Confused about where Fitzrovia is? Clueless is more like what the fools were who turned up at Whitfield Gardens on Saturday 5 December to promote local shopping. A Golden Santa complete with steel band and squeezed between Starbucks and Cafe Nero; and in the pouring rain under those stupid fairy lights. “Do you shop local?” said the bouncing, successful brain-donor. Yes! says the Political Geographer. “How did you hear about this event?” I live here, I say. I can hear the racket going on from inside my flat over there I point. “OK. I don’t understand” says the brain-donor. Do you know where you are I say. “Yes!” says the donor, “Tottenham Court Road!” Correct, I say. But what is this area called? A blank look stares back at me. Now the two street wardens move in and they are fiddling with their utility belts. I turn to them and ask them where they think they are. They combine their efforts and chorus back “Tottenham Court Road”. All three of them are now united in complete stupidity. Yes we are at Tottenham Court Road, but what is this area called by the people who live here? “No-one lives here!” says the triumvirate of cluelessness. I pull out a copy of Fitzrovia News and announce that thousands of people live here. The goons are getting a little twitchy and the brain-donor is looking nervous. This loony who thinks he lives here has even produced his own fake paper to try to convince people that there is a community buried underneath all this rush to Christmas.
Now I know for a fact that that this confusion has arisen due to the publication of Camden Council’s Development Control leaflet which states quite clearly that the south of Camden consists of nothing but commercial premises and is devoid of any residential settlement. The fact that more that 35,000 people live south of the Euston Road is almost completely ignored. Camden, it is often said, is the only London borough with a town hall outside its borough boundary.