Roof work in Ham Street

I live in the hope that a lot of scaffolding and sheeting means that something exciting is happening inside. I am often wrong in this but I like the tension of waiting to see the end result.

Then and now: 18 Mariner Gardens

This is the first in a short collection of then and now photographs.

Several readers of this blog are people who used to live locally and they tell me that they like to see pictures of the places they know as they are now. One of these said:

My dad, Kenneth Kirchen, had to come to start work in Feltham in March 1967, while my sister and I stayed back in California to finish our school year. So when he found a house to rent in Ham, he took photos and sent them to us so we could see where we would be living. We moved to England in June 1967 and lived at 18 Mariner Gardens.  

It has taken me quite a while to get a "now" photograph of the same houses and even then I was not able to take one from the same spot because there are always cars (and vans) parked either obscuring the view or where I want to stand.

Nice job

It has taken over a year but the extension of this house in Ham Farm Road has finished, and very nice it looks too. The new parts fit in so well with the old ones that it does not look as though it has been extended, which is a good thing.

The front garden is a little bare but I dare say that will come soon and in the meantime the absence of vegetation provides a nice uninterrupted view of the house.

Spring flowers on Ham Village Green

Ham Village Green is a lovely harbinger of Spring with its swathes of bulbs. This is the view from Ham Street looking across the Green towards Ham Close, and a pretty view it is too. And it will be even better when the trees have grown to maturity.

More pavement work

The section of pavement on the corner of Ham Gate Avenue and Upper Ham Road has been worked on a few times since I started this blog and the surface there was very good, or so I thought, but there must be some reason why it is all being dug up again.

Hopefully the reason for the work will be clear once it has finished and the pavement will be even better than it was before.

New porch and windows in Dysart Avenue

Dysart Avenue has been a relatively quiet road for home improvements in recent years and while I have noticed somethings going on none of there has been interesting enough for me to post it.

This is not a particularly large project either but I have posted it because Dysart Avenue deserves some attention and I find this one interesting as they have kept almost all of the original house but added modern windows and a modern front door.

20 mph

Several 20 mph signs have appeared on local roads, these are on Upper Ham Road. Not many people paid much attention to the previous 30 mph limit that applied there and I do not expect the new signs to make any noticeable difference to traffic speeds.

CK60 DZE upsets everyone

Another driver who has shown no interest in anyone else whatsoever. The car is parked across a dropped kerb to frustrate pedestrians and away from the kerb to frustrate drivers trying to make the tight turn into the slip road.

EJ17 GUD sits on the pavement

Surely it is not too much to ask that cars do not park on the pavement like this? The angle of the car suggests that the driver was not interest in, or not capable of, parking correctly and leaving the car on the pavement shows no regard for anyone else.

54 Sandy Lane rises

The new house at 54 Sandy Lane has been keeping its secrets well but now that it has grown above the height of the hoardings it is possible to start to see what it will look like. The only definite things so far are the prominent yellow bricks and the house line which matches its neighbour on the right and is well forward of its neighbour on the left.

Elm Walk

I do not normally cover Richmond Park here as I see it as a place in its own right, it touches both Ham and Petersham but is in neither, and I am making an exception here as the new Elm Walk starts the journey from Petersham Gate to Ham Gate. And I like trees.

A different look at Thamesgate Close

It is not that long since I published a picture of this refurbishment in Thamesgate Close and I justify posting another one for two reasons; the first had a van obscuring part of the house and this view is from further back so that you can also see the house on the far left which is what the one that is being worked on used to look like.

Helicopters

I was having a coffee and some cake at Ham House when I heard then saw a helicopter approach and then appear to land somewhere just beyond the wall. Soon afterwards, coffee and cake completed, I was walking along the path between Ham House and Ham Polo when I came across these two helicopters.

A sneak peek in Lock Road

I have been watching this development in Lock Road by the junction with Craig Road for several months and have been frustrated that the ground floor has been hidden behind solid black boards so, as always, it was a delight to find the door in open allowing me to peek inside.

The piles of bricks suggest that there is more work to do as does the unpainted wall.

A jumble of trees

The little woodland next to the Sea Scouts is left to do its own thing with little of no evidence of any management. That may not be a bad thing when it produces wild views like this from Douglas Footpath.

Changes at Ham Common Gate

The lower end of Ham Parade on the east side has been sheathed in scaffolding and netting for a few weeks for no apparent purpose but just being there is enough for me to take a photograph.

Also new is the cleared bed on the small grass triangle which heralds the arrival of some plants. I welcome the arrival of new plants though I am not sure what the impact will be on the monthly Ham Parade Market which uses this area for a music stage.

New gate

This is the wall of the house next to The Dysart on Petersham Road. Above the wall you can just see the roof of a new extension that has been constructed over the last few months and in the wall a gap has just appeared in readiness for a new gate.

Resurfacing even more of the towpath

The towpath north of Teddington Lock was resurfaced over the last two years and this barrier just south of the footbridge announced that the next section was being done.

And this is the far end, stretching a little beyond the Border Stone and into Kingston.

The first thing to note is that this is standard black tarmac, not the brown small gravelled material used previously, and the second thing is that it looks a little rough. It looks to be of a significantly lower standard and I guess that we will see whether that is true in a year or two.

Hole in the road

This winter's rain has not been kind to local roads and there have been holes and puddles in many places. One of the worst area has been Duke's Avenue, close to the junction with Dysart Avenue, which has suffered severely from both.

This deep hole shows the mechanics of the road's construction and the patchwork of tarmac around it shows how often this area has needed repairs. 

New fence for Douglas Footpath

The fence separating Douglas Footpath from the German School used to be a simple, and much less sturdy, wire-mesh fence but now it is both brash and robust.

It is good to see that the path has weathered-in too and my comments about its brashness from 2009 no longer hold true.