To want to get far away from London?

[bluecherry1]

I have a very nice house with a great dh and 2 lovely dc, good jobs and no real worries BUT I live 2 streets away from one of the recent stabbings and it has put me so on edge, crimes rates here seem to be soaring, I hate not letting my children go out to play and don’t even feel totally safe myself walking the 10 minutes home from the station. I know there are nice places in England to live but me and dh are thinking of homeschooling the kids and travelling, we have family in Spain, South Africa and the USA, I want them to experience a carefree life for as long as they can. Ahhhh I’m so confused?

Girlfrommars77 I lived in south London for 8 yrs, north London for another 6, and have been working in various parts of London (all public facing roles, pretty much) for 14 years. DH is London born and bred and most of his family still live in London (some of the areas mentioned, which we visit regularly). Some of my family and a lot of my friends live in London. Just because I hold a different opinion doesn't mean I don't know anything about the areas I have an opinion on (and as.a result of the work I do I may know a bit more about some parts of London than most.)

Kittensinmydinner - well I did just that....moved out of London, felt bored and undestimulated and really noticed the lack of things to do, vibrancy, excitement, so we moved back and have never been happier.

Different strokes for different folks, but your post made me chuckle because you are not the oracle that speaks for everyone!

cardibach - city teenagers have access to a lot more choice of clubs and activities that they can get to by themselves, and they can get to each others homes to hang out more easily. We live in a village but with easy access to two large towns and a short train ride to London. My teens spend the majority of their weekends in one of the local towns at music classes or band practise, at sports meets or just going bowling/swimming/cinema/pizza with their mates. I know friends who live in more isolated villages say their teens can't get anywhere unless their parents drive them.

Slightly off thread but @speakout can you say where you like? It sounds amazing!!?

Oops @speakout I meant the last one to be another exclamation mark not a weird questioning one!

holycrap- it's OK. I live very near Edinburgh.

Kittens,you’ve described a life that sounds like hell to me.utter mc hell with fields

My kids do not attend any clubs, or classes by choice. So
No tutors
No brownies
No Cubs,
No guides,
No badminton club

Neither dp or I would ever join or participate in
cricket and/or hockey
yoga
I’d be nonplussed at WI and pottery within walking distance.

I live on a city,it’s busy but it also has parks,galleries,vibrancy and I like the pace,bustle and mix of demographics

The US is high crime?

Do you know how large the US is?

What a ridiculous sweeping statement.

Where I live nobody locks their doors even when they go on holiday and everyone leaves their keys in the ignitions.

There hasn't been a violent crime or burglary in my town for over five years.

Yep, hot bed of terror here.

cardibach my husband grew up in the countryside and has sworn never to submit his children to the same! City children have the ability to go to gigs, theatre, museums, clubs etc and get around to do so easily and independently. Where he lived until you learnt to drive you couldn’t do anything!!

We left London for Brazil. London is great for young kids, you can have access to great little over subscribed primary schools, bike rides in parks on the weekend, pop off to museums and events at the drop of a hat. We lived there for 5 years and at first it was fantastic, but as my kids grew I remembered that my teen years in London were not that great. It's not only those that live different lives that get sucked into gang crimes. Even in the 90's I was mugged for trainers and my Walkman. I knew people who accidently got caught up in gang activity.

Statistically I'm not as safe in South America as I would be in the UK. 26 in 100,000 murders compared with 0.94. But statistics are not everything. In my neighbourhood in 2017 there were no murders and one violent crime, compared with 229 in my old London neighbourhood. 1 burglary compared with 118. We were burgled twice in 5 years in London and haven't been burgled in the 5 years here. We had three bikes stolen and the car keyed, here I accidently left the keys in the car all night. So it depends where you are comparing. So yes, London is safer than Rio and if I was comparing a small village in the UK, the Brazilian one looks worse. The education is statistically better in the UK but my children are in a class of 15-20, rather than 30. The teachers don't have behaviour problems and in the last 3 years every one of the graduates have gained a place at university, one at Harvard. That wouldn't be the reality for my kids in London. The weekends we don't have fab things in the royal festival hall or the science museum, but my teenagers swim, ride horses, play outside, go out in the evenings to restuarants with their friends and cook their own lunches on their own campfires. My teens wouldn't be doing that in London.

So I say, go, give them a taste of life outside London for a while, you can always come back to the UK in the future.

I really find it difficult to understand why anyone would ever want to raise children in London these days. It's horribly dirty and doesn't have much to offer. Obviously it has great museums/theatre but you don't have to live in London full time for that. Why not move to a nice commuting village?

I grew up in a suburban commuter town and god I'd have loved to have grown up in London. Dependent on my parents to be ferried around, or waiting for infrequent buses to get anywhere. Turning 17 and learning to drive unlocked freedom. Compare to fantastic public transport and the ability to get around pretty much anywhere with an Oyster card and Uber.

I'm not sure I understand what clubs or activities a commuter village has to offer for a child or teen that you can't access in the city. Sports, hobbies, amenities etc. How does London 'not have much to offer' that a village does?

I am a Londoner. I have always lived on a low income and lived on estates or less desirable areas.
Where I live now has just got desirable and all of a sudden there is concern about violent crime in the area. Funny that.
We have numerous shootings and stabbings in the last couple of weeks.
Of course I worry. My DCs are male and black. Statistically they are far the most likely to be victims of this violence.
I don't feel unsafe but I am scared for my boys.

About five years ago ALL of the funding for youth groups was pulled. Family services are almost non existent now.
Its no mystery why gang related crime feels out of control.

This sort of crime rarely touches the affluent. not really. It makes them feel a bit scared and it might impact on house prices but their kids aren't likely to get caught up in it.
Perhaps if they did something might be done about it.
I won't hold my breath.

I haven’t RTFT but I live on the border of North Wales & Cheshire in a gorgeous little village. My 11 year old son wanders around the neibouring villages freely on his scooter to see his mates, he plays out at the local Sports & Social club & loves his freedom. There are plenty of places in the Uk that are “safe & sleepy”.

I really find it difficult to understand why anyone would ever want to raise children in London these days
Because its our home.

What I don't understand is people moving to London and desperately trying to make bits of it into urban facsimiles of their home towns and villages. 'Tweeing up' and calling places stupid new names.
It gets on my bleedin' nerves

I live in London Zone 2. In the summer, not only do we not lock our back door, we leave it wide open when we're all out.
Today DD and her BF, both just turned 15, went to Covent Garden and back on the tube to visit some specific shop. They are meeting some other friends later for dinner locally. I haven't had to take them anywhere or worry about them being safe. One of those stabbings was down the road from here and another about 20 mins away. I've lived here all my life, all over the place, and I've never been a victim of crime and only ever witnessed one crime. Being a teenager in London in the 70s was amazing and I don't want DD to miss that experience. Having said that, I have no problem with people preferring where they live and their growing up experiences, there's just so much hostility towards those of us who love London and don't want to live anywhere else. It isn't a case of being correct or not, regardless of statistics.

"Why would anyone want to live in London?"

Because it's fabulous! And say that as a foreigner who has made London home for the last 20 years.

Not all of London is Hackney fgs! Anyway, there are far worse places than Hackney in any humdrum Brutish town. South-West London is safe, green and diverse - with fantastic river walks, the best schools in the UK, as well as shopping and general facilities in the U.K. There are very good reasons that the house prices are the highest in the UK - people did not just make this up! Nowhere has the buzz or opportunities of London. If we ever had to leave, we would go abroad.

Both me and DH were born in London and lived there for over 40 years in total. Neither of us were ever victims of crime. We both lived in pretty rough areas at different times. I lived close to the Tottenham border when I was young and it was a pretty awful area then.

When we first married we lived in Stoke Newington which, again, was an awful area at that time. My parents were horrified that we would even think of living there.

We moved to close to Cambridge. In 4 years we were burgled twice and had our car stolen. That plus the fact we hated living there were enough to make us move again. Sadly we couldn't afford to go back to London.

If I were you I would rent your house out because if you sell up you will probably never be able to go back to London.

Also given a choice between London and South Africa I would choose London every time. South Africa has horrendous crime statistics.

Because its our home.

Well it was my home all my life until I left!

I agree with you about tweeing up. I hate gentrification in general. Apart from social houses people and young migrant workers there only rich people left in London now. And the social cleansing by price mainly happened under Labour.

It’s fine to feel on edge but a bit of an overreaction surely ? People get murdered everywhere sadly

Mightymucks, "only rich people left in London now"! I must tell my relatives that live there that they are rich. They don't live in social housing either

It’s very true that once the crimes get closer to gentrified areas people get antsy as fuck

When it was just Tower Hamlets no one gave a fuck

I am born and bred London and can’t ever see myself leaving . Yes I do get a bit scared about Secondary as the street here littered with drug detritus- but my country friends got fucked in E too . Private school kids get coke couriered over . Erghhhh

South-West London is safe, green and diverse - with fantastic river walks, the best schools in the UK, as well as shopping and general facilities in the U.K.

Each to their own - I much prefer Hackney over mega rich SW London.

Apart from social houses people and young migrant workers there only rich people left in London now
What?

only rich people left in london
Our street has a good number of banker-city types but there are also houses divided into bedsits, nextdoor on one side is a house owned by the council with 2 flats, a whole house opposite is lived in by a big Somali family, another house down the road is home to a big Bangladeshi family, another house is empty pending redevelopment as it was left to a Housing Association by the leftie old dear who lived there and there are a good few young working couples and mc families who've been here years. It's actually quite diverse although no-one would call it poverty by a long way

A mix in SE London - people who bought their houses 20+ years ago mixed with people who on higher income who can afford those houses today