Leytonstone Councillors are proposing that a sports cage be built in Church Lane car park in reponse to young people telling them there’s nothing to do in the town. Good idea or bad idea? Respond to the poll in our sidebar or you can submit your comments to the council on their website.
Unfortunately it seems the long awaited and much needed refurb of Leytonstone Underground Station has been delayed. Quote from Leytonstone Labour’s October 2009 Residents’ Report…
As some of you may know Leytonstone Tube Station was due shortly to have a much needed and significant refurbishment programme totalling some £5m plus. What you may not know is that buried within the announcements by the Mayor of London – Boris Johnson – regarding his fare hikes, was an announcement postponing refurbishment works to a number of tube stations including Leytonstone.
The works were due to include the replacement of customer information systems such as the PA system, Help Points and lighting and potentially also some other work to improve the appearance and access of the station.
We intend to write to Boris Johnson, expressing our disappointment at this turn of affairs and seek assurances that this much needed investment into Leytonstone’s well used infrastructure is not lost
indefinitely.
There are plenty of things happening in E11 over the Christmas period…
Leytonstone Christmas Lights Switch On
When: Thursday 26th November, 3:30pm – 6:00pm.
Where: Leytonstone Town Centre.
Christmas Market
When: Saturday 5th December.
Where: St. John’s Church, Leytonstone.
Town Centre Christmas Decoration Window Display Competition
When: Friday 18th December.
Where: Leytonstone Town Centre.
Wanstead Christmas Lights Switch On
Residents can take part in a fun treasure hunt from by picking up a map from local retailers along Wanstead High Street.
Carol singers will also be on hand to provide plenty of Christmas cheers and the annual lights display will be switched on.
All shops, cafes and restaurants participating in the event will also exhibit art by pupils from Our Lady of Lourdes RC Primary School on Chestnut Drive.
The event is being organised by Living Streets, which represents pedestrians and aims to make roads safer for people moving around on foot.
The participating retailers are: Bike Trax, One Deko, Rio, Nice Croissant, The Orange Tree, Picture Perfect Gallery, The Larder, Blush Temples, Heads N Tails, Wanstead Domestic Appliances, Horsfall & Wright, Knock Down Ginger and Lillies of Wanstead.
When: Friday 27th November, 3:30pm – 6:00pm.
Where: Wanstead High Street.
Came across this print of Knotts Green House, Leytonstone residence of Joseph Gurney Barclay, noted astronomer and head of Barclays Bank (yes, that Barclays Bank)…
Knotts Green House - Residence of Joseph Gurney Barclay
The drawing is taken from the Illustrated London News, July 15th 1865. The caption reads “Entertainment Given by Mr Gurney Barclay, at Leytonstone, to the Agents of the London City Mission”. Unfortunately, like most of the great old houses in Leytonstone, Knotts Green (which was situated around the Matlock Road area) eventually fell into disrepair and was knocked down in the 1960s to make way for Livingstone College and subsequently the tower blocks of the Livingstone Estate, also later demolished.
Tragic 
A mural featuring Leytonstone’s most famous son, Alfred Hitchcock, sporting a studded leather jacket has been painted outside 491 Gallery’s “Vertigo” building on Grove Green Road, Leytonstone…
Vertigo Mural: Alfred Hitchcock
Seems to have met with a mixed reaction. I quite like it, certainly brightens up the outside of the building – I’m sure Hitch would be amused. Further info on the 491 Gallery project can be found at www.491gallery.com.
A point was made at the recent Leytonstone Community Council Meeting regarding the state of Leytonstone High Road. The speaker had noted that 2 years ago the main uses for buildings on the High Road in South Leytonstone was…
He had spoken at a Community Council Meeting then about the state of the buildings there – badly run down with trees growing out of the roofs and had requested that the council do something about it.
Leytonstone High Road
So, since 2 years has passed what’s happened. Well, he’s done the same survey again and the new top uses for buldings on that part of the High Road are as follows…
Buildings are in a worse state than ever with even more trees growing out of their roofs.
Unfortunately when this point was raised the majority of councillors were out of the room deciding on Community Council Funding. However, Councillor John Macklin was present and spoke about the assumption made by the council that the Olympic Delivery Authority will be stumping up some cash to allow fund regeneration work on the High Road. Unfortunately it now seems that this money is not going to materialise and there’s no other money in the kitty. Hardly surprising given the current economic climate – Boris and the ODA are trying to cut back the main spend on the Olympics, never mind worrying about those of us on the periphery.
The tragic thing is that these are great Victorian buildings, letting them get into this state is absolutely criminal.
Driving down the High Road these days literally makes me cringe because its in such a sorry state. Surely something can be done – maybe the only way is to get up a ladder myself to chop those roof trees down!!!
Seems that Kirkdale’s has unfortunately bitten the dust. A double blow after the loss of The Loaded Dog. The way things are going pretty soon there won’t be anything left in Leytonstone!
As I sit on the committee of LARA, I attended the Leytonstone Community Council meeting on 12th October. We had applied for funding, which fortunately we got (hurrah!). There were many other benficiaries on the night, as each ward (Leytonstone, Cann Hall and Cathall) had a £10,000 pot to distribute amongst the various applicants, all voted for by the attendeed with a final decision made by the councillors. There was also a £5,000 pot for those applicants which didn’t fall into a particular ward. The majority of that went to the Leytonstone Festival (good news), though that initially looked like the Leytonstone Arts Trail would miss out. Fortunately Leytonstone Ward had a surplus, so that was given to them – great news as they did such a sterling job during this year’s festival.
E11 seems to have more than its fair share of apathy, so since the forum on this site was pretty much dormant (expect for a constant stream of attempted spam from our friends in Russia!) I’ve decided to ditch it. This goes hand-in-hand with a general re-focus/re-design, leaning towards a more regular blog/news site. I’m also currently working (well, trying to work) on www.leytonstone.org.uk which has more of an arts/editorial feel as well as aggregating streams from various other Leytonstone related sites. Hopefully the two will compliment each other rather than clash.
Residents in the Upper Leytonstone Area now have their own Residents Association, LARA. There are already a number of Residents Associations covering various parts of Leytonstone (BARA in Bushwood, FARA around Ferndale Road and FORA in the “Forest” Ward), but one for the Leytonstone Ward has long been noticable by its absence.
The domain name www.leytonstoneresidents.org.uk has been registered and I’m pleased to say I’ll be helping out with the website. We’re still to switch over the domain name to the “new” site – but it can currently be viewed at leytonstoneresidents.wordpress.com.
The next meeting is at 7:00pm on 28th April at the St. John’s Ambulance building on Queen’s Road.
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