Safest/most convenient area to stay in London
Nov 17th, 1999, 02:09 PM
#2
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The only unsafe areas of London are a dozen areas of social housing in point blocks in the suburbs. They are ugly, and no tourist has any reason to go there. The space in front of Kings Cross main line station has prostitutes, but they are dressed for their trade and you'd be unworried. <BR> <BR>In my view, the best place to stay is near Trafalgar Square and Covent Garden. Starting with the cheapest, some 100 dollars a night, this gives you <BR>Travellers Inn, County Hall, Westminster Bridge Road <BR>The Royal Adelphi, Villiers Street <BR>The Regent Palace, Glasshouse Street <BR>The Strand Palace <BR>The Charing Cross Hotel <BR>The Savoy <BR> <BR>Each of these has a web site. You're then walking to the Royal palaces, the south bank sites, the National Gallery and National Portrait Gallery, Westminster, the Courtauld, the Royal Academy, most West End theatres, Covent Garden, and many shops and restaurants. Busses run you to Oxford Street, St Paul's, the Tower and the City, and the District Line to the South Kensington Museums. <BR> <BR>Does your city have unsafe areas ? <BR> <BR>Ben Haines, London <BR>
Nov 17th, 1999, 02:45 PM
#3
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Ben, some cities do have unsafe areas in the core. Two years ago visiting San Fransisco my wife and I walked through the most expensive residential area to an area called Japantown. From there we started following a strait line to an area called Hiaght Ashbury. Well, don't do that. We had gone about a mile when a police cruiser pulled up beside us and the officer smiled at us quizically and asked us what we were doing there. He had us hop into the back and he drove us out of that area because he was afraid for our safety. So don't get uppish over simple questions
Nov 18th, 1999, 12:52 AM
#4
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Goodness, I'd no plan to get uppish. Rather, I thought there might be some kind of divide of history or culture between Lisa's city and mine. I still don't know about her city, but your tale of San Francisco well serves to make a point that I thought might turn out to be worth repeating. Cultures of countries and their cities are different, and it helps visitors if they have a feel for major differences. As you say, the police in a great US city can see certain highways as unsafe. I'm keen to show a difference here: I've never found a highway in London that police, or I, think unsafe. Some social housing areas, yes, highways no. <BR> <BR>I hope this explains matters, but please write again if I can comment further. <BR> <BR>Ben Haines <BR> <BR>
Nov 18th, 1999, 04:30 AM
#5
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Let me take up for Ben Haines, whose comments and helpfulness over the years have been solid gold. American cities, indeed urban areas almost worldwide, have undergone many changes in recent decades. Areas that once were free of street crime have fallen on hard times. Areas that once were slums have undergone "gentrification." Chicago is a perfect example of how waves of immigration over the past 125 years have completely changed the character of many neighborhoods. Same with London. And watch what is happening with Berlin today. Ben's recommendations, from my personal experience, are correct. Our recent stays in London have shown that even the West End -- once the epitome of safety and civility -- has its seedier areas. And around the South Bank and the Tower of London -- once a zone of toughs -- has almost been completely rebuilt. My personal preference is a place where there are many other persons on the street during most hours -- yet that did not keep us from being mugged at knifepoint at midday on a busy boulevard one block from the Presidential Palance (La Moneda) in Santiago, Chile.
Nov 19th, 1999, 07:45 AM
#7
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I'm grateful to Al both for kind words and for developing upon the divide of culture that I had thought might be lying in wait in these notes. The line that troubles me is "waves of immigration over the past 125 years have completely changed the character of many neighborhoods. " True enough, in both our countries. But in context, does that mean "changed for the worse". If so, the line may be true in the States. What I want to say is that it is not true in London. Immigration and street crime are not co-incident here. Poverty and crime are co-incident, though even then the two do not map out perfectly one with another -- we are pretty poor in Peckham, but our style of crime is car theft, not street assault and theft. <BR> <BR>It follows that I agree that even the West End has its seedier areas, but do not think that these areas are especially subject to crime. In the West End the main crime is financial swindling by men in suits, and the main street crime is picking pockets and stealing bags. That goes on wherever tourists are gathered (Big Ben, Buckingham Palace, and so on) which are respectable addresses (except that I hear that some Earls of old family think the Windsors are parvenu). <BR> <BR>In London, those who say "immigration leads to crime" are racists, and are tiresome. <BR> <BR>Ben Haines
Nov 25th, 1999, 05:17 AM
#9
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Maybe the difference can be illustrated by an experience I had in London five years ago. My friend and I enjoyed a dinner cruise on the Thames. When we disembarked, we took a walk by Nelson's Monument, etc. and missed the last tube to our hotel in South Kensington...it was about 10:30 p.m. My friend, who lived in England, suggested we walk to the hotel. I was really nervous, as you just wouldn't do that in America...two women alone on the streets of a large city at midnight. On the way,I saw a bobby and stopped him to ask if we were safe. He gave me SUCH a quizzical look and said, "why, yes, madam...you're perfectly safe", as if "why would you even ask?" That is when the difference was SO clear to me between London and New York, or between Great Britain and America. Don't want to give America a bad name here, but we forget how different things are! I have never felt as cautious in London or even Rome as I might routinely feel here.
