Parenting in London - positives?

[Mariposa26]

We live on zone 2/3 border and have a 6 month old DD. We enjoy an active social life, and really loved London up until now. Currently all I can think about is getting her out of London - comparing it to my childhood where my family dropped by every day, where I played out with friends after school and knew everyone locally…things I feel she will never experience here. I feel that I want to move back to the NW, but my partner will never go for it.
Can anyone share positive stories of raising kids in London and the London lifestyle? All I hear is negatives, and it’s getting me down. She will be in nursery full time too (or possibly a 9 day fortnight)
Thank you!

As in when a victim of gang/knife crime is in the news & the parents of the victim say "they were not involved in crime etc" a lot of people don't believe it, particularly if the child is not white. You often see the narrative on here that you will only be a victim of gang crime if you are involved in gangs/drugs. It's not true.

I think London by virtue of size and demographics is overall liberal & accepting of vast majority faiths and people
Great place to live & raise kids
in comparison I think there’s more casual discrimination and violence in the regions and the burbs

All of this!

We're so lucky with all the free/cheap stuff we have on our doorstep: Young V&A, Olympic Park, Discover Centre, child-friendly cafes and pubs, so many great places to eat, loads of playgrounds, so many activities to choose from in terms of sports/music other hobbies... We have a really great local music service with a standard of tuition and range of opportunities you wouldn't get everywhere... great primary schools... Friends within walking distance. Boats and trains and tubes and the cable car and the DLR (my children are big on transport those may not be selling points for everyone!), no need to have a car...

And when they're older you don't need to be a taxi service because there's so much they can get themselves to :)

We're in zone 2, and we love all the cultural and leisure opportunities here. My dcs attend weekend classes linked to some of the best conservatoires in the country (other major cities have these too, but geographically they're spread further and only one locally). Some parents travel a 3 hour round trip to attend these - it's walking distance for us. Our income is at the higher end thanks to the excellent employment opportunities, and there are some of the best private schools in the country. DH is able to walk to work (I mostly wfh) and be home for the dc's tea, we split bath & bedtime every night. We've had to have medical treatment in recent years and had easy access to top specialists (some private, some NHS). I met some people travelling down from Scotland for appointments. Travelling abroad is easy, we get the Elizabeth line to Heathrow and we're a couple of tube stops from Eurostar.

This is interesting.
We live Zone 3. So far this summer my 15 year old has been to the cinema, been bowling, picnic in park with mates and shopping in ordinary shops that teens enjoy like Primark and HMV.
We are heading up to medium size Midlands market town next week (where I am from).
Our plans include going to the cinema, going bowling and probably shopping in Primark and HMV. No picnic in the park with mates but if I am lucky she might picnic with me 😂.
Main difference of London vs Midlands market town is public transport. Less of it and I have to pay for her when out of London.
Everything else that’s ordinary everyday stuff is pretty much the same.

Im a city girl and could not think of anything worse than moving out of a big city to raise kids...
I lived in London for 13 years and I would happily raise kids there, with zero regrets! There are so many things to do!
My child will also be raised in a big city (not as big as London, but also a European capital city) and I cant wait!

@Needmorelego exactly.....

A difference would be if you were living rurally with no transport links then that would be a challenge from tweenage onwards.

@Mariposa26 I don't think you should move for the reasons you described as it is dependant on other people and you can't control what others do ......

@chopc but there’s more than London vs Rural. My hometown is a medium size Midlands market town. It’s a town not somewhere “rural”.
The public transport is actually generally fine - some routes don’t run in the evening past 7 and/or Sundays so compared to London it isn’t as great. But really it’s fine.
What I kind of meant with my comment was really everyday normal life things that families do (cinema, shopping, swimming, scouts, playing in a park, library etc) is the same whether you live in a town or London.
People act like London is the only place with all these amazing things for children to do and all those cultural places etc etc - but it’s not. Plenty of towns (even medium size ones) have the same kind of things to do.

@Needmorelego I knew what you meant and agree with you.

However if you were living rurally, the public transport can be non existent. No life with kids will look different as until driving age, they will need to be driven around.

What I kind of meant with my comment was really everyday normal life things that families do (cinema, shopping, swimming, scouts, playing in a park, library etc) is the same whether you live in a town or London.

I do agree with this point. I don't think my childhood/teen hood was very different to peers who grew up in other areas. I wasn't eating brunch in Soho & then popping to an art gallery I was hanging around the shopping centre or seeing the latest blockbuster with friends.

@chopc yeah I understand you were agreeing 🙂
It just seems a lot of mumsnetter seem to think moving out of London means moving to a village 😂
They seem unaware that there are ordinary towns that have ordinary things just like London 😂😂

I do agree with this. I spent a week at my mums recently (larger market town) with my baby. What did we do? Swimming. Coffee shops. Town centre. What do I do in London with my baby? Coffee shops. Swimming. Town centre. The main difference was the ease of getting to these things in London vs at my mums. It was a huge difference. Which for me is a key reason why I live in London with my Dc. People prioritise different things of course. Also the demographic which pps mention - in some places outside of London the demographic is similar to London, but in my mum’s market town it certainly isn’t! So that one depends where you go, but for me it’s very important. I don’t want my Dc growing up in a predominantly white market town.

I brought 2 children up in London. Its so easy to find things to do with them. Most local councils organise sessions for mother and babies in libraries and leisure centres etc and many are free - a great way to meet other mothers and build a "tribe". Once they are a bit older there will be lots of inexpensive places to take them - many museums have children's activity packs, art trolleys etc and there are loads of adventure playgrounds, concerts, sports activities that are free or very cheap.

I was very impressed today that my local council leisure centre has free swimming for 11-17 year olds in the Borough. Permanently. Maybe they do this out of London too - fine - but I was very impressed. They also had a £20 p/m unlimited classes (gym, badminton, table tennis) for 11-17 year olds who could afford £20. Otherwise the free swimming is fab.

@londonmummy1966 you get that in pretty much every town and city in the uk though.

But nothing like as many museums and concert halls theatres etc all with their own offerings. Unless I'm very much mistaken Northampton, Kendal, Portsmouth, Bodmin, Perth, Cardigan, Holt and North Allerton to name a handful of towns around the country do not have almost 200 museums, 250 theatres, 3000 parks nor 325 libraries..

It's mostly the ability to get around by themselves that mine value (14 and 16). Today the older one has been nannying. She can take younger kids bowling on the tube as all have zip cards and then get them home safely, and there are a bunch of free museums she can take them too. She also popped up to 'Central' as they call it, with a friend to mooch around Trafalgar Square.

Younger one will take herself up to Kings Cross tomorrow to get on a train to York for a course. There are some cities that also allow that for teens but not many as cheaply as London. I grew up rurally and I'm jealous of their freedom!

@londonmummy1966 yes but even if you don’t live in London you can travel to get to big museums etc. Most people don’t go to them all the time. Once you’ve been to the big museums more than 3 times it all becomes a bit samey.
You don’t need 300+ Libraries- you need one near to where you live. You don’t need 3000 parks - just a few different ones.
Most people I know going to the theatre is a big event - not an everyday thing. Most big towns have a theatre and have touring shows of the big name ones. So it doesn’t matter if a town only has one theatre - it’s still a theatre.

I don't understand why you think your DD don't have those things in London? My dds are 12 and 8 and their lives are a whirl of playdates, playing out, friends around the corner. Everything is pretty nearby as the school catchments are so tiny also their friends are too - and parties and sports clubs and drama clubs and so on. There's so much going on for kids in London.. And so many people in similar boats wanting to create a community and mutual support networks. Sometimes I get a whim to live by the sea but my kids wouldn't live anywhere but London.

I think this depends on where you get your energy from. I love the sense of discovery in London. Waking up on a Saturday and going somewhere new. Having someone visit and a big choice of where to go or what to see. One small museum and a touring theatre isn't the same, though obviously other places can be lovely to live in for different reasons

Agreed on freedom. I’m jealous too! My daughter was walking to and from school and around our neighbourhood since she turned 10. She’s now in secondary and able to go further by bus or tube solo or with friends. London is like lots of smaller towns or villages glued together so I feel kids are independent much younger as the shops, library, school, friends and playgrounds are within a short walk away from home.

@Needmorelego = actually I and most of my friends would be in and out of the museums and theatres and various libraries all the time. Summer holidays are so easy in London - you can do 3 different museums in a week, get free tickets to West End shows and picnic in a different park every day. One local library might organise one event a week but we can walk to 4 different ones - that's a child's activity every other day. SO no - what is on offer in London is very different to what was on offer in the large but very dull city that I grew up in and my DC have had a very different childhood to mine.

@londonmummy1966 @longestlurkerever I live in Zone 3. Probably something like 5 miles from Central London. But it takes 25 minutes by train to get to Central London (Victoria Station or London Bridge) or almost an hour by bus and then you still have to travel more to get to where you want to go. It isn’t really a get up in the morning and think “oooh I think I will pop to x museum” - you have to plan, organise etc. Also even with TfL daily cap the cost of travel adds up so it gets expensive. It’s not really “normal day to day everyday life” if you get what I mean. Everyday life is school, play in the park, go to Tesco, go to Brownies, go to the cinema, go swimming etc. That can be done living in London or any city or town.

@londonmummy1966 obviously if I lived in Zone 1 my “London lifestyle” would be different.

We're in zone 2 but still quite central - 1.2 miles from Euston. We definitely do wake up and pop to a museum or gallery without much planning. You just wake up and get dressed and hop on the tube - not really much to plan for. They change their exhibitions so it doesn't get too samey, and there are enough musuems that we can rotate them so we don't get bored. I have free tube travel so we go all over London, and we go to theatres/concerts probably 20 times a year, so it's not a big event (not all West End shows but places like South Bank or Unicorn). My dc are at peak playground age so we do go all over to hunt down the best ones - the Diana Memorial, Holland Park, Battersea, Coram's Fields, plus some lesser known local gems. It would be boring to just go to the same neighbourhood park all the time. We have library cards for 4 different boroughs and visit libraries in all of them. Some people may not choose to utilise all that London has to offer but that doesn't mean that all Londoners live mundane lifestyles that is just the same as in any regional city.