Admittedly the title is 'what seven hours in London teach...' rather than 'what seven hours in every city of the world teaches' There's nothing in the piece that says 'this only happens in London'
I'm from the edge of the balkans, and have travelled all over europe, and only London gave me the feeling of some future dystopia (exaggerated, but pointing that way), where they tell you to mind the gap, keep to the left, see something, say something, cameras everywhere, and a news story every now and then about someone getting arrested because someone got offended.
Compare that to eg. the Balkans, where noone tells you anything and everything is chaotic in a "manage it yourself" way, similar with eg. spain and france, and the "everyone is adhering to a set of rules, but noone will tell you, unless you figure it out yourself" going from austria to germany and north, with some exceptions here and there (noone will "officially" tell you not to walk on the bike lanes in eg. amsterdam, but many locals may yell at you if you do).
Other cities won't face this to the same degree - but it's exacerbated in London because it's such a popular destination yet with antiquated infrastructure due to such structures being built so ahead of the curve - thus surprising platform gaps and corridors far too narrow to support massive commuter flows of a metropolis that has grown so much.
An aimless tourist could be knocked over if they don't follow conventions or aren't made aware of unusual hazards that more recently built transport systems won't have.
I'm from the edge of the balkans, and have travelled all over europe, and only London gave me the feeling of some future dystopia (exaggerated, but pointing that way), where they tell you to mind the gap, keep to the left, see something, say something, cameras everywhere, and a news story every now and then about someone getting arrested because someone got offended.
Compare that to eg. the Balkans, where noone tells you anything and everything is chaotic in a "manage it yourself" way, similar with eg. spain and france, and the "everyone is adhering to a set of rules, but noone will tell you, unless you figure it out yourself" going from austria to germany and north, with some exceptions here and there (noone will "officially" tell you not to walk on the bike lanes in eg. amsterdam, but many locals may yell at you if you do).