All so fast

- the river positively whooshing along
- the years seem to be going by at a great speed
- the building sites around here

This shows a lot of the area near my home. The river Avon from the St Philips Greenway, the path I walk on most days, either to get somewhere, or for pleasure.  Then the Paintworks development- protected from the river by a wall of gabions. (I know that word from my son, Mr civil engineer.) This was an industrial area with paint and dye works in the 19th and early 20th centuries.  When I moved here in the 1980s it was a run down industrial estate - but with a nice bar or two, and some interesting projects like a women’s woodworking training centre. (Cutting Edge). Now it’s getting more established as an arts area, there are many commercially let design studios, also arts projects, and the Martin Parr Foundation and the Royal Photographic Society exhibition space recently moved here, which ups the status no end. Beyond that are Victorian houses on the Bath Road (the A4) now mainly  divided into flats. 
Beyond that are the trees and slope of Arnos Vale cemetery ( which my garden backs onto) a really important wildlife and historic place, though also still holding funerals - and weddings:-) At the very top right you see the end of my road, built in the 1880s to house workers at Great Western railways. 
What you can’t see, as I’ve deliberately left them out, are the HUGE housing developments either side of this view. It’s complicated - we need more housing, some of them will be affordable, we must accept that change will occur. 

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