[mafribe]

The transformation of East London which I believe to have been the main reason for choosing to host the Olympics in London, has been fairly spectacular. The Stratford area where the Olympic park was built, used to be a wasteland. Although I don't know this, I conjecture that the Olympics were used as a mechanism to force through a substantial number of planning permissions that would not have been granted otherwise.

[christoph]

Visually, it's changed - sure. There's a nice big stadium there that can be used every so often. It doesn't look as bad as it once did. It's changed very little of the outside area as far as I can tell though.

Stratford was recently named as the countries worst crime hotspot[0].

According to the FT, "the bounce" has failed to materialise [1].

I would not recommend a walk around the outskirts of the Olympic stadium for all but the very brave, it's still an area in much poverty with many social issues completely unresolved, notably violent crime (3.5 for every 1,000 people) [2].

[0] - http://www.standard.co.uk/news/crime/westfield-stratfords-po...

[1] - http://www.ft.com/cms/s/2/543cabaa-8a41-11e2-9da4-00144feabd...

[2] - http://crimeinlondon.com/newham/stratford-and-new-town/viole...

[ljf]

It's rough, but not that bad - I live locally (well in the even 'rougher' Forest Gate) and in the 15 years I've been in the area I've never personally had or seen any trouble - the kids who might look scary are well brought up - there isn't the crippling poverty (or as in other parts of London, poverty next to excessive wealth) that blights other parts.

Much of the crime is theft, rather than violent crime that south London sees - the postcode mentioned in the link above is the postcode of two shopping centres and transport interchange - the places you would expect to see high pick pocketing and shoplifting, which is what the majority crime mentioned in the report is.

I think the adjacent areas have changed, Leyton and Leytonstone are both far nicer - and in the last years have had new interesting pubs, cafes and shops open up.

Would this have happened anyway? Maybe - but most people I talk to are pretty happy with the changes the area has seen.

I'm still a little sad the plan to open Google offices in the Olympic park was shelved - that would have brought in a whole heap of jobs and new people to the area.

[test1235]

>in the even 'rougher' Forest Gate

The setting of the movie 'Ill Manors'?

[ljf]

Yup, but I'm living in the leafy suburban Victorian bit with a massive park at the end of my road, I love it here, really culturally diverse but with a real London history here too, and loads of people that have chosen to make London there home or grew up in the area.

[buro9]

The question should be: Would that transformation have happened anyway?

London has been re-developing brown fields since the mid-80s and shows no sign of slowing down. The Olympics may have accelerated it, but I'm not sure anyone I know who lives in East London or works in Techcity would buy that this re-development wouldn't have happened anyway. The pressure for space is just too great.

I'm fairly pro-Olympics now, afterall... that velodrome is something beautiful and I'm going to ride it.

[andy_ppp]

Problem with Straford is that

a) new builds in the UK are made as cheaply as possible.

b) new builds go down in value as soon as you buy them

c) we in Europe hate soulless man planned cities - a lot of the area around the olympic park feels this way.

I think the government could have just paid for the cleanup of the area and done something like subsidise housing for the poor there with the money, rather than pay the the huge costs of running the games. The opening ceremony was pretty good though :-D

[rayiner]

> I think the government could have just paid for the cleanup of the area and done something like subsidise housing for the poor there with the money

The whole point of development, especially development pursuant to the Olympics, is to push the poor out of the area. When any mayor says "we will clean up and develop this area," none ever mean "... in order to make a nice place to live for poor people." Indeed, if poor people still live there, the public won't even perceive the area as being nice.

E.g., this is one of the "bad neighborhoods" of Chicago: https://maps.google.com/maps?q=south+halsted+and+west+77+chi...

Like most of the city, it's actually quite well-maintained and pleasant. If lower-income people didn't live there, it wouldn't be considered a bad neighborhood at all.

[tptacek]

That's Auburn Gresham. It's not a particularly bad neighborhood. It's mostly black, like the rest of the south side, but also middle class and connected to the Metra. Just one neighborhood south is Beverly, one of the safest neighborhoods in the city.

Here's a bad neighborhood in Chicago:

https://maps.google.com/maps?q=west+garfield+park&ie=UTF-8&h...

It is not well-maintained and it isn't pleasant; it's block after block of board-ups and red-X placards.

[rayiner]

I guess it depends on where you are in the neighborhood, because: http://news.yahoo.com/four-chicago-neighborhoods-named-list-....

"Chicago's Auburn Gresham neighborhood made the list twice this year, but the census tract around South Halsted Street and West 77th is ranked highest at No. 4. Within a one-year period, NeighborhoodScout says there is a 1 in 9 chance of being a victim of violent crime here, and per 1,000 residents, the violent crime rate is 116.56.

The average per capita income in this area is lower than 99.4 percent of other U.S. neighborhoods, and 51 percent of children in this section of Chicago are living below the federal poverty line, giving this census tract a rate of childhood poverty that's higher than 93 percent of neighborhoods around the country."

I'll defer to your knowledge of Chicago, though. My point really is that while people talk about "bad neighborhoods" on the south side of Chicago, much (most? at least what I've driven through) is in pretty good shape. Even West Garfield Park isn't so bad in places. E.g. https://maps.google.com/maps?q=west+garfield+park&ll=41.8819...

[tptacek]

If you look at what they're reporting, they're analyzing "census tracts" that appear to be 2-3 square blocks; for instance, the really bad Auburn Gresham one is the corner of Ashland (a busy street) and 75th (a busy street). There are (believe it or not) bad corners in Oak Park too (I live kitty corner to one), but you'd be nuts to say Oak Park was unsafe.

I wouldn't want to drive down Washington in Garfield Park at night.

All of this is really not super relevant to your point, except to demonstrate that the neighborhoods people think of as "bad" in Chicago aren't pretty tree-lined residential streets that happen to have poor people living in them.

[andyjohnson0]

"I conjecture that the Olympics were used as a mechanism to force through a substantial number of planning permissions that would not have been granted otherwise"

There was also fairly widespread use of compulsory purchase orders [1] to obtain land for the olympic park [2]. A significant number of people lost their homes, and businesses were forced to move, so that private-sector developers could take-over the land.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Compulsory_purchase_order

[2] http://www.gamesmonitor.org.uk/node/1092