Author: Giles

Photos – thank you to Andrew Burns

Hundreds of saplings have been planted by volunteers in the Roding Valley Park, just next to the M11 in the area at the end of Elmcroft Avenue.

The tree planting was a project last weekend by Redbridge and the Trees for Cities organisation. It’s near a community orchard which was planted in 2016 and now has dozens of apple trees which are nearly mature.

Gold stars all round.

It never rains but it pours. Suddenly ANOTHER Wanstead profile has come on the scene. And that tells a different story to the happy tale published in MyLondon earlier in the week. Wanstead is apparently being ruined by snobs.

Noel McMahon, well known from his years as landlord at the Nightingale, told the paper: “It’s changed. It has lost its village status for what it used to be. It’s still a great community – but the attitude of some of the new arrivals has changed. They don’t have the same community feel.”

The most damning quotes though come from someone the Sun bravely doesn’t name, who EXCLUSIVELY tells the paper that people are “moving from central out here to get more for their money…. They’re up their own f***ing a***s.”

So it’s quite a controversial read. You can find it here. It’s in the Sun, which according to someone who would rather not be named, is ***** ******** ****, we can exclusively reveal.

We have a long history of picking apart articles written in the news about Wanstead, and the latest example to attract people’s attention was this profile in MyLondon.

It’s rare nowadays for news providers to send reporters out of the office (or away from their dining room table) to actually visit the places they are reporting on, so this is a welcome article, even though it was written by their “SEO Reporter” (ie the person who writes things to attract the attention of Google).

So some key quotes, wilfully taken out of context:

If you buy here, you stay here.

I mean, look at Gail’s, it’s packed the entire time.

The best thing about the area is that is has two stations

In the evening, it’s a ghost town.

But, surprise surprise, people in Wanstead love Wanstead though are anxious about the cost of living, rents, property prices and inequality.

One thing we did learn – the newsagents now known as Krishanco has been there for more than 100 years, well before gentrification. Long may it continue.

H/T Gaynor, and Ray

Roadside collections of Christmas trees are being extended into next week for Wanstead following “high demand”. Trees will still be collected on Monday and Tuesday by Redbridge Civic Services, the company which does rubbish and recycling collection for Redbridge.

After Wednesday trees can still be collected by only by arranging it through the council’s bulky item collection service.

Pop legend Feargal Sharkey paid a visit with friends to Wanstead Cricket Club on Friday. And since it was junior training night, some sort of pun like Teenage Cricks might be in order. Or, preferably, much better via the comments form below please.