Where we live
This site is put together by Peter Aylmer of Forest Gate in east London, where I have lived since the 90s.
I was born just the other side of Wanstead Flats from where we live now, but I'm not the first Aylmer in the area.
My father, Anthony Jack Aylmer, was born in Tonbridge, Kent, but his own father came from Forest Gate.
Forest Gate
'Forest Gate' takes its name from the historic gate on the road northwards into the Forest -
the gate itself survived into the nineteenth century.
Depending on where you draw its boundaries, something like 30,000 people live here.
It is mostly residential, with many Victorian and Edwardian terraces like ours.
Our house is just a few yards from Wanstead Flats.
Forest Gate is seen as one of the more favoured parts of Newham, the east London borough in which it is situated.
This is thanks partly to the Flats and partly to the Woodgrange Estate on the other side of the main railway line -
some of the finest and most spacious terraced houses in London, and a conservation area.
However there is great challenge and deprivation here as well.
Forest Gate came to international attention in June 2006 with a massive - and abortive -
counter-terrorism raid on a family home in Lansdown Road. (My PC got mended at a shop just a few yards away).
The police alleged that they had strong evidence of an imminent chemical terrorism attack,
and invaded the house in force in a dawn raid. One of two suspects (brothers in their early 20s) suffered a gunshot wound.
After many days of detailed searching, nothing was found, and the suspects released without charge.
Community relations in Forest Gate are for the most part very good, but this incident did not help.
Read more about the raid on Wikipedia.
Many people commute to central London from Forest Gate, myself included.
Once, there were more commuters between Forest Gate station and the city terminus of Liverpool Street
than any other two rail stations in Britain - and each of the dozen or so peak time trains often sees a hundred plus alighting here.
Check how local trains are running from
Forest Gate station and our other local station
Wanstead Park.
Forest Gate ends where Epping Forest,
here the large open space of Wanstead Flats, begins.
Because of the pressure to develop land in London, there have been many efforts to build over the Flats.
They were safeguarded along with the rest of the Forest by Act of Parliament in the late 19th century -
not least, as a result of direct action by Forest Gate people tearing down fence enclosures -
and the most recent effort was by the then West Ham Council shortly after World War II.
Thankfully though the Flats - unromantic name, elsewhere it might be called a Heath - have survived.
You can still walk continuously on forest land from Manor Park station (next stop from Forest Gate) to Epping, sixteen miles, on the
Centenary Walk.
The Flats are largely treeless.
Part is given over to football pitches, but most is unmanaged and still 'wild' - cows grazed here to the late 1990s.
Three ponds provide a contrast to the green.
In area the Flats are only about one square mile, but there is plenty of space for horse riding (stables in Wanstead),
running and walking (it's two miles round the central part of the flats, without crossing a road -
try finding that elsewhere in east London), informal sports, kite flying and picnics.
The top picture shows the main pond, Alexandra pond.
In wet winters, the flats can flood - see Barbara in front of an inundated section in February 2001 in picture 2 -
but the flip side is summer fire, as in picture 3, taken summer 2004. There can be a wilder feel to the flats too.
Picture 4 shows the northern part of the Flats, approaching Bush Wood.
To the north-east of the Flats there was once a grand house and grounds, Wanstead Park.
The house fell into disrepair and was demolished in the 19th century, but part of the grounds and their ornamental ponds survive,
as can be seen in picture 5.
As well as the pictures in the sidebar I am building a month-by-month survey of the Flats -
click here to view.
For more information about the Flats visit wansteadflats.org.uk
Olympic borough
Newham is the lead borough for the 2012 Olympics and Paralympics.
The main site is about a half-hour's brisk walk from my house, and I see it grow as I go past on the train each day (picture 6);
there are more pictures on my Olympics page.
I have a personal target of attending a different sport on each day of the Games.
Newham is also home to the favourite football club of all Aylmers, West Ham United.
Its Upton Park ground was built on land bought from the local Catholic church -
as picture 7 shows, the club is the major partner now.
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