Moving to Kingston

[JSK80]

Hi Mumsnetters, I'd really appreciate some advice from Kingston locals, so here goes...

Our family is planning to move into the area (from South Africa) with DD who's 4 and DS age 2. Our must-haves are to be close to an 'outstanding' state primary and green spaces. DD will be applying for an in-year reception place so we'll need to be on the doorstep of whichever school we hope to get into (so far we've only seen Latchmere and were highly impressed).

I love the idea of being able to walk to schools, shops, train station (DH will commute to London Bridge) and parks. Is this possible in North Kingston? Or is a car a necessity for families living here?

You don't have to have a car. If you were nearby the Latchmere school though you might not want to walk everywhere.

Your dh could walk to the station. You can get buses to town and to parks further away.

You dont have to have a car here at all as it is well served by buses but you may not be able to walk absolutely everywhere and I'd say that's true of every outer London borough.

Buses are good but to walk from the Ham side of N Kingston to Kingston Station is a good 25 minutes. Much longer to Richmond, 40 minutes, probably. A bike would be a good plan.

Appreciate the advice, thank you both! It seems like there are plenty of amenities in the area but that they're fairly spread out, and of course the tight school catchments make it all a little trickier!

To be fair I dont know of any London suburb where absolutely everything you need is in walking distance.

Or any suburb of any city to be honest.

Live in Kingston proper or Richmond proper?

Central Richmond will have all you want in walking distance as will central kingston but if you're looking at Latchmere area, north kingston / Ham you will need public transport as the distances arent comfortably walkable daily.

Try Thames Ditton and Hinchley Wood too - trains to Waterloo and very good schools nearby.

If you want an in-year reception place at an outstanding school your best starting point might be contacting the local authority and finding out if any schools have places then basing your search around the school. Outstanding schools are usually over-subscribed and you might find that there's a waiting list for places - if you're not careful you could end up moving near an outstanding school and finding that you're given a place at a totally different school.

I am in North Kingston (also from SA) and you can walk and/ or cycle everywhere you need in Kingston. MUCH better than taking the car as traffic gets congested in Kingston. Car absolutely is not needed for North Kingston and/ or commuting. We use the car only for shopping trips or leaving Kingston trips.

Fern Hill Primary on Richmond Road is an exellent school, as are all the primary schools in the area to be honest. All have small catchment areas though (Fern Hill with a slightly bigger catchment area than Latchmere)! I would suggest living between Kingston station and Tudor Drive for accessibility (and I also prefer the river side as great to cycle/ walk along the river to get everywhere and Canbury Gardens is great).

North Kingston is an amazing place to live and for all the wonderful outdoors there is in SA, we live a much more daily outdoors and healthy life here than we did there!

Think about moving to Sutton. Excellent schools and green spaces in the area and there is a direct train to London Bridge (Kingston only has slow trains to Waterloo, Richmond and Surbiton have fast trains to Waterloo but the area costs more).