Race row after Hackney Council ‘whitewashes’ Narrow Way
The Narrow Way image, published by the council, which the BEMA Network objected to. Credit: Studio Weave
Hackney Council has been forced to go back to the drawing board and commission new images of the Narrow Way after an artist’s impression of the street was slammed for being ‘too white’.
The Town Hall published this image (above) of the historic Hackney Central thoroughfare to illustrate planned changes to the recently pedestrianised street.
But after the Black and Ethnic Minority Network (BEMA Network) pointed out that almost everyone in the image was white, the council removed it from their website.
A page about the Narrow Way on the Town Hall’s website now displays this image (below).
A detail from the image Hackney Council has used in place of the ‘whitewashed’ one. Credit: Hackney Council website
In a press release entitled “Future of Hackney won’t be whitewashed”, BEMA Network chief officer Ngoma Bishop said of the original image: “The image revealed Hackney’s transformation into a borough inhabited almost entirely by young white people. The diversity of the borough has almost completely disappeared and the different communities, cultures and people of all ages and abilities have been replaced with white children and cyclists.”
The release added that after several complaints the image had been removed and replaced by one that was “more acceptable”.
Mr Bishop said: “To us to have an image which is so clearly one dimensional, we and other people found that quite strange and puzzling and offensive.”
A Hackney Council spokeswoman said: “We were provided with images by the architects to illustrate the changes to the Narrow Way’s public realm. We have requested more images which better represent the Hackney community.”
A spokesman for architects Studio Weave, who produced the image, said the council had contacted them to say there was a problem with it.
He said: “We didn’t publish that image, although we did generate it. It was generated to show how the paint works rather than to represent Hackney.
“We didn’t want to offend anyone. We are Hackney based and most of us live in Hackney.
“We are embarrassed people feel it has somehow misrepresented the racial mix of Hackney. The whole idea of the scheme is to get as wide a range of people as possible using a public realm space.”
He said other images showing the Narrow Way populated by a more diverse range of people had also been produced alongside the one to which BEMA Network took exception.
It must be the future Hackney…. all young, wealthy and white, because of the cost of living here is so high soon the racial diversity will be gone along with the multicultural society which made Hackney such an interesting place to live. My daughter who was born at the Mother’s Hospital can not afford to rent here and has move to Walthamstow. There are whole areas of the borough where it is all white,and most of the languages heard are now European but not very often English.
Like Kevin has already said the multicultural Hackney of my youth (I’m 33) is rapidly disappearing.
Increasingly all I see on my cycle commute through the borough are white, wealthy (although how many of them are really ‘aspirationally wealthy’, living off credit and the bank of mum and dad?), homogeneously trendy twenty somethings.
I too had to move to Walthamstow as the price as the price differential on a two bedroom flat was approx £150,000.
I’m not surprised that the architects produced such a picture; they probably have no engagement with the remaining ethic groups other than their white, middle class friends. I am surprised that Hackney Council didn’t notice though.
It is a double edged sword; I like that there are delicatessens and pubs where you don’t have to worry about being beaten up; but conversely as an example London Fields now resembles the periphery of the main stage at a music festival, not somewhere that I would particularly want to spend any time unless I wanted to get blind drunk and dance to house music (and by 7am it looks like a rubbish tip).
If people think that the person who created this image is trying to portray some sort of ‘social cleansing’ agenda on behalf of the council, then I think you’ve missed the point of the image.
I never use the narrow way because it’s permanently blocked with filthy buses and walking down it is a horrible experience. I would only use it if it was permanently pedestrianized. What’s the rationale for the lurid colours painted on the road though?
everyone has a choice either the pic at the top or the real image from a couple of years ago during the riots i know which one i prefer
If the architects were white then it is only natural to create the picture in their own image. When the problem was noticed highlighting it should of been more than enough rather than all of this moaning. Have the Bema got nothing better to do than release press statements on a mistake that was quickly rectified. Groups like this make integration harder for everyone by blowing things out of proportion. On the point that it is mainly white in hackney now, if someone moaned it was mainly black or Asian it would be seen as racist so is this not the same?
I live on the Narrow Way, as it stands it is a bit of a dump, over run with betting shops and pawn shops, drunks and bums of ALL ethnicities! This new paint job is only sprinkling glitter on it. If this is someone’s idea of diversity then bring on the ‘whitewash’.
Also, love how people complain about being marginalized and then go on middle-class bashing.
This comment was deleted (25/07/13) by a moderator following a complaint.
Have not much to say only again we have a spineless council enough is enough.
Oh for heavens sake – the whole country is in a mess and all you can count is how many faces are what colour – Grow up – get a life. So sick of hearing folk complain about the colour of their skin and how badly off they are . Poverty doesn’t look at the colour of skin, homelessness doesn’t care if you are illegal or not. There are people in this country too ready to stir up trouble for others – when all the majority want to do is get along with one another. So they are going to pedestrianise a narrow street – great – get on with it as economically as possible.
As we live in a rural area that is not particularly wealthy not many people from black/ ethnic cultures are to be seen in say the City of Truro. Does that mean that journalist who take photos of public places down errr should ensure that for every 10 white person in a shot there should be three quarters of a black person. a quarter of an Asian person and the foot of an Oriental which represents pro rata the national ethnic presents. I noted not long ago that a council in Bradford (I think) made 70 white workers redundant, many of whom had been employed for decades. The reason was not because they were corrupt, lazy or inefficient they lost their jobs because of the colour of their skin given the Council stated that by firing the 70 white workers and replacing them with Black and Asian workers this reflected the balance of the community. The white holier than though PC head of Devon and Cornwall Police decided that in a community where less than one per cent of the community were not white she would recruit Black and ethnic offices who would make up 5 % of the force. In order to achieve her aim quick time she introduced a split level entrance exam where by white candidates needed to score 60% to pass an entrance exam whilst none white aspirant were required to sore 45% to pass the same exam. After the woman nearly got lynched an a strike was narrowly averted for he blatantly racist act she dropped her proposals. The time has come when many tolerant white people are becoming exceedingly angry with a minority who continually gain advantages by playing the race card. This is manifested by the increasing number of people voting UKIP who are defiantly not to be confused with the BNP or the NF. Perhaps the time is about to dawn when in the UK all pigs are equal and that includes the honkies.
they are superimposed, stuck on actors! its hardly going to represent the human beings that really live there???
Hackney is being ethnically clensed,there is no doubt about it. The problem is that the new white inhabitants don’t look like they want to mix with anyone of colour. They barely want to look at you when you pass them on the street and all the new business they set up are not inclusive to anyone other than their own kind. London is going the way of Paris with less wealthy and poor people being forced out to the outskirts of the city. Its clear to me that councils like Hackney are completely complicit in this movement. SHAME!!