Its 15.51 and the bus stop on the corner of Oxford Street and Tottenham Court Road is thick with people. Some stand, waiting, watching. Others race up or down the stairs of the tube exit, taking two at a time. A few people in matching yellow jackets try to intercept the merging masses. leaflets in their hands for mobile phone deals, McDonald's food vouchers or discounted english classes. Even the people standing, waiting are not still. They move to and fro, bodies leaning over the gutter to check for the bus, heads turning to watch people pass. Some circle around the bus stop signs checking destinations and times.

Tottenham Court Road is an artery of people and vehicles. People come here to go somewhere else. Tottenham Court Road provides access to travel, to shop for electronic goods or for food. There are three tube stations (Tottenham Court Road, Goodge St, Warren St), major bustops, Sainsbury’s, a plethora of technology shops, lifestyle/furniture shops and a smattering of cafes, few of which you would want to sit outside and leisurely consume anything amongst the pigeons and pollution. People do not stand around in this street. They have purpose or at least a list. They shop, they browse, wait or run for buses, carry heavy Sainsbury’s bags, hail cabs or disappear or reappear from tube staircases.

Many streets feeding off Tottenham Court Road support more casual encounters and experiences. They flourish with cafes, book and fashion shops. They have more trees and benches on which to sit and watch the streetscape. Not so Tottenham Court Road. It is what Conley in his introduction to Augé’s In The Metro, calls a ‘non-place’.

The non-place is an ambiguous site in which a person experiences a mix of pleasure and uneasiness of self-suspension. It is the waiting room beyond the security gate of an airport: the passenger consigns himself or herself to living in attendant expectation of an event that will take place when the boarding of the craft is announced; it is perpetuated in the anticipation of calm when we find our seat in the plane but is dashed when the constraints of the space remind us that we are human cattle; the pleasure recurs in the wait for the drink and food that will help consume and pass the time, the deception returns with the tasteless ness of the fare. (2002:xviii)

Waiting for a bus can be seen as a state of ‘self-suspension’. There is relief in finding the bus stop if you don’t have bus experience and in seeing people already there which confirms the arrival of a bus in a short period of time. This is shortly followed by boredom as you wait for a bus and dodge the glut of people interweaving along the footpath around you. There is the anticipation coupled with anxiety that is catalysed by glimpsing a flash of red in the traffic shortly followed by disappointment at seeing three of another bus go past. There is not enough time to wander into any of the nearby shops and you can’t read a newspaper as it is one of the windiest corners in London – there is nothing to do but stand and wait. When your bus does arrive the excitement of getting on and finding a seat is then replaced by distaste at the grime, the squealing brake noise and graffiti windows which obscure the view. If you are standing up there is the additional discomfort, awkwardness and potential danger of falling from the jerkiness of the bus movements.