I lived on Wood Vale for about one year about 5 years ago. As someone else said, the bus connections are OK (provided you want to go to either Peckham or Crystal Palace which are good connection points for other routes). For the trains it was a bit of a pain because it's equidistant between about 4 stations (Forest Hill, Honor Oak Park, Peckham Rye, Nunhead) but isn't really near any of them. This was seriously annoying as we didnt have a car.

It's not great for supermarkets because again the closest is Sainsburys and you'll have to schlep over the hill to get there.

It is pretty though as you have the Camberwell New Cemetry and One Tree Hill at one end and then the Horniman at the other, plus that butchers is amazing...

We never had any trouble there and the neighbours were lovely.