Rising East Online

Stressed out in Stratford

by Lennie Pothecary and Carly Crittenden

Our roving reporters found that opinion on the ground in East London doesn’t always match the positivity of the ‘Back the Bid’ lobby.

Living around the corner from the venues where Olympic events are due to take place - if London wins the bid, that is - we felt we should take a look at where the main Olympic village is going to be built: Stratford.

Stratford hasn't been getting the most favourable reviews; some have called it desolate and ugly. But to us, walking through the town centre, as local people went about their everyday business, it looked like a normal East End part of London.

Approaching Stratford station, we could see promotional material for the Olympics everywhere - there are banners on lampposts, the Olympic colours and ‘Back the Bid’ posters adorn Stratford station itself.

As we looked around, there seemed to be a positive vibe; on the day we visited, London mayor Ken Livingstone officially unveiled the new ‘Back the Bid’-decorated tube trains, adding to a sense that East London, indeed the whole of London, is behind the bid.

But people in Stratford appeared less positive than their highly decorated train station suggested. Is this because of the delays that Livingstone’s unveiling caused local residents, or is there something else going on here?

As we were taking in the atmosphere, we attracted the attention of a woman selling the London Evening Standard. She seemed the perfect candidate for some questions.

She was not nearly as positive as you might expect Stratford locals to be. She told us that some of her friends had lost their jobs due to the fact that builders are demolishing many local warehouses in order to erect the velodrome and other Olympic venues.

This came as a shock to us - because until now we have only heard positive opinions from the media and others involved in the London 2012 campaign, and thus assumed that local residents are looking forward to having their area restored and transformed into a byword for sporting excellence and an international tourist attraction.

Others held similar views to the Evening Standard seller. For example, none of them felt especially well-informed about the Olympic plans, about how things are being built and how building work might affect them in the coming months.

Many said they hadn’t read all of the leaflets they had received; one individual even denounced such material as ‘a load of lies’, pointing to a certain distrust of the media and the authorities.

There was no ‘type’ who were expressing these kinds of opinions; it wasn’t only a certain age group or a certain kind of person. Rather, negative opinion seemed rather prevalent among different kinds of people living near the Olympic site.

Contrast this to views held by people who live outside of London. In surveys and polls, many non-East Enders have been positive about Olympic developments in the Stratford area and about the ‘Back the Bid’ campaign in general.

Perhaps this is because they live far away from the site itself - or because some individuals still imagine that the East End is a run-down area full of crime, which could do with the kind of boost promised by hosting the Olympics.

We decided to drive around the Olympic site. This wasn’t as easy as you might expect; even after receiving directions it was never clear whether we were at the site or not, as there are few signs or information posts.

There are no promotional banners; you start to wonder whether they don’t want you to know this is the site, because, frankly, it is far from looking like a promising place at the moment.

The positive mood that we first encountered on our arrival in Stratford soon dissipated. After hearing negative and worried opinions from local residents, and seeing the reality of where this magnificent village is going to be built, we cannot see how the bid will be a success.

The 2012 team have a lot of work to do to persuade the people of Stratford that there are benefits to hosting the Olympics. Otherwise they will continue to win nods from media people and politicians, while further isolating the people who already live in this ‘Olympic village’.

Lennie Pothecary and Carly Crittenden are second-year journalism students at the University of East London.

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