Downham West

Downham West sits in the south-east of the London Borough of Lewisham and is mainly a residential area created in the interwar period by the London County Council as a cottage estate. Housing is a mix of terraced houses with small front gardens and low-rise flats, arranged around pockets of green space and small local shopping parades. Community facilities include primary schools, a leisure centre and health services that serve a neighbourhood shaped by the estate’s original plot layout and generous garden fronts.

Transport links are local: buses run through the area and Bellingham rail station is within walking distance, providing regular services toward central London. Downham Fields and other public open spaces provide sports pitches and play areas that locals use year round, and the street pattern still reflects the estate planning of the 1920s and 1930s, with longer residential avenues punctuated by communal greens and shopping clusters.