I went back to work in Soho – and the deserted streets of central London made me gasp

The full impact of a city without its people hit home, writes Jenny Eclair. It was as if a malevolent spell had been cast on the capital

Graffiti paying tribute to health workers in London’s West End during lockdown (AFP/Getty)

I went back to work last week. Proper, outside-the-house work. I was even wearing trousers and shoes and it felt like a very big deal. The job entailed two full days in a recording studio in the middle of Soho, where I was promised deep-cleaned equipment and no physical contact.

It’s actually pretty simple to abide by the new coronavirus safety rules with audio recordings. The performer is already separated from the technician by a glass partition and any instructions are delivered via headphones. But now coffee and lunch breaks were staggered too, so I didn’t accidentally bump into the one other woman recording in the building at the same time, and gloves were supplied for loo breaks.

I felt quite happy about the situation, but my big problem was travel: with a visit planned to see my mother next weekend, I didn’t want to take any chances with cabs or public transport. As as a non-cyclist, and with my car out of action (possibly forever), I begged the old man for a lift there and back. He agreed and I immediately felt like a spoilt teenager going to a party.

Driving into town was an odd experience itself. Traffic around our local area was heavy, but as we approached Westminster Bridge it suddenly melted away; we sailed over the river, round the now boarded up statue of Churchill and towards an empty Trafalgar Square in minutes. I took some photos out of the moving car and neither of us spoke. It felt like the sleepy London of a very early morning, as if the city might wake up soon and return to normal in a couple of hours. It reminded me of 5am drives to the airport for inconveniently timed flights and resurfaced some very distant memories of leaving parties and clubs long after I should have done, back in the 1980s.

But, actually, it wasn’t that early. It was 9.30am and all the commuters were on furlough.

I’d left Camberwell without eating breakfast, knowing that Pret a Manger on Wardour Street would be open (I’d done my homework). Quite honestly, I’d been planning that Pret breakfast in my head for a week: egg mayonnaise sandwich, decaf skinny latte and one of those little ginger-shot bottles. Oh yes! What I wasn’t expecting was to feel a sudden rush of weepy emotion on entering the shop, which was open for takeaway only and queue-less.

There was some difficulty getting the barista to hear my order through the triple barrier of his face mask and mine, and his plexiglass screen. When he repeated back what he thought I’d said, I couldn’t really hear him either. But it didn’t matter; I was demob happy, I’d have been thrilled with anything at this point.

It was only as the day went on that I was struck by the utter weirdness of it all. How, when I stepped back out into Soho at lunchtime, it was still as empty as it had been a few hours earlier. Suddenly my Pret salad box tasted a bit lonely and I noticed properly how many shops, bars and restaurants weren’t just closed but had been boarded up, as if they expect to never reopen again.

The old man picked me up again at 5pm, which would ordinarily have been peak rush hour. Yet we sailed through the deserted back roads on to an entirely empty Regent Street. That was the moment the full impact of a London without its people hit home. Both of us actually gasped. It was as if a malevolent spell had been cast on our city in March and, suddenly, we couldn’t fathom how on earth we were going to break it.

Of course, in the olden days a fire would probably sweep through the place. But plagues change, and so must the solutions. This week, we are all being encouraged to shop our way back to normality.

After last week’s eye-opener, I would give a great deal to return a week later to Regent Street and see it bustling with happy shoppers. Despite the promised discounts, I’m certain it’s not going to happen. With a no touching and no trying policy, the future of shopping, particularly for clothes and shoes, is going to be very different. In any case, I don’t know anyone who has got any money left or who doesn’t want to get rid of their lockdown gut before they buy anything new.

That said, the instinct to shop is very strong for many of us – and I have to admit the sight of those “50 per cent” off signs did make my heart beat a little faster.

My dilemma now is how I’m going to travel back into town in the future. I cant imagine the old man is going to cave into many more lifts; the spoilt teenage act wears a little thin when you’re 60. So if I want to shop up west any day soon, it looks like I’ll be walking in from Camberwell. With any luck I’ll be a size eight by August.