In our household, one of the jobs I recently had to do was work out how to attach the residents' parking permit sticker onto our car. True to form, I managed to stick the permit the wrong way round and on the opposite side of the windscreen than that intended. This led me to start thinking about how much we have become used to having cars in the area when just 40-50 years ago, a car in,  our Roads would have been a rarity. Going back further back, in the 1920s and earlier, the sight of milk and other items being delivered by horse and cart would have been common, as shown by photos we have of the local area.


Leading on from this thought, at the first local history exhibition in 1994, some people from my road brought in some Oyster shells which had been found when street works were undertaken in Stroud Road in the 1950s. It has always puzzled me how they got there and I only recently discovered that up to the 1920s children used to go round on St James's day collecting money door-to-door using these shells as a base in which to put candles.


Apart from looking back, a few of us on the committeehave been looking forward to see how we can develop the WPRA web site. Presently, we are at a stage where the possibilities are almost endless but we are in need of people who have the time and skills to see the potential of developing the site so it can fulfill community needs in much the same way as the local library used to do. Please do contact me: kenb@4front.co.uk or any of the WPRA committee members, if this is something that interests you.


And for all fellow long suffering commuters, any ideas for strap on rocket packs to avoid the daily horrors of train and tube travel into the city?

           Ken Ball