To think our towns and cities are just so run down lately, and our standard of living has decreased significantly?

[blahhhhg]

I don't know if I'm just feeling a bit down and bitter lately but I just feel like lately our country seems to have gotten very run down. I went out into town today and couldn't help but notice how grotty and rundown everything looks. Litter everywhere, security guards everywhere - in nearly every clothing shop there is security on the door now, security wandering up and down the high street. It makes you feel really unsafe but they must be there for a reason now? Shops are dirty; filthy floors and used Starbucks cups just left off the shelf for some poor worker to clean up. Clothes for sale that are covered in makeup stains. I just found it really depressing. It's just not one town either, I've noticed it nearly everywhere I've been. I'm in my late 20s so it's not like I've had decades of life experience to draw from and I have a rose-tinted view of yesteryear, but it seems that in the last 5ish years things have really declined.

@1dayatatime

Nail on the head. Agree 100% with all your points. It is, indeed, managed decline and we're not going to reverse it any time soon as none of our politicians have the faintest idea, so just continue re-arranging the Titannic's deckchairs. As you see, the population aren't ready nor prepared to face what we have to do to turn it around.

No. I went to Manchester yesterday and there were stalls selling hot flavoured sweetcorn outside the Arndale Centre! They did smell quite nice but I did think it was quite a random foodstuff to be selling. I haven't seen it for sale in any other city, must admit.

I'm local and they're all over the different towns across Greater Manchester. Seen them in other areas too not just around here.

I normally visit cities in the Midlands and haven't come across mobile sweetcorn sellers before.

What's wrong with the sweetcorn sellers?? Is it because they're often black people selling it? We have them in Leeds and it's delicious. A welcome addition to our city.

I haven't said there is anything wrong with sweetcorn sellers. I responded to a prevuous poster asking if that was a typo (in someone else's post) and I confirmed that I had seen sweetcorn for sale in Manchester yesterday. The sellers weren't black either...

Apologies, I meant to respond to @Nutmuncherwho mentioned sweetcorn peddlers as if they were a negative thing.

We have them in the big high street near me and I think it stinks out the place and looks trashy.
Who the hell wants a cup of sweetcorn as a snack they walk along the shops?!

Plenty of people do. It's very tasty.

No, in Manchester there’s vendors selling tubs of sweetcorn along the main stretch of high street, non of them appear to have proper licenses or hygiene standards.

Sorry missed this- they are absolutely a negative thing, no hygiene standards and unlicensed. They’re literally carts dragged along the streets.

How on earth do you know they have no hygiene standards? They seem pretty clean to me. Roast chestnut sellers (which we have in Leeds) are also just carts dragged around and they've existed since at least Victorian times. Do you object to them as well?

I'd like to know how you know they don't have licences or proper hygiene standards. Have you done a full health and safety inspection?

They also look trashy.
Its all very well being 'right on' about them but they make a high street worse in my opinion.

Sweetcorn? I'm intrigued, never seen this. Speaking of hygiene and food carts, do the mobile hot dog sellers in London still exist? Hygiene non-existent, theoretically hundreds or thousands of people should have been poisoned by the wretched things over the years but I never heard of one.

A lot of us have to work full time. I’m working 9-5 Monday to Friday, which happens to be when the shops are also open during the week. I can quickly pop out in my lunch break, but that only gives me about 20 mins in the actual shops. At the weekend I like to do more fun things than shopping, or I have my young kids, one is autistic and often refuses to leave the house anyway. So there is often no time to go to the shops. We have a culture of working all week, is it any surprise that people turn to online shopping in the little spare time they do have after work when the high street is shut anyway?

We'll have to agree to disagree. I don't think they look trashy. I think the carts selling cheap mobile phone covers look more trashy but I don't have a huge objection to them.

I'd say any street vendor with questionable equipment should be held to the same hygiene standards and scrutiny as those with proper licensed facilities. The fact Market St in Manchester often has 3 or 4 of these sellers in a line suggests it’s more of a chancers game than a reputable venture. They make the streets look god awful and a free for all for the other peddlers dragging carts of tat up and down (phone covers, hats, toys). Hopefully councils start taking strong action to get rid of them.