Louisa

I used to have a great postie, he would come out in rain and shine, but the present chap who delivers my mail is a waste of time. He spends most of the mornin at the end of the street lighting up a cigarette, and when he can be bothered to actually do the job he's paid for, he often losses letters or posts them in the wrong door. Waste of space. I bet he is the type who would ring up work and not go in because of a bit of snopw on the pavement. Loser. Louisa.

Vee my love, as much as I would love to divulge how I spend my precious days amidst the chaos known as ED, I am afarid this is neither the time nor the place for such information to be shared. However, I did take sometime out of my busy day to reove ice and snow from the front of my property. Did you? Louisa.

EmmaG I could not agree more, it seems fine to close off access to a public space where it isnt dangerous and yet public highways and walkways are left dangerously slippery and no one in authority seems to give a damn. Louisa.

I cleared away the ice and snow not just from my front garden but also the area directly outside my house and the elderly gentleman who lives next door (he didnt ask, but thanked me later). I agree that is a respectful and decent thing to do, and it certainly helps local councils out so they dont have any excuse for waste disposal not to come round and collect my bins for x number of weeks. Louisa.

dukesdenver, I have had the same problems with Southwark and this is the explanation they gave me. I am not a fan of Direct Debits, so I usually pay my council tax sometime between the 1st and 10th of each month as and when I have the time by going into the office in Peckham and paying cash over the desk. However, despite doing this, and being upto date with my payments, I received a summons through the post asking me to pay the remaining yearly bill up in one go because I had fallen behind with payments. Raging, I rang them up and was politely informed that because my payments had been erratic and spread over various days of the month, despite being upto date, that the computer showed up my address as red and therefore I had to pay the rest of the year in full. The lady I spoke with then asked me to send a letter expalining that I was upto date and a photocopied receipt prooving payments for the previous 8 months and then I would come off the red list. To be honest, i'd never heard of anything so stupid in all my life. Can you imagine an elederly person who prefers paying with cash receiving this through the post? It's a disgrace, and yet another reason why I have no respect at all for Southwark Council. Louisa.

or... (alternative ending) Little girl (gives Daddy a hug): I still love you Daddy. When I grow up I wont take random days off work playing in the snow and will make sure I keep what may well be an ailing economy as a result of your present actions alive by working even when as much as four inches of snow has fallen on the ground! Louisa.

shaun more than you will ever realise dear boy hehe *Bob* as you well know, small potatoes sometimes grow into larger ones. DD, exactly, some people think that the the country still ticks over even if everyone is sat on their a*se or in the park chucking balls of frozen water at one another. tut tut. I am not a killjoy people, snow is a very beautiful thing - if I were a 6 year old or perhaps a ski fanatic just landed in Geneva I could appreciate the winter wonderland, but a week day in London town with a couple of inches on the ground isnt exactly Val D'Isere. Sean dear heart, I care deeply for my views and you know I dont intend to offend, but I am not changing my views overnight just because the magic of some frozen water has sent the rest of ED into a frenzy of childlike proportions. Louisa.

Perhaps you should invest some time reading over my first post on this thread before you snap at me. Further more, I could only dream of the days in which I was a young sixth former lol (but thankyou for the kind compliment). Louisa.

Well everyone, glad you all had a great day further f*cking up our economy yesterday! (as if the banks have not done enough damage already), I presume most of you are now back to work are you? Or is the melting half an inch still on the ground causing you problems? :'( lol Thousands of people left stranded by a suspended public transport network, foreign visitors left wondering whether Britain really is a place worth visiting and many people killed or injured on the roads because the necessary emergency equiptment was not freely available for use or had not been invested in. Glad you all had fun! (By the way the small koala is adorable) Louisa.

I'm no killjoy, kids can and should enjoy the snow, but lets have a little realism people. Louisa.

MrBen, thanks good to speak to you again. Yes the weather service has not be very specific about the Greater London area on the main channels these past few days. Certainly considering most of the general public get their info by switching on and watching the news bulletins the answer was yes we would get some significant snowfall, but the home counties were mentioned very specifically and London was not given a great deal of notice. However on the met office website it was clearly stated that a Severe Weather Warning was in force for Greater London and the South East of England and I am 100% sure local councils and government would have been made aware. Many of the main routes have NOT been gritted despite what some people have said, and those that have been gritted are becoming impassable because the buses have stopped running which in turn has lead to the snow turning slushy with fresh falls on top. BBC weather has just said that Greater London can expect at least a further 8 inches of snow from around 2 o clock onwards coming from the south east which will be persistant and prolonged into the evening and overnight, followed by clear skies and a freeze. Louisa.

I didnt look Horsebox, no doubt it was because some people arnt as pathetic as others. Louisa.

Sean when a country is in recession and tourism is one of the few things that actually seems to be a revenue maker these days, I think it is utterly essential that we keep things moving. I agree that the number of days in which we have such conditions has become a rareity in recent decades, but this does not justify things coming to a halt. A little forward planning would surely help matters, maybe even a revised emergency bus timetable would work, but stopping buses altogether is just not a good idea for business, the elderly, people who do actually want to get to work and infrastucture in general. It is winter time for christs sake, the met office gave plenty of warning and we are in a recession, all of these factors should mean that things can and indeed should keep moving. But this laid back approach isnt necessary in my opinion. I can remember buses running in London in the 70's when we didnt have the technology for heated rails and widespread gritting, and winter were a hell of a lot worse in those days. We dont have to spend billions of pounds to keep London moving, that is just what certain people say because they couldnt organise a p*ss up in a brewery. Louisa.

Yes funnily enough it does, because the elderly and infirm rely on the bus services and public transport in general, they rely on shops to stay open for them to buy necessary goods when it is like this, how about you think before you type? Everything has a knock on effect, but you dont see that do you? I may as well be conversing with a brick wall. Louisa.

Sandperson, as I have already stated, the reason some people cant get to work is because of the pathetic decision by TFL to cancel all London bus routes. This then leads onto people who need to come a distance to get to work not being able to do so, knock on effects and so on, this then means shop closures, this then means a missed days trading. Obviously this doesnt really bother you, oh well, you arnt everyone are you? Further to your comment about me living in Toronto and Moscow, I dont run away from problems I prefer to get them fixed where I already am thankyou very much. If you were a trouist staying at a central London hotel today what would you be thinking of this situation? It is winter, you are in a northern hemisphere city not exactly shy of snow historically, the largest in the EU may I add, and you cant get a bus because of a bit of snow on the ground. It is possibly the most ridiculous thing I have ever heard in all my years of living here. Louisa.

I think some people are forgetting that London is actually a global city, it keeps this country alive and kicking (just about), and without it we would all be in dire straits. For our latitude and our proximity to the continent it does not take a rocket scientist to realise that every so often it might snow, why not just be prepared for it huh? Businesses closing and public transport being on the lock down gives a very bad impression to foreign visitors and foreign investors. I have seen snow an awful lot heavier than this in London back in the 1980's, just because it's not happened in a while does in no way justify today's antics by the institutions which suposedly keep this city moving. It is an utter disgrace and I bet people in other parts of Europe and the world are laughing at us, I know I am! Louisa.

no Sean, what excerbates the problem is when people do precisely what you are saying, stop driving and running buses! The gritting is fully effective, i've seen it work on bigger falls of snow than this before in other parts of the country and it is no doubt because people actually just get on with it, rather than make a huge song a dance about a bit of snow! So what, we dont get snow that often, does this mean we should therefore not be prepared for it? As for you Sandperason, just because you dont want to get on a bus doesnt mean the rest of the population are that damn lazy they want to stay home and get a day off! Somerfield and Barclays are both businesses, if everyone in Canada and other countries closer to home that had this much snow just decided oh lets not open today we'll take time off, they would not be in business for very long would they? God some people are just stupid lol. Louisa.

Highly topical discussion, but I am pretty amused and angry at the same time. Somerfield and Barclays bank along LL both closed, all London buses suspended, delays on trains and underground, cars sliding along main roads. Oh it must be a couple of inches of snow in London! No wonder! I have been to Toronto and Moscow and experienced temperatures of well below freezing, as low as -22 in Moscow when I was visiting in 1995. Everything kept running, everwhere was open and people still managed to survive the daily slog to work. It isnt only the fact that we are not used to big falls of snow any longer, it is the fact that we are rarely if ever prepared for such rare events. Why do TFL think it is acceptable in a global city to stop the entire bus service for a few inches of snow? What is the justification? Are they just too damn bloody lazy to want to work or what? Why have very few of our main routes through ED NOT been salted/gritted, hence making the situation worse? Why are people on the roads so damn stupid that they cant slow down a little bit? All of these questions need answering and it angers me like mad! In the north of England and Scotland snow is a regular event and big cities like Birmingham and Manchester still manage to keep going, so why the hell is it such chaos here? Extreme weather events happen, everyone should have been well prepared and we should have been able to keep this huge city running without all this chaos. Will local councils and public transport learn from this event for future reference? I highly doubt it.. Louisa.

MP, i'm sorry but I just dont buy that argument at all. The population for such stores is still in the surrounding areas and this is not an issue about 'new populations' as you put it. Brixton and Lewisham are very ethnic diverse areas and they maintain many of these shops to the present day, and the population structure is almost identical to Peckham. I would not describe transition from huge department stores to dirty rat infested shops as some sort of positive cultural revolution for local people. If anything, the long standing residents are left completely isolated, new residents are left confused and only a small percentage of the population feel that they have a reason to go shopping in Peckham. Just look at the majority of posts on here about the place, it is all so completely uneccessary. Louisa.

???? I think I love you. Louisa.

Bring it on I say, I am always up for a decent barny, especially when it's on my own doorstep. I would not think twice about questioning the rights of a squatter over a law abiding citizen such as myself. I know I would win at the end of the day, so either way, I think my route is best. Louisa.

It isnt about market forces Brendan, if you look at the surrounding areas the demographics have probably increased in favour of the likes of such stores. Bare in mind Rye Lane has considerable space (unlike LL) to accomodate these big stores and they certainly would be profitable. I think the problem is a lot deeper and associated with who owns the lease/freehold on these shops or who has bought them in recent years and seems to favour certain types of shops over others. Louisa.

Microbite, Primark as an example, was once known as Bhs in Peckham, and before that going way back was a Dorothy Perkins/Burtons/Richards. The decline in the number of High Street stores along Rye Lane, coupled with the 'downgrading' of those remaining High Street stores, and in such a short space of time (comparable to say Lewisham, Brixton, Bromley eg) is my main reason for being so particularly angered by this decline. The likes of M&S moved out along with C&A between 1988 and 1993 and were not replaced by any equally as famous High Street standards. I want to know why this is? Louisa.

Have to recommend Le Moulin, I can assure you it will not be overly Valetinesed. Eric and Margaret just make you feel very welcome minus the frills and spills. Louisa.

Squatters should be shot. If they gained entry into my house whilst I was sunning it in Spain, i'd not hesitate to pay a bunch of 'door staff' a backhander to get them forcefully removed. Louisa.