Vauxhall Grove,London
 

Anyone heard of this area? It is suppossed to be a relatively unknown but small "charming" residential area just southeast of the Vauxhall bridge. We are considering renting an apt. there for our visit. Anyone know the area? Are we taking a chance on that location? Thanks!!

Fodors<BR> <BR>I live four miles away, and cycle one street distant from Vauxhall Grove about four times a year. I have to admire the chutzpah of the huckster who sold you this line. Vauxhall Grove is a single street, no doubt charming enough -- I've not been on it. It is not a residential area, nor part of one. It is a steet in a triangle, of which the sides are Lambeth Road, a wide one-way street for day and night southbound trucks, busses and cars, Harleyford Road, a westbound one-way street of similar width and use, and Vauxhall Park, a small park, I think run-down, set amongst tower blocks of social housing apartments.<BR><BR>Once you've got yourself safely over Lambeth Road communications are quite good, as you've direct tube trains to Green Park (on Piccadilly) and Oxford Circus, and direct trains to Waterloo, for the London Eye, the National Theatre, and South Bank concert halls. Two stops southbound by bus takes you to Old South Lambeth Road, where the Vasco da Gama is a Portugese pub that serves good and cheap Portugese meals, and wine at your table at five pounds a bottle.<BR><BR>"Relatively unknown" ? This time, they're understating the case !<BR><BR>Please write if I can help further. If you offer me a pint I might go along to see the road itself.<BR><BR>Welcome to London -- but I hope not to Vauxhall<BR><BR>Ben Haines<BR><BR><BR>

Great response, Ben. You and Susan might be interested in this excerpt from an article in the Guardian, June 10, 2000, describing a walk from Kennington Park to the King's Road, Chelsea:<BR><BR>"Then I'd go down Harleyford Road, which is a traffic-infested sewer, and turn off through Vauxhall Grove," he says. "It's an unknown area full of quite charming houses, with some very strange trees and plants. It must be the least-known residential area in central London." This brings him to "the horrors" of Vauxhall Cross, one of the most despoiled and blighted corners of London, where six major routes collide...<BR><BR>The full article can be found at:<BR>http://travel.guardian.co.uk/activit...424685,00.html

Thanks Ben and Ron for the quick replies. I had pulled the description from the same narrative tour of the area! The Apt. is through THE LONDON CONNECTION which appears to be a reputable firm. We dont care so much about charming and residential...SAFETY is our main concern. And, as we will be bringing our 3 kids,the very reasonable rent is appealing. The apt. looks great on the web site, as does the video of the street itself...but pictures can be very deceptive!<BR><BR>Ben...Are you interested in a good Portuguese meal (wine included) sometime the second week of August?? Thanks again, Susan

I now think you should book. If young, the chikldren should take much care in using the lights to cross the main road safely. <BR><BR>I'll go along in a week or two to see the road. I'm intrigued: the Guardian is a reliable newspaper.<BR><BR>Can you please tell me what parts of London are not safe ?<BR><BR>Ben Haines<BR><BR>

Ben, did you change your opinion so you can get the Portugese meal? :-) (Sorry, just had to get that dig in.)

For Linda: Watch this space.<BR><BR>Ben Haines

Fodors <BR><BR><BR>I had time today between music at lunchtime and hearing a lecture at teatime, so I popped along from Waterloo to Vauxhall. The Grove and neighbouring streets are too small, to form an area, but they do form a neighbourhood, green and pleasant. Whether "charming" depends on how you use that word.<BR><BR>The drawback is heavy traffic at either end of the road, with teraffic noise that oenetrates into the street. The same traffic presents problems on crossing the road to the station: to live you have to use the timed pedestrian crossings.<BR><BR>Otherwise, my earlier note was about right. So, should you stay there ? Up to you, but on balance I think yes.<BR><BR>Bad news fro the Vasco da Gama. It is wholly unchanged, with good cheap food and outdoor tables, but a bottle of house red is eight pounds fifty.<BR><BR>I look forward to learning from you of unsafe places in London. An in general, please write if I can help further.<BR><BR>Ben Haines<BR>

Don't do it!

Ben, You are a peach!! Thanks so much for checking the Vauxhall area. We will rent the apartment. Remember,we have 3 kids... maybe the traffic noise will drown-out their fighting...traffic noise is SO much more soothing, don't you think?<BR><BR>Do you mean London has no unsafe (crime-wise)neighborhoods?? Can you feel a sense of personal safety wherever you go<BR>night or day all over the city? We are from Chicago...and certainly do not have that luxury! <BR><BR>So...will it be 6 for Acorda a alentejana with a nice

Rojoes a minahota to follow?? We will be there Aug. 10 - 16. We would love to see you there!! Susan

Susan. About one in three of the big estates of social housing in tower block apartments some three miles from Piccadiully Circus is unsafe. The estate near you in Vauxhall is not among them. You can tell them because the police walk in pairs.<BR><BR>In a limited area of central Soho there are clubs upstairs or downstairs from street level that offer friendly and half-naked hostesses. They also offer compulsory drinks at fifty pounds a glass, and burly men to make sure you pay up. <BR><BR>Can I help at all on any particular interests, enthusiasms, or school or college special topics for the children ? How old are they ?<BR><BR>Perhaps you could phone me in August from Vauxhall and we'll compare diaries ? Meanwhile, please write about the children or on any other matfer where I might help.<BR><BR>Mel: If you'll tell us why Susan shouldn't do it she and we will be able to think it over.<BR><BR>Ben Haines<BR>

Susan: Please would you e-mail me ? My software can't find you by e-mail, and I'd like to send you my phone number.<BR><BR>Ben Haines

Tower blocks= the projects!!

I disagree with Ben that the area is undesirable. Having lived near the area for a couple of years I think it is quite good. There is an excellent vegetarian cafe and an excellent community feeling at Vauxhall Grove - although somewhat hippy like. There are good Portuguese and Spanish restaurants on South Lambeth Road (a few minutes walk). I agree the traffic is bad but name me somewhere in central London where the traffic isn't? Also good clubs nearby (mostly gay though). Vauxhall is suprisingly central and the Vauxhall grove has a nice buzz to it.

Fodors <BR><BR>I don't think I said the area is undesirable. On balance, I said the enquirer and family should use Vauxhall Grove, and from the start I said that Vauxhall is pretty central for busses, tubes, and trains.<BR><BR>Peter knows, but overseas readers may not, that there's an inner ring road for London, not specially built but composed of normal streets widened and ofen turned into one-way streets, about a mile from Piccadilly Circus. Readers with a map of London can trace it: Kings Cross, Angel, Commercial Street, Aldgate, Tower Bridge, Elephant and Castle, Vauxhall, Victoria, Hyde Park Corner, Marble Arch, Baker Street. That gives a circumference. Wherever main roads run radially across that circumference there's heavy traffic, and pedestrians are second class road users, controlled by lights, sent down pedestrian tunnels, coralled by fences, and so on. This is mildly unpleasant anywhere it happens, but especially so when there are no shops or pubs to soften the sense of living in a motorway. If I pick the bottom places I get Vauxhall, Old Street, Aldgate, the edges of the Tower, and the Elephant (which the Borough of Southwark wants to rebuild entirely). By subtraction this leaves Kings Cross, Angel, Victoria, Hyde Park Corner, Marble Arch, and Baker Street as heavily trafficked, but bearable. But "somewhere in London" that has hotels and apartmens and is not in this sense trafficky, includes Bloomsbury, Convent Garden, the Strand, south of Victoria, Earls Court, South Kensington (but Gloucester Road is trafficky), Kensington High Street, Paddington, Mayfair (away from the Park). In all of these traffic is far less dominant than it is at Vauxhall.<BR><BR>I'll be glad to comment further if so asked.<BR><BR>Ben Haines, London<BR><BR><BR><BR><BR><BR>