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Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!

Haringey - long-term residents - is Haringey getting nicer to live in or worse?

Hello to all the long-term residents. 

I've lived in north London for a good few years now, and always been a Londoner, but only recently a resident in Haringey - I'm aiming to live here for a good few more years too!

I was wondering what your opinions are about the borough, in general, is it getting a nicer, more liveable place, or is it a bit like where I grew up, going downhill and increasingly run down?

I don't mind where you live around the borough, I'm just curious really!

Tags for Forum Posts: what's harringay like?

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Great question! Where did you grow up? 

In Hounslow West if you're familiar - was fine when I was young (usual city living stuff), but the surrounding streets went from being families to HMO over ten/fifteen years.

Generally the locals seem to not care about trees, gardens etc, more interested in 4x4s. 

I'm from the area so very biased. Lived here since 1984, even sloped off to sunny Tottenham recently (cheaper houses init). It's great you should stay. But like my wife says everywhere looks nice in the sun ;) 

I think it's improving in Harringay

I've been in the area for twenty years or so and it's changed a lot in that time.

There's much more in the way of coffee shops, bars, etc and the whole shopping area down at the Arena. On the other hand you've lost quite a bit of the variety (all the restaurants are a bit identikit nowadays for instance) and character.

The area does feel safer, or maybe I've just become more used to it.

I think the house prices and the big developments show the way it is going. I suspect some will prefer it and some won't.

Personally I find it better now but not all will.

Lifer here. It is nicer no question. It is safer and better serviced overall. There are many parts people may or may not like, the new apartment blocks, the parking and anti traffic measures in general but I think most of them are part and parcel of it. I don't remember seeing so many homeless or beggers as today but I don't know if that is a real change, a London wide change or something I just notice more now being more aware of societies issues as an adult. It is not the same place I grew up in but it is a better place overall. 

I presume you are referring to Harringay, rather than Haringey. I have been living here (Harringay) for the best part of 5 years.

As an unapologetic gentrifier who couldn't afford Islington or Crouch End at the time, I would say it's improved very considerably over this short period, but has a long way to go, mostly in the realm of: antisocial behaviour  litter/cleanliness; traffic and traffic pollution.

There are a lot of positives - new builds that will hopefully bring more affluence, slightly more upmarket stores, and what appears to be the nearing of the point of peak kebab. There's also an undercurrent of positive development in the Florentia clothing village, parts of which have been regenerated with an art pavilion en route, as well as West Green road. Of course Wood Green/Turnpike lane are as shocking as I remember them when we first moved here but there's no reason you should go (or buy) there. I certainly don't go there more than once a year, and only out of absolute necessity...

Arts pavilion at Florentina village? Interesting. Do you have more info?

We completed our house purchase here on Christmas Eve 2014, after we were unceremoniously served notice for the second time in 13 months by unscrupulous landlords in Crouch End (the second of which tried to pocket our deposit... fortunately my partner worked not only for the same employer but in the same office! - an “amicable” solution was agreed......)

However, my acquaintance with “round ere” goes back to the summer of 2008 when I stayed with an ex girlfriend in one of the Turkish owned guest houses opposite Effingham and Fairfax - at the time I was NOT familiar with the area and, a sojourn into Wood Green(!) aside we stayed put. It didn’t feel like a nice area then.

Even visiting friends in 2013, I thought it was a bit rough, although by then I was in Leafy Crouchendez, so inevitably blinkered by the “wrong side of the tracks” mentality.

Having been here for 5.5 years now, I’m not sure if the area has improved or I’ve grown to love it. Probably a combination of the two. If you’d have told me 12 years ago I’d be happily living 400 yards from the cockroach infested bed sit we’d rented for 60 quid for the weekend(!!) I’d have told you to get lost. But like everywhere in London, Harringay has as many merits as drawbacks, and I’m not sure I’d change too much.

Except reopening the Salisbury, but I think current circumstances are rather outside your request.

EDIT: Oh and the traffic. Green Lanes traffic is appalling.

Like Matt I’ve also lived here (on the Ladder) since 1984. It has improved out of all recognition. It is a lot cleaner than many nearby areas I visit regularly.  Because Green Lanes is busy for most of the day it generally feels a safe place to be out and about in.  I find it very neighbourly and know most of the households near me as well as the people who work in the shops I use regularly.  The two primary schools have excellent reputations.  The mix of people keeps it feeling buzzy, it doesn’t have that homogeneous feel you get in places like Crouch End.  Public transport is excellent 

The downside - traffic!

I often wonder why anyone who needs pubic transport would select Crouch End over Harringay with our underground, overground and bus services. It was Horney School for Girls that brought us up here in 1980 when Islington secondary schools were dour. I'm told that the Harringay Green Lanes shopping area was Jewish during WWII, at least my Jewish hairdresser's father had a shop here then. It's been interesting to watch the street's change of ethnicity, primarily Greek in 1980 with a smattering of others such as the Italian delicatessen that I sorely miss. And of course the piano shop is gone. Now we have Turkish/Cypriot, South Asian news agents, and the more recent European entrees. Ever-changing Harringay is, indeed, a good place to live. 

I lived on Crouch End Hill for years. It's a 14 minute walk for me to get to Archway Tube. I'm now near Hornsey Police Station. From Hornsey station I can be at my office in Holborn in half an hour. I lived near the Salisbury for years. I'd usually walk from either Manor House or Turnpike Lane because the bus would take a lifetime, the traffic was so bad.

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