Why do people shop in West Ealing? A recent survey gives some answers

 David Highton, Regeneration, West Ealing Shopping  3 Responses »
May 312011
 
Why do people shop in West Ealing? A recent survey gives some answers

‘Why do people shop in West Ealing?’ is the title of a survey late last year of 400 shoppers carried out by Brunel University on behalf of Ealing Council.  The answer – buying food is the main reason people come to shop in West Ealing, but there’s a good deal more valuable information in the results of this survey than  this one answer. The final report is 20 pages long but here are some of the key findings from this survey: What’s good about shopping in West Ealing: 1. Buying food was the main reason for people shopping in West Ealing. 2. Buying specific non-food items came second 3. Eating and socialising ranked third as a reason to come to West Ealing Overall, West Ealing is liked for its varied, multi-cultural location that is good for food shopping, pubs, eating and socialising. What needs to be improved about shopping in West Ealing: [...]

 Posted by at 7:24 am

Join us for the 1st West Ealing Neighbours Tweetup and Meetup – Wednesday, 29 June

 Community  No Responses »
May 262011
 
Join us for the 1st West Ealing Neighbours Tweetup and Meetup - Wednesday, 29 June

Want to get to know your neighbours and your community? West Ealing Neighbours in partnership with West Ealing’s newest gastro pub, The Star and Anchor is holding West Ealing’s first Tweetup on Wednesday, June 29th from 8pm. It’s a chance to have a drink and a chat with your neighbours in West Ealing, meet some new people, and maybe even make a connection or two! We’re inviting local tweeters, bloggers, foodies, councillors and personalities. There will be locals to talk to about the arts in Ealing, including local film, reading and music. Or, if you’re interested in the bricks and mortar of our community, you can talk to people about local planning issues and regeneration. Maybe there’s a fantastic local restaurant you want to tell everyone about? So come on down to the Star and Anchor (there will probably be nibbles!)- it would be great to see you there and [...]

 Posted by at 8:18 pm

West Ealing garden designer helps win gold medal at Chelsea Flower Show

 David Highton, News  2 Responses »
May 252011
 

I have to declare a personal interest in this as my wife Elizabeth also had a small role in this story. West Ealing garden designer Lesley Faux of Designed Gardens played a key role in Korean designer Jihae Hwang’s Hae-woo-so (Emptying one’s mind) garden which not only won a gold medal but also was voted best garden in the Artisan garden category at this year’s Chelsea Flower Show. Lesley has spent the past few months busily sourcing a wide range of unusual plants for this garden and then, with a little help and moral support from my wife, spent a good deal of last week laying out and planting this unusual garden which has as its central feature a Korean toilet. The RHS website describes the garden as follows: ‘Hae-woo-so is the Korean word for the traditional Korean toilet. The inspiration behind the garden is that for centuries the Korean people believed that going to the toilet [...]

 Posted by at 10:45 am

Ealing’s targets for affordable and socially rented homes are unlikely to be met

 Community, Eric Leach  3 Responses »
May 242011
 
Ealing's targets for affordable and socially rented homes are unlikely to be met

Vice Chair of West Ealing Neighbours, Eric Leach, looks at the housing situation in Ealing and finds few reasons to be cheerful about the future. Recent research by the School of Medicine at University College London suggests that apart from smoking, the principal sources of avoidable illness and premature death are overcrowding, homelessness, a poor standard of housing and insecurity in housing. (Hansard HC Deb, 5 May 2011). These findings should leave no-one in any doubt as to the gravity of anyone not having a home. The numbers of Rough Sleepers in London is on the rise. There were 3,673 in London in 2009/10 – an annual increase of 6%. (Crisis CHAIN database). This is the first uplift in the figures since 2002. Rough Sleepers life expectancy is 42 years. (Crisis). Historically homes for the poor were described as Council Housing. Prime Minister Thatcher began the phasing out of Council [...]

Is drug dealing a problem in West Ealing? Tell us what you think.

 Community, David Highton  2 Responses »
May 212011
 

The post on the Ealing Today website about blatant drug dealing on the streets of West Ealing has set us thinking again about how to tackle this problem. I’m told the CCTV cameras along the Uxbridge Road have simply pushed the drug dealing onto the side streets. We’re interested to know what people  think so that we can take this up again with our local Safer Neighbourhood police teams.  Please leave a comment to let us know your thoughts and experiences.   David Highton

 Posted by at 9:07 am

Origins of some West Ealing street names

 Local Development Framework, Local history  1 Response »
May 192011
 
Origins of some West Ealing street names

Local historian David Shailes writes that when the streets of Ealing were originally laid out the landowners and property developer got to choose the names, so the reasons for their choices are generally not recorded and are lost in the mist of time. Researching street names is interesting for lots of reasons as some have names of local historical interest, others have no local connections and some are linked to events in history. The length of this article (published in our May newsletter) means that we can only scratch the surface of the 200 odd roads that have a W13 post code. A set of my personal favourites are the Australian named roads: Adelaide Road, Brisbane Road, Sydney Road and Melbourne Avenue and these were all on land developed by the Steel family and it is known that Charles Steel whose market garden at one stage made him the largest rate [...]

 Posted by at 7:30 am

West Ealing – hub for car accessory shops

 David Highton, West Ealing Shopping  1 Response »
May 182011
 
West Ealing - hub for car accessory shops

It hadn’t occurred to me until Desire Motorsport opened last week (where Hewden Tool Hire used to be) that this end of West Ealing near the junction with Eccleston Road has a cluster of tyre and car accessory shops. There’s Ealing Tyres in Eccleston Road itself, Kieran’s tyre, MOT and accessory shop in the Uxbridge Road, Kwik-Fit on the corner of the Uxbridge Road and Coldershaw Road, Cartronic Centre in Coldershaw Road and now Desire Motorsport tyre and alloy wheel hub shop has joined them. I spoke to the owner of Desire Motorsport who lives in Hanwell and has worked locally for many years. He realised the value of being part of a cluster of car-related shops. Good luck to him and I hope all these shops and businesses, and West Ealing, benefit from being near one another. David Highton

 Posted by at 11:29 am

WEN Reading Group is involved in a research project

 Sarah Judic, WEN book club  1 Response »
May 162011
 
WEN Reading Group is involved in a research project

In August 2010 we read Iris Murdoch’s ‘The Bell’ for one of our monthly meetings.  As always our book choices are suggested and discussed by members of the group before being agreed upon.  This has led us to some interesting reads, things we haven’t always liked, but others that have been riveting and an experience we wouldn’t have ventured upon on our own. ‘The Bell’ was an interesting choice not just because it was an enjoyable novel to read or that it led to an interesting discussion but also because it has been taken as the novel for Liz Broomfield, a freelance copy editor, to centre her research around.  Interested in the book choices made by reading groups Liz has noticed that these tend to be those in the media, recently published or promoted, prize winners or classics.  This misses out an enormous amount of fiction that would make great [...]

 Posted by at 9:01 pm

Duck waiting patiently outside Sainsbury’s

 David Highton, West Ealing Shopping  2 Responses »
May 162011
 

Just as I came out of Sainsbury’s this morning I heard this quacking noise and there waiting patiently near the front door was a Mallard duck.  Maybe its mate had gone in to shop!  After a while it gave up waiting, quacked loudly and flew off. That’s by no means the first time I’ve seen ducks around that area. I’ve seen and heard them walking the streets around Melbourne Ave and St James Ave a few times over the last couple of years. I do wonder where they come from? Maybe they are based in one of the ponds at Walpole Park and come to visit West Ealing a few times each year. If anyone else sees them please do let us know. David Highton

 Posted by at 9:01 am
 Older Entries