Dollis Hill as a place to live

[Esshum]

Hi guys, really grateful for advice. We have a six month old and are planning to make to move from central London (elephant and castle) to the suburbs. Whilst we love it where we live, we need more space, a garden, less pollution, to be nearer family etc etc....

So we were thinking of North West London. Dollis Hill in particular - it has lots of space (Gladstone park), family houses, is very conveniently on the jubilee line... It sounds great in paper, but it would be good to hear from locals/people with kids that we're not about to make a terrible decision we'll come to regret!

Awwww! Dollis Hill is one of my very favourite places! I lived there for 9 years in total, in a flat and house - both near Gladstone Park. I absolutely love it - but this was over 20 years ago now, so can't vouch for it now.

The park was wonderful- sitting on the benches at the top of the hill with great views, the duck pond, walled garden and very quirky tea room in the house (no idea if any of these things still exist?!), children's playground and lovely little strolls through the trees.

The railway line running through was just for goods trains - our flat (Cornmow Drive) was literally on top of the line- to the extent that we had to hold things on shelves frol falling off at times when the train went through! But we didn't mind and there were only maybe 1 - 2 trains a day. The house we lived in was a few streets away and you couldn't hear anything.

it was a quiet, friendly area at the time- I think it's Quaker land, so there are no pubs, which we didn't mint all!

There is a local primary school which I remember being good - but we lived there pre-DS's being school age so I can't vouch for the schools.

Journey into London was perfect and there are local shops- all in all, I always thought it was a hidden gem!

I hope it's still as lovely now, but couldn't resist posting as it's not often Dollis Hill comes up in conversation! Good luck and hope you find somewhere lovely to live!

@dottydotagain thanks so much for this! I know you lived there before you had kids, but it's so so helpful to hear from someone who's actually lived in the area! This is exactly what I wanted to hear.

I was going to add that we then moved to Preston Road - which is also worth considering. Bit busier in terms of more shops on the high street, but lovely houses and a very nice park - we'd had ds1 by the time we moved there and it was great when he was a baby/toddler - although I remembered that we would often go back to Dollis Hill and take him to Gladstone Park!

Preston Road is also brilliant for getting into London - Met line so very easy. I think if I had the budget and choice, I'd still go for Dollis Hill, but it would be a close run thing!

I don’t live in DH but I live nearby in Willesden Green. My kids attend a chess group in DH and I do not let them travel there on their own (despite travelling all over other parts of London on their own) as I don’t think it is safe. I can only comment on the area directly outside the station and about two streets away where they walk to - really really unsavoury in the dark. There have been stabbings right outside the station too.

If you like Gladstone Park, why not look at the Willesden Green side of it? Very leafy and suburban. I live near WG station in Mapesbury (a little further from the park) and love it. We moved from Central London 8 years ago. Like all of London it is mixed and has both good and bad but I would say it is much much nicer than Dollis Hill.

That's really interesting - we also lived in Willesden Green - on Dean Road - for a year, but although we loved it (especially the library/arts centre - is that still there?), we were broken into almost as soon as we moved in, and regularly had attempted break ins (we had a ground floor flat), so moved to Dollis Hill which felt much more safe!

I think the Gladstone Park side of Dollis Hill is way nicer than the other side (Kendal Road side) and I would be very fussy about which streets I would look at in DH to live on - we were on Ellesmere Road which was lovely.