I walked around Somers Town and the areas adjacent to it recently. impressive how the main estate appears to have kept a distinct feel and community in such a central location, surrounded by big train stations and developments. that whole area from Regent's Park Estate to Somers Town feels like a bit of a forgotten area considering where it is, in both a good and bad way.
King's Cross - events, photos, news, Coal Drops Yard and redevelopment
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jimbarkanoodle
Well-Known Member
i like that about Somers Town too. I also like to go to The Cock Tavern on occasion for a Celtic match, brilliant pub.
I walked past there. seemed like an everyone knows each other sort of place, albeit a bit moody to an outsider perhaps!
is it a bit of an Irish area then?
jimbarkanoodle
Well-Known Member
Doubt it, its more likely that the pub is a bit of a relic leftover from the days of large waves of Irish immigration to North London 50 or 60 years ago.
ska invita
back on the other side
really agree....whats amazing about the kings cross wider area is how residential it is and how relatively peaceful and pleasent the little pockets of estates are ...theres somers town but also south of the euston road (officially called st pancras that area i think)...the barnsbary estate off the caledonian road...south east towards cerkenwell...in fact in every direction apart from the coals drop redevelopment - though even when you go north of there theres great social housing as you get into south east camden
the problem is developers never forget, so this area is far from forgotten, and im sure every vulture is eying it up ...... unlike somewhere like the aylesbury estatein elephant the housing stock remains in great condition though, so it would take some running down.
ska invita
back on the other side
theres a big irish community up the caledonian road.....theres about 7 irish pubs on it...
somers town very mixed
yep. a lot going on around Mornington Crescent but not sure if that's all train related.
ska invita
back on the other side
pinkmonkey
2.4 hour party person
I’m bumping this thread because I brought my 82 year old mother for a 2 day London visit Fri/Sat, first touristic visit, now I don’t live here anymore. The main purpose of our visit was to see Raye at the O2 Arena, but I thought Coal Drops would be a good place to go, straight off the train as she can no longer walk miles although she’s pretty fit we have to no overdo things.
We first went to look at what used to be Bagleys Warehouse because we have a connection to the Bagleys family. They owned one of the three huge glassworks (all still operating) in our town. Raw materials were delivered by canal, until the mid 80’s and the finished glass items were originally shipped by the canal to this warehouse in Kings Cross for distribution. Our connection to the Bagleys family is my grandparents flat was in one of their converted mansions, my grandfather worked in the factory inspecting finished glass and one of my great uncles worked in production ‘a peeled potato in the furnace for cloudy glass, rusty nails for amber glass.’ My father bought some land off them to build his house on. ETA and my other grandfather worked as furnace foreman at Bagleys in the 70’s.
There was a craft and food market, which was pretty touristic, but mum loved it.
On the way home, yesterday, mum was really tired and I needed groceries so I left her waiting in the seating area in Kings X station so I could go back to the big Waitrose at Coal Drops yard. This is the other reason for my post.
I left London 3 years ago and there’s several things that were noticeable to me on my visit. Takeaway/casual dining has doubled in price since the pandemic. It’s gone up in Yorks, but not as much. Another thing is street homeless, obviously increased. We have beggars in my town too, we’ve never had them before, not even in the 80’s when there was a serious heroin problem.
When I returned, mum was chatting to a woman about 10 years young than she, apparently she’d been targeted by an aggressive beggar and this kind woman had come to sit with her to distract the beggar.
There were several very aggressive/desperate and addicted, street homeless, going around the seated area over and over again. They didn’t ask for change once, they asked several times and they were intimidating. Really in your face, like boundary overstepping. I got called a cunt, which was nice. Could see no police and no security anywhere whereas in the past, I’ve seen them escorted out.
Also despite the shiny designery newness of the stations, there was evidence of a serious shortage of willing workers, the swish ladies toilets in St Pancras were completely unattended and resembled nightclub bogs at dawn, rubbish piling up in there, in the cubicles, no paper, no soap. Some of the food places we went to were understaffed and dirty. I guess Brexit and the cost of living in the capital has had a big effect. The enshittification of everything?
We first went to look at what used to be Bagleys Warehouse because we have a connection to the Bagleys family. They owned one of the three huge glassworks (all still operating) in our town. Raw materials were delivered by canal, until the mid 80’s and the finished glass items were originally shipped by the canal to this warehouse in Kings Cross for distribution. Our connection to the Bagleys family is my grandparents flat was in one of their converted mansions, my grandfather worked in the factory inspecting finished glass and one of my great uncles worked in production ‘a peeled potato in the furnace for cloudy glass, rusty nails for amber glass.’ My father bought some land off them to build his house on. ETA and my other grandfather worked as furnace foreman at Bagleys in the 70’s.
There was a craft and food market, which was pretty touristic, but mum loved it.
On the way home, yesterday, mum was really tired and I needed groceries so I left her waiting in the seating area in Kings X station so I could go back to the big Waitrose at Coal Drops yard. This is the other reason for my post.
I left London 3 years ago and there’s several things that were noticeable to me on my visit. Takeaway/casual dining has doubled in price since the pandemic. It’s gone up in Yorks, but not as much. Another thing is street homeless, obviously increased. We have beggars in my town too, we’ve never had them before, not even in the 80’s when there was a serious heroin problem.
When I returned, mum was chatting to a woman about 10 years young than she, apparently she’d been targeted by an aggressive beggar and this kind woman had come to sit with her to distract the beggar.
There were several very aggressive/desperate and addicted, street homeless, going around the seated area over and over again. They didn’t ask for change once, they asked several times and they were intimidating. Really in your face, like boundary overstepping. I got called a cunt, which was nice. Could see no police and no security anywhere whereas in the past, I’ve seen them escorted out.
Also despite the shiny designery newness of the stations, there was evidence of a serious shortage of willing workers, the swish ladies toilets in St Pancras were completely unattended and resembled nightclub bogs at dawn, rubbish piling up in there, in the cubicles, no paper, no soap. Some of the food places we went to were understaffed and dirty. I guess Brexit and the cost of living in the capital has had a big effect. The enshittification of everything?
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Absolutrly loads of free outdoor film screenings this summer.
Anyone been before?
Whats it like?
Anyone been before?
Whats it like?
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