The little green men put Streatham on the map

Lindsay Johns
27 Jul 2009

The aliens have landed. And of all the places they chose to make contact, they chose Streatham, the quintessence of south London ghetto chic. Or so we thought following the highly publicised UFO sightings in the skies above Streatham Common last week.

Suddenly internet forums, Twitter blogs and radio chat shows were ablaze with the news of extraterrestrial activity in SW16.

As a long-time proud Streatham resident whose flat overlooks the Common and whose very existence is owed to my parents meeting here in the Sixties, I am delighted.

The much-maligned and unfairly stigmatised St Reatham (as we locals like to call it) has finally been put on the map. Now we have a legitimate claim to fame beyond high crime stats and shootings. It's just a shame that it has taken the enthralling prospect of little green men to do it.

When I tell people I live in Streatham they smile politely then nod sympathetically and edge away slowly, as if I'd said Beirut or Detroit.

After the High Road was voted the worst street in Britain in a BBC Radio 4 Today programme survey a few years ago, my corner of Lambeth has been pilloried as the archetype of urban decay.

With its reputation for ladies of the night, tawdry takeaways and low-rent charity shops, Streatham is often seen as the malodorous armpit of south London, an insalubrious wasteland where few come by choice, unless heading to the ice rink or along the A23 to Gatwick.

Of course, all of London is curiously riven with such micro-geographies.

Alive with inter-area rivalry and subtly nuanced perceptions of different streetscapes, we all have our bizarre tribal allegiances to our own "manor".

Where we choose to live is often a crucial expression of our personality and identity. Our area is our prism through which we see the world, at times a much-needed defence against the barbarians who live just up the road.

When we come out of our postcode, we step outside our psychological comfort zone. Thus Chelsea regularly turns its patrician nose up at anything south of the river.

North London thinks of itself as more genteel and cultured, and yet you need oxygen to get to Muswell Hill.

And as for the east, well, Hackney is another country, a maelstrom of chaos and confusion - or so I'm told.

By contrast, Streatham is a happy Babel. With its enormous Victorian terraces nestling off the High Road, three train stations and a stunning park, it is a place where West and East Africans happily rub shoulders with Caribbeans and Indians, not to mention Poles and white English.

We might not have a Tube station, we might lack Notting Hill's elegant stuccoed façades, Primrose Hill's yummy mummies or even Kensington's designer shops, but Streatham does not merit its pariah status as Brixton's poorer, more dissolute cousin.

For one thing, it thankfully lacks the feral, in-ya-face edginess of Brixton, not to mention the plethora of annoyingly persistent pharmaceutical vendors forever plying their wares, or the legion of basket cases who shuffle up and ask you for 20p before stumbling off in a belligerent, drunken stupor.

It's about time my manor got both the kudos and the cultural cachet it deserves. St Reatham is quite clearly the new black. All we need now is a jazz festival, a Starbucks and a Topshop and we'll be officially on the up.

The UFO drama may have been one small step for the little green men attempting to conquer our planet - but it was also one giant leap for SW16.

Lindsay Johns is a cultural critic for Colourful Radio.