Kennington Association Charity Art Auction

The Kennington Association are holding their fourth annual charity art auction tomorrow evening (18th September) at 18.30. There is a preview tonight.

More trouble at the Oval?

When driving through SE11 and past the Oval tube station yesterday, I noticed what looked like a memebr of the police force boarding a bus that had been stopped just outside Oval tube station. A few hours later, I drove passed again and noticed that Oval tube had an "incident response unit" outside. Also, the road around the Oval was closed.

I've no idea whether that was one, two or three events of any significance. Does anybody have any information?

Thames Festival 2008

The three wheeled one only found out about the Thames Festival by accident this year after wondering about the vast hordes of people making their way through Waterloo yesterday. This might (or might not) be due to Boris Johnson (BoJo) scrapping The Londoner (the newspaper that supplies Londoners with information about what the mayor is up to). On the other hand, chances of us actually receiving the newspaper are slim!

So... Excited about the possibility of the giant meal with strangers (and happy to try and meet some more South Londoners), we plodged off today, beginning towards the east end of the festival near Southwark Bridge. Unfortunately, I had not realised that the giant meal only took place yesterday and would not be repeated today. Not to be deterred, we obviously had to go and nosey around at what else was on offer...

The rest of the festival consisted of food stalls (many over-priced), stalls selling pictures of London, music stages (I presume some of it /was/ music), the Co-Op selling Fairtrade goods (yay), the BBC doing something related to art for children, various European cultural promotion/food stalls, a giant stage put together by those people who manage to get around London without touching the floor (it's called "freerun" apparently), the BBC and Capital FM broadcasting, lots and lots of performance artists, some people kayaking on the Thames (not sure if these were part of the kayaking demonstrations), old and young men skulling along the Thames (separately), some rather strange performance drama, free Starbucks coffee, more stalls selling everything from books to clever widgets for hanging flower pots...

We were queuing to buy Hog Roast after arriving at lunchtime (around 2pm), but that failed because the Hog Roast wasn't on offer until 5pm. Driven by impending starvation and lack of money, we ended up sharing a Doggett's cheeseburger after concluding that despite Lebanese food being good value for £5 a plate, it just appeared too expensive. I figure that for people visiting London, the prices must just be swallowed, but for actual Londoners facing impending recession, the costs are all too high!

We walked from Southwark Bridge to the London Eye (I'm not sure what was beyond the Eye, if anything) and enjoyed browsing at the varied stalls. We discovered a world film/DVD shop (named mdc music and movies) that we didn't know existed (which wasn't part of the festival) and generally had a happy time soaking up the sun. I think the festival lacked some edge (there were parts of the South Bank that didn't seem to have much going on) and it didn't seem much different from festivals of previous years. However, that won't stop us going next year!

As we left, we saw some people that appeared to be preparing for a carnival procession (in some fabulous outfits), which (if it was a repeat of previous years) would have taken place this evening. We headed home after about 3 hours, and then happily watched an absolutely stupendous, amazing, fantastic, glorious, expensive, colourful fireworks display from our home in SE11. The fireworks were so good that we might have to invite lots of people around next year just to watch!

Peace March leaving from Kennington Park, SE11

According to an article in Southwark news, there is to be a peace march against knife crime, organised (in part) by The Damilola Taylor Trust later this month. The march is to be called "The Peoples' March", which is a fitting tribute to Kennington Park's history of organised revolution and ferment.

The report also notes that two individuals, Sharon Singh and Gemma Allway organised support for the march through Facebook. I think it's fantastic when networking technology allows for friends to organise strangers to march together for peace. I googled the two of them and found that The Mirror has a photo of them alongside their description of themselves as "two ordinary Londoners who can't bear to see any more dead children on the news".

The march will congregate in Kennington Park on 20th September at 10am, depart at 11am and will culminate with a rally in Hyde Park at 2pm. It is specifically organised as a peace march, and not a protest march.

I will go. I might even make a "Lurking about SE11 for peace" banner, but I'm only little and it's a lot to get on one banner!!

SE11 Monthly Crime Update: July 2008

I just noticed that the July 2008 stats are out for the Metropolitan Police Crime Map. The Police have started to compare the different levels of crime in each different Borough when you click in detail on the map. However, I'm turning it into a crude chart format so we can watch Lambeth in-depth over the next few months.

See my previous post for reasons as to why these stats. are not definitive.

Comparison:

Lambeth crime levels (Average - June 08, Average - July 08)
Southwark crime levels (High - June 08, Above Average - July 08)
Westminster crime levels (High - June 08, High - July 08)

So, overall, things have improved somewhat in Southwark, and Lambeth remains the same. Now, breaking Lambeth down into its boroughs, we find as follows:

(3 = Average, 4 = Above Average)

Jul08 Jun08
3........3 = Bishops
3........3 = Brixton Hill
3........3 = Clapham Common
3........3 = Clapham Town
3........4 = Cold Harbour
3........4 = Ferndale
3........3 = Gipsy Hill
3........3 = Herne Hill
3........3 = Knight's Hill
3........3 = Larkhall
4........4 = Oval Ward
4........3 = Princes
3........4 = St Leonards
3........3 = Stockwell
3........3 = Streatham Hill
3........3 = Streatham South
3........3 = Streatham Wells
3........3 = Thornton
3........4 = Thurlow Park
3........3 = Tulse Hill
3........3 = Vassall Ward

Oval Ward has high crime for 2 months running and in Princes Ward, crime has risen to the "high crime" bracket. However, other than that, crime has broadly either stayed the same or improved throughout Lambeth and every borough is reporting "average" crime. Furthur investigation reveals that 31 crimes were reported in Princes in June, but in July, this went up to 41!

A couple of Stockwell news items

I have failed to report a few Stockwell items that have come up in the news of late, so here is a quick round up:

1. A good Guardian article on "why we must remember Jean Charles Menezes". Last month was the third anniversary of his death, after he was shot by police in the aftermath of the July 7 bombings in London.

2. A BBC article (thanks to Stockwell news for pointing this out) about a seventeen seater minibus travelling back from the Notting Hill Carnival which collided with four pedestrians on South Lambeth Road. Unfortunately, two of the pedestrians have died as a result of the traffic accident.

3. And most recently on Friday... According to The London Daily News, some burglars broke into a house on South Lambeth Road in order to steal scrap metal. They tore out gas pipes, which basically put everybody in the locality in danger as it casued a major gas leak. Personally, I think it all sounds rather strange. Could it be the other way around... Might they have meant to cause a major gas leak and have it look like a burglary? Presumably they'd have put themselves in some danger, and how much can old pipes possibly be worth...?

Cross River Tram - more news

We've not yet reached the crucial date of 8th September, but Boris Johnson appears to have announced to a committee:

I am not intending to spend a lot more money on the Cross River Tram

SE1 news have the full article.

I'm still rather hoping that this doesn't mean the project has been axed. I'm hoping Boris will say that he doesn't plan to spend more money on the Cross River Tram until he receives a committment from central government to fund it... or something...

Caroline Pidgeon has made adequate disappointed noises, but I really wish that there was something else that could be done.

SE11 goes Scottish

I just spotted an article in The Times advising that the Scottish Piping Society will be holding lessons at the Charlotte Sharman School on West Square. I wonder whether they are at all related to the somewhat incongruous man man who plays(?) the bagpipes on Westminster Bridge.

West Square itself is worth a visit as it has a lovely open green garden in the middle of it, and it's a bit of a haven in the Elephant and Castle area, but I might go and visit at a time when I knew the bagpipers weren't about :)

Cross River Tram - we have a date

My "Cross River Tram" alert popped up a BBC article today to reveal the date crucial for whether the tram project goes ahead: September 9th.

The article contains a fabulous quote from Caroline Pidgeon who is upset that it takes longer to get to central London from Peckham than it does from Reading. I wonder whether that's because the people in Reading have more money... :-)

"It can take longer to get from places like Peckham to the centre of town than it does to get to places like Reading, and that is just ridiculous,"

she said.

Unfortunately, some councillors north of the river aren't so excited about our trammy ambitions :) But that's because they're all lucky enough to own and drive cars.

Anyhow, 9th September is when the tram review is to be undertaken by Boris Johnson. Here's keeping our fingers and toes crossed.

Ezekiel Adeboyego Ojo murder in Penrose Street

In the early hours of Friday 23rd August, Ezekiel Adeboyego Ojo was found with head injuries on Penrose Street (just off the Walworth Road, SE17) from several gun shot wounds. He died soon after. He was only 24 years old. Operation Trident are investigating the incident.

Penrose Street is not unknown to police. Unbelievably, the main police station for the area is on Manor Place, which is only two streets away. I sometimes wonder whether police turn a blind eye to crime that occurs immediately upon their patch. I don't think I blogged about it, but earlier this year on June 21st, two young boys were stabbed in Penrose Street (both are ok). Indeed, in the same article, it is noted that "The boys were attacked in a London borough being targeted by the Met as a knife crime hotspot with dozens of extra patrols and "stop-and-searches" of anyone suspected of carrying a weapon."

It appears that we don't need a Metropolitan Police Crime Map to tell us anything at all.

I know I'm probably last on the news front with this one as I haven't been near a computer since late last Thursday, but still, another shooting... In how many weeks?

Oval incident involving 173 innocent people who might have been about to commit crime

I've been offline (and will be for the next week or so) due to the house move, but heard more than the usual wailing of sirens and saw a lot of blue lights near to Oval tube station last night. There was clearly something more going on than cricket.

This morning we have the following round up:

1. The Metro reports that a "mob of 180 youths" who apparently only "planned" to unleash chaos at Notting Hill were stopped yesterday.

2. The BBC report that "About 180 youths were stopped and seven arrested outside Oval as police prevented a large group from going to the carnival". Out of the 150 or so that went to the police station, only "seven were formally arrested". Even more outrageous, "Police said they believed the group, which included many teenagers, were on their way to the carnival to create disorder and criminal incidents." And of course, it's definite that they might have been about to commit crime. After all, "Some members of the group had a history of being involved in disorder at the carnival, police said." The drama all took place in Harleyford Road, which was closed off.

3. Bathsheba at Stockwell News asked what was going on, and received reports of helicopters and police presence.

Is it just me, or does it appear somewhat wrong that a large number of {innocent} people were stopped by police, a huge number of {innocent} people were then detained, and only seven were arrested? I mean, the BBC report rather implies that these were people that only might have been about to commit crime. Can you really refuse to allow somebody to go to the Notting Hill Carnival on the basis that they might commit crime? And from all of the "intelligence" gained, why was it only possible to arrest seven people?

Of course, we're not living in a police state...

Crime in SE11, Lambeth, Southwark and surrounds

On some of my previous posts, I've been scathing about people who consider South London to be dangerous, full of crime and not worthy of their attention. I've been interested for some time about how much crime is really committed in the different parts of London, and what type of crime etc. I'm most interested in SE11, but being so close to SE1, SE17, SW8 and SW9, it seems that a wider view ought to be taken. We can hardly stop people postcode hopping to commit crime!

Crime statistics are massively flawed for (at least) the three following reasons:

1. Crime stats. depend upon people reporting crime. I know lots of people who are the victims of petty theft who wouldn't report their crime if they didn't think that there was anything the police could do.

2. The police, periodically, change the definition of of what constitutes a crime "bracket" for a particular crime. So if one bracket goes up too much eg. "violent crime", they'll remove car crime from the bunch and place it in a different bracket. This makes long term study of crime very difficult because it's hard to tell where the boundaries have moved from and to.

3. Periodically, the area boundaries for measurement of crime are changed. I'm not sure whether this is so much of a problem as changing definitions, but it no doubt factors.

Anyhow, having said that, I found that the Metropolitan police (with some cleverish google mapping) have plotted a crime map of London (excluding the City). The "crimes" it counts are burglary, robbery and vehicle crime. The map uses colour to display highest crime areas in orange and red, and average in yellow. One can then break the areas down furthur and see the crime in particular wards.

Overall, Lambeth has a yellow shading (average crime), but Southwark has a red shading (high crime) for June 2008. I checked the figures, which state 850 crimes in June 2008 in Southwark, and 739 in Lambeth. It seemed to me then that the margin of difference between the brackets was small. However, I've played around a little more and it seems that the average numbers are calculated on the size of the borough in question. Westminster had fewer crimes committed than Lambeth, but since it's smaller, it records "above average" crime for London. The site is only in "Beta/testing" mode at the moment and I've asked for feedback as to more detail on the crime for future versions....

Anyhow, looking at Lambeth overall, there are (as is predictable) pockets of parts of Lambeth with more crime than others for June 08, but the good news first:

Average Crime compared with the rest of London: Bishops Ward, Princes Ward, Vassall Ward, Stockwell Ward, Larkhall Ward, Clapham Town Ward, Clapham Common Ward, Brixton Hill, Herne Hill, Thornton Ward, Tulse Hill Ward, Streatham Hill Ward, Streatham South, Streatham Wells, Gipsy Hill, Knight's Hill,

The bad news (but note that Lambeth has no wards with "high" crime:
Above Average Crime compared with the rest of London: Oval Ward, Ferndale Ward, Cold Harbour Ward, Thurlow Park Ward and St Leonards Ward.

Lambeth is statistically safer (but remember that this is an odd figure because of the different ward sizes) than both Southwark and Westminster.

SE11 has average crime levels for June 2008 (much of the area is in Princes Ward so that seems correct), the small Oval Ward subsection of SE11 also has average crime levels. The west of SE11 (a small subsection of Princes ward) has above average crime, but it's not clear how much of that might stem from the Albert Embankment.

However, the borders of SE11 are not so good. At the south and east side, SE11 is surrounded by 3 pockets of "above average" crime and 1 pocket of "high" crime (I suspect that that is due to Vauxhall Station and its unpleasant surrounds). Directly north of SE11 near Elephant, there is a pocket of "above average" crime as well.

As I said above, I'm hoping that the Metropolitan Police Crime Map will be developed over the next few months so that it will be possible to compare different periods of time and break down the type of crime in any area. I'll report back as soon as they release the figures for July 2008, so we can just see whether it was a quiet month, of whether Lambeth might really be declared to be a place of only "average" crime.

Ashley Bucknor remanded for Walworth Road shooting

The Press Association reported on Sunday that a 19 year old man named Ashley Bucknor was remanded in custody for Ryan Bravo's murder on Walworth Road in SE17, which I reported previously here.

Another SE11 Blog

It seems that SE11 bloggers are brushing off their blogging skills and happy to share their insights with the rest of the world.

Here is the latest SE11 related blog, Flogging a Dead Horse from somebody who terms herself, "the grumpiest gal in SE11". She's started off with a suitably ranty post concerning bad manners and lack of courtesy on London's public transport.

Cross River Tram - a furthur update

I've just spotted a new post on London SE1 forum to advertise a seminar hosted by the Greater London Authority to consider the Cross River tram in light of current mayoral priorities.

Unfortunately, being mid-house move and working flat-out, the three wheeled person can't easily take the morning off, for the sake of attending the seminar. It would be great if lots of home-working / retired / flexi-time people could be present to give support and make a constructive noise.

It's possible to provide written submissions. I wonder if one has to be important (or represenative of some important body) so to do.

I'm uninformed on the structure and politics of the GLA, so I don't know whether this an officially mayor promoted/sanctioned event, or whether it's an attempt to stall for time, or quite what the purpose of it is. However, some of the panel of speakers look quite interesting, especially the one speaking on the business perspective from Camden, which (I think) sounds like a Tory / Boris Johnson type line of thought.