One Year Of Living In Croydon

Well, I’ve made it to one year of living in Croydon. Well, a little bit more.

I’m not in Croydon through choice. Living in London on a fairly decent wage, but having no wealth, means you have a choice for your first home – a scuzzy flat in a half-decent area or a good flat in a more questionable area. That choice is assuming you want to own outright, as I did – there are government schemes also.

But I saw enough of Croydon to think I could make a decent go of it here. OK, I appreciated the transport links too – 20 minutes on the train to central London, a little more to Gatwick Airport.

The Darker Side

Croydon has seen better days, as evidenced by my friend in his book, Croydonopolis.

Poverty is a lot more obvious here than anywhere else I’ve lived, at least since I lived in Hull.

There are plenty of homeless people, some aggressive beggars, a fair few crackheads roaming around – and it seems like there is a population that is struggling a bit to afford things.

It’s far from everyone here, as evidenced by the thousands of people that stream off the trains from central London in an evening, but it is a notable minority.

Further to that, there is crime – there are gangs hanging around in certain areas, and I did once walk past two gangs confronting each other on a Sunday afternoon, which was a tad hairy.

Yet I don’t feel particularly unsafe here in Croydon. Despite the mythology, I feel safe walking around – sure I keep an eye out, but I do in central London, or hell, Hampstead.

It Has Potential

Croydon does need a bit of architectural love.

Westfield was supposed to open in the centre by around 2018.

As you can probably work out, this is not Westfield and not a brick has been laid by Westfield or any of the random companies associated – I think they now called themselves Unibail Rodamco Westfield. They studiously aren’t building a Westfield but they do own a whacking great chunk of dated, if not run-down town centre land that is apparently going to be redeveloped into housing and some shopping by…2040. Only 22 years after the original opening date.

Will any of these plans happen before I’ve paid off my mortgage in 25 year’s time?

I often see potential in Croydon – some will see shithole, but half of those type of “Croydon is a shithole” social media comments are from those who are not billionaire enough to be outright racist as they might lose their job.

The Nestle building is a great example, and that whole plot of land. It was supposed to be redeveloped a few years ago, but the Chinese company who owns the land went bankrupt. Does anyone have a clue what is happening?

This is prime central Croydon land that at the least could be flats (the Nestle building was supposed to become flats, in the same way that my block, Leon House, was converted into flats), if not some entertainment, restaurants, etc.

Housing crisis…yet huge chunk of shabby land right in the centre of Croydon.

But What Do I like About Croydon

It does feel like Croydon has had a lot of bad luck, though also made some pretty bad decisions in terms of post-war planning too.

Yet I’ve found plenty to like about Croydon. OK, the first thing I’m going to mention is about escaping Croydon, but it only takes 20-30 minutes walk to get into some really gorgeous woodland.

It’s only an hour’s walk (or 15 minutes on the bus) until you reach actual non-stop countryside. I’m sure there are some great country pubs around here, that I am yet to discover.

Speaking of pubs, there is actually good beer served in Croydon. Art & Craft is my favourite place as they always have some great IPA on, also The Green Dragon, which looks like a basic 90’s pub yet actually also has some really interesting beers on.

Riff Raffs and The Cronx Tap (alas closed down between starting and finishing writing this post) normally have some half-decent beers on too…you can make a pub crawl of it. In fact, you can make a tram crawl, if you include the two brewery tap rooms on the outskirts of Croydon, Signal Brewery and Anspach & Hobday – quite why I’ve not been to either, or done the tram crawl, I’ve no idea.

Having a Boxpark in Croydon is a useful middle ground too. Trickle is fairly newly opened, and has a good beer list. There are definitely places I enjoy drinking in Croydon.

OMG – and there are two M&S’ within walking distance.

Eating And Shopping

Furthermore there is a plethora of independent restaurants in Croydon, though I’ve only made it to two in the one year of living in Croydon. One was respectable – a Romanian restaurant that basically served MEAT. Another was a dire Italian, stuck in the 1990’s, yet newly opened.

The more basic chains are here like Popeye’s (their cajun gravy is banging…and necessary seeing as the chicken tastes like cardboard), but there are none of the good London chains, maybe bar Breakfast Club. Not even a Pizza Pilgrims, or any of the half-decent pizza chains.

Clearly there is work for me to do here, to get around to some of the various independent restaurants – I could even make a blog of it.

I’ve actually joined a Croydon Eats Out group, alas they do their restaurant visits on a Tuesday evening, and I don’t particularly like going out the evening before my office day. But I have been out with them and intend on going out some more…I would have been at the Saturday brunch club just gone, were it not for the flu virus shit I decided to contract.

That does lead me onto one of the more appealing things about Croydon – I’ve met some really interesting people here. Quite a few fellow software engineers, a giggle doctor (I had no idea this was a thing), a bona fide movie star and plenty of genuine nice people. I still don’t have “my people” but I have a feeling that I will eventually have my own group of friends here.

Like Croydon itself, I feel like my enjoyment and acceptance of Croydon needs a little work, and a little love – but I do intend on making the most of it. One year of living in Croydon, and it’s a bit of a work in progress.

I’ve gone through some stages, when I moved in, I used to say that “I didn’t hate Croydon”. Then I moved onto “I don’t mind Croydon”. Now I think I’m at the level of “I quite…like…Croydon”, though said unusually slowly.