Is our town a shithole..

It's like that here - though white british men and few loud mouthed women.

There have been som HMO and other hostels set up near town center but honestly I think teh problem predates them.

So over the years we slowly start to go to nearby town with nice shopping center or nearby city especially as so many shops are lost in our center. We don't drive and pulbic transport here is expensive so we are some of the last to do so - but it's a sprial of decline.

Though went to town I grew up near recently - and it was just dead - no-one around and loss of shops. That was odd too.

Only been a few cities centers that we've been to that feel lively at all.

I moved to England a decade ago and I remember feeling shocked by the amount of ASB in some areas. However it didn’t stop me going to the town centre.

I prefer to avoid it nowadays though. I don’t think it is a lot worse, but I think I have changed since I became a mum. I didn’t mind hanging out in the past myself, but now I feel I want to shelter my children and I have got a lower tolerance level for that crap you describe.

Absolutely. I think some on this thread might be unable to grasp that it's getting a bit harder to find naice places these days because there simply isn't the money to make them naice. If people are so out of touch with what austerity has done to this country, then they should think themselves lucky instead of complaining places aren't as bijou as they'd like them to be.

Yes to a lot of people appearing angry.
I have definitely noticed this not only in my nearest, pretty affluent city but also in the ever growing village where I live.

I know quite a few towns like this, and it is a growing number. Lots of factors increasing street drinking. Growing number of young people still living at home. More and more people housed in HMOs without social spaces. More and more people housed "temporarily" in hostels and b&bs where you have to leave during the day. Fewer employment opportunites for unskilled or low-educated or hard-to-employ men.

When the street drinking starts to become noticeable, people move away from it. Those houses become more HMOs etc, the day drinkers are not so diluted by the rest of society and become more obvious, they increase as a proportion of locals, they take over more space and the cycle continues.

With regard to the nature reserves, I am aware of several that have become ASB hot spots precisely because measures were taken to cut down these behaviours in town centres. The problem was just relocated rather than dealt with.

Isn't it likely to have a lot to do with the fact people who have money to spend are doing so online or in big out of town shopping centres, hence the slightly smarter and independent shops and cafes, restaurants etc. closing due to lack of footfall, and retail units being boarded up or occupied by low rent places that appeal to people who don't have credit/ debit cards to shop online, or don't have much money and are just hanging around. Additionally a lot of cheaper town centre pubs closing because the business model is no longer profitable (someone mentioned weather spoons - cheap places day drinkers hung out yes, but cheap places with toilets they could use that gave them a place to meet up other than parks, pedestrian zones and bus stops etc).

It's a spiral isn't it? Initially started because people stopped spending as much money in town centers due to big out of town shopping centers having more choice, and the convenience of online shopping, then escalated during the pandemic and some town centers were then too far gone - people with money to spend no longer have a reason to go in, so there's a change in use of the space, away from consumption and retail and gastronomy and towards betting shops and people with nowhere else to go realising that they can hang around there because there are no longer businesses owners putting pressure on the police and council to move them on.

Not going to the town centre makes the town centre decline - then when you do decide to go once in a blue moon, you finally notice that it's not somewhere you want to go - because nobody's been going, so it's got run down.

Not a conspiracy, more lethagy and neglect and expecting "someone else" to keep businesses going, just in case you fancy going into town once a year and want it to look thriving and affluent.

I’m in Hyde, greater Manchester and this is exactly how it’s gone round here. So many shops closing, our shopping centre is like a ghost town nowadays and the only places that survive the test of time are takeaways and vape shops

Also getting a large influx of homeless people/addicts walking up and down the main road, actually inbetween cars with a cup asking for money. Sad

Yeah, fair dos. I didn't fully think that one through, did I. 😅

Op in originally from the midlands. (Name changed as may be outing) Derby is now like this. One of the reasons is because the council is paid to take overspill of drug addicts, alcoholics, homeless with severe mental health issues etc and put them in their temporary accomodation. They come from various other boroughs of the UK, they don't know anybody. They meet other junkies and alcoholics and start drama and politics. They take over local services because councils make them first in like priority for things like gp appointments. The worst part is they don't want to get better. They are accessing the services because they are made to, not because they want to be clean. I've seen some total shit shows lol, saw a woman so drunk she was unconscious at 2pm and then I thought a man was going to help her but he was mugging her, another man went over and I thought he might intervene but he started demanding some as well. I saw a bunch of smack heads shaking down a disabled woman (who also accesses some of the same services they do at one of the centres) and taking all her money in the doorway to an andoned shop. Saw police walk past two junkies shooting up as they can't be arsed with it. Constant fights in the town and they are everywhere.

I moved away and I grew up on a council estate and am as rough as old boots lol it was too much even for me when my neighbour was almost stabbed and the poor 20 something year old single girl who lived next door had her house broken into by 3 ski mask wearing men at 3am, and the police when we called couldn't even tell us if they would send somebody out!

Fair enough. I tend not to think of it as being a thing.

@FroggletTowers Most of what you describe is a police issue. Moving men on who are threatening is not up to the council. Use of parks is but misuse is a police issue. Dealing drugs in our park is a police issue but of course it’s ignored. It’s really about how we want resources spent and who will challenge such poor behaviour.

I think the underbelly of society is now bigger and people like this simply don’t care what they do because they have no standards and get away with it. It’s always a minority who spoil it for everyone else.

what subject do you teach? Would you be able to get a job easily if you moved?

This.

Anywhere touristy leads to a lot of low paid and seasonal work and that means the locals don't have much money (unless they work a profession or on the next big town) and so a lot of people with higher earning potential move out.

There was always a lot of what I would now call low key grooming- older men with younger girls- drink and drugs because many seaside towns lack anything for teens to do (and many parents on low paid seasonal work can't afford them anyway)

Oh please 🙄

I grew up near Peterborough and had need to go to the town centre for the first time in years recently. While there are more restaurants and some swishy bars, the general atmosphere was terrible. I felt really on edge. It seemed really rough and grotty (apart from the Cathedral precinct which is exquisite). A lot of the people seemed angry.
It was never a posh town but I don't remember it ever being so crap and depressing.

Yep, step too far right there.

Don't have it in my town but it is in another one a few miles away

I was never fond of the one we were on the outskirts of and recently left. I liked the house and the neighbours, but the town encroached more and more in terms of theft, anti social behaviour and general discourtesy.

By the time we left it was horrible. Yes, it’s a seaside town.

Exactly. I suspect this is going to be just another post about asylum seekers though.

OP it’s happening everywhere. I was recently visiting a very affluent, leafy, town. There was a large congregation of boozers gathered around a bench (yards from a Le Creuset showroom)

Yard from a Le Creuset showroom? 😱 Well that's it - I'm throwing in the towel!

I agree, senseless destruction. We have a beautiful reserve locally. It was maintained well but lovely wooden benches and pretty bridges have been destroyed. I guess the volunteers just feel frustrated by it all and can’t keep caring.