From white to grey

When I first remarked on this narrow property in Ham Street, back in 2015, it was white, like one of its neighbours, and now it has transformed to a striking modern grey and stands proudly out from both of the buildings it is joined too. I think the grey works. The brown door less so, but that is forgivable.

New Indian coming soon

The small parade of shops by Ham Library always looks as though it is struggling with a few of the units empty and others changing hands quickly so it is good to see one of the units coming back to life.

A day or so later there were large posters in the window announcing that this will be The Taste of Lahore, a Punjabi restaurant.

Of course there is a well established Indian just around the corner, Jaflong, and I hope that there is space for both of them. The menus should be different and I expect to be a customer of both. I go to Saqui on Ham Parade too.

New frontage in New Road

Every walk down New Road is rewarding thanks to its pleasant mix of pleasant cottages and sometimes there is something new to see too. This time I caught the early days of a building project that looks to be making substantial changes to the front of the house.

K139 CNC on the pavement

My only criticism of Wates Estate is that the pavements are not very wide and so it is even more of a problem when motorists choose to park on the pavement there, as K139 CNC has done.

Buckingham Road CPZ

There is a story behind this sign that I do not know.

This is a spur off Buckingham Road and I do not know why this section is a private road rather than a normal highway. I also do not know, but could have a reasonable guess, why the residents felt it advantageous to have their own Controlled Parking Zone (CPZ). Parking issues generally have to be pretty bad before residents are prepared to pay for their own spaces. My reasonable guess is that parking is an issue in that area generally due to the presence of two schools nearby.

As the road is private so is the CPZ.

Herrick Court

There is always work being done somewhere in Parkleys and one of the current projects is to replace the wooden structures across the fronts of some of the blocks, including Herrick Court.

You can tell that this is Herrick Court because the name is on the sign next to the entrance but it used to also be on the plank at the front, as shown in this photograph. I hope, and expect, that the name will reappear in due course but I wanted to capture the time when it was missing.

New railings at Teddington Lock

I had to go back to 2012 to find a picture of the low fence that used to separate the lock from the towpath to put the new railings in context. Compared to what was there before the new railings are markedly different, being taller and more substantial, but compared to the other railings on the site the only difference is that these are black whereas the others are grey, as you can see on the other side of the barge lock.

I have no idea how the seemingly continuous works at Teddington Lock are justified but it must be said that they are making  good job of it all.

Sandpits update

Progress on the rebuild in Sandpits Road is steady and while the front of the house is still hidden the side view remains promising.

Confusingly the bricks immediately behind the boards are not part of the house, they are just piled there waiting to be used. The front of the house is the yellow section between the stock pile and the doorway and this looks here to be a slightly different colour to the rest, which is redder. This may be deliberate and it may be effective, it is just something to look at again as the work continues.

23A/B/C Clifford Road

I keep wandering up Clifford Road to check on the new houses being built there only to be frustrated by a barrier that has been installed at the entrance to the site. At least there was a new letter box to discover and, with it, confirmation of the new house numbers.

LS66 LJC blocks crossing

Under other circumstances I may have chosen to show the van because of its distinctive paint work but LS66 LJC gets featured here because it is parked across the dropped kerb that marks a busy pedestrian crossing place.

If that was not bad enough, there were two policemen queuing for Rowleys who did nothing about this. A quick word with the driver would probably have sufficed, doing nothing did not.

Parkleys window box

This pretty window box is in Tennyson Court which while it faces nicely into the development is also forced to have its back looking on to Upper Ham Road.  

Broughton Road refurbishment

This house in Broughton Road has obviously been left to fade in recent years and even an untrained eye can see that the windows, door and porch roof are in need to repair (or, more likely, replacement). The scaffolding suggests that the house can be hopeful that it is going to be refreshed soon.

New wall at Ormeley Lodge

The best thing about the new wall at Ormeley Lodge is that it looks very much like the old one. It is only by looking at old photographs, such as this one from 2014, that you can be certain that anything has changed.

LD18 JYR double parks dangerously

This is possibly the most awkward and dangerous place that some motorists choose to park badly, just as the northbound traffic reduces from two lanes to one along Ham Parade, but the driver of LD18 JYR obviously thought that what they were doing was more important than other people's safety.

Rocking chair skeleton

Presumably allowed out in to the garden for Halloween, this skeleton was still enjoying his/herself in a rocking chair in the front garden of a house in Buckingham Road a few days later. They look happy and not at all scary.

The start of something small

This is the end house of another little spur in Wates Estate that abuts Riverside Drive. The cement mixer is the main clue that a little building work has just started here. It is probably going to be a porch and I will go back in a few weeks to be sure.

It is good to see the compost bin there too. I have one like that and two smaller ones and they are brilliant for most food waste, potato peelings and the like, and also prunings from the garden.

Metal porch

This porch on Petersham Road is not typical of the area but it is close enough to not stand out in a bad way and it is pretty enough to stand out in a good way.

My sort of path

There are many paths winding through Ham Common Woods which means that you can visit it many times without repeating a route. Some of these paths are busy and well trod but I prefer the paths like this one that are rarely used and which disappear into the trees, destination unknown.

WU10 UEM blocks entrance to Kingfisher Drive

Not only is WU10 UEM parked on double-yellow lines it is parked away from the pavement making the entrance into Kingfisher Drive much harder for other motorists. The lines are there for a reason.

New fence and gate

The last time that I mentioned 226 Petersham Road was three years ago and then I anticipated that work would be done to the front boundary, and now it has. A new fence has been added behind the original wall and at either end. 

There is a new gate too which looks very obvious in its bright white hue. This may be to make the gate obvious in the dark or it may even be a temporary colour, I would be tempted to paint it grey like the roof behind it.

BT17 TDO blocks the path

 

Ham Gate Avenue is very wide but a ridiculously narrow part of it is allocated to pedestrians so it is particularly annoying when somebody chooses to park across it.

Extension in Tideway Close

I try to vary where I walk and the direction that I walk in so that I miss fewer things. Recently I have mostly been walking past the Locksmeade estate in a south-east direction but reversing that and walking north-west instead allowed me to see into Tideway Close where this extension is being built.

As with a few other current extension projects, a significant part of the small garden is being added to the house. I guess that is an indication of changing priorities but it concerns that that this is not a decision that can be easily reversed when fashion changes again.

On the positive side they have matched the bricks very well and a sloping roof always looks better on an extension than a flat one.