SO WHO IS LIVING IN BRISTOL’S CARAVAN CITY?
Soaring rents and the cost of living mean that 800 people — many of them hard-working — have made their homes on the roadside in one of Britain’s most desirable enclaves...
OPen bin bags line the kerb, kitchen appliances sit on the grass stripped of parts, lager cans lie discarded beside cigarette butts and plastic wrappers flutter in the wind.
It may sound like the scene after an allnight rave, but this is the everyday reality for those living beside Bristol Downs — part of which was bequeathed to the public in 1861 and which is now the epicentre of the city’s fight against homelessness.
Along Parrys Lane, cutting across the north of the Downs, an unbroken string of caravans, RVs and mobile homes have turned the area into what someone on TripAdvisor disparagingly called a ‘holiday park’.
But these aren’t all Travellers, holidaymakers or young wastrels out to cause trouble. The caravans are largely populated by ordinary citizens, with jobs, degrees and aspirations, who have either been made homeless by the cost-of-living crisis or have chosen the alternative lifestyle as a way to save money.
According to the Office for national Statistics, Bristol is now the most expensive place to live in the UK outside of London, with the average private rental costing an astronomic £1,734 a month.
A Bristol City Council report last month revealed there are as many as 800 people living in up to 650 vehicles across the city. That’s up from just 150 people before the pandemic. In the 51-page document, Bristol Mayor Marvin Rees describes a dystopia of ‘spiralling rents and rising bills, threatening to push many towards the brink of homelessness’.
But for many, the threat has already become a reality. And so- called ‘vehicledwellers’ are now ubiquitous across Bristol from the Downs in the west to St Werburgh’s in the north-east.
Welcome to what residents have dubbed Caravan City.
The reality is that most of these caravans are woefully inadequate for modern living. Most have no running water, no electricity or gas and — vitally — no waste disposal. In the words of one mother living beside the Downs who is at her wits’ end: ‘My street, where I’ve built my life and raised my children, has become a human sewer.’
SO, TO what extent is the cost-ofliving crisis really responsible for this surge in vehicle- dwellers? And how have the caravans affected life for the half million residents of a city described, by The Sunday Times in 2017, as the best place to live in Britain?
There is a clear tension between those living in caravans and locals who feel their presence has shattered the social fabric of their otherwise close-knit community.
Sarah Wilkins walks her dog Benji on the Downs every day. She worries that some of the caravan-dwellers keep ‘rough, aggressive dogs’ which pose a real threat to other pets. ‘ And then there’s the sewage, the rubbish and the broken glass I fear Benji could step on,’ Sarah added.
She also recalled once watching a man in boxing gloves repeatedly punching the side of his caravan, intimidating everyone nearby. That image will stay with her.
Such stories are echoed across Bristol. Lou, in her mid-70s, who has lived in St Werburgh’s for 43 years, said that while vehicledwellers typically don’t bother locals, she remembers one man — clearly mentally unwell — who ‘came to the door one day wanting his water bottles filled up, except he only had his underpants on’.
St Werburgh’s residents have since lined up large wooden planters along the kerb to deter the parking of mobile homes.
The legal rights of van-dwellers depends on their location. According to Section 77 of the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994, local authorities can move anyone living in a vehicle away from land ‘forming part of a highway.’
However, Bristol City Council says it takes many factors into account before making such decisions, including noise, waste management, criminal behaviour and the number of public complaints.
Daniel, 25, who works in retail and grew up in the affluent St Paul’s area south of St Werburgh’s, cannot abide the behaviour of some vehicle-dwellers. ‘St Paul’s used to be very respectful. But since the caravans arrived, people are shooting up heroin in the streets and using the bushes as a toilet,’ he told the Mail.
‘I used to pick up needles and return them to the Bristol Drugs
Project, but what’s the point now when there are simply too many to bother?’ he asks.
Yet, when the Mail spoke to vehicledwellers last week, another side to the drama was revealed.
Callum, a maths tutor originally from Scotland, was giving a lesson over Skype to a student when the Mail arrived. He is saving for a house and so, rather than paying for rented accommodation, has done up an old horsebox into a contemporary one-room home with a petrol generator, woodburning stove and a bathtub.
A few yards down the road and Ezra is furiously cleaning his caravan, in which he takes as much pride as if it were a semi-detached residence in the affluent nearby neighbourhood of Clifton. ‘I’m just a responsible individual who works hard, cleans up after himself and wants to live independently.’
Having lived in house-shares for years, Ezra became frustrated by what he saw as the ‘politicisation and intolerance’ of other young people he had to live with. ‘There were people who only wanted to live with Labour supporters, for example,’ he told the Mail.
He decided enough was enough when he was forced to leave a flat share by two vegan girls after he dared to bring home a packet of pork sausages.
But due to the cost of renting a one-bedroom apartment, Ezra instead elected for a caravan where he can finally get the independence he craves.
Another man — who wished to remain anonymous — began living in a mobile home after retiring from a successful career as a cameraman and video editor. Now in his 70s, he says vehicle- dwellers have been given a bad name due to the behaviour of others, particularly Travellers who pitch up on the Downs in summer.
Kyren, 27, moved on to the Downs just two weeks ago and bought a dilapidated caravan from a Traveller for just £100. The small box, no more than 8ft x 4ft, is his home now. Close to the busy A4018, each time a car whizzes past, his caravan gives a deathly rattle, creaking on its blocks.
‘This is the bottom of the barrel,’ he told the Mail. ‘Nothing works. No water, no electricity, no gas.’
Last Christmas, shortly after his partner died, leaving him ‘catatonic with grief’, Kyren lost his job as a manager at a pub. He quickly fell into arrears and missed payments on his council tax, leaving him in more than £1,000 of debt.
KYrEN says: ‘I’ve had a bad hand over the past two years. But, for now, I’m just trying to stay calm.’
He has just found a new bar manager job and hopes to pay off his debts before applying for social housing. However, the outlook remains bleak for this bright young man with a degree in illustration from the University of the West of England.
And yet, some of his friends simply do not understand the severity of his predicament.
‘Some say: “Ah, that’s great, you get to live for free on the Downs!” But I’d rather just have a shower. They don’t understand the gravity of what I’m going through.’
Having read dire things about crime and anti-social behaviour at the Downs, Kyren was apprehensive when he first moved in. But any myths were soon dispelled: ‘On my first day I dropped a can outside and one of my neighbours came past and said: “Hey, pick that up — that’s not what we’re about here.” ’
However, not all vehicle-dwellers are quite so conscientious. Large piles of rubbish akin to fly-tipping remain a problem, and locals have reported loud music played at night, the smell of marijuana smoke and a general anxiety that these beloved public commons are becoming a dangerous place for the scores of young children who love to play here.
But when it comes to the perceived menace of van- dwellers, the Downs is far from the most intimidating or dangerous spot in Bristol.
One of the largest camps to have sprung up since the pandemic sits beneath the M32, beside Eastgate retail Park and is populated almost exclusively by Brazilians who speak little English and have no right to work in the UK.
The Mail spoke to 28-year- old Bianca, a student who commutes to Cardiff for her studies but lives here in a small one-person caravan. She has no family in the UK and relies on money wired from her parents in Brazil. ‘I used to live in a shared house in Newport, but it was too expensive,’ she said. ‘I’ll have to return to Brazil in July as I don’t have a visa to work.’
FOr A shower or to use the toilet, Bianca must walk 200m to PureGym over the road. And when asked about security, she replies: ‘Let’s just say, it is a good feeling to lock the door.’
Claudia and Joseph, a couple in their 50s, live a stone’s throw from Bianca’s caravan. They say they are unable to get financial support due to ‘ incomplete paperwork’. When pressed on their legal status in the UK, the pair quickly retreat into their van.
Junior, a delivery driver, is the latest arrival. He smokes a long, filterless Brazilian cigarette and perches awkwardly against his moped. ‘The problem here is there are guys taking drugs, fighting. There are knives. In Brazil, that’s normal. But here, I don’t think it is so normal.’
It certainly is not normal for Bristolians, especially those who park their cars beside these caravans when shopping at Ikea, Waitrose or using the gym.
But while the picture in Bristol may appear decidedly bleak — both for vehicle-dwellers and settled residents — it’s very possible that things could get even worse due to rising housing costs.
Micky, a woman in her 30s living in a one-bed flat in Easton, told the Mail her landlord is attempting to hike her rent by a huge 60 per cent. Steve, who works in a local bakery, revealed he’s had to remortgage his small house in Greenbank after repayments went up by 40 per cent.
There may be 800 people living in caravans in the city today, but who can tell how many there will be tomorrow?
To remedy the problem, Bristol City Council hopes to create more ‘ meanwhile sites’ across the city — dedicated spots for caravans away from residential neighbourhoods.
But for many of Bristol’s vehicledwellers, their situation is not ‘meanwhile’; this is their life now — whether they chose it or not.