View Full Version : The decline of Atlantic Road
Look how nice and clean and well-tended it looked forty years ago:
http://viewfinder.english-heritage.org.uk/gallery/450/aa0/aa063952.jpg
Similar scene today. Look at the state of it!
http://www.urban75.org/brixton/photos/images/october-2007-07.jpg
Stinks of rotting meat and fish too. I was most impressed with a market in Paris that had //tiles// on the streets. When the food traders swept the floor the food would not stick to the tiles. Everything was clean and lovely.
When the food traders swept the floor the food would not stick to the tiles.
Or slowly create a stinking pool of rancid fish juice under one of the loose paving stones (that Lambeth don't seem willing to spend your council tax on fixing) that spurts a stinking jet of this shit up your trouser leg when you happen to walk on it on your way to a meeting :mad:
supercity
31-10-2007, 09:27
You really notice the bad state of those buildings when you're waiting for a train. Some of them look on the verge of collapse, and it's not hard to imagine the vermin they might house, so close to a food market.
Can't the owners be forced to do something before they become a real danger?
Loupylou
31-10-2007, 09:42
Look how nice and clean and well-tended it looked forty years ago:
http://viewfinder.english-heritage.org.uk/gallery/450/aa0/aa063952.jpg
Similar scene today. Look at the state of it!
http://www.urban75.org/brixton/photos/images/october-2007-07.jpg
Good point, well made.
memespring
31-10-2007, 10:00
Look how nice and clean and well-tended it looked forty years ago:
http://viewfinder.english-heritage.org.uk/gallery/450/aa0/aa063952.jpg
Similar scene today. Look at the state of it!
http://www.urban75.org/brixton/photos/images/october-2007-07.jpg
I think the owners responsible for the disintegration of that building are the same people who now own (and are fucking up) our one.
Minnie_the_Minx
31-10-2007, 11:38
[quote=editor]Look how nice and clean and well-tended it looked forty years ago:
http://viewfinder.english-heritage.org.uk/gallery/450/aa0/aa063952.jpg
Similar scene today. Look at the state of it!
There was either something very intersting on television that day or those people were all standing there dreaming of the day they could afford a television :D
poster342002
31-10-2007, 11:40
Most of those buildings' upper levels still look pretty derelict even in the old photo. I wonder if they've been uninhabited all that time - from then right up till now? If so, are they stilll even usable or viable for any type of occupation at all, I wonder?
Donna Ferentes
31-10-2007, 11:46
I like "Wool Shop".
purves grundy
31-10-2007, 11:49
There was either something very intersting on television that day or those people were all standing there dreaming of the day they could afford a television :D
Little people in a box - what who how??
:eek: :confused:
I like "Wool Shop".
Back to basics innit? :cool: :D
dash_two
31-10-2007, 12:04
I liked it when high street shops had awnings (red-and-white stripes for the butcher) and those 'gentlemen's outfitters' which had a doorway recessed by about five feet or so allowing a bigger window display area ('you'll be a big hit with the ladies in this, sir').
There was either something very intersting on television that day or those people were all standing there dreaming of the day they could afford a television :D
bet it was the footie results; people used to do that back in the day
Donna Ferentes
31-10-2007, 12:18
They still do...
bet it was the footie results; people used to do that back in the dayI still do if I'm walking along Tottenham Court Road (yes, i know I can get the results on my phone in seconds, but I like seeing it onscreen).
Stobart Stopper
31-10-2007, 16:20
I think tattiness has happened in alot of areas. Walthamstow High St used to be really nice back in the 70's, now it's a shithole IMO. I remember when it had lots of decent, family run shops, a Marks and Spencers, Davis the upmarket clothes shop. It's horrible now, really run-down.
poster342002
31-10-2007, 16:24
I think tattiness has happened in alot of areas. Walthamstow High St used to be really nice back in the 70's, now it's a shithole IMO. I remember when it had lots of decent, family run shops, a Marks and Spencers, Davis the upmarket clothes shop. It's horrible now, really run-down.
Walthamstow seems to have declined very quickly in a very short period of time. I can remember it being similar to how you describe it previously being as recently as the early-mid nineties. A lot of London has become very grubby and unpleasant in the last 10 years or so, it seems.
untethered
31-10-2007, 16:37
People often underestimate the amount of time and money it'll take to maintain a building beyond its original purchase.
As time goes on, this becomes gradually more apparent.
Being the obsessive type, I went out and photographed the exact same scene as the 1960s shot: http://www.urban75.org/brixton/history/atlantic7.html
untethered
31-10-2007, 17:20
Being the obsessive type, I went out and photographed the exact same scene as the 1960s shot: http://www.urban75.org/brixton/history/atlantic7.html
Very good. :D
Did you ever get your copy of How Buildings Learn?
Very good. :D
Did you ever get your copy of How Buildings Learn?Yep. Flicking through it occasionally. It's a bit more US-centric than I would have liked, tbh.
untethered
31-10-2007, 17:25
Yep. Flicking through it occasionally. It's a bit more US-centric than I would have liked, tbh.
You tend to get that with American authors, though many of the ideas are more widely applicable.
Perhaps there's a gap in the market? (And if so, try to find a photo of it thirty years ago!)
lang rabbie
31-10-2007, 17:37
Yep. Flicking through it occasionally. It's a bit more US-centric than I would have liked, tbh.
The author, Stewart Brand, had to take the criticical remarks about Richard Rogers out of the UK edition because of the threat of legal action (http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0140139966/).
lemontop
31-10-2007, 18:02
I like "Wool Shop".
I wish that wool shop was still open!
Lock&Light
31-10-2007, 18:54
I was living in Stockwell forty years ago and well remember Atlantic Road at that time.
untethered
31-10-2007, 18:57
The author, Stewart Brand, had to take the criticical remarks about Richard Rogers out of the UK edition because of the threat of legal action (http://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/0140139966/).
I didn't know that.
I think my edition must be the UK one though I can't quite tell.
bluestreak
31-10-2007, 19:13
Walthamstow seems to have declined very quickly in a very short period of time. I can remember it being similar to how you describe it previously being as recently as the early-mid nineties. A lot of London has become very grubby and unpleasant in the last 10 years or so, it seems.
it was pretty grubby and unpleasant in the mid 90s when i used to hang around there.
Minnie_the_Minx
31-10-2007, 21:26
Being the obsessive type, I went out and photographed the exact same scene as the 1960s shot: http://www.urban75.org/brixton/history/atlantic7.html
Sorry matey, but there's no fog :p or was that smog? :D
Lock&Light
31-10-2007, 21:32
Sorry matey, but there's no fog :p or was that smog? :D
I can testify that it was smog. It was only towards the end of the sixties that the smog was finally conquered.
If you could catch a bus from Atlantic Road that would drop you off in 1955 how many of us would get on it?
- Poor air quality
- National Service
- Hardly any nice restaurants
- No cheap flights
- Cars rust and break down all the time
- Winston Churchill has to resign as PM.
- only 2 TV channels
- The Goons
- No interweb.
- Manchester United win the League.
- Polio still kills and cripples people
Minnie_the_Minx
01-11-2007, 09:11
If you could catch a bus from Atlantic Road that would drop you off in 1955 how many of us would get on it?
- Poor air quality
- National Service
- Hardly any nice restaurants
- No cheap flights
- Cars rust and break down all the time
- Winston Churchill has to resign as PM.
- only 2 TV channels
- The Goons
- No interweb.
- Manchester United win the League.
- Polio still kills and cripples people
how about listing the good things as well?
No mobile phones
No Starbucks
No MacDonalds
No Nail Bars
bit early in the morning for me to think at the moment
untethered
01-11-2007, 09:46
If you could catch a bus from Atlantic Road that would drop you off in 1955 how many of us would get on it?
- Poor air quality
- National Service
- Hardly any nice restaurants
- No cheap flights
- Cars rust and break down all the time
- Winston Churchill has to resign as PM.
- only 2 TV channels
- The Goons
- No interweb.
- Manchester United win the League.
- Polio still kills and cripples people
Oh you're close, so very close.
Of course, I'd want to take a nice train to 1955.
Surely many of the things you list are virtues (or the consequences of them are).
Rubbish cars? Fewer cars? Easier to walk and cycle? Fantastic.
Rubbish TV? Brilliant. It probably packs up around 9pm too. With the national anthem.
National Service was a wonderful idea bring it back.
Who needs cheap flights? Or for that matter, the Internet?
Etc.
poster342002
01-11-2007, 10:00
it was pretty grubby and unpleasant in the mid 90s when i used to hang around there.
You should see Walthamstow now. A lot of the market has dwindled and most of the shops are now those pseudo-pound shops (looks like a pound-shop, butthings cost more than £1), money-transfer and "phones unlocked" type-places. The cinema's long gone (ABC, I think it was ...) and the area's not somewhere you want ot hang around in too much after dark. :(
Even further down the road in Hoe Street, it's a shadow of it's past. I can remeber when that area - along with the Baker's Arms corner - was a heaving and bustling town centre with all manner of leading-brand shops and services.
Sad to see this area's decline - I have a lot of childhod memories of visiting there in it's heyday in the late 70s and 80s.
- Cars rust and break down all the timeAm I supposed to care on this one? Cars are a fucking noisy, polluting, all-dominating blight on the urban landscape, stopping kids playing around their houses, penning pedestrians into ever decreasing pavement spaces and uglifying areas.
Mind you, I would go bonkers with the lack of entertainment on offer in the 50s.
Minnie_the_Minx
01-11-2007, 10:23
Mind you, I would go bonkers with the lack of entertainment on offer in the 50s.
Then you'd have to become a criminal. After all, that's why kids are so busy getting into trouble nowadays isn't it, there's nothing for them to do.
Send 'em back to 1955 where they can entertain themselves on old bomb sites and play with catapults instead of fireworks and play in the middle of the road ;)
Lock&Light
01-11-2007, 10:53
Mind you, I would go bonkers with the lack of entertainment on offer in the 50s.
I lived on a remote Hebridean island in 1955, but even there there were many ways to be entertained. Radio was magical and books were widely available, (as indeed they still are if anyone still wants to use them). The Eagle comic was a weekly delight, while the lack of electricity, at least were I lived, meant bed-time stories were listened to in a candle-light atmosphere, which added to their impact. And that's only indoors. Outdoors was then a much safer and therefore entertaining place for young people to be, than it has become since then.
I lived on a remote Hebridean island in 1955, but even there there were many ways to be entertained. Radio was magical and books were widely available, (as indeed they still are if anyone still wants to use them). Thing is, you can't go back now and I like having ten zillion ways of listening to music, radio, watching video, TV, the internet etc.
Although we've definitely lost some good things along the way, I wouldn't want to live in the 1950s. I'll never forget the stupefying boredom of the 70s.
But I think I'd prefer walking around the streets in the 50s. Trams! Steam trains! Empty roads!
You really notice the bad state of those buildings when you're waiting for a train. Some of them look on the verge of collapse, and it's not hard to imagine the vermin they might house, so close to a food market.
Can't the owners be forced to do something before they become a real danger?
Does anyone know who DOES own them? It seems a pity to leave the upper parts empty and rotting away given the shortage of housing in London.....
I can't understand why people do this: I am a businessman and a landlord. I would not leave several perfectly good flats like this if they were mine.
Leaving aside the social responsibility argument - even the most money-oriented owner should see that they could make money if they fixed them up and then either sold them or rented them out.
In trendy Brixton surely they would be worth a fair bit?
Giles..
Minnie_the_Minx
01-11-2007, 11:21
Thing is, you can't go back now and I like having ten zillion ways of listening to music, radio, watching video, TV, the internet etc.
Although we've definitely lost some good things along the way, I wouldn't want to live in the 1950s. I'll never forget the stupefying boredom of the 70s.
But I think I'd prefer walking around the streets in the 50s. Trams! Steam trains! Empty roads!
There was a lot worse in the 70s than the boredom - the fashion for a start :eek: Bet you wore flairs
There was a lot worse in the 70s than the boredom - the fashion for a start :eek: Bet you wore flairsI think you mean 'flares', yes?
Middle bit of the 70s was supergroup boredom with a bit of glam thrown in, but the tail end of the decade was one of the best times to be a teenager with punk, new wave, ska, reggae and the likes of the Pistols, Clash, Joy Division, Talking Heads, X Ray Spex, Costello, Ramones, Blondie, Specials and the Ruts etc etc making it one of the best ever periods for music.
Minnie_the_Minx
01-11-2007, 11:28
I think you mean 'flares', yes?
Middle bit of the 70s was supergroup boredom with a bit of glam thrown in, but the tail end of the decade was one of the best times to be a teenager with punk, new wave, ska, reggae and the likes of the Pistols, Clash, Joy Division, Talking Heads, X Ray Spex, Costello, Ramones, Blondie, Specials and the Ruts etc etc making it one of the best ever periods for music.
yep, that's what I meant. I had flares as well - with lovehearts on the knees :o
agree with you on the music. I can't even think of any that I remember from the early 70s but then I'm probably a bit younger than you
sir.clip
01-11-2007, 11:33
Brixton is a dump....
Atlantic road is just an arm pit.. My old man cried when i took him back there as he said it was all broken.. he was born on Railton road in the 30's... I guess things were very different in Brixton back then..
I get sad looking at thoose particular buildings, neglected & crying out for a refurbishment, The Railway hotel is a pillar of demise...
Brixton needs an injection of cash just to keep these historic building intact before the whole lot crumbles down & a new glass structure is thrown up in its place....
There were many hat shops in the fifties - well there were still a few in the 70s
Also the USSR still existed so many of our posters could have emigrated to the now defunct Workers Paradise.
Or use the 5 quid assisted passage scheme to move to Australia
If you could catch a bus from Atlantic Road that would drop you off in 1955 how many of us would get on it?
- Poor air quality
- National Service
- Hardly any nice restaurants
- No cheap flights
- Cars rust and break down all the time
- Winston Churchill has to resign as PM.
- only 2 TV channels
- The Goons
- No interweb.
- Manchester United win the League.
- Polio still kills and cripples people
Not a great time to be black or a woman either. And what about all that kow-towing to the establishment?
Still at least you'd have Lucky Jim and Beyond The Fringe to look forward to.
and LSD was still legal, no fucker knew what magic mushrooms were so pick away like a nutter, MDMA was legal, everybody could get their mitts on speed in one form or another, VERY few people had a clue about weed so grow as much as you like no one would recognise it, tell yer doc you feel a bit depressed, six buckets of valium are yours and the scripts free.
The TVs boring so start a rock and roll band and be a the "cutting edge" like, get famous, etc
Personally I'd like a return so I could buy a house then have rented it out 50 years so that not only would the mortgage be paid, but here'd be a fair bit left over when I got back to now!!!!!!:D :D
Brixton is a dump....
no it's not... well, i'm from bradford :(
*loves brixton*
Brixton needs an injection of cash just to keep these historic building intact before the whole lot crumbles down & a new glass structure is thrown up in its place....
fair point :)
supercity
02-11-2007, 08:29
with my tinfoil hat on, I can see why it's in the best interests of the owners to collect the rents, let the buildings fall down, say they can't be repaired then build us a bright new shopping centre.
with my tinfoil hat on, I can see why it's in the best interests of the owners to collect the rents, let the buildings fall down, say they can't be repaired then build us a bright new shopping centre.
Maybe. Anyone know who DOES own them? Is it a private individual, a big company, even the council?
Giles..
The top floors of the striking building at the end of Electric Avenue (just seen in the pic) have been empty for years on end.
poster342002
02-11-2007, 14:09
The top floors of the striking building at the end of Electric Avenue (just seen in the pic) have been empty for years on end.
I can remember a whole row of houses up on Loughborough Road by Fiveways Corner that were derelict throughout the 80s - including one which had sheered away completely, displaying the remains of the staircase. No idea what state they're in now, though.
Mrs Magpie
04-11-2007, 11:19
Rebuilt, Housing Association.
quimcunx
04-11-2007, 12:22
Little people in a box - what who how??
:eek: :confused:
:) :)
'Ooh it just doesn't look natural in colour. I'm sticking to black and white.'
Walthamstow seems to have declined very quickly in a very short period of time. I can remember it being similar to how you describe it previously being as recently as the early-mid nineties. A lot of London has become very grubby and unpleasant in the last 10 years or so, it seems.
London's always been grubby.
The Atlantic road is great, I can buy all my hair oils, Jamaican food, fish and music in in about 30mins have a quick chat with some cousins then jump on the train home.
Its Great!! :D
Loupylou
05-11-2007, 02:52
My old man cried when i took him back there as he said it was all broken.. he was born on Railton road in the 30's... I guess things were very different in Brixton back then..
I get sad looking at thoose particular buildings, neglected & crying out for a refurbishment, The Railway hotel is a pillar of demise...
Brixton needs an injection of cash just to keep these historic building intact before the whole lot crumbles down & a new glass structure is thrown up in its place....
So was my Dad ! but when he (first) went back in the 80s he couldn't believe the yuppification (of a Rd off Railton Rd) & how posh it was ! Also more integration between black and white people.
But then he lived there til the early 70s - it had already gone well down hill decades before then.
He used to play (Jazz) gigs in the Railway :cool: and all the other live music pubs in Brixton. Brixton's about live music and Lambeth Council are activally working against the history by letting this happen.
Yossarian
05-11-2007, 06:50
If you could catch a bus from Atlantic Road that would drop you off in 1955 how many of us would get on it?
In 1955, food rationing had only ended a year earlier - if someone from 1955 got on a bus to 2007 and saw the amount and variety of food on offer, they'd probably think they'd died and gone to some slightly shabby heaven.
In 1955, food rationing had only ended a year earlier - if someone from 1955 got on a bus to 2007 and saw the amount and variety of food on offer, they'd probably think they'd died and gone to some slightly shabby heaven.They'd also probably think they'd walked into some bizarre, fucked up future when they saw people throwing away so much food without regard.
potential
05-11-2007, 11:05
Brixton is a dump....
Brixton needs an injection of cash just to keep these historic building intact before the whole lot crumbles down & a new glass structure is thrown up in its place....
brixton is in a sorry state, but why are you saying it needs an injection of cash ?
brixton has had more grants, improvement cash injections than anywhere
its the people who make it shit, you can have an army of road sweepers but if the locals dont give a fuck, pissing in the street, muggers drug dealers.
give me brixton in the 50's any day, nice neigbours, hardly no crime.
if a shop owner cant even keep the outside clean, what do you think the store rooms where the food is kept looks like
Brixton Hatter
05-11-2007, 11:10
Being the obsessive type, I went out and photographed the exact same scene as the 1960s shot: http://www.urban75.org/brixton/history/atlantic7.html
great photos, though I fear that if you took a few in colour you'd see even more how crap the street is now!
Maybe this is something people want to take up via "Future Brixton" - the council's latest wheeze on regeneration & consultation. They want us to tell them how to improve Brixton - here's your chance. (The LBL website appears to be up the creek tho, so I cant find the link!)
Brixton Hatter
05-11-2007, 11:11
give me brixton in the 50's any day, nice neigbours, hardly no crime.
Oh yeah, the Golden Age of the 1950s when everything was perfect and you could leave your door unlocked. :rolleyes:
I think maybe what the 50s had that we've lost now is a sense of optimism and excitement. A dreadful war was slowly fading into memory, there was a real prospect of living standards improving for people, the NHS was established, TV was becoming widely available, technology was improving at a rate of knots with people buying time saving appliances available and maybe people felt that things really were going to get better.
Fast forward 50-odd years and we've got everything they could have possibly wanted back then and we're not exactly bursting with joy and optimism, are we?
potential
05-11-2007, 11:46
imo people had a sense of belonging,
now its you out for what you can get
imo people had a sense of belonging,
now its you out for what you can getThat's not true for everyone, you know.
potential
05-11-2007, 12:04
That's not true for everyone, you know.
granted...
whenever my mum comes around she ask's to see all the old pic's of brixton and tells me she saw "gone with the wind" at the cinema thats now the fridge or spent ages looking in the windows at the clothes shop next to the bon marche...
but now if she wants to go shopping she will go to bromley or john lewis its just safer and thats soo tragic....
brixton is in a sorry state, but why are you saying it needs an injection of cash ?
brixton has had more grants, improvement cash injections than anywhere
its the people who make it shit, you can have an army of road sweepers but if the locals dont give a fuck, pissing in the street, muggers drug dealers.
give me brixton in the 50's any day, nice neigbours, hardly no crime.
if a shop owner cant even keep the outside clean, what do you think the store rooms where the food is kept looks like
Too right.
There's a block of flats that looks like a huge mansion just by the Harmony bar on Railton. There are quite a few families with young children living ther, yet I regularly see people going inside to urinate because it has a lot bushy greenery.
It really is quite disgusting.
The families actually had to put a sign up telling people not to piss in the garden where their children play.
Sadly those are the types of neighbours we have here, and there's no amount of grants or cash injections that will solve that.
poster342002
06-11-2007, 13:57
London's always been grubby.
This was/is indeed the case with parts of London, but it seems like more and more of it is falling into a shabby and rundown state.
Furthermore, the contrast between the central area and the rest has never been more stark, imo.
tarannau
06-11-2007, 14:02
I don't see this at all. When I was a nipper, huge swathes of South London were pretty much fucked - Brixton, Clapham, Battersea and the like all had crumbling multiple-occupancy housing stock. Now it's 3-wheeled pram territory, with even the tatty warehouses by the river replaced by luxury 350k one bed flat in a tower monstrosities by St George.
Camden, Kings Cross, even the Charlotte St area have been massively cleaned up. Even Croydon's gone all glass fronted and corporate welcoming.
Where and when are you thinking about Poster?
poster342002
06-11-2007, 14:10
I don't see this at all. When I was a nipper, huge swathes of South London were pretty much fucked - Brixton, Clapham, Battersea and the like all had crumbling multiple-occupancy housing stock. Now it's 3-wheeled pram territory, with even the tatty warehouses by the river replaced by luxury 350k one bed flat in a tower monstrosities by St George.
Camden, Kings Cross, even the Charlotte St area have been massively cleaned up. Even Croydon's gone all glass fronted and corporate welcoming.
Where and when are you thinking about Poster?
I think we're sort of coming full circle with it again. Many areas now are full of derelict shops and houses. The luxury flats are the preserve of a few.
Basically, we've got a return of a situation with a lot of impoverished people living in the grotty bits that the developers aren't interested in while the rich and big business live/function in almost surreally different luxury.
take Walthamstow - as mentioend further back. Once I can remember a bustling community there in the early 80s - but now it's in a right state.
tarannau
06-11-2007, 14:21
What? Are you really that delusional? Full circle in 30 years?
So in the mid-70's people around here all lived in perfectly-mixed harmony, in decent quality housing stock, thriving local shops and without huge contrasts in wealth.
Meanwhile, on earth, without the rose-tinted memories and belief that everything is much more miserable now...
I would say that in the last 10 years, many derelict places have been fixed up. The rise in prices made a lot of owners of run-down places realise that they were worth spending the money on, because they could then sell them for loads more......
It wouldn't surprise me if some of the Atlantic Road buildings are owned by some organisation that is too big or incompetent to see or care about the potential value of their near-derelict properties.
In my experience most individuals or small companies won't leave places empty because its their money they are wasting and they can see this.
Big organisations where no-one takes responsibility frequently seem to leave places to rot.
Giles..
Stobart Stopper
06-11-2007, 20:09
Brixton is going to be on tv tomorrow night, Inside Out, BBC1 at 7.30, something about buying guns in the area/gangs etc.
There was an article about it in today's Evening Standard.
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