Pinnacles, in West Thamesmead, London SE28, is the Ground Zero of the housing crash. Its position on the Thames meant that, like everywhere else on the river, "luxury flats" - those combinations of East German plattenbau building methods, eighties shopping centre brickwork and poky windows-soon sprouted up there.Last year, amid allegations of mortgage fraud, the asking price of a flat sunk from a quarter of a million to around a third of that sum, and stockbrokers were horrified to find that their exclusive community was now inhabited by West African migrants.rnOn a visit there, it became obvious that this is a very, very strange place. Adjacent to the Pinnacles is a Tor, a gigantic mound made most probably from rubble. Bottles of Lambrini sit on the benchesrnand a winding path takes you to the, er, pinnacle. From there you can see the oppressively blank sheds ofbusiness parks, the brown brick of Belmarsh prison, a vast development of exurban sub-Poundbury homes, a stretch of wasteland with second world war pill boxes, and in the distance, the original Thamesmead, designed by the Greater London Council in the 1960s.
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