To think London is in a major decline?

It’s not a London issue, it’s an anywhere issue except if you don’t live in the south east you have to deal with significantly less funding for everything.

Sofa season is a London classic. That is not a new thing.

The change I see is in the London suburbs. These used to be quite well off. Now not some much.

Some areas like Hackney and Elephant are totally bourgeois now. These were once dangerous places. The centre is now totally gentrified (and also very boring!).

Declining standards of behaviour everywhere and “decent” people scared to say anything for fear of being called a Karen or a snob or racist.

People with their feet on the seats in public transport, playing loud music, drinking/smoking using drugs, dropping litter and letting their dogs shit all over the place. Mattresses in the front garden, piles of junk flytipped on the corner. Say anything and you get a mouthful of abuse at best, or a threat of violence or a knife pulled out.

My neighbour who is in her 90s and has lived in a housing association property on the same street her entire life tells me it did not used to be like this. People took a pride in their neighbourhood. Parents disciplined their own children.

I think one of the big issues in London is the hollowing out of the “working classes”. You have to be rich, or have access to housing association/council housing or be prepared to live in a shared house to live in central London now. Council housing is allocated on points so people in work and working families hardly ever qualify. They move out of London - or to the outer zones. The rich move to Zone 1 or zone 2 enclaves. This leaves a disproportionate number of people with problems in a lot of Zone 2.

Until society in general starts to insist on better standards of behaviour things will only get worse.

Don’t think it has much to do with Brexit btw.

Again it depends where you go, some crap parts some lovely ones, it's the same the world over

Rich live cheek-by-jowl with the not-so-rich. Move 2 streets down and it is a different world. London is constantly changing and evolving. Same as it has always been

this was certainly the case in my childhood but things have definitely changed imo. Councils moving families out of London, lack of social housing, high housing costs means some schools are not that diverse. I think there is more division now.

Also in London- zone 1/2 and noticed the same thing.
place definitely very scruffy.

however, having visited friends and relatives over Xmas in other parts of the country m, I think London has escaped lightly.

the ‘local’ areas defiant have more boarded up shops but nothing like high streets in rest of UK

I’ve noticed it too. The amount of dog shit is unreal. Any green space just stinks of dog poo.

rubbish absolutely everywhere either from dumping or foxes. It’s dire

Some parts of London were very different in the 80s-90s & only really changed in the mid to late 90s. Where I grew up is safer now but there are less families. I think lots of families have been moved out, people having less or no dc. London isn’t as cool as it once was, people don’t seem as hopeful or happy as before.

It depends where you are, here still has some good change, but just a short distance away the decline really is noticeable

We’re more in gentrification areas which have changed over the last two decades

On the latter areas I was just talking about it, I agree with you on that it can be quite bad

...abandoned sofas...

Their first album is criminally underrated.

We're in zone 2 NW1 and the parks are lovely, the nearest is a royal park which is well maintained. Dog poo and litter is a real problem and very frustrating but I don't see how it can be stopped unfortunately.
Stabbings haven't affected me directly although I read about them, but it doesn't make a difference to my life.
I've not found the buses too bad but then I generally prefer to use the tube. Bus reliability is awful.
Lots of homeless and drug issues but again it doesn't affect me

I wouldn't want to move out, we spend more of our free time doing touristy things with the dcs and those areas tend to be cleaner. We have an easy walking commute to work and dcs go to school 5 mins walk and a longer commute would mean lower quality of life.

I'm in zone 6, in an area of mixed/middling affluence. In the local high street there are more homeless people than there used to be, several closed down shops, and too many tat (£/phone/vape/ bookies) shops. The playground in our local park has a lot of broken equipment. Dog mess and litter are problems.

But on the whole, things are pretty good. My DCs schools are excellent. There's a good community and we never feel unsafe. We have excellent amenities and public transport and wonderful green spaces.

I travel quite a bit and the whole country seems to be in decline - I think this area has fared slightly better than average if anything.

Completely.

Rich live cheek-by-jowl with the not-so-rich. Move 2 streets down and it is a different world. London is constantly changing and evolving. Same as it has always been.

I am very happy in my area of London. Estate agents could not leaflet our house enough.

There’s been a huge increase in homelessness over the last 10-15 years, awful.

And then things like waste collection etc are down to local councils but they have been underfunded so haven’t been doing everything they used to.

London as a whole, I think is still very vibrant and hopeful as a city. There are some issues that are nationwide like the decline of high street shows away from central London that needs to be addressed though.

I think London is definitely better than in the 80s but I do think that some areas are beginning to feel a bit more unsafe or are at least no longer getting as secure as before. For example, yes Brixton is now more 'white' but I also think that despite its new M&S, deprivation is certainly still there and things arent getting better. We live in Herne Hill and whilst it's certainly 'safer' than before, low level crime is constant, kids are constantly mugged for their phones etc. Shops have closed, Lordship lane is full of empty units. Despite gentrification - there is still a huge difference between SW London and even the poshest bits of SELondon - and I dont think the gap is closing anymore.

London seems to remind me now of 30 plus years ago before Labour came in. Years of neglect.

But the difference now is the volume of people, and scruffiness has moved from the centre of town to the suburbs. London poverty is now in the outer zones. Much more Parisian.

I think the population is nearly 9 million now: I think it was 5.5 when I came. It does make a big difference to the quality of life.

I will say though even with regards crime and stabbings the fact they all make headline news shows how comparatively rare it is. I recall discussing with American colleagues (I won’t name the city) about teen deaths in a year London and they laughed at me. One responded “that’s one police beat here.”

Maybe you're seeing a decline, but there are places in the U.K that have always been poor or messy (those two things aren't always aligned). I've seen some streets in rural towns that almost look like Victorian photographs of what some slums looked like in London. Rubbish everywhere, dilapidated houses, abandoned sofas, that kind of thing.

I’ve lived in London almost my entire adult life. Most parts are far better now than they used to be. I can’t think of a single area which I’d be afraid to walk in after dark - whereas when I first arrived, I wouldn’t like setting foot in parts of Elephant, or Tottenham, or Hackney even in daylight. I found some old photos I’d taken from about twenty years ago a while back, and was surprised by how dreary and unkempt some parts of London looked then.

People’s attitudes have gotten shittier everywhere and I think it’s just that we’ve all somehow become more tolerant of casual disrespect, probably driven by a lack of proper policing. There’s nothing about Brexit or the Tories or being poor which leads people to leave their dogs’ shit all over the payments, or throw their trash in the ground, or play their music out loud on the bus, or vandalise their own community, however much people like to dress it up like that.

Genuine question, what about Brexit made the place so filthy and the people so arrogant?

The dog shit thing is everywhere now, it's absolutely vile to the extent that I wouldn't call this a clean country any more. There should be a dog licence to fund mobile dog poo cleaning and sanitisation by councils.

London should be a lot better than it currently is though, it's not improving at the rate of other European cities, especially Scandi ones. Going into London occasionally, I've noticed it's definitely declining, albeit very slowly.

They are fed there, in the Strand, where that great Austin watchshop was, and just behind it, another amazing jeweller's. All shut now, just homeless queues for food. I think they are doing a great thing (it is Pret?) but it just looks awful.

That said when I am in the nicer parts of London I remember why I love this city 😍

I don't think it is that bad and it's better now than a year or two ago. As for people being stabbed in broad daylight, that is extremely rare. The media obviously make a big report on any violent crime but most Londoners never see anything like that. Regarding rubbish and dog's doings, a lot depends on the local council. I do not see that where I live but just a couple of miles away is awful in all sorts of ways and has been for a very long time. I can remember spitting being a common occurrence, almost fashionable, in some quarters during the 1990s; it was awful but the phase faded out, not seen it recently. All cities have their bad bits, that is life. Everything was relatively subdued during lockdown which is why you notice it more now but even so, it isn't everywhere. London has much to offer.