Carnaval del Pueblo
Published by Peter | Filed under Events
A lady dressed in carnival clothing holds a Brazilian flag
Lots more photos of the Carnaval are available in this Flickr pool, but most of them have restrictive licenses so I can’t display them here. Boyd Tonkin in The Independent gives it the thumbs up.
August 5th, 2008
From Portugal the Carnaval seems so desirable…
He does give it a thumbs up, but reading it yesterday I was annoyed by the usual slightly sneering tone of ‘aren’t I brave, going to SE London’.
I quote: “On this Asbo-worthy patch of a scruffy, fragmented mega-city, surely the heartland of the ‘broken society’…”
He does then go on about how great it was, but I wish every journalist wouldn’t feel the need to introduce SE5 and its neighbours in apocalyptic terms. No, it’s not Highgate. But nor is it Phnom Penh in 1975.
Or am I being too sensitive? Maybe I’ve gone local.
Pete W — my mate came over from Brixton so you’d think he’d be used to it, but even he said what a horrorshow the tower block next to the park looked like. Rain didn’t help. LOL!
Review was spot on. Southwark is a leader among ASBO’s and guess what part of the Borough leads the pack?
You have to have a thick skin ’round here. We find the bright spots ’cause its our home. But we can’t deny the facts.
Fab foto, Peter. Pueblo carnival is the biggest and best, most bangin’ latin vida loca, breast is best, man is beast, festival in Europe. Cliche newspaper knowing-tone wonks need to say south east London is dodgy, but we have a rich life here, apart from, you’re right, newroad, they who intimidate, frustrate and repress us, depress us with all the repression of the oppressed, with the oppression of the emotionally deprived and dispossessed, oh yes, what a mess, but what a hot scene in the Burgess, kinda I wanna be your mistress if you got the sheer strength to undress me, I’ll step out of the waves like Ursula Andress…
“…they who intimidate, frustrate and repress us.”
Walworth really, but Camberwell Rd is named.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/7546536.stm
Hey ho.….
Whoops, same link as Peter. Sorry all.…
Very sad
I guess it could be classed as the start of camberwell –it has an se5 postcode afterall– its very scary that the victim was apparently an innocent bystander: I have used that shop several times late at night myself.
http://www.transportbriefing.co.uk/story.php?id=5113 — interesting news on Phase 2 of the East London Line
We have a local ‘pop star’:
http://www.last.fm/music/Florence+and+The+Machine/+wiki
http://www.last.fm/music/Florence+and+The+Machine/_/Kiss+With+a+Fist
the lyrics are worth listening to in the context of the above comments …
The further (if minor) bad news for Camberwell is that the Reuters story about the murder is tagged “Britain-shooting/Camberwell” on the agency wires system.
There are thus now news editors all around the world who associate our neighbourhood with gang violence. It’s not unfair, of course.
The saddest thing is that this young lad seems to have been an innocent bystander. I’m not saying it isn’t sad when a teenage gang member gets killed, but this adds an extra layer of tragedy.
it can, and does, happen anywhere.
And do DFS really think rock stars have such awful sofas in their homes? The advert is driving me mad.….….
back to Camberwell matters — the coffee in Hermits is a hidden gem, as is the DIY store in the basement of the convenience store near Hermits.
And the fact I can ride to work in under 30 minutes from home makes Camberwell fine with me.
Totally agreed re the DIY. They are really good with advice/customer service and stay open until 11pm. Who needs B&Q.
PS Brewers near Queens Rd station for paint..
yes we are well provided for in terms of hardware/ DIY shops — many is the time I have called into the basement DIY shop and found exactly what I was looking for rather than having to go travel miles to B&Q Old Kent Road. There is also the hardware shop on Coldharbour Lane opposite Nandos which is also very good although not offering quite the long opening hours of the basement place. And Crusons’ range of flower and vegetable plants is more than adequate for my gardening needs
Black people are compressed into the cities in Britain, which is a heavily populated country. It’s not like America as a model at all. American black people think that British black gangsta life is nasty, small, small-minded and spiteful. They do not like the Brits at all. You only have to read the autobiography of Malcolm X to get it.
Huh?
The DIY people in near the hermits Cave is indeed great — they have helped me out a lot recently trying to find odd hsaped bulbs for ovens, fridges and extractor fans.
What’s it called though? I’m thinking Camberwell stores ir superstore but maybe that’s something else?
DIY place on Coldharbour beats DIY place near Hermits.
Can I just say how gutted I am that DRINK STORE has changed its name.
That’s the problem with Camberwell. No sense of keeping the good.
Does it Phil? Really? At 10.30pm on a Sunday?
I’ve used both many times. Better range, expertise, prices.
Though if you’re stuck at 10.30pm on a Sunday then maybe, but like they say about DIY, preparation is everything.
@19: It’s called Camberwell Food, Wine and DIY. As others say, a winning combination — where else can you get a bottle of wine and a couple of hacksaws at the same time?
does it do gardening equipment?
A bit of gardening stuff, but hardly any as I remember. It doesn’t do Oyster or much media either. But it is open late, and sells booze too.
Power drills and Special Brew. A winning combination.
@16 Dagmar
I don’t get your point either. Don’t disagree with what you say, but don’t get what you’re trying to say. Am intrigued, however.
I bought a full size axe there at 8pm on a Saturday night once. Could have been mid row in a local ale ‘ouse but was actually chopping down a bay tree. (Sorry Reg.)
Have also bought palm sanders, floor stain and emulsion there.
no need getting into a head to head with other great local suppliers though due to unsociable working hours and the fact that they have never let me down — actually came and replaced a tap once– then I do have a clear preference.
Handy for 4T4LSAC too..
I’ve long thought that dagmar’s posts are not be taken literally, but are rather a series of clues to the whereabouts of a bejewelled thing buried in lucas gardens.
lol@26.
Yes, I think it shows the commercial spirit of our local businesses, to sell the sorts of items that are urgently needed on a Saturday night in Camberwell.
Baby formula, headache tablets, hammers and special brew.
Seems they’ve done their research and are simply catering for their market.
I bet somewhere sells knives late at night in Camberwell, too. Which is probably quite worrying.
Once I got locked in Lucas Gardens at night — I was returning from the petrol station with my shopping and the park keeper locked the gates in sequence, in the opposite direction to which I was walking, so by the time I got to the Graces Road entrance, I was incarcerated in the magic garden.
Ignominious as it is to confess, I was dying for a poo. In fact for various gastric reasons, the poo would stay no delay. I crouched in the bushes, away from where little children might play, and let go.
For some days after, I monitored the progress of its decay in the wild. Who would not be fascinated! What a photographic project for the SLG, Tate Modern or Serpentine! Talk about arte poovera! Can you hear me, Piero Manzoni!
Various creatures dined on the pile. But most constant — Florian, how prescient you are — were the “gilded flies” as King Lear called them, like brilliant active jewels, gold here, sapphire blue there, perhaps a glint of diamond, as they danced and dined, buzzed and sang as they busied about slurping up the excreta, till the pile went down and down — and finally, was completely gone.
Caught, preserved and strung on a fine silver chain, what a byzantine and iridescent necklace they would have made, a macabre and mesmerising detail in a sinuous poem by Algernon Charles Swinburne, a voluptuous meditation on the fascinating lure of the decay and death that one day we must all, each one of us, embrace…
By christ! my quest here ends.
Bag it and bin it.
As the prophet said, it may be shit, but it is quality shit.
Just posted this to my MP, London Assembly member and councillors.
TO THE ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES FOR LOUGHBOROUGH JUNCTION
The stabbing of a man in Northcross Road last Saturday has left me feeling profoundly sad about Loughborough Junction. I’ve lived here for over 10 years and, while there have been some improvements (CCTV, refurbished terraces on Coldharbour Lane) there is an air of decline and i feel more scared about waling around than I ever have before. I feel there must be a link between escalating levels violence in the area and its neglected state. It gives the impression of lawlessness, that no one cares about the area, so it’s ok to do whatever you like — including attacking people.
The area has long suffered from being on the edge of a range of administrative boundaries — we are on the edge of three parliamentary constituencies and on the Lambeth & Southwark Council borders. The area should be seen as a gateway to the borough — an opportunity to create a positive first impression. Instead when people arrive in Lambeth — either by road along Coldharbour Lane or by train at Loughborough Junction they get the impression that they have arrived in a slum. Boarded up shops, random and broken street furniture, graffiti, paving slabs loose and broken, dumped clothes and rubbish on street corners, litter bins overflowing…etc. No wonder shops remain empty — shopkeepers won’t take leases in the properties when the public realm around their business is so badly neglected.
One of the biggest blights to the area is the industrial estate. It forms a barrier between the junction and the more affluent Herne Hill area. Commuters get off at Herne Hill even if they live nearer to LJ because they would have to walk past the industrial estate with it’s windowless walls onto the street and dark unlit areas. Does it really provide local jobs? It seems to be mainly used for religious worship. If the planning policy is not enforced then why not change it and allow residential or mixed use development?
I would like to know what you, as my elected representatives are going to do to improve the environment and regenerate this long neglected area. I suggest a concerted campaign in following three areas;
CAMPAIGNING & LOBBYING
Surely there must be funding we can access to improve the environment in the area? From Europe, the Governemnt or the LDA? Both Lewisham and Southwark have successfully bid for regeneration funding for similar mixed tenure streets in Rushey Green and Bellenden. We need to be lobbying loudly to get a Loughborough Junction stop on the East London Line extension. We can’t let this opportunity to make a step change to transport in the area slip away.
ENFORCEMENT
Enforce planning policy on the industrial estate or change the UDP to reflect the sort of development that the local area needs.
Other planning and building control regulations seem to be ignored as well adding to the “wild-west” feel of the area. Shops fronts are altered and rubbish is dumped with seemingly no intervention from any authority.
INVESTMENT
The paving — particularly around the station and shops is atrocious. Metal slabs are all that stops pedestrians falling into shop basements, paving is lose, broken and uneven, advertising sites block site lines. I find it hard as an able bodied person. It must be impossible in a wheelchair. We need new paving, street furniture and better lighting. Not just mega-wattage floodlighting which adds to the brutal bleakness of the area. It should be carefully designed and include input from artists and architects.
I hope this does not sound too negative. I love living here. The area has some great features (Ruskin Park, lovely neighbours, urban foxes) and our street is a genuine mixed-tenure, cohesive community that has evolved and thrived despite rather than because of politicians.
I look forward to hearing your plans.
P.S. I have copied Kate Hoey, my MP into this. I hope that she will see fit to do something for her constituency instead of campaigning in favour of fox hunting or helping Boris organise the Olympics.
Not sure that slagging off Kate Hoey was lifted from ‘How to make friends and influence people’.
I also completely disagree with you about foxes — both the beauty of our oversized urban rodents and the right of people to continue hunting. But what do I know — I’m pro cock fighting.
Despite this I thought that your letter was great and I hope you get what you are looking for along with the associated house price alpha.
There was an inident yestedrday morning at Camberwell Daily News (next to Kamera Obsura, Morgan Berry estate agent etc). I saw police cordin off the area. Anyone know what happened?
oh dear what now?
@35 good luck with it!
I’ve long thought that L Junction is much “worse” than Camberwell or Brixton. Things go really downhill for those few hundred metres. A lot of people say that. Shame.
I thought L. Junction was on the up; lots of building work underway, looked cleaner, etc; seems to have stalled a bit now, though.
@ 35 The guy who was murdered was on Northlands Street he lived on Southwell Road. I live there also.
Love-borough Junction I sit in a different ward and constituency (Tessa Jowell) to you but the same borough Lambeth. I have emailed my local councillors with a similar sentiments especially that of the problems of being on the Southwark/Lambeth border. What is very sad is that there is one solitary bunch of flowers at the spot from his parents. I wonder what they think of this area.
On a positive note I went to the newly refurbished Cambria Pub on Cambria Road. it is really good, very glam, good food and really friendly Landlords Steve and Amy. I was not that keen before as it always had a few blokes in gazing mesmerised at the telly with no atmosphere. I was really impressed with the new look and a good addition to the area.
I can’t agree with the letter. It suggests L’Borough Junction suffers from poor transport and should be renovated to look like Bellenden Road to weed out crime. Truth is, Bellenden has as much crime. And worse transport.
As with Camberwell (and Bellenden), you can spruce up and paint over the cracks but they’ll come back. An East London Line and major Government subsidy to spruce up shop fronts won’t cure the underlying issues.
Lboro J has its problems but I’d say its transport is OK (though I don’t live there, I’m familiar with some of the routes).
I often have to go from Camberwell (big)to Loughborough Junction (small) to get the speedy, frequent transport connection it enjoys so have little sympathy for the perceived need to “lobby loudly” for improved transport. I also agree with Peter that it looks better than it ever has. Maybe you’re just getting tired of the place, love-borough junction? Good neighbours can be found in any place except posh ones in my experience.
Having said that, I did hear rumours that many of North Peckham Estate’s finest shifted to LJ when it was pulled down.
As for you Mr Dale, I propose a last-one-standing contest between your cock and a pit bull in one of LJ’s vacant units!
I wish you luck, Love-Borough, but would recommend that you attend one of your local councillor’s surgeries and make the points you raise in person as well — they’re much harder to ignore than a simple letter and you’ll be able to judge from that if they are likely to be an ally to your cause.
I favour baby-steps to improve things in your area — if you go along with a fully worked out manifesto of all the things that you want sorted, you’re less likely to succeed, I’m afraid. Start with the paving stones and end with re-routing the East London Line extension and building an 18 platform station where the Green Man is now!
I empathise with your frustration about the look of Coldharbour Lane. I think most of those shops will never be tenanted and ought to be converted to housing.
dear me — slag off whoever you need to — foxes are lovely, cockfighting abhorent and kate kate…kate.…what can one say??
this is NOT about house price “alphas“
wait til YOU get murdered for your primark socks dale .…
see you next thursday !!!!
@37 Kia Blue
Nothing unusual at Camberwell Daily today. Maybe some minor incident outside? (i.e. stabbing that didn’t lead to a fatality. These go unrecorded now, don’t they? Like burglaries.)
THE LADY OF LUCAS GARDENS
by Algernon Bysshe Keats
Late at night while wise owl hoots,
She may be seen in long leather boots
Striding silently the sward of Lucas
In denim mini, with moon-bathed hooters
Set off by her fossil-fly necklace,
Clapped eyes on by only the reckless
Nightime folk who dine on crack,
Like those flies who slurped her cack.
They yearn to climb her lunar hills
Only — ah! — to fall into the ills
Of the ravine of deadly desire below.
Oh jewelled flies, they laugh, they know!
Thus the purlieus of Camberwell
Cast their irresistible spell!
If you are really interested in challenging your prejudice about cock fighting I suggest you go for a drink in the cock pit:
http://www.beerintheevening.com/pubs/s/60/603/Cockpit/Blackfriars
200 years of cockfighting history.
As for the quest for alpha then I reserve the right to keep looking.
C U Next Thursday then number13. Where are we going?
On a different note — a public meeting on September 8th for anyone interested in the future of Camberwell Baths. I got the email below yesterday and the invitation is extended to all Camberwell Citizens!
“There will be a summit on the regeneration of Camberwell and in particular the next steps forward in the development of the Camberwell leisure centre.
The Council has received expressions of interest from various companies and are studying in depth proposals from three; they are the English National Ballet, Ash Sakula Architects and Fusion.
So that you can hear more about their ideas and plans, we have asked them each to prepare a short presentation and to take questions from you. In addition, as your local councillors, we are always eager to hear the views of the community and to pass those views directly to the Executive; therefore we have invited Councillor Lewis Robinson, Executive Member for Culture, Leisure and Sports to be present.
This special meeting will take place on Monday 8th September 2008 at 7pm. It will be held at St Giles Parish Hall in Benhill Road, Camberwell, SE5 7LL.”
@ Mushtimushta — clearly you are also local to LbJ, for it would be unconscionable to wish away amenity space from an area where one did not reside, rather than advocate addressing the root causes — poor customer infrastructure, abysmal quality of public space and high crime, which make inner city trading so difficult.
In my experience low-level local councillors shy away from large projects as it exposes their political impotence. They will champion a public toilet, fix the lifts in a council high-rise, or ride a new supermarket bandwagon, but nothing on this scale. You require the support of both the elected leaders (of Lambeth Cabinet and Southwark Executive) AND the ‘permanent’ CEOs of both local authorities — Annie Shepperd and Steve Reed. This is because elected executives do not have the power of dismissal of permanent Council employees, and that threat is required to get them to do anything outside their comfort zone.
I remember LbJ Rail as the pretext used by Network Rail and the TOCs not to reopen Camberwell Rail, and whilst I accept that this was a fig leaf for the avoidance of a project with insufficient scope for profiteering, the fact remains that Camberwell’s public transport is inferior and more deserving of improvement.
LbJ — like parts of Camberwell — is in such a state largely because planners accepted landlords’ arguments that commercial rents should always be on a par with residential rents, resulting in serial rubber stamps of conversions to residential in the area.
However, the commercial and residential property markets have different cycles, and should do. £5 per month in an inner city commuter town criminal area could be a fair commercial rent, albeit neighboured a £1 million gated private commuter property with little exposure to local life.
An appropriate response to the next attempt to convert a shop should be a CPO of the shop freehold for £5,000 outright, with analysis to show how local crime and poor parking make this a fair price, to reflect the difficulty of trading there. A covenant not to convert should then be imposed which can only be released by all residents within 50 metres of the property.
Councils need to increase rates for empty properties to the maximum full occupancy retail rate, and refuse conversion to the peanut rate “storage” for shops at ground floor level.
I am not optimistic that this call to a local free market — unfettered by planning bias — will be heeded, although like Love-borough Junction I do not wish to be negative.
One of the endless calls for local info again.
Anyone know of a decnt NHS dentist in the area? My, previously good NHS dentist, has changed my status to private and is now refusing to offer the treatement i need (root canal work) on the NHS.
Camberwell Dental Care on Camberwell Church St is very good. Hitesh is the name of my dentist (if he’s still there). Had a tricky wisdom tooth problem last year, which he referred me up the road to King’s, but it was all NHS.
Returning to a favourite topic of ours: the lovely somerfield — apparently the Co-Op are looking to sell off the Camberwell one (according to a report on the Telegraph website http://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/main.jhtml?xml=/money/2008/08/12/cncoop112.xml)
I’m with the dental practice on Camberwell New Road (about four or five doors up from the Co-Op: I thinks its something like 165 Camb New Road) — they accepted me as an NHS patient with no questions when I contacted them in March and gave me a course of lengthly root canal treatment which was successful (although painful at the time) Tel number 020 7582 2562
hello all
i loved this carnival, it was a great day and ended up with me and my friends dancing in the warm rain!
here is my review of th festival
http://boidus.co.uk/?p=82
(with videos)
Amidst all the cock and tedium of public transport, may i say how much I enjoyed your poem. Are there other instances of a turd providing a poet with their muse?
@52 Regen — no, I don’t live in LbJ, but don’t really see what that’s got to do with it. You make some valid points in your posting about the powers vested in councillors. I think Coldharbour Lane’s vacant shopfronts will never be fully tenanted again because there are too many of them, built in a time when people didn’t go to Bluewater on a Sunday, didn’t buy all their home decorating materials from Homebase or B&Q, had their milk delivered to their door.……need I go on?
Sandwiched between Brixton and Camberwell, did it really have a chance to survive? Not really. Even the pubs are closed.
I lived at 170 Coldharbour Lane in the mid 80’s and the decline was already well underway then.
No offence meant, Mushtimushta. You are entitled to your opinion, and I agree with the baby steps approach plus end vision. Although I’d personally never suggest that a deprived and built up inner city area — where I didn’t presently live — have far less shared community space. Wonder what Stella Duffy thinks.
Consider there are at least twice as many people living in the area now as when those shops were conceived (mid-century, average?), and there isn’t enough space on the roads for even one third of households to store a car there for a hypermarket commute. And average disposable income has never been so great. So don’t believe the Bluewater model to be ubiquitous — that’s just the case amongst a segment of the local middle class.
I invite fellow bloggers to inspect the quality of the shop-to-flat conversion finished this month on Camberwell New Road (near Oval) painted in light pastel green, coincidentally behind the massive pavement cut-out where dumped fridges and long-stay white vans are oft to be found. That’s the death knell for that particular shopping parade as planners once more rubber stamp mediocre designs and provide zero quality control.
Another conspicuous failure, visible to potential local entrepreneurs from deprived ethnic minority communities barred through institutional racism to the City jobs enjoyed by many locals. Don’t forget to yawn, F.
Hannah, thanks for the notice about the Camberwell Baths meeting. In a romantic moonlit park way, I hope da Ballet crew get it because (a) they are class and (b) there would be built-in benefits for us, built in I bet. Yes, I know ballet girls are tense and ballet chaps are gay, but (or rather therefore) it would be a great addition to our se5space. The Laban in Deptford is fab — I know the Ballet’s thing would be totally different, but it wouldn’t be just practice space for them, it would have something for the community and would class us up, above our expectations. I mean, uptight girls and gay men, uptight gay men and tightly muscled girls, we can’t go wrong!
Hannah, also, Church Street dentists are great, Norman Maine and I both smile therefrom, they use our pix in their ads!
I’d love ENB too but apparently they are the only group who won’t keep the pool. All this swimming and diving on the tele has me inspired to fight for it!
@55 Mumu Presumably the Co-op will sell one of the two stores on Denmark Hill, and convert the other into a Co-op.
@various: The real root of the problems that Coldharbour Lane and LbJ have yet to recover from was the Dulwich-Brixton motorway that was planned along there, but not mothballed until the 1980s.
@58: It is said that Lisa Stansfield, er, indulges herself along those lines.
Oh God not the Lisa Stansfield rumour. That can’t be true can it!?
@64 Ben Patio — to check out Ben’s observation have a look along Paulet Road and up Knatchbull Road along the side of Myatt’s Fields Park. Note the WALL OF MODERN HOMES along the Myatt’s Fields side of Paulet. Notice the dead ends heading towards Paulet off Knatchbull from the Myatt’s Fields side.
Bloody nonsense of curtailed grand vision that looks to me like it was myopic in the first place.
If you’re going to do social engineering do it uncompromisingly and get it finished.
Florian, “The Lady’s Dressing Room” by Jonathan Swift is a famous piece of lyric excretiana.
@66 I think Mr Hitler had something also to do with it too — bomb damage meant that it seemed to the powers that be in some cases to be easier (and appeared to be cheaper) to demolish rather than repair housing and then build new stuff. The biggest remnant of the proposed road is of course the ‘barrier block’ on Coldharbour Lane (see http://www.urban75.org/brixton/features/barrier.html)
Thankfully proposed road was never built but the planning blight as you say is still being felt in the area.
Its also I think a problem of concentration of poverty — the figures for Vassall and Coldharbour wards in Lambeth (probably true of much of the Southwark Camberwell wards as well) show that the areas are some of the poorest in the whole country with for example around 65% of the housing being social housing of one sort or another and far far more benefits claimants and people in low paid jobs than elsewhere. Where you’ve got a poor community it takes a lot for businesses to invest and therefore hard to counter the spiral of decline.
I live on Paulet (on the “period” side of the street) and I’m trying to let my spare room, anyone know anyone who’s looking? it’s very nice!
@64, Lisa stansfield was in the Colony Rooms saturday night. V. p****d
Do folks living in LJ consider themselves part of Camberwell? I would think those closer do but those on the other sides of the tracks may take exception. Dunno.
Breaking news
Walked past lots of Police action in Camberwell — Station Road, Denmark Road and Carew Road cordoned off by the railway bridge, 10s of policemen walking around with dogs — I wonder whats happened?
Heres the story — http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/7561651.stm sounds nasty
uh oh. More screaming headlines with ‘camberwell’ and ‘shooting’. Honker down folks.
‘Breaking news’ on BBC London — and yep, Camberwell, gun and shooting all packed in the dramatic script!
This crime wave is out of control. Frankly it is getting embarassing. Our area is just seen by outsiders as a violent crime ridden ghetto. At the moment this is more or less correct.
Anyone got any ideas what can been done?
“Police believe one or more people carried out the attack before fleeing the scene.”
A brilliant deduction.
Well it happened not far from my flat yesterday afternoon./
We’weren’t allowed back until about 7pm.
All calm now and the Police haven’t told us anything more than two people were shot but didn’t die. Scarily it happened at 2pm in the afteroon — Denamrk Road is a residential street with a large amount of families living on it, a sports centre across the road, local shops, businesses and a Primary school just around the corner — I’m just extremely surprised and incredibly grateful no one else got hurt. I am struggling to understand the mentaility of people having a shoot out in braod daylight on a residential street is unbelievable and fairly terrifying to be honest.
The thing is, as you will all know, Denmark road isn’t some crime ridden ghetto, it’s a normal street with flats, houses, shop and a park at the end — the majority of time we are just all happily going about our business.
Will update people if plod come round to question us — however my flatmate was in all day and claims not to have heard or seen anything!!
@Hannah — I would agree that Denmark Road is still a relatively safe place to be — you are far more likely to be knocked down by a speeding clamper’s lorry along Denmark Road than assaulted in person.
@Sam, the few remaining shopkeepers along this road will attest that there has been a very significant rise in crime since the conversion of the majority of ground floor shops (all except three I believe). Particularly during the daytime.
Many community activitists adopt a proto-Thatcherite “no such thing as community” position that as many should be converted as possible, but the fact remains that a full row of ground floor shops would have been more likely to produce witnesses than a row of empty conversions, with absent commuters.
Could the chip shop or newsagents have glimpsed anything through the residents’ cars — some pavement parked — , vans, and wheelie bins parked all day blocking off their frontages? Perhaps — it’s worth asking.
Meanwhile, while activists continue to ignore the vested interests of the Councils (as commercial property owners — c.f. 67 Crawford Road) and institutional investors such as pension funds, in “realising” the residential values of inner city shops, local daytime communities will continue to disintegrate.
Certain middle class locals can continue to persuade themselves this it is all the fault of crack whores absent fathers and gangsta culture.
I’m sure if there was a Costcutter or something similar there, the shooting wouldn’t have happened. What? Oh.
Ben, I wasn’t going to mention this, but the massive pavement cutouts outside CR Costcutter have a huge detrimental impact on the quality of public space there. Just as cutouts outside retail shops do all along Camberwell New Road (near Oval — recent ugly conversion of shop to flat, Dankif application to convert to minicab and neighbouring shop empty).
All these cutouts are (ab)used primarily by goods vehicles who do not patronise or deliver to the shops and effectively alienate the primary clientele of these shops, who come by foot or public transport. Another concession to minority motorist infrastructure at the expense of local communities.
I don’t make a direct 100% causal link between this and the recent tragic incident, but — well, you brought it up …
Daft.
As usual.
Anyone been to the reopened Red Star? I went on Staurday. It’s gone all South American. Had a great night. Was buzzy if not busy.
Heard a girl on the bus extoling the virtues of Camberwell to her beau. She was on her way to a ‘lovely bar called Sun-Doves’. Discussed the possibility of checking out the ‘fabulous little Greek restaurant’ at the end of her street.
During their chat she mentioned Seymour Bros and the hidden Thai restaurant as well.
‘I love living in Camberwell’ her words. I share the sentiment.
No surrender to the shop conversions, pavement parking and the (obviously) associated gun crime.
They can shoot us in the arm and buttocks but they can’t take away our freedom..
@78 — it is shocking when it happens yards from your door and even more frightening when its not only gang members/dealers who could have been hurt.
@79 agreed — There are things that only the people who live here can do but there’s stuff that we need our elected politicians and the council to do as well. That’s what I tried to convey in my letter. Thanks to everyone who commented b.t.w.
Had the best Thai meal ever in Seymours this week. The Angry Lamb rocks.
Does anyone know who is in charge of scenes of crime.
On Paulet road that flat where the guy was murdered last year is still boarded up with metal sheets, I just wonder what is going to happen to it and who is in charge.
http://maps.met.police.uk.
Great takeaway from New Loong Kee Cafe the other day.
@84 I live on Paulet too (on the period side!) and have been annoyed about the shutters on the house — its owned (like around half the houses on the street) by Lambeth Borough Council so I would suggest contacting your local councillor in the first instance — see http://www.lambeth.gov.uk/moderngov/mgMemberIndex.aspx?FN=WARD&VW=LIST&PIC=0 for details of Vassall ward councillors, in my experience the two Labour ones are good; I havent had cause to contact the Lib Dem but I’m sure he would be equally willing to take up your case. It may have something to do with the Police — its a scene of crime afterall and I dont think the case has come to court yet.
a couple of weeks ago there was a policeman stationed outside it for a day, and the memorial paraphernalia was removed the same day, I got my hopes up that maybe things were moving along but sadly not.
82@ Alan; I wonder if it was Erin O’Connor? Though I doubt she travels by bus much, too tall. You’d recognise her as the one with the ‘bob’ hair in the M and S ads; no-one believed me when I reported that she was in The Hermits Cave earlier this year…
I went to Thai@Seymours last week; brilliant food and cost not much more than a bag of chips. And BYOB too!
Its tough to know about this violent crime wave…
It could be the terrible lack of mini supermarkets, fried chicken shops and off licences (at ground level) on Denmark road that makes people want to shot each other in mid afternoon..
or it could be the pavement cut outs that generates the motivation..
or maybe its the signs in the (ground level) Costcutters that drive folks to reach for their shooters..
or maybe Thatcherite middle classes are simply sending out their kids on shooting excursions from Fulham..
suppose it could be the crack whores, but probably they are too busy smokin their pipes and servicing their clients in crack whore council flats..
Maybe it is actually those moron people that do not give a fuk about any of the above and are quite happy to shoot people at 2 pm on a sunny summer afternoon in a residential street. They do not care much about placing litter in bins. They probably are not really bothered about studying or working (only for middle class Thatcherites toss*rs). They aint even that concerned about camberwell arts festival!
Even southwark council officiers are fleeing Camberwell like dirty rats from a sinking ship. The decent folk that are left need to get a grip on their community. Camberwell is becoming knife / gun crime central yet still the police station is not even open. Crazy.
It maybe you are more likely to be killed by a car than a gun in Camberwell. Is that somehow meant to be good? Is Camberwell such a crime ridden slum that its residents cling to some crumb of comfort that they are still more likely to get run over than shot?
Its time for a clean up. Restore some order to our war zone. Set up community action groups. Get our rulers to send in police to prevent crime. Get the drunks and drug addicts off Camberwell’s pretty streets and greens. Round up the truants. And please stop that wild woman with the megaphone ranting about God — it gives me a headache!
Right who is going to be first to sign up to the new Camberwell Guardian Angels brigage (bullet proof vest advised)?
Just seen that Ross Kemp is doing a new series “on gangs” for sky one.
Might get to watch Kemp in Camberwell on my skyplus!
Kemp has already done Peckham (still has a better ring to it than Camberwell), so he’s probably not going to bother with us lot.
You might get Harriet Harman to join the Camberwell Guardian Angels. She’s already got her bulletproof vest, for one thing. Cuts down on expenses.
Wasn’t her Drew but she was dining at the table next to us in the Bear a couple of months back. Impressive lady. Great pub.
So Sam, you don’t think we can tackle the violence by converting the whole post code into a giant bazaar? Controversial.
Nice to hear someone turn on the tramps on here. Filthy gets.
I am so sick of the pathetic big issue waver with ginger hair and beard and his greasy Mickey Pierce side kick, scavenging around Denmark hill each morning.
Saw some do gooder give them a fiver the other morning. Ginger then gave Mickey the nod and off they trundled. Nothing compounds the tramp problem more than making it pay. If you mean it give it to shelter. If you don’t then show some backbone.
Sam’s right though. Round them up and help them. Arrest the beggars and ban the Big Issue. Nice idea but it doesn’t work. Just gives beggars an alibi.
Kemp is abig fat luvvie. Littering is gross. That and dog turds. Time to get a bit draconian about these issues.
Must try Thai@Seymours again. The last time was a bit of a disaster but everyone and thing deserves another chance.
Neighbour was raving about Safa too the other night. Time to give it another try.
I have to laugh at the marketing boards for those new apartments in Grove Lane (??)
Walking distance to Peckham Rye station?? Denmark Hill station, fair enough, but isn’t East Dulwich closer than Peckham Rye? (Clearly, I’m not a train user.)
Still, hopefully once people move into those flats, the shops in Camberwell Green will go up a gear.
I used to be in favor of the Cross River Tram project but yesterday I discovered what they will be destroying:
http://www.flickr.com/photos/nickwoodford/sets/72157606749097952/
This old cricket bat factory in Peckham is amazing and in my opinion should be listed. I don’t believe the tram is worth its destruction even though it would be good for the area.
@NickW — the photos are great. Wasn’t aware of the existence of 133 Rye Lane. The next time I’m down there, I’m going to have a look at it. How did you get access to the inside, by the way?
Anyone coming to the Bear Quiz’s 1st birthday party tomorrow night?
Team Paulet will be out in force and hopefully on winning form (we’ll see)
Another appeal for information (although fortunately not crime related)
If a group of people were wanting to host a party in Myatt’s Fields Park, who would we contact to get permission, indeed do we have to ask permission or can we just turn up?
I’d contact Lambeth parks department first off — http://www.lambeth.gov.uk/Services/Environment/ParksGreenSpaces/
Seymours — nice ambience, nice studenty vibe, not so great food. Though if people keep bigging it up then I’ll return for a rematch.
Safa — looks good but tastes poor. Don’t do it! New Dewaniam (sp?) instead!
Advertising for those new flats — yeah sg I noticed that too, they’re dreaming on the walk time to Peckham Rye station aren’t they. Rip-off timeshare dealer tw@s.
LBJ — the few people I know who live there say they are LBJ rather than Camberwell / Brixton. Just like the postcode gangs, they’re wary of laying false claims.
Though I did know one girl who said she was Denmark Hill when she was LBJ through and through. Daft cow.
Peckham Rye is about a mile’s walk, so 15–20 minutes from the old Mary Datchelor. East Dulwich is just under a mile’s walk, but uphill for half of it, so about the same time.
97 genfink — person you want to speak to is Victoria Sherwin.
permission i suppose depends what kind of party it is, before the works started there would quite often be impromptu picnic birthday parties in the area with the tables, and wedding photography seemed to be pretty popular too.
problem currently is that since the refurbishment started, it’s been hard to know which areas will be open when, and all the internal dividing fences have been taken down, so there’s no clear dog-free and ball-free area, although i have to say the committee and developers have put in great efforts to keep users well informed of area and gate closures.
this has been done to allow most of the park to be open most of the time, which is a boon as I’m sure the developers would have prefered a total shut-down.
there are exciting plans afoot for the grand re-opening as part of camberwell festival next june — can you wait that long?
talk to victoria tho
VSherwin@lambeth.gov.uk
that’s exactly the type of party it would be, no music or bbqs just a largish group of people (about 20) on picnic rugs eating cake and drinking nice things that we all bring from home. there’s no law against that is there?
Next june! my birthday’s in a couple of weeks
(
Just turn up in the park. You’ve paid your council tax.
I’ve often seen large groups picnicking in Dulwich Park.
102 — sounds lovely, genfink, i hope you get the weather.
no permission needed for a big picnic, i’m sure, but might be worth asking one of the foremen onsite if the picnic area is due for closure.
the quiet garden at the knatchbull/cormant corner is nice for smaller picnics, but 20 might be a bit tight.
can we all come?
Our local ex-Prime Minister Sir John Major spoke well about sport on the wireless this morning — there’s a fellow who knows how to talk on the radio, take the right tone. His populist line was that the lottery funding which he instituted should not be used as a “political football” — the language of the people, an excellent metaphor. He lived in a coldwater flat at 144 Coldharbour Lane at one time. The toilet was on the ground floor, he lived on the fourth — he must have learned how to not be “run out” early on. He is a fixture to this day at the Oval cricket ground. Coldharbour Lane was originally called Camberwell Lane. The Camberwell Beauty butterfly “Nymphalis antiopa” was first found there, almost certainly brought with Scandinavian timber to the Camberwell docks. Today, Coldharbour Lane is know as “Crackharbour Lane”. At the Camberwell end, there is a large pub called the Sun & Doves, says Wikipedia, which has the longest entry in Wikipedia of any pub in Camberwell.
Sir John says the Team Britain success in the Olympics has “uplifted the whole country”. He gets his words wrong, that’s populist. He praises Kenneth Branagh, our ‘Enery.
EVERYONE WELCOME TO Camberwell Green this Sunday 24 August 1pm — 5pm for Beijing Olympics 2008 handover to London Olympics 2012.
TWO GIANT screens broadcast live from Beijing, free healthy food and refreshments provided by Sainsbury’s. Unveiling of Southwark 2012 Olympic Banner and first use of Southwark’s brand new state of the art portable sports track.
Rock Hard Circus performs live with additional workshops and Gymnastic show from Brunswick gymnastic club. Lots of other things going on too.
More tomorrow…
Plus weather forecast is hot and sunny. For a change.
The rest of that post was flagged as spam. Lots of acts Rock Hard Circus, Brunswick Gymnastics club, free food and refreshments.
Sponsored by Southwark, Clam, SE5 Forum for Camberwell, local businesses, more when the info doesn’t get lost.
Wow I’ll be there!
So will I. It’s good. We don’t hear much from Clam these days, do we?
Can any one help or does anyone know of a building that Cooltan can move to in Camberwell or Walworth they are looking for;
We run workshops in visual arts, textiles, I.T, Web design, drumming,
poetry, and we also run a huge programme of assisted volunteering.
We are part of the cultural fabric of Southwark we run our cultural walk
through the heart of Southwark as we have been doing since 2005.
We have brought much money into the Borough and we run many activities and
enable many local people to move back into employment, including the project
director who spent 14 years on benefit before setting up this project.
We urgently need your support to find a decent access double affordable
premises that can accommodate our needs, and office space for 10 people 300
sq feet
and a computer workshop space for 10 people 300sq feet
Visual arts rooms for 10 people 300sq feet
A textile room for 10 people 300 sq feet
A small kitchen for refreshments 100 sq feet
A small shop area of four sales of people’s work 100 sq feet
A medium-sized Gallery to exhibit people’s work 500 +
A small office for two people 100 sq feet
A small meeting room for up to 10 people 300 sq feet
Toilets
Outside space
An alt store space for plants
Bicycle racks
A disabled car parking space
Disabled toilets
Obviously not all our requirements may be met by such least if we aim to
meet all of them we might find something in-between.
Gnomee — there is an amount of long-term unused landbanked commercial space locally, but it just isn’t a fashionable cause to prise any of this out of the hands of usurious landlords into the shared community space (including retail) demanded by locals. You will have seen recently several posters on here actually celebrating ugly conversions of shops, when we have already lost half our shared amenity space in Camberwell since the mid-1990s.
You need either some gangsta shaheeeeee-eet or to have interests geographically in-between Camberwell Green and Denmark Hill Rail to get any local interest, as this is the sphere of activity of all Camberwell NGOs and charities. I do wish you luck.
Gnomee — i’m not sure of its status but there is quite a lot of warehouse space at the Denmark Road end of Warner Road — Some of it looks as if it is beign used (possibly without the right planning permission) but contact the Council Plannign department to see if they have any info — we could do with people like you down our way!!
Also no more news on the Denmark Road shooting — we haven’t seen any Plod since and we obviously don’t merit a yellow Met incident board.
However we aren’t shaking in our boots and life goes on. Although i am, it has to be said, a little more cautious if i see groups of people i don’t recognise around.
There’s space on Warner road but it’s expensive. Camberwell’s plight.
“BEAR ART — UPSTAIRS AT THE BEAR 6 September 6pm until late.
The Bear Free House is one year old.
In celebration of its youth The Bear is hosting an arts fair. All are invited to submit artwork on the theme of THE BEAR and upon submitting their piece are invited to an evening of ribaldry, rambunctiousness and potentially meat. (sic)
There are no specifications or limitations to what will be accepted. All art work will be sold in the Bear Art Auction at the event with all proceeds going to the adoption of a bear from the PAWS — performing animal welfare society http://www.pawsweb.org/meet-bears.html
Submission deadline 1 September 2008
Submissions to The Bear Free House
296a Camberwell New Road SE5 0RP”
The Mayor of Southwark will unveiling the 2012 Olympics Banner on Sunday on Camberwell Green — see 107 above. Be there or be square.
Sainsbury’s donated food, Co-op water, many others involved.
Clams and other shellfish welcome.
That is not intended to exclude amphibians, arthropods, molluscs, arachnids, mammals or reptiles. Birds considered very cool if attending.
Here’s the full story from the main folks: http://www.southwark.gov.uk/MediaCentre/Homepagenews/MoreNewsSection/olympicscamberwellgreen.html
Well done Southwark for choosing Camberwell as the borough’s offical celebration site. Rare but welcomed.
The event on the green sounds nice and community-spirited. Bravo.
And surely we have some ambitious yoofs who could be 2012 contenders in pistol shooting?
A further sighting of the model Erin O’Connor at the Bear on Tuesday, I was sitting by the window, and she and her gentleman friend walked up to the pub, but as it was bursting at the seams, must have thought it was too busy and went away again, shame, she would have added some glamour to the occasion.
If I were him, I’d be bursting at the seams, too.