Day 83
Star Lane - Stepney Green - Stockwell - Stonebridge Park
I set off to the tube station this morning in a sombre mood, having yet again woken to the news of innocent lives being lost in a horrific terrorist attack. A suicide bomber has blown himself up at a pop concert in Manchester and 22 people have been killed - mostly children and young adults - with many more facing severe injuries.
Whoever was responsible, and whatever their 'justification', I can't help feeling that acts of terrorism like this are symptomatic of a wider problem - that it is the divisive fracturing of our society which is the cause (not, as some would have it, the result) of such acts.
I'm no politician (nor would I want to be) and any statements I make are purely my layman's opinion, but it seems to me that after a good half-century or so of gradually breaking down barriers, seeking to understand and accept the differences between nations, creeds, sexualities and genders, and attempting to come together rather than split apart, we seem now to be regressing and giving up any progress we've made as a species.
We're in the middle of a very nasty General Election campaign in the UK at the moment, and there have been several equally divisive elections and referenda around the world in recent years. Name calling and personal attacks have become the norm, taking the place of reasoned argument. Perhaps, I'm looking at the past through rose-tinted glasses and it was always like that, but I can't be the only one who longs for the impassioned and erudite speeches of an Abraham Lincoln, a Martin Luther King, an Emmeline Pankhurst or a Mahatma Ghandi rather than the childish bile we have to listen to these days.
I don't have any solutions - only a hope, that before too long we come to our senses and start to move together again, rather than continuing to pull apart.
***
Anyway, it's in this rather sombre frame of mind - and conscious of the fact that I'm heading into the centre of a city that could very easily be the target of the next terrorist attack - that I set off on my travels once again.
I'm starting with a DLR station called Star Lane, which is one of the newest stations I'll have visited on my journey, having opened as recently as 2011.
 |
| Start Lane |
On the other hand, the lines that go through it have been here in one form or another since 1846, having originally been part of the 'Eastern Counties and Thames Junction Railway', which connected the Royal Docks in the south with the railway to Ipswich which ran from Stratford.
 |
| Footbridge over Manor Road (Star Lane to the right of the photo) |
The station straddles the very busy Manor Road via a footbridge, though it is named after a smaller road to the east called - of course - Star Lane.
It's one of those stations with seemingly little reason for existence - being so close to more major stations to the north and south - but I have a brief look around to see if there's anything at all of note here.
And, sadly, the answer is 'not a lot'.
Following Star Lane for a few minutes I soon come to Star Lane Park - a relatively small open space with a children's playground, football pitch, and a few benches - it's ok as parks go, though nothing special.
 |
| Star Lane Park |
Part of the reason I'm not bowled over by the area is that it's largely industrial. The buildings around the station include a DHL distribution centre, a Screw-Fix depot, and the local Bus Garage - all large, grey, metal boxes - with only the distant spires of the O2 to liven up the skyline.
 |
| View south from the station |
So - moving swiftly on, I head west to my next stop, Stepney Green.
***
Stepney Green station is rather older than Star Lane - having opened in 1902.
 |
| Stepney Green |
Stepney itself - one of the areas of London whose bells are so loquacious in the song 'Oranges and Lemons' - is what most people consider (together with its neighbours Whitechapel and Limehouse) to be the true 'East End' of London.
It's also - as you will see - somewhere that begins to restore my faith in humanity and dispel some of this morning's dark thoughts, but more of that anon.
I take a triangular walking route from the station - heading west firstly along the Mile End Road, before turning south onto the road that gives the station its name - Stepney Green.
 |
| Stepney Green |
The 'Green' is a simple collection of railed rectangular gardens running the length of the road, and as always it's nice to see some greenery among the brick and concrete of the capital.
 |
| Memorial Clock-tower |
At the bottom of the Green is a clock tower. This was erected in 1913 as a memorial to a certain Stanley B. Atkinson - a local government member and philanthropist - in 'recognition of his unselfish devotion to the public good'.
 |
| 'Guardian of The Poor' |
It's not clear what exactly he did (the plaque describes him as 'Guardian of The Poor') - but good on him.
It's nice to remember - especially today - that people can be nice to each other sometimes.
It does also occur to me that if the various members of present day governments thought a little more 'unselfishly' about the public good, we might all be a bit better off.
They might even get their own names on a clock-tower...
A little further on is something else which brightens my day - the Stepney City Farm.
 |
| Stepney City Farm |
This was originally opened in 1979, when local residents decided to make use of a derelict former bomb-site by building a community farm.
 |
| Farm Entrance |
By the early 2000s it had fallen into disrepair and a new group of locals decided to set up the Stepney City Farm charity, which - with funding from the Crossrail project - managed to relaunch the farm in 2012, complete with a ten year lease.
 |
| Info about the Farm |
The farm is free to enter, and I spend a pleasant ten or fifteen minutes wandering among the various pens and saying hello to their furry occupants. I'm no James Herriot, so forgive the simplistic captions to the following photos...
 |
| Goats |
 |
| Donkey |
 |
| Pigs |
 |
| Lamb |
I enjoy the respite from the trials and tribulations of modern life - even more so when I discover this little sign tucked away in one corner.
 |
| Wall of Kindness |
Again - my faith in my fellow man takes a welcome boost from such a simple idea, and I'm thankful to whoever thought of it for putting a smile back on my face.
 |
| Geese |
 |
| Rabbit |
After a few more animal encounters I leave the farm and make a brief stop across the road to look at St. Dunstan's Church.
 |
| St Dunstan's |
This stone church stands on the site of an original wooden one dating back to 923AD and is thus Stepney's oldest church. The current building mainly dates from the 15th Century, with some later 19th Century additions. It's the 10 bells of this church that feature in the aforementioned 'Oranges and Lemons' song, asking 'When will that be?'
Heading north again from St. Dunstan's, up White Horse Lane, I complete my triangle and find myself back at the station. Time to move on to my next stop.
***
And here at Stockwell, sadly, I'm reminded once again of the evils of terrorism, and the sometimes unforeseen consequences of trying to combat it.
 |
| Stockwell |
On the 7th July 2005, 52 people were killed in a series of bombings on public transport in London. Two weeks later, five more attacks were attempted but failed - with only the detonators exploding in four cases, and the fifth device being dumped before it was set off.
The attackers all fled, and a major manhunt was set in motion. One clue led the police to a block of flats in Scotia Road, Tulse Hill - to the south of Stockwell - and they put the flats under surveillance.
An electrician, originally from Brazil, lived in the flat with his two cousins, and on the day after the attacks he set off for work at 9.30 in the morning.
His name was Jean Charles de Menezes and he would be dead within an hour.
 |
| Memorial to Jean Charles de Menezes |
An officer (actually a soldier on secondment) spotted him leaving the flats and mis-identified him as one of the suspects.
Thanks to a combination of this initial mis-identification, the pressure to make snap judgements under difficult circumstances, and the erroneous belief that he was 'behaving suspiciously', by the time Menezes reached Stockwell Station he was being pursued by both undercover and armed officers.
He boarded a train, followed by the undercover officers, who identified him to the armed officers behind them. They too boarded the train and was shot seven times in the head, and once in the shoulder - killing him outright.
When they realised their mistake, the Metropolitan Police issued an apology and affirmed that he had nothing to do with the bomb attempts. A shrine was erected outside the station, and this was eventually replaced with a permanent memorial.
***
To the north of the station stands another memorial - this time to those killed in the two World Wars.
 |
| War Memorial |
Its unusual construction - that of a tower next to a lower concrete drum structure - owes itself to its original use as the entrance to a deep-level air-raid shelter during WWII.
These shelters were built under the existing tunnels of nearby tube stations and were designed to hold 8000 people.
The murals on the shelter walls are based on designs by local school-children and at first I'm a little surprised by the inclusion (to the bottom left in the picture above) of the James Bond gun-barrel motif from the opening of the movies.
It's only later that I discover that the actor Roger Moore, who famously played Bond in seven of the films, grew up here in Stockwell.
And only later still that I hear the news that, on the very day I visit his childhood home, he too has just passed away. Coincidence can be a disconcerting thing sometimes...
 |
| Bronze Woman |
The brightly painted memorial now stands in a little garden, together with a statue of a Caribbean woman holding a baby aloft - entitled 'Bronze Woman'.
The poem of the same name, which inspired the statue, is by the late poet and Stockwell resident Cécile Nobrega, and is a tribute to womanhood, as is the statue that she raised money to fund.
 |
| Plaque on the statue |
A plaque on one side of the statue features the opening lines of the poem:
in the sun
in the sea
on a rock
near an Isle
in the Caribbee:There I will set her,
Honoured, Free!"
I leave the brightly painted war memorial behind me and head back to the station, ready to move on once more.
 |
| Rear of the War Memorial |
***
And here, at my final stop of the day - Stonebridge Park - I encounter more murals, and more attempts to bring us together, rather than split us apart.
 |
| Stonebridge Park |
 |
| Sign outside the Ari D. Norman offices |
The murals on the building opposite the station - Ari D. Norman jewellery - were commissioned to mark the 2012 Olympics, and each commemorate a previous games where racial tensions were at the forefront.
They serve as a reminder of how easy it is to let religion, race, or colour get in the way of human endeavours.
 |
| Munich 1972 |
 |
| Mexico 1968 |
Stonebridge Park is once again in an area almost entirely devoid of interest, being an 'intermediate' station between other, more lively, locations.
It's slap-bang next to the very busy A406 (aka the North Circular) taking traffic to and from the M1 motorway at Brent Cross - and as such sees many thousands of cars and lorries pass by every day, few of which will ever stop anywhere near here.
A brief walk to the south of the station, however, reveals another form of transport which evidently feels very much at home in this area.
 |
| Bikers this way... |
The variously coloured metal cut-outs of motor-bike riders lead me along the road parallel to the North Circular, to the black and white painted exterior of the Ace Café London, possibly the most famous transport café in the UK.
 |
| Ace Café |
It was opened in 1938 to cater for the hauliers using the newly built North Circular, but soon became synonymous with bikers and other 'petrol-heads' who congregated here in the fifties and sixties to listen to the juke-box, rev up their engines, and engage in 'record-racing'.
As the name suggests, this involved putting a record on the juke-box and racing to a given point and back before the record had finished playing. Not, I suspect, something that went down well with the local constabulary.
The original café closed in 1969 but reopened in 1997 thanks to the persistence of enthusiasts, who bought the site and raised the money to refurbish the buildings.
 |
| North Circular - looking westwards towards Ealing. |
I take a brief stroll over the North Circular via a footbridge, but see only the usual company cars and long-distance haulage lorries, instead of the souped-up Triumphs and Nortons and leather-clad rockers of yesteryear.
Still, I've ended the day in a better frame of mind than when I set off. And I've seen far more evidence of people joining together in solidarity than of the divisions I spoke of when I left home this morning, so perhaps there's hope for us all yet...
Let's hope so.
No comments:
Post a Comment