258 Creek Road
Jonathan sent me a very interesting query this morning, then went a good way to solving it himself, but I am wondering if anyone else has any further info on this one...
He asked about that falling-down half-building on Creek Road, that has been held up by scaffolding for bloomin' ever. It's an oddity - and I confess I'd always assumed that it was just dead.
He then found a news story about a bookseller, who apparently still lives inside and runs an internet bookshop with over 100,000 books from its ten rooms. David Herbert apparently did up his place some years ago (he's been there for 35 years) but then suffered from "ill health" which prevented him from doing any more. Apparently the council has admitted responsibility for some tree roots creating subsidence (hence the scaffolding) but have presumably done nothing further because they were expecting him to move out for the Bardsley Lane development (the same that threatened the Lord Hood.) He's digging his heels in - or was, as of the news story in July 2006.
The trail runs cold - there is nothing new that I can find. I know the Lord Hood managed a compromise, but how about Number 258? I've been reading recently about how Sir Christopher Wren was obliged to keep The King's House and The Queen's House when he was designing The Old Royal Naval College. Look what he came up with. If Sir Chris could come up with something fab under compromise circumstances, surely the Bardsley Lane guys could manage to include an old house into the new buildings?
Does anyone else know what was decided? I haven't been able to find anything else about this - not even the online bookstore with its 100,000 books. What's going on? I think we should be told.
The links Jonathan sent are:
http://icsouthlondon.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0200southlondonheadlines/tm_objectid=17446091&method=full&siteid=50100&headline=trader-fights-for-home-name_page.html
http://www.london.gov.uk/mayor/planning_decisions/strategic_dev/2006/20060830/creek_road_bardsley_lane_report.pdf
He asked about that falling-down half-building on Creek Road, that has been held up by scaffolding for bloomin' ever. It's an oddity - and I confess I'd always assumed that it was just dead.
He then found a news story about a bookseller, who apparently still lives inside and runs an internet bookshop with over 100,000 books from its ten rooms. David Herbert apparently did up his place some years ago (he's been there for 35 years) but then suffered from "ill health" which prevented him from doing any more. Apparently the council has admitted responsibility for some tree roots creating subsidence (hence the scaffolding) but have presumably done nothing further because they were expecting him to move out for the Bardsley Lane development (the same that threatened the Lord Hood.) He's digging his heels in - or was, as of the news story in July 2006.
The trail runs cold - there is nothing new that I can find. I know the Lord Hood managed a compromise, but how about Number 258? I've been reading recently about how Sir Christopher Wren was obliged to keep The King's House and The Queen's House when he was designing The Old Royal Naval College. Look what he came up with. If Sir Chris could come up with something fab under compromise circumstances, surely the Bardsley Lane guys could manage to include an old house into the new buildings?
Does anyone else know what was decided? I haven't been able to find anything else about this - not even the online bookstore with its 100,000 books. What's going on? I think we should be told.
The links Jonathan sent are:
http://icsouthlondon.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0200southlondonheadlines/tm_objectid=17446091&method=full&siteid=50100&headline=trader-fights-for-home-name_page.html
http://www.london.gov.uk/mayor/planning_decisions/strategic_dev/2006/20060830/creek_road_bardsley_lane_report.pdf
Labels: Ask The Phantom, News
posted by The Greenwich Phantom at
10:12
5 Comments:
Aha! On some occassions you can see in through the windows to see rows and rows of books. One Saturday 2 or 3 months back the door was open onto Creek Road, as some kind of shop. So I'd go with the book store theory ...
So do you think it's open as a book shop? I can't find it as an online store.
We had a lady come into the Powder Monkey last Sunday asking for signatures to petition against the council who are trying to drive this person out. Unfortunately...she seemed to have a few screws loose, and broke down into fits of crying when we asked her to stop disturbing customers. From what I managed to decipher from her hysterics, there seems to be an ongoing battle to get this person out to pave the way for a "luxury development"...
Last summer, I often used to see the elderly bookeeper sitting outside this falling down old building campaigning with a placard to save his building. I took it upon myself to do some investigating of my own. I knocked on his door to see if I could help. The gentleman invited me in to the front room which clearly used to be a book shop with shelves and counter still apparentt. The room was in a very sorry state, the celing is rotten with damp, the whole place loked terrible, it was very Miss Haversham and I would not let a dog live in there let alone an elderly man. The gentleman told me that his elderly wife (must be in her 70's) was bed ridden and lived upstairs in their bedroom.
As many of the other comments have stated he is in a dispute with the council, they pulled down a building next to theirs and damaged their foundations causing the subsidence thus it is now being held up with scaffolding. The council have admitted responsibility, but as you know they are planning to build on this land and therfore are not repairing the builidng and the bookeeper and the council are at loggerheads.
I think this is a disgusting situation when there are two elderly people involved one of them bed ridden, that they should be living in such a dangerious house.
I also think the council need to think about the health and saftey aspect of all that scaffolding, which does not look safe. There is a large housing estate behind that building and I have often seem mothers struggling to get past that building especialy when it is raining, as the makeshift pavement between the building and the road becomes flooded.
I catch David now and again, mainly on a Saturday or Sunday, opening the bookshop, petitioning for the council to resolve the issues with the new development, sort out the consequences of the subsidence - I nearly offered to assist with the building of his online bookshop, but I cannot do it alone, and I don't know if he could afford to do it...
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