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Comment by tomhoward | Hacker News Reader

My favourite feature when looking down in London (as a foreigner who has only visited a few times, briefly)...

The Stanton Warrior drain cover: https://www.google.com/search?q=stanton+warrior+drain+cover&...

They were produced by Stanton Ironworks in Derbyshire, which closed in 2007 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ilkeston#Stanton_Ironworks.

Many of them must have been replaced with a different brand since then as I noticed fewer had the Stanton Warrior brand when I was last in London in 2019.

The British electronic music producers The Stanton Warriors took their name from these covers - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanton_Warriors.

(Also, at adds with the old Google interview brain-teaser, "Why are manhole covers round?" - they're rectangular. So I guess it they don't care so much if these ones fall in the hole, probably because they're not holes that workers go down into).

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Manhole covers are round if they cover a pipe and square if they cover a brick built manhole.

Your note about them not falling in makes me wonder if Google had a different answer?

> Manhole covers are round if they cover a pipe and square if they cover a brick built manhole

This is inaccurate as a generalization - in the three jurisdictions I've worked in, they're round if they're newer than ~1990, and mix of round and square (or two triangles that go together to make a square) if they're older than that. The frame and cover are replaced independently from the MH structure itself so the cover doesn't tell you anything about the makeup of the structure.

Not quite true. The cover itself has to be supported by a structure. The frame itself is insufficient. If you put a round cover on a square hole it would cave in if a truck ran over it.

Catch basins in my jurisdiction have round covers on a square structure. The cast iron frame is square with a circular hole in the top.

Edit: for example https://maps.app.goo.gl/m8rR4vrPHBPTyXxo9

> Your note about them not falling in makes me wonder if Google had a different answer?

It's the kind of question that's asked in interviews because it has several answers and a good candidate should be able to think it through and suggest a reasonable number of them and demonstrate their ability to creatively think through a problem. That round covers can't fall in seems one of the simplest and most important, given that a cover that falls in could kill or seriously injure a worker.

https://www.livescience.com/32441-why-are-manhole-covers-rou...

Also grime artist Newham Generals were named after the hospital.

Also recommend this in Tokyo!

Great artwork and interesting stuff with many remaining ones effectively unique as they were put in by a particular locality for a time and then others have been removed.

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