Money still lost on Thamesmead

We've covered some of Thamesmead's problems before, epically with Negative Equity, looking at this map and article from the Evening Standard it would look like five out of the top ten streets in London for Negitive Equity are in Greenwich, and two are in Thamesmead. They are;

• Calderwood Street, SE28
• Erebus Drive, SE28
• Woolwich Common, SE18
• Glashier Street, SE8
• Greenhaven Drive, SE28

Even with CrossRail possibily offering people a way out it still looks like people could be stuck in Greenwich against their will. Still we wonder if Tilfen Land has made any money out of Thamesmead, because if it hasn't, it looks like it might have missed the boat.

Stuck in Thamesmead?

We've often covered Thamesmead and now it looks like a few other heads are starting to look at it, one of them being the BBC's Panorama show, which last night looked into the housing developments in the area which have lead to some residents finding themselves in negative equity as well as concentrating on the anti social behavior problems which residents have found.

The show can be seen on the BBC's iplayer for another week, with the Thamesmead section being about 15 minutes into the show.

What's that smell?

We've got a bee in our bonnet about Thamesmead these last few days and it isn't over yet. Anyone who lives in Thamesmead knows quite well that during the summer the sewage smell that floats across the area is grim. Well we bring you great new, that smell will not be there for much longer!

The Council have decided in their infinite wisdom that they're approaching Tilfen Land about the possibility of developing an anaerobic digestion site in Thamesmead. A whaty whaty? we hear you say. It's quite simple really. It's what they're planning for all that food and garden waste that you will start recycling in January.

The Council wants to build the facility so they can capture methane and produce energy. It's a very green tree-hugging initiative with one minor draw back. Like all the Council's recycling ambitions it hopes to handle not just our waste but other Boroughs too.

That means there will be, quite literally, tonnes of rotting food traveling into the Borough to the proposed centre and whilst it queues up to go in it will carry on rotting and pump lots of methane out in the locale of the riverside that decidedly winding development. No more raw sewage smell, it's going to l'eau de crap mixed with l'eau de dead food instead.

Council gets egg on its face in Thamesmead

Oh how we laughed this morning when we heard about the Thames Gateway Bridge. Readers may or may not know that last night was Full Council. As is traditional at these events motions get tabled, and this time the Tories - bizarrely given they don't usually venture to such northern heights of the Borough - tabled a motion about Thamesmead celebrating its fortieth anniversary.

As is usual practice anything that opposition parties table gets amended by the ruling group. In this case the motion was amended saying how the Council eagerly anticipated the positive decision of the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government on the Thames Gateway Bridge.

We're guessing no one told them before they added their amendment that the Secretary of State had published her decision yesterday, and it was far from positive. The inquiry has been reopened as the traffic models are inaccurate and the evidence suggests that all the regeneration that the Council claims the bridge will bring will happen without it anyway.

Like we say, we laughed our socks off when we realised that the Secretary of State had already made her negative decision whilst the Council was publicly saying how much it was looking forward to a positive one. Isn't it good to know that the Council actually knows what is going on? What a bunch of prats!

Will the councillors for Thamesmead please stand up?

The 10th-biggest mortgage lender in the UK has pulled out of Thamesmead. GMAC RFC, part-owned by General Motors made the announcement the other week that it would no longer provide mortgages to any properties in Thamesmead because it considered it too great a risk because of already rising negative equity.

Why is there rising negative equity in Thamesmead? Could it be because it is now one of the capitals of Europe for mass international fraud rings linked to Nigeria? After all, the former chairman of the Nigerian Oil Mineral Producing Area Development Commission (OMPADEC), Chief Opia, now lives there after allegedly siphoning off millions from the aid programme before coming here.

Don't expect the Council to acknowledge any of this though. The councillors for Thamesmead Moorings pretend that it's all just peachy in their ward (but they don't live there). The reports of alleged torture rooms and rising gun crime are quietly ignored.

Who is the owner of the Thamesmead developments though? It starts at the top with leaseholders purchasing their lease from larger companies who have purchased larger land leases from the freeholders. Who are the freeholders? Well it depends where you look, but vast swathes of the area are ultimately owned by Tilfen Land.

Tilfen Land? Could this be the same Tilfen Land that has a paid non-executive director that used to be the leader of Greenwich Council, and is now the Chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority, and is also the partner of one of the councillors for Thamesmead Moorings? Perhaps the news of lenders bailing out of the area might motivate them into action? The business impact could be huge when no one is able to buy the property.