Un film de Mrs E

January Junk with the Community Volunteer

OS Map of Harringay

Being a bit of a map head, I like this OS mapping in Multimap. You can see the hills of Harringay

View map of Harringay, Haringey on Multimap.com
Bird's Eye view of Harringay, Haringey
Get directions to or from Harringay, Haringey

Harringay weekly photo #2: Look up and see the past

Look up and see the past
Originally uploaded by MrsEds

Our historical environment is all about what the generations of people who have lived here have made of the place they have lived. Look around and you will see layer upon layer of human activity as each generation makes its mark.

Looking around at the cladding and pebble dash on the houses and the garish signs featuring blurry photos of kofte on Green Lanes, it is hard to imagine that there will people, 50 years from now ,sighing and saying 'Those were the days' but I may be wrong and red tile paint may be considered the last word in style.

Still, looking up, you can still glimpse the past peeping through and showing up what our grandparents and great grandparents saw when they made their way home from a hard day at work.

These little features are part of our 'common wealth' and seeing them survive makes me feel closer to the history of my neighbourhood.

Consultation in Plain English with a place to talk- A model from Brum

Birmimgham city council have a Big City Plan but their portal for consultation shares many characteristics with Haringey's. As local blogger Parboo puts it, "the plan is really quite hard to penetrate and the feedback mechanisms do not encourage a deepening of understanding or indeed a conversation."
Sound familiar?
Brum's active online community have decided to do something about it.

They have rewritten the plan in plain English and placed the new text next to the original, they provide a place to comment and see other people's comment and develop the conversation. It's called Big City Talk and its a pretty impressive piece of work.

I would also suggest that it is a great model for consultation and something from which we in Harringay and Haringey can learn.

Harringay weekly photo #1

Arena sign
Originally uploaded by MrsEds

Trying something new on the blog. I'm going to post a photo every week taken in Harringay of something unusual, interesting (at least to me) or amusing.

This week;

This is the new metal sign erected at the Arena Shopping Park on Green Lanes that tries to draw passers by attention to the fact that there was once a world famous sports and cultural venue on the site where they now munch foot long Subs and browse for cheap sportswear in Sports Direct.

Wonder if anyone has stopped to read it? or even noticed it? Many people drive to the shopping area, so it is unlikely they will even spot the tiny purple sign on the big wall round the car park but hey at least its there...

Wishing myself back to 1949

My grandad's 78s.
You lifted the lid on the blue and silver record player, yanking down the switch to change the speed to 78rpm and balancing the record, big as a dinner plate on the little catch of metal at the top, then you pulled the arm across. Another yank on the on button and, with a loud clunk, the record dropped and the arm shot across to the outer edge of the disc.
An age of hissing and crackling as the needle found the groove and then from out of the fast whirling black disc came voices from another world.

Of all the voices I heard on Grandad's records, I loved Paul Robeson's the best; Old Man River, Joshua Fought the Battle of Jericho.

Even as a child his voice sent shivers up my spine and and 35 years later, it still does.

You can imagine then how excited I was to spot that in 1949, on April 17 and 18, Paul Robeson performed at the Harringay Arena.



To give you a flavour this is Paul Robeson singing in Prague in the same year


and here he is at St Paul's Cathedral.


So the next time I'm stuck in Harringay's Homebase queue, maybe I'll close my eyes and imagine myself in a different age. In 1949, sitting squashed up in the middle of a row wearing my best blouse, my eyes fixed on the stage, feeling the tears pricking at the corner of my eyes, as Paul Robeson begins to sing My Curly Headed baby and hearing one of the greatest voices of all times reverberating around the Arena.

Christmas tree spotting competition

Christmas tree spotting #2 & 3
Originally uploaded by MrsEds

Well, despite the council's best efforts the annual Christmas tree spot begins well with 4 in Warham Road yesterday morning.

All the trees have now been stickered by council as dumped with threats of fines. Oddly enough, like festive triffids, they all inched away from the walls of the houses where I originally photographed them.

Tree number 1 has joined the cones (31 days and counting since first request to remove them) to create a lovely vista from my window.

Tree 2 suddenly threw itself into a gutter in despair at the end of its life and its loss of glamour.
Tree 3 shuffled up and joined company with the three rotting mattresses a little further up, perhaps to drink cheap booze and hope for better days.

The whereabouts of tree 4 is underdetermined at this time.


What's your tally? And where is the most unusual place you've spotted one? Fellow campaigner Alan s has photographed one as late as April last year. Of course there's a Flickr group for dumped Christmas Trees


Alan has had a good idea though. he suggests that Haringey retailers be asked to distribute a leaflet when the tree is sold detailing how to get rid of the tree which seems to be a good intiaitve, as I doubt that many people actually go to the Haringey site to find out what to do, despite there being ample advice on it (oh and on Harringay Online as well).

This is something perhaps that our hyperlocal website could do in conjunction with the council or a local resident's group?

Why everyone should be happy when a school gets a good Ofsted report

A reason to feel very proud in Harringay this week as our local Infant school has a fantastic Ofsted report
"South Harringay Infant and Nursery School provides an outstanding education. Children make a very positive start to their schooling and teachers ensure that no one falls behind. The school is a beacon of good work and makes a substantial contribution to the cohesiveness of the local community."

Full report here

The entire community should feel pleasure when one of its institutions does well. The teachers and support staff work amazingly hard for the school and therefore for our community. It is not about what some parents believe about a school that counts, but about how much a whole community is behind a school.

Local schools are focal points in the community and it is clear from the report that it enjoys massive support from all sectors of the Harringay community. Indeed take a look at the photos of things organised by the PSA and you will see the very diverse face of Harringay reflected. Where parental involvement in a school is high, their children's education benefits. S Harringay I&N illustrates this beautifully.

Having worked in schools where the community holds a negative view which was often supprted by a sensationalist local press, I know how detrimental to the esteem of the community as a whole that attitude can be, "the school is sh*t, so the place must be sh*t".

You should have heard the applause and seen the delight on the faces of kids, parents and staff when the head made the announcement. It really mattered to everyone that their work is appreciated and so via my blog I'm asking for the wider community's appreciation as well.

"One piece at a time and it won't cost me a dime"

As the immortal Johnny Cash might have said, lets do it 'one piece at a time'

An American project asks us to imagine

"what if 100,000 people picked up one piece of litter each day? How might the world change? What if you did... how might you feel about yourself?

You are invited to participate and make a tangible, daily difference in the world. We are all in it together. . . pick up a piece every day."

Well a local version might say, what if a thousand people in Harringay a day picked up a bit of litter. How might Harringay change?

They believe success will be

"the day when 100,000 individuals, after looking around for a piece of trash to pick up and finding none, ask themselves “what’s next?!”

Me? I've started: I Uncluttered an old party dish which is off to the charity shop and threw away a load of junk from a drawer yesterday.

I removed a wrapper from the pavement this morning

So Unclutter 1 good; Litter picked up 1 good ( in the spirit of Bridget Jones)

Litter Project

I will chart my own progress with this on Twitter. Follow me and give me a hard time if I fail!

The shocking state of the New River Path

Happy New Year and I'm on the warpath already!

This New Year's day the E family decided to get close to nature and take a stroll down the New River path to the West Reservoir.

Looks lovely eh? (Those of you who've clicked through to the photoset)

Well it came very close to being a disaster. Indeed, if it were not for watching the sheer joy of my daughter at wading through mud in her brand new wellies, the sight of the nearly grown swans sitting bold as brass on the side of the river close enough to touch


or loving the fascination that nipperette showed with the frozen river and how she could crack the ice, I can't help feeling that my enjoyment of this walk would have been totally ruined.

Why?

The shocking and disgusting state of the path which was strewn with bottles, cans, fag packets, fast food packaging and all manner of other rubbish. Not to mention the dumped mattress, the glass pane dumped or the blue plastic bags hanging from the trees.

I almost exploded at the terrible state of the water near one of the gates which was choked with cans, bottles and other foul stuff.

Now I was meant to be enjoying a walk with the family, so I resisted snapping photos and walked. I have been known to spoil family outings in the past through my incessant photo taking of rubbish and I was determined to just enjoy being out with the little 'uns and Mr E. So there are no pictures of the mattress, the glass, the choked up water, the plastic bags but I would be lying if I said that I hadn't secretly snapped a couple of shots


And it bothered me such a lot that today I composed a letter:

Dear Thames Water,

I wish to complain about the terrible state of the New River in North London, in paticular the stretch between Harringay Green Lanes and the West Reservoir. On a recent walk with my children along the New River Path, there was a shocking amount of litter and rubbish, some of which must have been a danger to the wildlife we saw, including plastic bags and bottles, cans and fast food packaging. There was also a lot of fly tipping including a dumped mattress, glass and other household items. The areas that were most noticable were at the Seven Sisters gate and the Green lanes N4 gate near Finsbury Park but there was hardly a stretch of the path that did not have rubbish on it and there was also a considerable amount in the water.
I appreciate that while you are not responsible for this shocking behaviour, I would like to know if there are plans to clear this area of the terrible litter and rubbish that is blighting this natural 'breathing space' and ruining the enjoyment of walkers like my family and me. I would also suggest (although it may not help with the fly tipping) that bins are provided near gates and arrangements made with contractors to empty them on a regular basis.
I also walked the Enfield part of the New River in the summer and it was virtually litter free and beautifully kept. It would be appreciated if the stretch that runs through this area could be given similar attention as soon as possible.

I look forward to your reply

with links through to the photos.

We shall see...

"Heritage led regeneration of an area fosters social inclusion and community cohesion"

Not my words but the words of the experts. It seems that its not bad old nostalgia to want to restore Grand Parade, preserve the memories of Harringay Arena, conserve the valuable Victorian housing stock of Harringay but good economic sense,
This from Margaret Hodge,
‘If we want strong and sustainable communities with access to a vibrant civic culture and a strong local economy, then it is vital to engage future generations with the places where they live.’ She went on to ask the heritage sector: ‘How do we really make sure that the contribution the historic environment can make to our sense of identity and belonging is fully understood by strategists and decision makers at all levels?’

The writers of the article referenced below state:
"Heritage is not widely perceived as a tool for delivering social policy. Indeed, there is a shallow but common stereotype of historic environment conservation as an elitist, white middle-class concern. The ‘Better Places to Live’ essay issued by the Department of Culture Media and Sport in 2005 2 reinforced this view, presenting the ‘castles and stately homes’ view of heritage, with little reference to wider social and economic issues, or to crucial impact issues such as global warming.

Despite this rather short-sighted view being perpetuated, there is still considerable evidence to suggest that building conservation not only contributes, but sometimes plays a key role in delivering community benefits and social inclusion."

Read more from this website here

but it seems to me that a key element in the Harringay Charter has to be a recognition of the history of Harringay and how it can contribute to the intangible but powerful need to build social capital and facilitate social inclusion