Rich Nimbys are strangling the capital’s culture by blocking concerts in Brockwell Park, and the poorest Londoners will suffer the most, writes James Ford

Do you remember when London was fun? Not just mildly fun, but properly and riotously so. A heaving metropolis where sweaty clubbers, ebullient party goers and merry music lovers packed themselves onto night buses after a rip-roaring night of dancing, wine and general hedonism. Whatever your vice, peccadillo or guilty pleasure, London offered an outlet and was all the better for doing so. Samuel Johnson famously took time off from inventing the dictionary to quip that “when a man is tired of London, he is tired of life, for there is in London all that life can afford”. Not to be outdone, Benjamin Disraeli described the capital as “a modern Babylon”.

But the vibrancy, exuberance and joyful spirit that once defined London and made it so distinct are slowly being strangled. London risks becoming boring. Less of a Babylon, more of a Basingstoke. Much has already been written about the decline of the capital’s night time economy and the

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