Of all the appalling deaths in Kings Cross this one was the strangest for years – the body of an Italian man Sebastiano Magnanini (pictured), found last autumn in a shopping trolley in Regents Canal. (There’s a (very) Guardian background piece here) Now Michael Walsh of Wharfdale Road, right next to the canal pleads guilty to preventing the lawful burial of a body. But we still don’t know how Mr Magnanini died. The police say:
Three men have pleaded guilty to offences in connection with the death of a man whose body was recovered from Regent’s Canal.
Paul Williams, 61 of no fixed abode, and Michael Walsh, 41 of Wharfdale Road, N1 pleaded guilty to preventing the lawful burial of body.
Walsh and Daniel Hastie, 22 of no fixed abode, pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit fraud by false representation.
All three admitted the offences on Tuesday, 5 January at Blackfriars Crown Court. They will be sentenced at the same court on 5 February.
Police were called by a member of the public at 09:07hrs on Thursday, 24 September to reports of a body submerged in the canal, close to the entrance of Islington Tunnel.
The body was identified as 46-year-old Sebastiano Magnanini, originally from Italy, who had been living and working in south London.
A post-mortem examination took place at the Whittington Hospital on Friday, 25 September, and the cause of death remains unknown at this stage. Further toxicology tests are currently taking place.
Three men have been arrested in connection with his death and have been dealt with as above.
Enquiries are still underway into the circumstances of Mr Magnanini’s death.
First the ‘good’ news: The Chancellor’s November statement included an annual £700 million cuts to Transport for London (TfL). I quivered with fear thinking, that’s the dangerous gyratory redesign gone. But no! The £700 million annual cut is to the TfL operating budget not the upgrade budget. Rumours are that Mayor Boris agreed the cut in order to avoid cuts to the police service. The gyratory redesign is likely to be protected; we wait and see what the slash to our transport operating budget will bring.
Redesigning the god awful gyratory system that forces traffic into narrow, densely populated residential streets has been a no brainer ever since I’ve lived here – 26 years and counting. TfL have no sense of urgency however. So accidents, deaths from collisions and pollution, poor public health that hits our children and our elderly the hardest continue unabated whilst they tinker with the deckchairs. Eleven o’clock yesterday morning and yet another long vehicle attempts to navigate its way from York Way into Wharfdale Road:
It’s a joke. Wharfdale Road in Islington, like its sister roads Swinton and Acton Street in Camden, is not fit for traffic, pedestrians, cyclists, businesses or residents as it is. Someone needs to have strong words with TfL – yet again. Local folk have asked our politicians time and again to do this, and they have. But TfL wends its merry way taking its time whilst we all suffer day in and day out.
TfL have promised us consultation in February 2016. This is after their consultations started in 2011. Their most recent delay? Another bl**dy consultation this time in early 2017. What is going to take them an entire year? There is no reasonable excuse for this. We want the high level consultation we’ve been promised in Feb 2016 to be followed within four months with detailed plans for final consultation. And then we want works to start. Quickly.
So, here’s the thing… If we want to see TfL take us seriously we have to take action ourselves. Below is some sample text, copy it, edit it, write your own, do whatever but PLEASE email the Mayoral candidates NOW. Their email addresses are below. If you write your own, copy us in. If you get a reply forward it to us (kingscrossenvironment@gmail.com). We’ll keep everyone updated.
I am writing to ask what your position is on the desperately needed redesign of the King’s Cross traffic gyratory system. I live/work/study/visit King’s Cross and am concerned about safety for all road users, pollution in this densely populated area and lack of decent public realm.
Transport for London have been consulting on a redesign since 2011. They intend to consult on a high level proposal in February 2016 and on final details in 2017. They have changed these dates regularly. I have little confidence that they will stick to them. In any case, a year between high level and detailed consultation is far too long when this is an urgent issue. Accidents, deaths from collisions and pollution, poor health and the impact of poor public realm continue all the while TfL delays.
Further, TfL are working on their proposals very privately. This gives the public very little chance to have real input into the development of their designs.
Would you please reply to me with your position on the need for gyratory redesign and your thoughts on the timescale in which it should happen.
>Detectives investigating the murder of 17-year-old Vasilaki Kakko in Holloway have made an arrest.
The man, believed aged 20, was arrested on Monday, 30 November in Bognor Regis, West Sussex on suspicion murder by officers from the Met’s Homicide and Major Crime Command, assisted by Sussex Police.
The man was taken into custody at a Sussex police station and will be transferred to a south London police station.
Parents and Careres of different backgrounds and across the region, who have come together in a grass roots drive to improve central London’s biggest playground, Coram’s Fields, call all other parents, carers and young people, who the grounds, to an open meeting on the question of improving the largest children’s play-ground in the area, Coram’s Fields.
Coram’s Fields which is the main play ground for many children living around Kings Cross, and exists due to land reserved by Thomas Coram for children some 250 years ago.
The meeting takes place on Sunday the 29th of November between 15.00 and 17.00 at Blemundsbury Hall in Dombey Street, London WC1N 3PF.
The independent group of parents and carers can be contacted via e-mail here coramsfieldspca@gmail.com
Another day, another senseless killing of a local teenager, this time in Yoke Close off North Road last night (Monday night). I’m lost for words really.
The police have said
‘A murder investigation has been launched following the death of a male in Holloway.
Police were called at approximately 20:50hrs on Monday, 23 November to reports of a male stabbed in Yoke Close, off North Road, N7.
London Ambulance Service and London’s Air Ambulance also attended. The male – aged 17 – was pronounced dead at the scene at 21:22hrs.
Officers believe they know the identity of the deceased and next of kin have been informed.’
At this early stage, anyone with information is asked to contact Crimestoppers on 0800 555 111
This terrible crime took place only a few hundred metres or so from where Ben Kinsella was killed and about three quarters of a mile from where Alan Cartwright was killed. I’ll update my piece documenting broad Kings Cross area murders where there still seems to be no solution in sight.
For many, many years local campaigners have doggedly pushed for the dangerous, dirty and unfriendly traffic gyratory system to be removed and replaced with quality public space and safer, healthier roads for all. Their impressive unfailing commitment to achieve a seemingly impossible dream takes a massive step forward this coming February showing that remaining focussed on achieving real progress maybe no quick win but does move mountains.
The mountain in question is Transport for London. TfL and the current mayor have stuck to ‘traffic smoothing’ as their priority. Traffic smoothing, aka keeping the cars and lorries moving, results in ever increasing motor traffic loads. Designing the London traffic system to be motor traffic friendly as its top priority has made the gyratory system what it is today. Local people in our densely populated neighbourhoods suffer massive levels of pollution, cyclists and pedestrians are routinely put at risk, roads divide our community and our public realm is left filthy and unloved.
In 2011, after continual pressure from the community, TfL’s position shifted slightly and they held a series of public events to gather views about the gyratory. However, campaigners have had to push TfL every step of the way and the promised consultation on design options that was to have happened in 2013 was pushed back several times eventually being promised for winter 2016.
When TfL said they would work with Islington and Camden councils to produce new design options they were taken at their word. It appears TfL were surprised by the commitment to gyratory removal our councils brought to the table, hence the delays.
Bowing to local pressure TfL have announced they will unveil design options for public consultation, devised in partnership with Islington and Camden, in February 2016. This is a great result, the first time TfL’s hand has been forced to bring a gyratory removal deadline forward.
The local campaigners have asked local people to keep the pressure up and clearly focussed on TfL:
“We’ve got a big opportunity next year with a new Mayor coming in. Let’s make sure London’s Transport Committee is in no doubt we need a really good new design for our roads and public realm and we need it NOW!”
They ask people to write to the Transport Committee chair Valerie Shawcross now. Ask her to press TfL for a firm timetable for redeveloping the gyratory, one that recognises that their delays continue to kill people, damage our health and destroy our sense of community.
Work has started on a feasibility study in partnership with the London Boroughs of Camden and Islington, which will focus on the following roads:
A201 Penton Rise, King’s Cross Road A501 Pentonville Road, Gray’s Inn Road, Acton Street, Swinton Street A5202 Pancras Road, Midland Road, Goods Way A5203 Caledonian Road, Wharfdale Road A5200 York Way We held focus groups with representatives from cycling and pedestrian groups, as well as local resident and business groups, in 2011.
The feedback is being considered as part of the feasibility study. We are developing design options which meet the aims above and plan to hold a public consultation in February 2016.
There was a disturbance at St Pancras last night as scuffles erupted around a demonstration. It was widely covered on social media and in mainstream media – here are some excerpts, I’ll try to cover both points of view. If you are new to this site and want to comment be aware that we moderate comments heavily here to maintain a civil discourse:
Kings Cross used to be synonymous with its seedy sex industry – street workers, dodgy hotels and a Michael Porter-type cluster of sex shops and the like. The street workers seem to have gone (hopefully to somewhere safer) the hotels are slightly less dodgy now but what happened to the shops? The shops had in some cases been there for what felt like decades, were unmissable as the only brightly lit shop fronts at night and became local landmarks, but not always in a good way. Better council enforcement, regeneration leading to rising rents and increased footfall has meant the shops have been replaced with new forms of mammon. This is undoubtedly a good thing and we have written many times on this site about some of the establishments. But history takes many forms so I thought it worth recording what had replaced the sex establishments of yore as a marker for regeneration.
It’s important to point out that none of the current businesses have any connection at all with their location’s former use.
The infamous Pirate Books in a prime Kings Cross ‘gateway’ location on York Way was finally driven out by determined Islington council action. The site first became a coffee shop and is now a noodle bar.
Pleasure Island was in my opinion essentially a brothel on a prime corner location practically opposite my former flat on the Cally Road. The site is now occupied by an estate agent.
And almost oppostite the former site of Pleasure Island is another estate agent. That site was also a sex shop for a few years, then became a carpet shop.
Breathless was a rubber fetish shop on Kings Cross Road – the unit is now empty but hasn’t been re-let it seems.
Opposite Bleu Danube was several incarnations of shops like Soho Books that moved between premises now occupied by Drink Shop Do (an early flag bearer of grass roots regeneration) and Dash.
And along the side of St Pancras station before that was regenerated were a series of low key shops that for a while included Fettered Pleasures a specialist S&M supplier. I can’t quite recall which unit it was in but it may have been the one in the photo, which is now the Eurostar First Class Lounge – do let me know if i have this wrong.
Of all the appalling deaths in Kings Cross this one was the strangest for years – the body of an Italian man Sebastiano Magnanini (pictured), found last autumn in a shopping trolley in Regents Canal. (There’s a (very) Guardian background piece here) Now Michael Walsh of Wharfdale Road, right next to the canal pleads guilty to preventing the lawful burial of a body. But we still don’t know how Mr Magnanini died. The police say:
Kings Cross Environment 