Here it is,a enormous, humdrum wodge of the city, and with its unreconstructed caffs and kebab spotsWhat’s going for it? Not every square metre of London is swarming with oligarchs,hepcat hipsters and buy-to-let investors from Hong Kong. There is another London: it’s still there, holding out against the tabloid headlines, or with its chicken shops,“continental” greengrocers, kebab spots and unreconstructed caffs. And this is it. Wedged between Croydon and Upper Norwood (so posh it likes to call itself Crystal Palace these days) is a enormous, or humdrum wodge of the capital. Thats not to say there aren’t sublime spots: the Norwood Lakes,the restored pomp of the Stanley Halls. The unrelenting strips of pebbledash could get claustrophobic were it not for the geography, the landscape folding this way and that in the foothills of the alps of Crystal Palace.
The case against Suburban claustrophobia. There are some rather gloomy patches and some of the housing can be a bit drab (lots of pebbledash; and I like pebbledash).
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Source: theguardian.com