A second home in the city

The following blog entry is either news report from the future or a vague stab at satrical humour, only time will tell.

‘It used to be such a community’ remarked Crispin Huntington-Thorp ‘People knew each other, that’s gone now.’

Crispin lives in a very changed London, since the great recession of the late noughties people living in the cities have had their way of life slowly eroded. Things weren’t always like this, it used to be that well paid people in the towns would have second homes in the countryside but due to the financial crisis the situation has been reversed.

Now poor city bankers who just want to scrape a living and preserve their way of life are increasingly being forced to sell their houses to people from Cornwall and other rural areas to avoid bankruptcy. Humble traders and commodity brokers are being pushed out of family houses that have been in the family for perhaps up to a generation to make way for housing for cattle and land for food.

‘It’s disgusting how they are changing this area,’ continues Crispin ‘someone should do something before it’s too late. Second homes are destroying the character of Kensington.’

It’s a very different Kensington these days, The Chelsea Tractor has been replaced by a real Tractor and cows can often be seen being driven down the high street on the way to their milking sheds. Even the smell is different with the horrific fumes of freshly cut hay and clovers drifting across whole areas of South West London.

Some parts of the capital have suffered more than others, typically the areas where people were likely to have a second home in the countryside – the sort of people who overreached to have that bolt hole in Dorset are the ones paying the price now.

People like Amanda Chumley-Warner. ‘Once they get into an area they ruin it. First to go are the expensive delis, Farming people don’t want them and so they can’t stay in business. It’s impossible to get Parma ham on the Fulham Road now. If I want essentials like Avocado Oil I have to go for miles to get them. There used to be a little knickknack shop on every street corner where I could spend money on little expensive things when ever I wanted and that’s gone too. Farming people just want to by wellies and animal feed, most of their food is reasonably priced and locally sourced it’s disgusting.’

It’s not just the shops that are suffering as waves of new people come into the area who don’t want to buy Mongolian Carpets or Cath Kidston Yurts. The local wine bars are suffering as well. One owner, who declined to be named, said the following.

‘It used to be that you could expect to shift a few bottles of stupidly pricey red to the regulars when they would come in, but that’s gone now. All the wine bars are suffering. The local people can’t afford to come here anymore. Restaurants are in trouble too, the influx of rural types who don’t want our sort of food is forcing some people out of business. It’s all ploughman’s lunches and disgustingly simple food with fresh ingredients now, who wants to eat that?’

The outlook for the next generation is bleak too. Local children can’t afford to get on the property ladder because of the raised prices and all the houses being used to store grain and cattle. The young adults of London now all talk of moving out to the countryside to make some money, they don’t want to leave the city but, for them the only way of getting a living is to move to a rural area.

‘Whole areas of London are now ghost towns during the week.’ Said Sebastian, a bright fifteen year old ‘It’s those second home bastards, they don’t realise that their holiday home means that proper local people can’t get homes. Not that I want to stay in the city, there is no future for it. My family have lived in Notting Hill for generations working in PR and consultancy but there is no chance of that for me.’

‘People move to the city because they have this dream of an urban life with cars and smog and things but the moment they get here they change it. They idyllic view of living in somewhere like Maida Vale doesn’t match up to the reality – cars smell, but they don’t want that so they get them banned and it’s the locals that suffer. I hate everyone who has a second home in the city.’

Sebastian’s words echo down a Sloane Street that is forever changed, gone are the exciting clothes shops and fashion boutiques to be replaced by yet more places selling animal feed and post offices. The latter makes Sebastian spit with rage

‘Post offices? Why is it that every part of London has to have a post office? It’s disgusting, it seems almost every day another of our essential upmarket delicatessens is closed down to make way for yet another bloody Post office.’

With that Sebastian marches off towards Knightsbridge. We all have to wonder what sort of future people like him will have, and if the government will realise in time that this precious urban way of life needs to be preserved. Even the Cityside Alliance’s march didn’t make a difference, so what will?

For Sebastian’s sake I hope something is done soon.