Englands Most Depressing Towns

[uptherebels]

No I don't, is it Jason's home town?

No. That would be a better connection though. Are you from there or living there? Do you know Kings Square, where the fountains used to be? Well before they put all the water features in, that used to be the Bus station. It was there that your avatar hit the headlines in the mid seventies I think. Not something he will be too proud of either.

[deadman]

I quite like Banbury.

Personally I don't think it's a bad town.

[ianb78]

I take it none of you have been to West Bromwich then?

A curious little place - I recall my walks to the town centre were through broken glass, blood and sh*t (and yet no dogs about bar the odd council warriors Pit Bull so must have been human!).. The shopping centre is creepily plagued by these horroble black birds that crowd in the roof tops and sh*t down the whole time whilst squawking and flying at people.

Hell hole!

Coventry's up there too - with Croydon, Nottingham and Worcester coming up on the outside as a somewhere that's going to the dogs!

I'm sorry I'm going to have to reply to this. I was born and brought up in Nottingham and currently live in Worcester!

Worcester is an idyllic semi rural location set on the banks of the river Severn with a beautiful cathedral that adorned the £20 note until recently. It also boasts streets of orginal Tudor buildings

Are you seriously comparing it to the likes of Barnsley and Coventry??

I'm always bemused as to why Nottingham continually gets in these surveys. It's a lovely city-not too big or too small. Great compact city centre with good shops and great nightlife. Probably because of turf wars in unpleasant council estates around the edges where nobody goes!!!!

[uptherebels]

Worcester is an idyllic semi rural location set on the banks of the river Severn with a beautiful cathedral that adorned the £20 note until recently. It also boasts streets of orginal Tudor buildings

Are you an EA?

[River Man]

Worcester is an idyllic semi rural location set on the banks of the river Severn with a beautiful cathedral that adorned the £20 note until recently. It also boasts streets of orginal Tudor buildings

Are you seriously comparing it to the likes of Barnsley and Coventry??

Worcester is ok, but it was really torn apart by the planners in the 60s. It's got some really nasty 60s architecture. It's probably one of the worst examples of self-vandalism, actually. I'll have to defer to Gavin Stamp again, in "Britain's Lost Cities":

“Many seeing Worcester for the first time assume that it was badly bombed in the Second World War – the victim of a Baedeker Raid, perhaps – because there is so much post-war rebuilding so close to the medieval cathedral and elsewhere in the centre of this ancient city. But the city was not deliberately attacked from the air – the single raid seems to have been a mistake by German bombers looking for Birmingham or Coventry… the damage done to the historic fabric of Worcester was entirely self-inflicted.”

“Worcester used to be a jumble of timbered Tudor houses and of Georgian mansions and small houses. This gave it a unique and irreplaceable character which distinguished it from its rival Cathedral cities of Gloucester and Hereford. That character was rapidly destroyed in the second half of the century…”

“Never, surely, did Pevsner express himself so angrily about the treatment of a historic town as he did in the Worcestershire volume, published in 1968. As far as he was concerned, despite the industry, “C20 Worcester was a cathedral town first and foremost, and that makes it totally incomprehensible that the Council should have permitted the act of self-mutilation that is the driving of the busiest fast-traffic road through in a place a few yards from the cathedral.”

“To add further insult to injury, the surroundings of the Cathedral across the new roundabout were ruined by the redevelopment of the south-eastern end of the High Street. Here, where there were mostly Georgian facades, the extensive Lych Gate development along with the Gifford rose between 1963 and 1969. This required the removal of the unique cathedral lych-gate as well as of Lich Street itself, once the main route from London to Mid-Wales, with its timber-framed buildings…Further east, the mediaeval character of Sidbury was destroyed by the building of what is possibly the ugliest car park in the country.”

“The area east of High Street consisted of narrow streets of medieval, Tudor and Stuart houses, very many in half-timber and with overhangs, and some even with exterior galleries. No English city was so rich in houses of these early period. What the war did not do, peace, prosperity and lack of appreciation did instead. The remaining houses in Sidbury and the Shambles were scheduled for demolition…. And today they are gone, with the Shambles left as an uninteresting 20th century shopping street. Only in Friar Street does a little of the old character of Worcester survive.”

[ItsColdUpHere]

I thought everybody in Consett went into Durham to either fight the people from the other satellite towns who had come for a punch up, or to randomly beat up students. Well, thats what they seemed to do in the late 80's, that is.

In fact, it may well have been you who planted one on me outside the Chinese takeaway on Claypath for no reason ...!

We used to go into Durham for stag nights etc., because it didn't matter if we got barred for fighting etc.

Ah, the good old days...

[ExecutiveSlaveBox]

I think the worst place in the UK I've ever been to would be Redcar. Park up by the pleasant beach which has a really run-down seafront, wind down the window, and you get assaulted by the worst smell you could possibly imagine. And then your eyes are drawn to the steelworks......

When I'd just left uni and was completely clueless about such things my mater took me down there for a job interview. She thought it resembled barter town from mad max.

Also I think Ridley Scott shot some of Alien down that way as well. He fondly remembered it's black beach (from coal not volcanic!) and thought it's post apocalyptic landscape was just the ticket for a bleak alien planet.

[Austin Allegro]

Whilst most towns in the UK are crap may I offer the names of some towns I think are actually quite nice? I'm sticking to towns rather than little villages.

Oxford

Cambridge

Winchester

Norwich

York

Guildford (apart from the dire ring road)

St Albans

Sudbury, Suffolk (not Sudbury, Middx, which is ghastly)

Richmond, Surrey

Ely, Cambs.

Stamford, Lincs.

Frinton-on-Sea, Essex.

[a+b+c+d]

How grim is Grimsby?

[Executive Sadman]

Whilst most towns in the UK are crap may I offer the names of some towns I think are actually quite nice? I'm sticking to towns rather than little villages.

Oxford

Cambridge

Winchester

Norwich

York

Guildford (apart from the dire ring road)

St Albans

Sudbury, Suffolk (not Sudbury, Middx, which is ghastly)

Richmond, Surrey

Ely, Cambs.

Stamford, Lincs.

Frinton-on-Sea, Essex.

I dont see why people rate Cambridge that highly. Other than a beautiful square mile or so around the colleges, its a pretty ugly city with exceptionally poor quality and overvalued housing stock and absymal traffic planning. Have you seen all the new flats and retail around the railway? Truly nasty. Otoh, its about the safest 'feeling' city ive ever been too, and i guess the people that live there make a place.

Ely was nice about 15 years ago. Now its a chav filled dormant commuter town of new housing estates, although the area around the cathedral is still nice.

[River Man]

You missed Shropshire, which has the three most beautiful towns in England: Ludlow, Shrewsbury and Bridgnorth. Let's not think about Telford.

North Yorks is pretty good - harrogate, York, Richmond, Knaresborough, Ripon, Beverley etc.

I think the grimmest towns are around the M25, though. I know the towns up in the north can be a lot worse, but you usually have some beautiful moorland or deserted countryside only half a mile away.

Someone mentioned Glasgow upthread but the West End is one of the prettiest urban places in the UK.

[Vache]

Probably not all big enough to be classed as Towns:

Glossop

Saltburn by the Sea

Redcar

Sleaford

Surely there must be some mistake??! Saltburn-by-the-sea is an oasis in a desert of waste. Sea, surf, cliffs, Victorian era gardens, predominantly white brick town centre, still many independent shops, many good cafes, tea shops, the oldest water powered cliff lift in the world, good schools, good churches, a quaint theatre, with possibly the world's smallest annual film festival, tennis, football, swimming pool, etc, train station, old pubs, amazing coastal views, and not unusually unfriendly.

Maybe you could compare to: Haverton Hill, South Lackenby, Grange Town, South Bank, Skinningrove, Loftus, Carlin How, St. Hilda's, Brotton, and I see you've already sussed Redcar, to mention but a few less inspiring towns/areas in the environs, to the passing stranger.

[Executive Sadman]

I think the grimmest towns are around the M25, though. I know the towns up in the north can be a lot worse, but you usually have some beautiful moorland or deserted countryside only half a mile away.

I think thats true, other than the north downs and parts of the chilterns the 'green belt' to the north and east of London isnt really worth protecting, its all flat fields with burnt out cars and pylons.

[SpewLabour]

Looks like I'm becoming a Jonah like GB himself !! Just read on the news that the Redcar steelworks is to be closed, costing over 1000 jobs.

[New Tarbuck]

>Worcester is an idyllic semi rural location set on the banks of the river Severn with a beautiful cathedral that adorned the £20 note until recently. It also boasts streets of orginal Tudor buildings

It was not too bad about 5 years ago - a recent trip the only thing rougher and scruffier than the buildings and the shops were the people - maybe not in Coventry's league but it has turned into a bit of a white-trash toilet!

[New Tarbuck]

Re: Banbury:

>the Kraft factory on the edge of town is an eyesore and can make the area stink of instant coffee when the wind's in the wrong direction.

No - it's the smell of fart-gas being added to the little bags of crackers.

[ImA20SomethingGetMeOutOfHere]

I'd like to add basically anywhere on the Isle of Wight outside of the tourist season.

I remember well running into a couple of year 9 pupils who I taught in Totland sometime in early March and being chearfully invited to come for a smoke with them.

As a pit of festering, chavvy awfulness, Ryde and Sandown have few peers.

[Pindar]

Bracknell (a real chavtopia)

Fleet

Amesbury

High Wycombe

Slough

Maindenhead

Melksham

Thurrock

Maidstone

Gravesend

[Horridbloke]

The festival of roundabouts that is Basingstoke.

Hard to say the word without sounding like Marvin the paranoid android.

Does anyone actually live there? I know there are lots of people there but is anyone alive?

I've passed through Basingstoke by train on the way to London a few times. It's identical to the start of Half Life 2.

[Bosh]

Someone mentioned Littlehampton earlier in the thread. I have to agree. It`s the most backward scary shithole I have ever been to.

It was on Sky a while ago in the top 10 of Britains hardest/shittest places or something like that.

They shoud level the place and turn it into a car park.

[Pindar]

So far nobody has mentioned the obvious candidate of Didcot.

Not only does it benefit from panoramic views over the extensive power generation facility, it is well served by road, rail and police helicopter.

It's the poisonous waste the whole family can enjoy.

[tomwatkins]

Someone mentioned Littlehampton earlier in the thread. I have to agree. It`s the most backward scary shithole I have ever been to.

It was on Sky a while ago in the top 10 of Britains hardest/shittest places or something like that.

They shoud level the place and turn it into a car park.

Sounds so nice-the name anyway. Or rude whichever way your mind works.

[New Tarbuck]

..but I think Coventry gets the most votes.. rightly so..

[River Man]

..but I think Coventry gets the most votes.. rightly so..

Agreed.

but partly from my point of view, for its history.

Once third or fourth most important city in the country, with a wealth of tudor stone and timber buildings. Baedecker guide in 1920 called it one of the best preserved medieval cities in Europe.

Look at the state of it now.

And it wasn't mostly the luftwaffe. it was most mostly the city engineer.

[whojamaflip]

You obviously haven't been to my home town, Consett.

Massive unemployment, massive benefit fraud, pound shop central, ugly fat women, windy and cold most of the time.

It used to be horrendously violent when i went out drinking in the 80's, but I think the population can't even be bothered to fight now.

It was once to be one of the cheapest places in the country for housing though. There was a reason for that...

* Edited for speeling

16 pages of 'bland' towns. and this one touched a nerve.

in their own way places like tow law & easington have character, sure the people might not have jobs, but they are not desperate/depressing places.

for people to post cotswold market towns (banbury) on this thread need to get out (or maybe best not to).

I only went thru consett once, but i remember it vividy. (not like tow law, easington etc which i think are have character and community etc..)

(cycling)I was coming from the west and no doubt there was a scenic climb, rolling hills, blah blah blah, typical stuff. . and then on to conset..

it was odd.

the street was empty. loose chippings. no traffic. (its just one street?)

plastic bags & litter doing better than john sergent.

kids push prams.

kids looking like they'd do me over & nick my bike.

a bus comes along...

then turn off the street. cycle past a ball bearing manufacturer (how the eff do i remember that? its 20 years ago!!)

i think the ball bearing manufactuer was the only thing the town had going for it..

..back onto rolling hills, a smoth descent. nice tarmac.

consett is a shock to the system.

sure places like dagenham aint great, but at least people have hope,money,escape.. a view of canary wharf.. consett is depressing (but maybe you need to live there).?

consett, they make crisps there.. apparently