East London

jamespetts

I am looking at the map showing risk of flooding from river or sea: the area just South of Central Park is in the blue, for some reason. The Thames Barrier will be of little assistance if the flooding comes from groundwater or the river Roding.

Corelli

ringo_24601 wrote: »

Sunny - do you ever remember a wool shop called Bettys on Green street? I think it's an Afgan/Persian restaurant now

I'm not Sunny, but I do, it was in Plashet Road (or Grove, I can never remember which one is which) wasn't it, just round the corner from Green St. I used to cycle past there twice a day at least for years and had forgotten all about it. Why are you interested in that shop?

Corelli

East Ham and all around the Roding are a definite flood risk, no help from the Thames Barrier there. It's never happened in East Ham though, AFAIK but I do remember flooding in Ilford about 16 years ago when the land that was a car breakers yard was under wayer for a while. It's housing on that site now.

Corelli

I know the Burges estate well. You have good transport links, a reasonable leasure centre, a rubbish library and if you drive, easy access out into Essex or onto the M25. But if you want theatre, cinema, music venues you will have to travel a few miles. You would also be in fairly easy reach of Wanstead Flats - but Forest Gate in closer of course, and the same bus ride would take you to Wanstead Park which is more foresty despite being the remnants of the grounds designed by Capability Brown for Wanstead House.

Although it has been suggested that East Ham is due for gentrification (snigger) there are still a lot of HMOs and people in badly maintained rented property. Not that this means anything about whether or not you have decent neighbours, it just makes the area rather tatty. And it IS pretty filthy with rubbish all over the streets.

Anyway, if you do move here, welcome to Newham

jamespetts

Looking again very closely at the flood risk map, the property in Mitcham Road is actually outside it by a hair's breadth: bizarrely, the road immediately outside the house, but not the house itself, seems to show up as in a flood risk zone, which is odd, to say the least. Does anyone understand flood risk mapping well enough to know why that might be and whether the house is actually at risk?

Corelli - thank you. How does it compare with the Upton Park area, which is the other place that I am considering? The house next door to the one that I am thinking of buying seems to have undergone a somewhat smart makeover recently, and the road (Boleyn Road) on which I was looking seems mainly to house families.

Corelli

I don't really know any one who lives there now but the park is lovely and the streets feel comfortable to walk down. You'd have a new leisure centre in a few years when the Atherton Centre rebuild is finished and Stratford (cinema, theatre, decent pubs) is walkable from there, easily done on the bike. Um, you want to invest in serious security for the bike if you leave it outside at all.

Also worth considering is the chaos that comes whenever West Ham play at home. Upton park through to East Ham just about becomes gridlocked and the traffic extends out through Barking, I don't know how far it goes the other way. The trains become unpleasant although the violence is nothing like it was.

Many decades ago I had a short lived relationship with a boy who lived in Boleyn Road, and I had other friends there about 10 years ago, but I haven't socialised there since then so my knowledge is not so detailed, sorry.

jamespetts

Thank you - that is most helpful. I am told that that particular football club will eventually be moving its stadium to Stratford, which might ease things a little, I suppose. Does the West Ham football club thing affect East Ham so much?

As for the bicycle, I should either have to invest in one of those metal bicycle stands firmly secured into concrete, or store the bicycle inside. The thought of dragging my bicycle through the living room does not, however, fill me with joy. The East Ham property at least has a sort of conservatory area where I could put it.

Corelli

West ham congestion in East Ham? Oh yes, The Barking Road is solid and many of the back roads. Bike safety. Hmmmm, I think you'd be better off keeping it indoors tbh, I hadn't even thought you might leave it outside your house overnight, I was thinking of leaving it outside shops, venues etc and worried about it's safety.

I'm not trying to put you off, I like many aspects of living here but it is a very poor area and that has to be taken into account. The health service is overstretched, if you ever needed to use the CAB the queues go round the block every morning, the potholes get neglected, you would be moving into a poor borough with a council much criticised for wasting money. Eg supporting WHFC move into the blasted Olympic stadium at the cost of a £40m loan from local funds and this http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/deprived-newham-watches-bemused-as-council-ponders-move-from-110m-building-after-just-three-years-8836972.html

Local politics don't dictate how pleasant an area is to live in of course, I just thought this sort of back ground info might interest you.

If I had a choice, I'd go for living near West Ham Park which in itself is lovely, close to Green Street for food shopping etc and access to your work place. That house looks as though it could be moved into straight away with more comfort than the other one, well, it is slightly more to my taste. But, the other house is bigger, and has a lot of potential particularly with that nice fireplace. You've not mentioned a need for parking. In that area parking can be a bit of a challenge although you would be far away enough to avoid all the high street shoppers. For guests you can have a batch of the CPZ permits for free if you don't have a car yourself. Sorry, can't comment on the Boleyn Rd parking situation.

How did you feel about the borough during your marathon viewing day?

Motleycrew

As someone who lived in forest gate for 10 years until 6 years ago, now leytonstone , I found despite one attempted mugging it to be a okay area, as people have mentioned, north of forest gate Wanstead village (lol) EA speak is okay , though avoid serbert road , lots of trashy let housing , streets off it are mostly okay, Green street or nearby is okay, walked down and up it many times without any hint of trouble , most crime tends to be around Romford road and upton lane, and going up to Maryland (avoid) i find manor park okay, more around the station and behind, as the Wanstead flats are nice open places, and further Wanstead house/park greenery is lush, a 15 min walk from where I live now , there are good and bad everywhere, and having lived north/ south london , I do feel better here , as someone previously posted, yeah Newham council does seen a law unto itself , wastes loads of money on stuff, but drops the ball on others such as recycling etc , the westfield is just another glorified shopping centre, and its postcode is the most crime ridden in the Uk, the mistake made there was not involving more local people , and as for the identikit flats around there and the Olympic village etc, most are being bought by Chinese, who will never live there...,! Expect some in years to come takin over by local authority to become council/social housing. was at westfield yesterday, the block towering over the bus station, what a eyesore, the savvy people don't buy into the it's trendy, it's here, everything on our doorstep Bulls*t, good luck though on your choice

[Deleted User]

Corelli wrote: »

I'm not Sunny, but I do, it was in Plashet Road (or Grove, I can never remember which one is which) wasn't it, just round the corner from Green St. I used to cycle past there twice a day at least for years and had forgotten all about it. Why are you interested in that shop?

No, definitely on green street. It was my grandparents shop