Author: Wansteadium

Wed 4th July is Independents' Day on Wanstead High St. Pls SHOP LOCAL & choose independent stores/ cafes over chain stores. Thanks! 😉

— The Orange Tree (@TheOrangeTree) July 3, 2012

Just two years after it was closed to be fitted out under its new guise, the Wanstead Co-op is to shut again for a refit.

A planning application displayed at the shop refers to new air conditioning units, but the two-week closure implies some major work being done on the inside.

This will be welcomed by customers, especially if it results in shorter waits at the checkouts. Some self-service checkouts seem inevitable. And all in good time for the Olympics.

• There’s been an awful lot of talk about a plan to bring a London Grand Prix to the Olympic stadium, a plan apparently backed (with varying degrees of enthusiasm, depending which paper you read) by Bernie Ecclestone. And the people who dreamt up the plan, a point on which the world’s press is agreed, is a Wanstead-based company called Intelligent Transport Solutions Ltd. None of the world’s press, however, seems to have asked who this company is. Wansteadium just wonders, since it doesn’t appear to have a website. Or a listed phone number. And Companies House seems to know of only one company called Intelligent Transport Solutions Ltd. It was based in Bristol and was dissolved in 2010. Naturally, nothing would make this site happier than to discover that Wanstead is home to a firm which is playing such an exciting role in the nation’s life. So if you work for the firm, know where it is based, or know any more about it, please get in touch with us at wansteadium[at]gmail.com.

• An enormous inflatable Stonehenge is to appear on Christ Church Green on 11 August (just to alert you, in case you should be alarmed.)

• Eyebrows have been raised over the tone of publicity for a church which advertises meetings at Wanstead High School on Sunday mornings. Setting out its message in uncompromising terms, the leaflets include a controversial passage from Corinthians in which a 1st Century St Paul sets out that “neither fornicators, adulterers, idolaters, (male) prositutes, homosexual offenders, thieves, greedy, drunkards, slanderers nor swindlers will enter the kingdom of God”. Clearly some churches embrace the harder lines of scripture, as is their right. But at least one resident is wonder if it’s right for them to use state school buildings to do so.

• Police have announced that during the Olympics they will be using powers under a dispersal order zone to move on groups of two or more from Wanstead Flats, if they believe they are behaving in an anti-social manner. More details at the Wanstead Guardian

• And to make everyone happy, a slice of a Sunday afternoon walk from Wansteadium reader @historybeagle.

• Wansteadium reader Simone reports that the parakeets are back. She writes:

Has anyone else spotted green parakeets in the area? A few years ago these were quite common near Hampton Court and Greenwich, but they’ve recently taken up residence in our area (I’m sure our trees make lovely homes!) At first I thought there were one or two, but I saw a flock the other night, of around a dozen or so. I’ve also heard and seen one or two in Wanstead Park and in Epping Forest (Chingford).

UPDATE: Reader Tim suggests in Comments that the Grand Prix company is actually Intelligent Transport Services Ltd, and is based in New Wanstead. Details of the company are here. It was incorporated in May last year.

It’s the foot of a deer.

Number two in a series.

• Whisper it… but something tasteful seems to be going on at the site of the old chocolate shop on Wanstead High Street. Readers may remember the sense of outrage when the old building – which had been part of a 19th Century row of cottages along the high street – suddenly wasn’t there any more, in 2009. The Wanstead Society was cross with Redbridge Council for, it said, failing to protect the building. The developer however insisted he was going to rebuild to the same design. It’s taken its time, but something not at all dissimilar appears to be taking shape. (Image, left, Google Streetview).

• Something not seen on Wansteadium before: a story from Mail Online. See the changes in Leyton High Road where shopfronts have been tidied up in time for the Olympics. It leaves quite an impression….

• But here’s something to cheer up the traders of Wanstead High Street.