| Your Letters
Dear N16
It’s an ongoing argument between me and my other half. ‘Stokey wouldn't be Stokey if we were on the tube map’, he says.
No tube means a 'village atmosphere', he says. Cycling and walking and smiling at slightly unstable people on the bus to work is so much more civilised than all that faffing around with copies of Metro and getting intimate with the scent of a million strangers' underarms on the miserable old underground.
But if, like me, you aren't blessed with a short morning stroll to your boutique business on Church Street, and must instead venture out of N16 to earn your crust – it isn't quite so beautiful. And for the truly damned and cursed among us, it is a living hell. Yes, I'm talking about those of us who rely on the 393 bus to take us to (what I insist is) the oasis of civilisation that is Highbury tube station (ah, lovely lovely Highbury... once there, the possibilities are endless!). I have lived all over London, from Kilburn to Camberwell, and I have never experienced such a poor excuse for a bus service in my thirty years as a London resident.
Waiting for the 393 at any hour, never mind the rush hour, is like waiting for Clissold Leisure Centre to re-open. Blind optimism means you never quite give up hope... but you know that the bookies would give you better odds if you put your money on Stokey traffic wardens putting away their ticket books and taking a tea break occasionally.
Once or twice in my lifetime, like a little red apparition hurtling down Church Street, the 393 has deigned to put in an appearance. A 393, I hear your cry? What? A real, live 393? Are my eyes deceiving me? It’s like seeing Father Christmas and the Tooth Fairy getting rat-arsed together down at the Rochester Castle! Amazing! But inevitably, the mirage disappears in a puff of exhaust fume, as the bus either completely blanks the bus stop (so heaving is it with shell-shocked N16-ers, blinking into the daylight in disbelief that they are the chosen ones who get to ride the mythical 3...9...3!), or stops for five seconds to let one person squeeze on, leaving gangs of weary workers screeching 'stick your Oyster card where the sun don't shine, Mr Bus Driver!' in its trail.
Have I made my point? The 393 bus is infrequent, unreliable, doesn't appear on any of the 'next bus due' monitors at bus stops and is, in short, rubbish. Why is Stoke Newington so under-served for transport? And who can tell me what is being done to address this? Answers on a postcard please.
Aisling Colfer, N16
Dear N16,
With regard to the City-worker's friend (Issue 32), who didn't think they'd be able to stand the commute to Canary Wharf, and just in case this has put people off, I commuted to the Isle of Dogs for over a year, and it was quite easy. I worked near the London Arena, so from Stokey Station I'd either get a 106 and then a D6, or any bus to Dalston and then the 277, after which I'd take a pleasant walk over the Wilkinson Bridge to Crossharbour. On the way back, I'd quite often shop at Canary Wharf, or get off at Dalston and walk home, doing a bit of shopping along the way. Biking it along the Lee Valley, through Mile End Park is also pretty straight forward too. Hope this puts the record straight – getting to Canary Wharf is pretty easy from Stokey.
Regards, David Cohen, Margaret Road, N16
Dear N16
Like Charlie Phillips, I always read N16, but it’s only since he has written to you that I’ve felt compelled to contribute to your Letters page.
1. Charlie loves the CPZ. He wants us all to use public transport, or walk. He imagines we never stopped to consider the environment before people painted red lines all over the road, making life still more difficult for Stokey’s independent retailers. Only Charlie did, in his green underpants. And he’s right – I’m so loaded and ignorant, I fly the 20 yards to my local store using an iceberg-powered jet-pack.
2. We’re thinking that Charlie is a ‘raging leftie’, he worries. (Yes, Charlie, you just care too much.) And to prove the point, he disagrees with something that Penny Rimbaud said in the magazine. That’s Penny Rimbaud who co-founded Crass, who practically squatted Thatcher’s pocket.
3. Charlie asks, ‘Does anyone in N16 actually support Spurs and Arsenal?’ As the bloke who writes View from the Lane (for free, in case you think I’m trying to save my capitalist bacon), this cut to the quick. Charlie, believe me, as a Spurs fan – the bastard area is heaving with Gooners. ‘I always see more Galatasary and Besiktas shirts around here’, he says. I was hoping to word a cogent riposte to that. But all I can think of is: You prat.
4. Charlie says the magazine is ‘far, far, far too obsessed with restaurants’. It’s barely worth the printer’s ink, but: just check the ratio of features on restaurants to features on anything but in the last issue. One half-page food review in 44 pages. Just be glad you have a local magazine, supporting the area, for nothing. Some people have to pay to read a national publication, the Guardian, say, then lecture everyone on all they’ve learned while browsing organic leeks in Fresh & Wild.
5. Look, I’m bored now. Anyone who uses the phrase (with quote marks), ‘Stokey has a whole load of ‘personalities’’ is stomping all over thin ice.
Charlie reckons that kids don’t need protecting from him behind windscreens. I’d keep my son behind glass if Charlie were in the area, just in case talking sanctimonious drivel is catching.
Sorry to moan, I’ve got it out now, I’m okay.
Nick Griffiths
Dear N16
Since August 18th I haven't had a car. At first I thought I'd get a green car, probably a Prius, but manufacturing a car is very polluting and then it takes up space and I'm realising I really don't need a full-time car. My needs are occasional & mostly flexible. What I would like to do is to buy into someone else's car, sharing costs of keeping it on the road. I need help with two things: finding someone and working out a fair financial arrangement. You'd think some green organization would have a blueprint but I haven't found it yet. It occurs to me some people might be prepared to share a car for single-day use but not for periods, in which case I could rent for holidays. Anybody out there have any ideas?
Amanda Welch, Norcott Rd N16
Dear N16
It has only recently occurred to me that aircraft have been flying rather low over our area at night.
It was only two nights ago when, as I was about to drop off to sleep, I heard the loud whine of an aircraft engine. It was loud enough for me to think that it was landing in Clissold Park (perhaps the bowling green perhaps?). It happened again last night and I could almost make out the undercarriage wheels! Is it just me nit-picking or have aircraft landing approaches been diverted over our area at night?
Stan, Carysfort Road, N16
Dear N16
I would just like to say that I think Hamdy Shahein is a complete legend for refusing to sell porn in his shop. I am absolutely against the Sun, the Daily Star and the Daily Sport as well as pornography and Playboy. I think that it is great that somebody stepped up and said ‘No, I do not want to sell this in my shop’. I would like to congratulate him for making ‘personality of the month’ and to tell him keep up the good work.
The Lukashi family, N16
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