London: the city that ate itself

[tfwsoll]

Interesting article on London. Beware the glass corridor.

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jun/28/london-the-city-that-ate-itself-rowan-moore?CMP=EMCNEWEML6619I2

[steveo]

The usual Guardian scattergun scaremongering, hand wringing, money and government hating claptrap; where does one start?

Nobody from outside London has ever easily bought property in London; they have always been priced out by rich Brits and foreigners, so they try and buy on the fringes and then move in or rent or stay where they are.

Nobody forced the cheerful Cockernee greengrocer to sell up to Kurds and move to Orpington.

Only bad artists have ever had any money and artists? studios have always been impossible to find.

If Network Rail wants to develop the arches in Brixton then it is down to the locals to oppose that and they should petition the government for help.

The article bemoans the lack of housing but hates the developments yet all those box like flats are being snapped up and not only by rich Chinese. Just walk around them and listen.

The piece says that industry in the capital has been denigrated since Thatcher and has been pushed to the fringes but then contrarily an interviewee says: ?There is a vast diversity of smaller businesses that is unstoppably, entrepreneurially driven. It is so fascinating to watch the refreshing of industry in London: things that people had written off are reviving and growing.?

Yes pubs are closing but craft beer shops are opening every day.

It says a number of mental health centres are being merged and the complaint is that some ?intimacy? will be lost. How about efficiencies increased?

The article moans about the One Hyde Park development; agreed it is truly horrible but then the article concedes that it was Ken Livingstone that let it happen.

It moans about basement developments in rich areas and then says that the sparse populations in these areas means that nearby shops and restaurants have to close. Er? where?

It suggests that people are living in garden sheds. So what? Some sheds are nice. I?d have willingly lived in a shed when I first moved to London.

Yes, the Heygate has been a scandal and the government and possibly the police should look into it but it looks more like old-fashioned corruption than politically driven social cleansing.

It moans that the regeneration of the Crystal Palace Central Hill Estate, which it describes as ?draped beautifully around a hilly terrain? - have they ever been there? ? will mean demolition. Where?s the evidence of that?

The Guardian wants to live in an imaginary past where artists, nurses and colourful artisans frolicked around the Maypole outside their low rent studios, local hospitals and shops then walked around their corner to their light and airy affordable park side flats. It ain't happening.

[*Bob*]

Jezuz.. social media is awash with this stuff today!

If you're leaving the party, just get your things, say a few quick goodbyes and go. There's no need to go around telling everyone you're leaving soon, then around again to say you're on your way out and then stand at the door shouting 'I AM LEAVING NOW - EVERYONE STOP AND LISTEN TO THE REASONS WHY WHICH I HAVE DRESSED UP AS WIDER SOCIAL COMMENT BUT IS REALLY MOSTLY JUST ABOUT ME and I'm short of copy this week and this stuff gets lapped-up at the moment'

[Earl Aelfheah]

I agree with much of that Steveo, it was an odd article.

...Except: "The article moans about the One Hyde Park development; agreed it is truly horrible but then the article concedes that it was Ken Livingstone that let it happen." Not sure what your point is here - One Hyde park is horrible and was approved by Ken, that's straight forward.

[bodsier]

The "Nobody from outside London has ever easily bought property in London......."

Londoners cannot even contemplate buying in London...it's far too expensive, so families are torn apart. And existing communities broken down, and for many, In your words 'it ain't happening'.

Secondly people who can't afford to buy cannot afford to rent and their rents are hiked up ridiculously. Look at what's happening in Dorchester court. Flats accommodated by families are only afforded by 5 individuals sharing.

Not every Londoner wants nor can afford craft beers. Pubs were once a community asset, not an exclusive elitist establishment.

Restaurants closing down...

http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/25/its-like-a-ghost-town-lights-go-out-as-foreign-owners-desert-london-homes

Granted, it is the only one I have read about that refers to the eeriness due to lack of people in the area generally, but so many others have closed Worrel thompsons, Blancs, Ramsey's and many others. Due to recession they claim. I think the article is spot on. If you talk to local people, who are on a modest salary, they all say the same thing. Just talk to the people affected by it, who know how to campaign, they seem to have to do it so often to defend their right to live and work in London and remain close to their communities.

isn't a warm safe comfortable home, rather than a shed in someone's back garden a basic requirement? At a time when homes are just seen as investment commodities, clearly not.... They are now a luxury. How low we have stooped.

[*Bob*]

Why does anyone have a 'right' to live and work anywhere? It's a bizarre concept IMO. Sometimes you can't live and work somewhere - in which case, you move. As I did - and many of the people I know. Some to London, some out of London, some out of the country. That's life; change, adaptation, no guarantees, do what you need to do.

I agree it's the media articles that drive me potty though - not 'people'. The articles always seem to be written by someone who's just moved from Hackney to Brighton.

[BrandNewGuy]

bodsier Wrote:

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> Restaurants closing down...

>

> http://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2015/jan/25/its

> -like-a-ghost-town-lights-go-out-as-foreign-owners

> -desert-london-homes

>

>

> Granted, it is the only one I have read about that

> refers to the eeriness due to lack of people in

> the area generally, but so many others have closed

> Worrel thompsons, Blancs, Ramsey's and many

> others. Due to recession they claim.

Ive never dined in Kensington and Chelsea, so I wouldn't know. But recently the Standard had a piece about restaurants moving to or opening in Zones 2 and 3 to avoid sky-high central London rents. Which is a good thing, I reckon.

http://www.standard.co.uk/goingout/restaurants/chefs-spurn-city-centre-for-taste-of-the-suburbs-10307264.html

Londoners have been deserting pubs for thirty years or more without the help of nasty developers or pubcos. And craft beer bars are not for the wealthy. Lots of micropubs opening up all over London at the moment. Beer, cider and good company. What's not to like?

[????]

Guardian Journalist in swapping Hackney for keeping it real Brighton shocker.

[bodsier]

Where exactly would people be moving on to.. Affordable areas tend to have high unemployment due to lack of jobs.... It's a catch 22, it's not just London that is being affected by this, most cities are in the same situation.

London is loved because of its diversity of culture and class...there once weree undesirable areas that were affordable, now it's all valuable real estate. Yes I get that it's a nauseating article in one respect, but This article isn't as boring as the city heads on the train recently who just kept babbling on about the next up and coming areas for investment. The city will be full of those, or those who invest but don't live here. Thrilling......

[miga]

[Otta]

steveo Wrote:

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> The usual Guardian scattergun scaremongering, hand

> wringing, money and government hating claptrap;

> where does one start?

Whilst I don't disagree with you, to be fair I saw an almost identical article in the Telegraph probably a year ago.

Basically they're all shit.

[????]

basically

Place I can afford to live in = vibrant, lively, community minded paradise

Place I can't afford to live in = souless, one dimensional, blow in, generic toy town

[Otta]

I do think there is some truth to it when you look at the development of Soho and the businesses closing down never to be seen again.

Or if you like small live music venues (jazz on a Sunday does not count!!!).

[bodsier]

Where are the vibrant lively affordable communities ???....actually PM me. Some real estate vulture is bound to have their tentacles up looking for the next investment, scouring forums etc for inside information....😭

[PokerTime]

Hong Kong used to be the most expensive city on the planet. That title now goes to london. In Hong Kong, the cost of property and rents went so high they had to slap a 26% tax on foreign property purchasers. It was a bubble. London is heading for the same disaster. Growth is not infinite. What multiple of average salary do prices have to reach before we all get it? And when there are no min wage people left in London to do all the dirty jobs, who are we going to blame then? The poor? For not being able to earn enough?

A vibrant city (and I'm talking in economic terms) needs a range of demographics to keep functioning. If we price everyone but the most affluent out of the city, that economy will suffer. The article may be irritating but it hits on real issues. The rise in the cost of property in London over the past 40 years is unprecedented. The reasons are many. But it can't be allowed to go on.

[miga]

There's a fine line between vibrant and stabby.....

[CARLOS THE JACKAL]

London is eating itself, but so I'd capatalism in general as predicted by Karl Marx. It is social cleansing and the action required to stop it lies outside the ballot box.

[Earl Aelfheah]

I've seen two articles on Catford this week, one in Time Out singing it's praises and another in the Standard (i think) saying that it's becoming too hipsterfied / is full of blow ins (I paraphrase of course). Seems like the wave of 'gentrification' has moved on again.

[????]

This is a differing viewpoint about Gentification (Spectator naturally). It's not really speaking about London as it kind of says London as a global mega-city is different. But that London's unaffordibility should regenerate plenty of other areas...a good thing surely? Rebaalancing etc?

Still, the old horrible Blow ins rubbish will continue - much of Islington and places like Camberwell Grove were of course saved from being knocked down and turned into concrete hell in the 1960s by middle class blow ins in reality

http://www.spectator.co.uk/arts/arts-feature/9565362/the-moral-case-for-gentrification/

[bodsier]

PokerTime Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Hong Kong used to be the most expensive city on

> the planet. That title now goes to london. In Hong

> Kong, the cost of property and rents went so high

> they had to slap a 26% tax on foreign property

> purchasers. It was a bubble. London is heading for

> the same disaster. Growth is not infinite. What

> multiple of average salary do prices have to reach

> before we all get it? And when there are no min

> wage people left in London to do all the dirty

> jobs, who are we going to blame then? The poor?

> For not being able to earn enough?

>

> A vibrant city (and I'm talking in economic terms)

> needs a range of demographics to keep functioning.

> If we price everyone but the most affluent out of

> the city, that economy will suffer. The article

> may be irritating but it hits on real issues. The

> rise in the cost of property in London over the

> past 40 years is unprecedented. The reasons are

> many. But it can't be allowed to go on.

Spot on

[*Bob*]

The problem is that most people who are desperate to get a foot on the ladder in London are too young to remember a crash of any long term significance - but old enough to remember when doom-mongers told them they'd be foolish to buy anything in 2008 (or whenever it was) - and then looked on as house prices accelerated even more out of reach.

[Louisa]

London's answers (whether we like it or not) to long term shortages in housing, are in the outer zones 5/6 and beyond. Whole swathes of brown and green field sites within the M25 (and just beyond it) could and should be prioritised for mass affordable housing schemes along side investment in infrastructure so that people can travel to and from the city centre in the fastest times possible for work. The thameslink scheme is part of the long term solution, but more has to be done. I don't see why London cannot expand its outer layers a bit further so that the city has a zone 7/8 maybe even 9/10. Something radical has to be done to spread the availability of housing for everyone.

Louisa.

[steveo]

You took your time

[Jeremy]

Louisa Wrote:

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> I don't see why London cannot expand its outer

> layers a bit further so that the city has a zone

> 7/8 maybe even 9/10.

Well... the towns and villages surrounding London DO generally already have train stations! Don't really see that bringing them into the TFL/Oyster system is going to make much difference.

[Louisa]

Yes Jeremy they do. But by redefining the greater London boundaries so that areas of the Home Counties come under London Borough control surely makes it far easier to buy up land and make it available for housing en mass. I know this wouldn be hugely controversial, but might be the radical move we as a city need. Cities do expand every so often, maybe it's time London did so that we have room for more housing.

Louisa.