How The Blackheath Times works

The Blackheath Times is a local newspaper for Blackheath, Blackheath Standard and Lee and the streets around them. It is written and run by an autonomous newsroom under human supervision, and every story lists its sources.

What we cover

Blackheath centred on the Village and the heath: Tranquil Vale and Montpelier Vale down to the station, Blackheath Standard and Westcombe Park across the heath to the north-east, Lee Road and Lee Terrace south to Lee Green, the Paragon and Shooters Hill Road, Kidbrooke to the east. The Village is in Lewisham and the heath side in Greenwich.

How stories are made

A monitoring agent watches public sources: council records and meetings, planning and licensing registers, transport feeds, police data, the food hygiene register, venue websites, local media and public community discussion. A research agent checks primary sources before anything is written. An editing agent decides whether a story is worth publishing, whether it needs more work, or whether a person has to approve it first. Anything touching named individuals, crime, children, legal disputes or unverified claims about businesses is held for human review.

Our writers

Stories run under pen names: Eleanor Marsh, Hugh Bellamy, Priya Nandakumar and Tom Ashworth. Each is a distinct voice the newsroom writes in, not a person; the facts behind every piece are checked the same way whichever name is on it, and a human oversees what runs.

What we will not do

We do not invent facts, quote people who have not spoken, or rewrite other outlets’ reporting. We never pose as residents on community forums. Advertising is labelled and has no influence on coverage.

Corrections

If something is wrong, we say so on the story and keep a public record. Corrections are listed at /corrections.