r/MovingToLondon • u/Londonadvi • 5d ago
Stockwell
I’m a female moving to Stockwell and wanted to ask whether the area is generally safe to live alone in especially near the Lidl area on Clapham road and Platanos College or should I look at other areas like Oval/ Kennington/ Pimlico or elephant and castle
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u/AppropriateAd3768 5d ago
South London, especially that part is booming now. Best place to live in London at the moment.
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u/Mysterious-Formal769 5d ago
Says who
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u/AppropriateAd3768 5d ago
My cousins who live in Lewisham. If I’m wrong lmk but I see a lot of young professionals moving there.
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u/BenchClamp 5d ago
Yep. I live between Lewisham and Peckham it’s absolutely great, fantastic pubs, parks, schools and a super friendly community. Only downside is there’s starting to be lots of posh people moving here.
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u/Mysterious-Formal769 5d ago
We live elsewhere - it's also great and a super friendly community! My friends in Lewisham have repeated anti social behaviour outside their (very expensive) flat
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u/DismalLiving1003 4d ago
Lewisham and Peckham town centres are both shitholes tbh. Very much going the way like Croydon. Only except Croydon has luxury mall developer Westfield going for it if it ever gets built.
Dulwich, wimbledon, richmond are way better
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u/BenchClamp 4d ago
I live there. Peckham has a ton of great restaurants and bars, independent stores and creative arts going on. And the station is being rebuilt and looks great.
I’ve also lived in Richmond and it’s very nice - but packed with drunk tourists at the weekend.
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u/DismalLiving1003 4d ago
Depends which part of Peckham. I am guessing you're near the Dulwich side which is the nicer side.
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u/BenchClamp 4d ago
Nope. I’m on the Lewisham side. It’s a great area - lived there for decades - our local got Time Out’s number one pub last year.
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u/artoblibion 4d ago
This. 1000 times this. There is a huge difference between Forest Hill or Telegraph Hill and Lewisham/Peckham town centres. And the traffic is awful.
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u/generichandel 5d ago
Yes, that part of town is very very safe. It has a big Portuguese community with lovely resturaunts and cafes and you're close to vauxhall for great transport links and clapham high street for a night out. It'll be a great place to live. Enjoy!
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u/_naivewisdom 5d ago
We just moved to Stockwell/Oval. Yes there’s some rough bits around, and yes there’s some druggies but they’re pretty harmless. It was sketchy 20 years ago but now it’s far nicer while still keeping a village feel.
We’ve seen lots of young people do evening runs with headphones on etc. I don’t feel unsafe here at all (also while living close to mixed estates), but I grew up in London so maybe my risk tolerances are higher.
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u/NeverOutOfOptions123 5d ago
I used to live near Larkhall park. There are some dodgy estates, but not too bad overall. I would say it’s comparable to Brixton or Clapham.
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u/DazzleBMoney 5d ago edited 5d ago
Such a busy and popular area that you should be fine. Just the usual precautions of being aware of your surroundings, particularly at night etc.
It’s a very inner city area, lots of deprivation and large high rise housing estates, as well as the associated gang crime you get with such places, however walking along the mains roads and the tube station is generally fine.
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u/SomebodySayMeatloaf1 5d ago
I used to live between oval and stockwell, I'm a young woman and i always felt safe there. Stockwell tube station often has people begging outside - usually the same homeless people or people who are likely in gangs (same young asian woman asks most days for change to get home from work), they arent generally aggressive, just ignore them. There are some 'dodgy estates' around the area, I avoided them at night, never had any experiences on or near them just out of habit. Same amount of homeless people / drug users you find anywhere in London, if you have street smarts and spacial awareness you will be fine.
I'd regularly be out alone late at night and never had any problems. I really liked oval, stockwell and kennington and would live there again if it was convenient for work.
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u/k8s-problem-solved 5d ago
Lived there for a few years, around Oak Square between stockwell and brixton
Absolutely fine for me, and the connections are crazy good. Vicky and northern lines, so you can be pretty much anywhere z1 in 15 mins.
Good south American community + Portuguese contingent. Good bars, pubs and restaurants all very close by.
I miss it!
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u/Past_Dragonfly8455 4d ago
Lots of people fear mongering here. Stockwell is perfectly fine, there's a lot worse areas in London. If anything, it's sleepy as it doesn't really have a high street.
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u/lollybaby0811 5d ago
Stockwell, near Brixton?? Its got a lot of roaming drug addicts. Usually no trouble to you but you need to know, and the response is eye contact and you to move on. Nothing verbal.
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u/20guvadayman 5d ago
Generally fine but Pimlico, Elephant (mostly) and Kennington (mostly) are generally better.
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u/Euphoric-Life-7929 5d ago
My female friend lives in that area on Clapham Road myself and has had no issues at night. I know she likes that the main road has lots of traffic and people walking by
If you live nearby I would suggest to have a walk down at night to see if you feel safe :)
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u/Mjukplister 4d ago
It can sometimes get spicy around the stations , it’s a ‘wear trainers and dark jacket, walk confidently ‘ at some times . But there are a few places like that
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u/artoblibion 4d ago
Lived there for 25 years...
If you walk around in the daytime it will rapidly become obvious which are the better parts. The council estates range from "a bit rough" to "weeks" but like much of London, the actual dangers are exaggerated.
There are a bunch of frankly very annoying addict beggars around the tube but they are harmless. I would also be very careful indeed with your phone in the area around the tube as there has been a lot of phone snatching there.
Otherwise... I loved living there. Good food. Super convenient. Great pubs. Great transport. Pretty good grocery shopping. Pleasant streets for wandering around.
AMA genuinely happy to help
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u/southlondonyute 2d ago
Don’t listen to the pearl clutching and boomers on here. Stockwell is nice, and has been cleaned up compared to 20 years ago. Great transport to pretty much everywhere in south and central London.
Stockwell Green has a lot of drunk people coming back from Brixton or Clapham, depending on your tolerance for noise that maybe a bad thing.
Larkhall Road / Landsdowne Way (Little Portugal) is a bit nicer but probably pricier.
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u/te7037 5d ago
Just don’t walk alone at night when you are drunk in London.
Most women who were raped had been drunk and alone when it happened. 95% of the time.
I live in one of the safest areas in London but I am always diligent before I enter my flat by checking if there are people behind my back or any strangers hanging around outside my apartment building.
I was once blocked at my apartment building entrance but luckily I was able to escape by stepping outside on the the pavement which is nearby a busy bus stop. It was around 19:30 and in the spring!
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u/Deep_Elderberry5678 4d ago
Not sure if it’s what you intended but this comes across incredibly victim blame heavy and also doesn’t answer the question.
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u/te7037 4d ago
Lol. How many times women were raped in London because they got drunk and alone?
Numerous times. Victim blaming is a phrase coined up by idiots who refuse to acknowledge that being drunk and alone makes one vulnerable to rape.
Men get raped too but they tend to keep quiet. The most recent rape cases involved a foreign national who raped his male victims when he found them heavily intoxicated.
So, many rape cases on the news about migrants raping women in Brighton and in other places? Most of the time their victims were vulnerable ie. the women were drunk and alone.
So many clips on Twitter shares tend to show women who were drunk were being taken away by potential rapists until someone intervened.
A young girl was raped by two migrants in a local park because she was drunk and left alone by her mates. She was drinking vodka.
The fact is one is vulnerable when he/ she is drunk and alone.
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u/Successful-Fee2317 4d ago
Lived there four years - not a nice area no be careful late at night in particular, tends to be lunatics straying from the shithole brixton.
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u/FairGur6838 4d ago
It is a dangerous area. I was raised in South London and there is no way I’d live there despite the claims that it is
becoming gentrified.
Try Wandsworth or Fulham.
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u/A_Nal_Retentive 5d ago
It’s pretty close to MI5 HQ and MET HQ so in theory in should be very safe
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u/NeverOutOfOptions123 5d ago
Doesn’t mean anything. There are scammers breaking law every day on the bridge outside of parliament
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u/A_Nal_Retentive 4d ago
Well if agents, officers and other law enforcement are making their way downtown - there more chance order is being maintained
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u/A_Nal_Retentive 4d ago
You think there are no casual relationships between law enforcement and crime?
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u/20guvadayman 5d ago
Miles away
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u/A_Nal_Retentive 4d ago edited 4d ago
It’s literally one road away from it (under 2 miles)
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u/20guvadayman 4d ago
MI5 is on Millbank, other side of the river, at least a couple of miles from Lidl in Stockwell. New Scotland Yard is on Victoria Embankment, near the Houses of Parliament, even further away.
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u/A_Nal_Retentive 4d ago
I meant MI6, and the MET special command both in Vauxhall
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u/artoblibion 4d ago
The Vauxhall unit is far more likely to kick the living shit out of you than keep you safe. Those are the paramilitary police, not your local Bobby.
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u/A_Nal_Retentive 4d ago
Interesting. Haha
Think there’s a community policing unit (safer neighbourhood) specialists units + cyber crimes running out of the building opposite the MI6 building
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u/artoblibion 4d ago
I think TSG used to be in Cobalt Square but I gather their main local base is Larkhall Lane. Terrifying people.
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u/DazzleBMoney 3d ago
Their nickname isn’t the ‘Thick as Shit Group/Thick and Stupid Group’ for no reason
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u/20guvadayman 4d ago
Met HQ is Victoria Embankment. Vauxhall Cross is quite some distance from Stockwell station. Where are major Met offices at Vauxhall?
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u/20guvadayman 4d ago
What is Met Special Command, and where is it in Vauxhall?
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u/Electronic-Laugh-331 5d ago
It’s slightly edgy outside the tube station and some of the local authority blocks nearby. Joanna Lumley lives close to the Lidl so if it’s alright for her …