'Why Parsons Green?' Family suburb ponders London's latest terror target
Latika Bourke
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Parsons Green: It is a sad truth that Londoners have become accustomed to terror attacks. They expect them and they anticipate them on the Tube.
But when terrorism hit Parsons Green, a pretty row-house village in south-west London bordering zones two and three, and neighbouring swanky Chelsea, locals were shocked at one thing: the location.
Ila Patel works in a drycleaners right next to the tube station. "I saw many hundreds of people running," she said.
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One young woman with a knee injury came into her shop seeking help. She told Ila and her colleagues that she had been in the Tube carriage where the bucket bomb had detonated. Such was her state of shock, she couldn't talk about what she had seen and begged staff not to ask.
Ludovica Romani was showering inside her flat on Parsons Green Lane, a few hundred metres up from the underground station, when she first heard the sirens. They continued for another 10 minutes and when she got out of the shower and went to her window, armed police were swarming down Parsons Green Lane as people were fleeing the station.
"I was shocked looking at people," she said.
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"I saw people and children running out of the Tube some without their shoes on, some were limping."
"You would never imagine it here because Parsons Green is calm and peaceful. Why Parsons Green? I would think maybe Fulham but not Parsons Green – it's very small, very little.
"I don't understand why they did it there."
Mark was busy working when a client who had just left his business on Fulham Road, near the corner of Parsons Green Lane, came back in and said there had been a terrorist attack.
"When someone uses that word in Parsons Green it's an odd thing – you don't expect to hear that word here," he said.
His business sits alongside family-run restaurants, artisan bakeries, home interior shops, beauty salons and yoga studios.
"It's a huge family spot," said 20-year-old musician Louis Gray, who lives on Fulham Road. "It's creepy to think this stuff happens in an area where you expect to walk down the street and not have to worry about anything."
Louis Gray, 20, pictured at his home on Fulham Road at Parsons Green, London. Photo: Latika Bourke
"There are £4 million houses around here – this is where a lot of Made in Chelsea is filmed," said James Curran, referencing the reality show documenting the lifestyles of London's social elite.
He was evacuated from his council flat where he lives with his two cats next to the Tube station. He was allowed back home 10 hours later.
James Curran was evacuated from his home next to Parsons Green tube station. Photo: Latika Bourke
"Between 8 and 8.30 the Tube is chock-a-block," Curran said.
"You often have to wait for the next train because the first one is full," agreed Jay, a worker at a drycleaners on Fulham Road.
"It's got kids going to school in all their numbers, you've got mums and dads off to work, 20-year-olds off to uni – you've got the whole shebob," Gray said.
While the Manchester bombing shows us that terrorists do not discriminate between child and adult victims, locals in Parsons Green were left wondering if they were supposed to be the real targets of the timed homemade bomb.
"I think it was meant to go off at Earl's Court – it's a bigger station, packed," says one business owner, stretched out on the seat at the front of his empty shop on Fulham Road.
Perversely it was the smaller size of the two-platform station that contributed to what Merton councillor Dan Holden described as the "horror" of commuters fleeing the station.
Horror on @districtline at #ParsonsGreen,due to EXPLOSION/ Fire on train. People struggling to get out of station @WimbledonNews @S_Hammond
Access to the station is stairs-only. "Usually only two or three ticket gates work at a time and if you had a load of people leaving at one time it would be a mess," said Mark.
The British overwhelmingly respond to terror attacks with shows of unity and their signature Keep Calm and Carry On mentality. But the attacks are taking their toll.
When Fairfax Media arrived at Parsons Green on Friday morning, a group of elderly women, a cabbie and a local restaurant owner all pointed out, unprompted, that there is a mosque right near the station.
"People are going to be so judgmental, certain people are now going to get picked off and it's going to cause trouble," Gray said.
A police cordon at Parsons Green. Photo: Latika Bourke
But with Parsons Green making headlines and armed police upping their presence on the Tube, it's impossible to pretend terrorism is not a top-of-mind fear.
A few months ago, 31-year-old Reena was travelling home on a packed Tube after the Manchester bombing when a man with a beard and large rucksack joined her carriage. She said she grew uneasy as she noticed him scanning the other passengers.
"As the train started moving, he reached into his pocket and pulled out a mini version of the Koran. He started reading this and muttered the words quite loudly under his breath," she said.
"I could see other people on the Tube were feeling uncomfortable too," she said. She felt anxious for two reasons: fear but also guilt.
"I felt awful for feeling this way, as he was most likely just going about his day, but the situation triggered a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. Thankfully, I was getting off in a couple of stops, but if my journey was any longer, I would have gotten off at the next stop, just for peace of mind."
With five terror attacks in Britain this year, there is a sense that while life cannot be put on hold to accommodate the terror threat, further attacks are inevitable.
"It's in our city, it can happen in bloody Dulwich, it can happen in the heart of the city, it can happen anywhere – all it is is a matter of time," Gray said.
Latika Bourke
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