Classic motorbikes in Greenwich, May 3

St Johns resident Will is organising this motorbike event. He says:

"I am running this event at Greenwich Market with my company, Urban Rider. My business is a specialist retailer of the world's finest motorcycle gear and we have partnered with Italian helmet manufacturer AGV in taking over Greenwich Market for an evening to celebrate motorcycle racing icons of the 1960s and 70s.

"It should be quite a spectacle and we would love local residents to attend, it is a unique opportunity to see some original race bikes and modern custom motorcycles. Even the Norton from the latest James Bond film, machine guns and all!"

The Sail Loft, Greenwich

11 Victoria Parade

London

SE10 9FR

The Sail Loft is a new Fuller's pub on the Deptford-Greenwich border.

A large glass box overlooking the river, it opened in January and is already hugely popular. I visited a couple of weeks ago and booking ahead to get a table at the weekend was essential.

A 21st century interpretation of The Trafalgar, The Sail Loft is spacious, buzzy and gloriously light. The ground floor is dominated by the bar, the first floor is essentially a restaurant. Although a stone's throw from the Cutty Sark, the stretch of river front it occupies is relatively untravelled and the pub feels more like a local than a tourist trap - more Deptford than Greenwich.

The menu was high-quality, albeit Sunday's are roast-only, which is annoying for those of us who don't fetishise Sunday Roasts. The pork belly was fine, but the non-Sunday menu looked more interesting. The service was friendly, if a little chaotic during the opening week.

The Sail Loft adds a new dimension to the area: It's the sort of place to take visitors who are suspicious of London - reassuringly bright, clean, jolly and tasteful. It will come into its own in the summer.

Click here to visit the website.

HSDY Boat Party

The some-time Brockley retro-night takes to the water

Cleaner, greener, safer future temporarily spoils Greenwich cycle path

Dr. Ian Malcolm: Yeah, yeah, but your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could that they didn't stop to think if they should.
- Jurassic Park

The driverless car future moved up a gear this week with the start of autonomous vehicle trials on Greenwich Peninsula, one of three sites in the country to host pilot schemes.

The technology promises to radically improve road safety, cut pollution and reduce parking requirements. The UK's expertise in automotive technology and computing means that it's well placed to profit from the emerging industry, estimated to be worth £900 billion in ten years, and the government is placing a big bet on autonomous systems as a driver for the country's future economic growth. As host borough, Greenwich is getting a cool £8 million grant for the privilege. Behold the white heat of technology in action:

 

But this future comes at a terrible price. Those maniac scientists have become death, destroyer of cycle paths. 853blog will not be placated by the promise of a future where robots save thousands of cyclists' lives - not if the cost is the temporary loss of 500 metres of cycle path, especially if the alternative is to cycle down the quiet road that runs adjacent. They say:

There was no consultation about the decision, instead there’s just a tiny notice on a lamp post and cycle markings scrubbed out and replaced with the word “SHUTTLE”. The notice cites “danger to the public” for the decision. 

But if the trial’s organisers think they can avoid danger by closing off a length of cycle path, they’ve chosen the wrong place. I cycle along this stretch regularly, and most days there are pedestrians wandering into the cycle track – often glued to tablets with headphones plugged in.

Click here for the full article.

Speed Dating at the Curlew Rowing Club

This is a little out of Brockley's sphere of influence, but it is a slow news day, it's one of the closest options if you want to take up this particular sport and BC used to go to their neighbours, the Globe Rowing Club. So... Speed Dating at the Curlew Rowing Club in Greenwich! Tiffany writes:

Curlew Rowing Club in Greenwich is hosting a speed dating evening at the riverside clubhouse in Greenwich on 19 February. 

It is £15 and includes a welcome drink and canapés. If you wouldn't mind putting a message in the Brockley central or retweeting it for us. More details and booking form can be found here bit.ly/SportySpeedDating

Rowing is physically the hardest sport we've ever tried, so if you want to date people who can keep going until they vomit, have the willpower to stare at someone's sweaty back for hours at a time and have bags of energy first thing in the morning, then this event is for you!

Silvertown Tunnel vision

This week, TfL launched a public consultation for the planned Silvertown tunnel, which would link Greenwich Peninsula to the Royal Docks. The plan would reduce the strain on the Blackwall Tunnel, create a direct road link between two of London’s biggest development areas and provide an alternative option whenever the Blackwall Tunnel decides to have one of its little closures.

We’ve kept out of the Silvertown Tunnel debate until now, because the details of the plan hadn’t been released and because there are people we respect who have mounted a very credible campaign against it on the basis of the deleterious effect it would have on air quality in the area. But now, a consultation leaflet’s been shoved through our front doors, it’s time to wade in.  

Opponents are right to highlight the risk of increased air pollution as new capacity encourages more cars and lorries. Air pollution is already bad across London and the Blackwall Tunnel approach is among the capital’s worst hot spots. Air pollution kills thousands of Londoners a year and harms the health of many more. It is arguably the single biggest problem we need to fix. But the campaigners are still wrong to oppose Silvertown.

Back in 2008, when the Thames Gateway Bridge plan for Thamesmead was cancelled, BC argued that the pitiful number of river crossings in East London was the biggest brake on employment growth in the city and it was time to build not just one, but several river crossings here:

“South East London needs more cross-river journeys. It needs more business people jumping in taxis to get across the Thames. It needs more tourists strolling or catching a bus across the river from the north bank. It needs to be part of the same city as north east London. The fact that one of the key crossings is a ferry only strengthens the feeling that the two places are foreign countries to one another.” 

Now, six years and one cable car sop later, wellity, wellity, wellity – everyone’s talking about the urgent need for more crossings to cope with London's rapid growth. Prospective London Mayor Andrew Adonis and a new report called Linking London argue that East London needs four more links to boost the economy by up £1 billion annually. For its part, TfL promises a “package” of new crossings, “including improved connections for cars, public transport, pedestrians, cyclists and freight.” They say:

"We recently held a consultation on options for further river crossings in addition to the Silvertown Tunnel; at Woolwich, Gallions Reach and/or Belvedere.  The Department for Transport has also proposed building a new ‘Lower Thames Crossing’ to provide additional capacity at Dartford."

The planned new river crossings

And it's in this context that Silvertown deserves support. In the absence of other crossings, Silvertown would encourage too much traffic into Greenwich - forcing traffic that doesn't need or want to come in to inner London through Zone 2. But with a range of new options and smart traffic management, Silvertown will be a huge asset, massively reducing the congestion, which is the biggest cause of air pollution. Yes, new supply begets new demand, but proposed tolls at Blackwall and Silvertown, as well a bridge at Belvedere will deliver smoother traffic flow even as the number of journeys grows.

Instead of trying to stop the tunnel as a way to reduce air pollution, we should be campaigning for positive solutions - pushing for a 'Bridge and Tunnel and Ferry' strategy to stop the Peninsula being treated as a funnel - or maybe even lobbying for electric vehicle-only crossings. By the time any of this stuff gets built, we'll all have self-driving, fusion powered, hover cars.

You don't fix London by trying to halt - or worse, ignore - its growth, we have to find smart ways to manage the network. Let the call go out - four more crossings!

Film and TV studio planned for Greenwich Peninsula

Part of the proposed residential scheme

The Wharf newspaper reports that developers Knight Dragon have revealed plans to build a film and television studio at Greenwich Peninsula.

With the 147 acre site now acquired from cash-strapped Quintain, Knight Dragon can now let their ambition off the leash and - with the UK's film studios running at full capacity and demand for UK-produced content growing, they want to attract production companies to Greenwich, bringing jobs and economic activity with them.

The developers have already signalled their intent by bringing in pop-up bars, restaurants and theatre performances to the Peninsula and opening a new visitors centre, to encourage visitors to North Greenwich to turn right, to explore the location, rather than be immediately swallowed up by The O2. They have also announced their intention to build a 5km running course around Greenwich Peninsula and to create a golf driving range. There is more to come.

With The O2 team developing a hotel at the end of the Peninsula and contracts being awarded for the next phase of residential construction, the promise of the location is finally being realised after a dismal decade, where nothing much happened.

In the new plans, all the social housing is now located at the southern end of the Peninsula and some locals have criticised the level of segregation between communities, but this is a brown-field site that has remained brown-field for far too long. There are no established communities being displaced and rich and poor will never be far apart, especially as there is a mixed community at the southern end of the Peninsula already.

Full disclosure: As part of my day job, I advised Knight Dragon for a short time in relation to this development, but I no-longer work for them.

Greenwich lifts Carbuncle Cup for the second time

For those who wish Lewisham would pool its sovereignty with Greenwich - a cautionary tale. Woolwich Central, which is essentially a giant Tesco hovering above a car park in the middle of town, has won the Carbuncle Cup - making it two wins in three years for the borough after the Cutty Sark restoration won in 2012.

The judges for the award, which is designed to highlight bad architecture, said of the building:

"Some truly diabolical cladding and a massing strategy that seems to have been directly inspired by the 1948 Berlin blockade; we can only hope that residential leases come with free airlift."

The Carbuncle judges are always wrong - picking on ambitious, high-profile (usually London) projects, rather than the mundane, sheepish dross that ruins our streetscapes. And while this
is a terrible, ludicrous building which looks like it needs the stickers to be peeled off, the pity of it is that the square that Woolwich Central adjoins is a very nice bit of urban landscaping and - together - the two developments have given a shot in the arm to Woolwich town centre.

Away from the square and the superstore, the long, slow death of Woolwich shopping precinct continues, waiting for the arrival of Crossrail to deliver a reversal of fortune.

New solar energy co-op for Lewisham

An electricity micro-generation co-operative for Lewisham and Greenwich residents is being set-up. Camilla from South East London Community Energy writes:

SE Londoners are being given the opportunity to: increase the use of renewable energy, invest in the future and reduce energy poverty through a new initiative. 

A group of local people recently formed the SELCE co-op with the aim of: 

- Raising funds to buy solar panels from a 'community share issue': Anyone can buy a share: annual interest for shareholders will be approximately 5% and the share value will be returned after 20 years 
- The solar panels will then be installed on large south-facing roofs in Greenwich and Lewisham. We already have our first 'partner' - a school in Woolwich 
- Our 'partners' benefit from cheaper electricity bills and the co-op receives income from the government's feed-in tariff (guaranteed for 20 years) 
- Profit from this income is spent on initiatives to provide support to fuel-poor households in SE London by improving home insulation and energy efficiency. 
- And we're collectively reducing carbon emissions into the bargain

If you'd like to get involved, you can follow them on Twitter or go along to their fundraiser night at the Amersham Arms on June 29th.

The summer of cycling begins

Summer officially dawned this weekend and we are guaranteed at least six months of unbroken sunshine in Brockley, from here on. So it is with exquisite timing that two cycling announcements were made today.

Firstly, Lewisham Council has promoted its new cycle loan scheme. For an initial £10, you can try a bike for a month - if you like it, you can buy it at a discount. Details here.

Secondly, the Mayor of London's latest cycling plan, unveiled today, will focus virtually all spending on three boroughs: Kingston, Enfield and Waltham Forest. They will get £30m to create "mini-Holland" projects, delivering "transformative" infrastructure projects that will afford cyclists in London greater protection.

A bone has also been thrown to South East London in the form of a new "Quietway" route from Waterloo to Greenwich (home of the Mayor's cycling Tzar, Andrew Gilligan), which will deliver "direct and continuous routes on low-traffic back streets and will open later this year." Bloomsbury to Walthamstow will also be delivered this year, with a further six routes covering all points of the compass have been selected for accelerated delivery next year.

The New Cross blog reports that slowly, very-slowly, the New Cross cycle "superhighway" is also taking shape, with options to provide segregated cycling currently being explored by TfL.

Oh yes, and the house prices

A group of Deptford residents is campaigning to have their homes reclassified by the Royal Mail as being in Greenwich, so they can earn a coveted SE10 postcode and profit from the Waitrose effect. A petition has been launched to move the SE10 boundary to Watergate Street, bringing it west from its current position at Deptford Creek.

The justification features some guff about postmen somehow not being able to find them because they get befuddled by the SE8 designation, before they cut to the chase:

"In addition to this, our property prices and held at artificially low levels due to this confusion."

This particular instance of postcode snobbery elicits no sympathy from BC. Firstly, anyone who's ever argued the toss over what and where Brockley actually is knows that the boundaries for postcodes, ward boundaries and taxi drivers' mental maps do not align. That's just life in the big city.

The idea that postal services can't cope with their own system sounds like a convenient myth, particularly as anyone who knows the area west of Deptford Creek would always consider it to be Deptford - the place is littered with Deptford place names and heritage.

And as for house prices, well if you bought your property any time in the last 100 years or so, you'll have got it at a discount on account of it not being considered part of Greenwich next door (although there are plenty of grotty streets with SE10 postcodes), so you've not lost out on anything. This is just opportunist gerrymandering by the petitioners.

Embrace SE8 - it is who you are.

With thanks to Melissa.

Greenwich pub group goes into administration

Greenwich Inc, the bar chain with a monopoly position in Greenwich town centre, has gone into administration. The Greenwich Visitor reports:

Administrator Stephen Hunt said Greenwich Inc and Greenwich Inc Holdings were in administration and that Greenwich Inc Trading had been liquidated. He said most of the venues Inc Group owns are "in good shape" and he is hopeful of selling them as going concerns.

Inc sucked the character out of many of Greenwich's best venues, including The Trafalgar Tavern, and the administrators will hopefully find new owners with more imagination and an interest in locals, as well as tourists.

Cutty Sark becomes a theatre

The Evening Standard reports:

London’s newest theatre was today unveiled in the hold of the Cutty Sark.

Comedians Alan Davies and Ross Noble, round-the-world yachtsman Sir Robin Knox-Johnston and sailing enthusiast Griff Rhys Jones are among the inaugural line-up of performers in the 100-seat venue at King William Walk, Greenwich.

Performances begin on January 29. Details at: rmg.co.uk/cuttysark

Click here for the full story.

Greenwich Peninsula deal paves way for delivery of 10,000 new homes

Developer Quintain has sold its minority stake in the Greenwich Peninsula regeneration scheme to its joint-venture partner Knight Dragon in a deal which will ensure the delivery of approximately 10,000 new homes on the 147 acre site.

Commenting on the deal, Sammy Lee, Director of Knight Dragon said:

“Greenwich Peninsula represents a unique opportunity to deliver one of the largest regeneration schemes in Europe and Knight Dragon is fully committed to delivering this landmark development for London, creating thousands of new jobs, new homes and a community where people will want to live.” “Our joint venture with Quintain has achieved a great deal over the past 16 months. We are now looking forward to building on the momentum which has been created.”

Full disclosure: Knight Dragon is a client of mine.

The Greenwich Comedy Festival 2013

This year's Greenwich Comedy Festival, switched from summer to autumn, will include venues across the borough, including the Greenwich Picturehouse and Woolwich's Big Screen.

Greenwich Theatre will host Richard Herring, Aisling Bea, Pete Firman, David O'Doherty and Alexie Sayle. The Sunday Special night at Up The Creek Comedy Club will turn into an 'all dayer’ event on Sunday 3rd with comedians including Seann Walsh, Mark Watson and Holly Walsh. COMEDY 4 KIDS will stage 'comedy without the rude bits' at Greenwich Theatre and The Tramshed in Woolwich.

The Monster Comedy Shed will be rocking up in Greenwich Market and legendary grump Arthur Smith will be embarking on a humorous tour of some of Greenwich's most iconic sights in his much anticipated ‘Alternative Greenwich Tour’.

Lewisham and Greenwich create new NHS Trust

A new Lewisham and Greenwich NHS Trust will be formed on 1 October 2013. The Trust will be responsible for Lewisham Hospital and community services in Lewisham, and for Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Greenwich.

Lewisham Healthcare says:

Services are not changing following the merger, and patient appointments are unaffected. Lewisham Healthcare and Queen Elizabeth Hospital serve similar communities, and have much in common in terms of what we do. As a larger organisation, the Trust will be better placed to meet the challenges of the future. Our focus will be on learning from best practice in Lewisham and Greenwich to improve NHS services for local people.

Following the merger Lewisham Hospital and Queen Elizabeth Hospital will continue to provide the same services. We will also continue to run community services in Lewisham, and to provide some services at Queen Mary’s Hospital in Sidcup. If you receive treatment at Lewisham Hospital, Queen Elizabeth Hospital or Queen Mary’s Hospital, it will not be affected by the organisational change.

All services at Lewisham Hospital – including for maternity and emergency care – are running as normal. In July 2013, Government plans to downgrade Lewisham’s emergency and maternity services in two to three years’ time were overturned by the High Court, following a legal challenge by Lewisham Council and the Save Lewisham Hospital campaign. The Department of Health is appealing this decision, and you will be able to find out more on this website as it happens. The judicial review and appeal do not affect the formation of the new Trust, as there is clear distinction between service change and organisational change.

With thanks to Joe for the news.

Campaign launched to protect Greenwich and Deptford trains to Charing X and London Bridge

A campaign has been launched by a group called the Greenwich Line Users to prevent major cuts to South Eastern train services.

As discussed on the South East London transport forum, the planned three-year disruption of services from South East London through London Bridge is due to begin in 2015:

- 2015/6 Charing Cross services will not stop at London Bridge
- 2016/8 Cannon Street services will not stop at London Bridge

These changes are the a result of Thameslink construction work to expand and modernise London Bridge station. Once work is completed in 2018, the London Bridge serviceswill resume, but Greenwich and Deptford will have lost direct services to Charing Cross or Waterloo East. The group explains:

Once the work is complete there will be no physical track connection that will enable trains to reach Charing Cross. So, after 150 years, the West End will no longer be reached by direct trains. 

The Greenwich Line Users’ Group has been formed to represent the interests of all passengers who use the Greenwich Line. Whilst we recognise that the work at London Bridge will bring about many improvements for passengers generally, it will disadvantage users of the Greenwich Line. Our objective is to remove that disadvantage. Insufficient thought has been given by the Department for Transport to the impact on the Greenwich Line and the possible ways in which direct Charing Cross services could be maintained. Cannon Street is a fine station for the City, but hopeless for getting to and from the West End. 

The Group will be lobbying the Department for Transport, Network Rail and Southeastern trains for a service that meets the needs of South East Londoners. The Users’ Group can be contacted at greenwichline@outlook.com. We will be happy to receive your comments or questions.

The cancellation of Brockley's infrequent direct connections to Charing X some years ago was a relatively minor inconvenience, but Greenwich and Deptford's West End services are much more frequent and would be a consequently greater loss.

Deptford and the Waitrose effect

Deptford's been given the Standard's Homes & Property treatment this evening, albeit with the focus on New Capital Quay, which lies on the Greenwich side of the water.

The imminent arrival of Waitrose (admittedly a rare thing in South East London) has forced the paper urgently to reappraise its view of the area, which we've been saying for a long time is already one of the best things about this part of the city. Suggesting that Waitrose confers "retail respectability" on a place that boasts a great market and dozens of interesting independent shops and businesses is pretty irritating, but it's nice to see namechecks for the Deptford X, Bearspace Gallery, the Albany Theatre and the Deptford Dame, among others.

With Workspace and Cathedral Group planning major redevelopments of Deptford's core and further improvements to the high street due soon, expect many more of these sorts of articles to follow.

Snow falling on readers

BC readers have sent in photos from their snow days this weekend. Firstly, Gema, moderator of the Deptford Forum, sends these shots of Deptford and Greenwich in the snow:

Joe discovered gnomes in Crofton Park:

And Fifi took this in SE8:

Blackwall toll to pay for Silvertown Tunnel?

TfL has launched a second consultation about its plans for a new river crossing or two in East London.

The key proposals include a new tunnel linking Greenwich Peninsula to Silvertown and a new ferry connection between Thamesmead and Beckton.

TfL say they are trying to fix the following problems, which were a lot like the problems that were ignored when Boris scrapped the Thames Gateway Bridge (a project that was superior to any now on the table and which, as 853 points out, may not be dead):

1. Regular long delays at the Blackwall Tunnel, particularly during peak times
2. Frequent closures of the Blackwall Tunnel and the impact of closures on the surrounding road network
3. The need to replace the Woolwich Ferry infrastructure as it nears the end of its operating life
4. The need for additional road connections to support growth

The Silvertown Tunnel would increase the volume of traffic trying to use the A102 and carve up Greenwich Peninsula. It would also be less pedestrian and cyclist friendly than a bridge. On the plus side, it would make it easy to re-route traffic in the event of a one tunnel closing and it would connect two relatively dynamic areas, rather than two moribund ones. Whereas the Gateway Bridge would have been primarily a traffic management measure, the Silvertown Tunnel is more likely to play a direct role in regeneration.

TfL has also mooted a £2 toll for Blackwall Tunnel users, to help pay for the new tunnel - something which Boris appeared to veto in a radio interview, at least until he's moved on.

If anyone can muster any enthusiasm to discuss ferry options, please feel free to post below.