting pistol (is that how they start?) but a steward on the top of Park Row was directing people away from the Town Hall and not allowing anyone through the fence; “the best view is the big screen on Briggate,” he was shouting. So Briggate it was, where I watched right up till the royals appeared when my republicanism couldn’t take it anymore and I decided it really was time for a drink.

A couple of hours later I was in the middle of a discussion started by this tweet:

So Leeds, we shut down pretty much all the city centre to cars today … & everyone had an amazing time! When can we do it again? #TDF2014

— Culture Vultures (@culturevultures) July 5, 2014

(the sort of discussion where people say things like, “I didn’t go as there was nowhere to park” and, “well, it inconvenienced a lot of car drivers …” and I have to stop myself from responding: yes – and car drivers inconvenience, poison and run us over most every other day of the year …) when I noticed a photo on Twitter of what looked like a load of people sitting down in front of one of the big screens, with the simple text, “The main shopping centre of Leeds!” Intrigued, I grabbed my camera and locked the office.

When I got to Briggate this is what I saw:

Thousands of people from Duncan St to The Headrow all sat down, watching the big screens, chatting, sharing food, drinking beer (there is a Designated Public Place Order on the whole of the town centre so this was a collective outbreak of civic naughtiness) and having a great time. Not a steward, police officer or community support officer in sight to make us behave ourselves. And not a single piece of Heras fencing to keep us away from trouble. Utterly joyful.

I stayed and watched the race to the very end, cheering on the sprinters, oohing and aaghing when one of the Brits made a break for it, groaning when the Brits got overtaken and gasping with the rest of the crowd when Cavendish’s collarbone crunched on the tarmac. I never expected to enjoy it as much and I tweeted my amazement.

Someone responded: Sod the City of Culture. What can we go for next that will fill our streets like today?

That’s a good question. I don’t think the populist takeover of Briggate was planned for. I don’t think it happened just because people like cycling more than “culture.” But if we can use the experience of what happened spontaneously on Saturday then we might be able to get people more excited about culture. Let’s face it, if I can get excited about a sporting event anything is possible. Culture can be C’est Magnifique too.