Poor London..

[Athame57]

I mean....really!  What have we come to? 

[Otis]

So sad to see what has become of such a wonderful city.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJLESaA_XrA&list=RDxJLESaA_XrA&start_radio=1

[SumpMagnet]

Also, ironically, if you were to ask the average Joe Public which one of the two in that picture is a law breaking hazard to the good folks around....they would pick the wrong one.
Those horrid electric scooters are illegal, unsafe, usually unlit, and the only time they show a decent level of illumination is when the lithium polymer battery pack goes nova in the hallway.

[Laverda Dave]

So sad to see what has become of such a wonderful city.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJLESaA_XrA&list=RDxJLESaA_XrA&start_radio=1

I am a Londoner, lived here for 63 years having been born in south London and moving to west London in 1971.

I recognise all the places in that video and sung by Jackie Trent who was married to Tony Hatch who was a composer (he wrote the Crossroads theme tune and was a panellist on New Faces and went on to discover Showaddywaddy, Roger De-Corsy with Nokkie Bear, Marti Webb and others).

Who ever made the video didn’t pay much attention to continuity, she walked through Aldgate station (the terminus of the Metropolitan line of the London Underground) and goes down to the platform to get on a train but then it cuts to her crossing Blackfriars Bridge on the Southern Railway! The guy is on a 1938 tube stock train.

Anyway......London in my eyes has become a lawless dump during the past 10-15 years, central London is Ok (as long as you don’t have a nice watch or a phone on show in Oxford Street or Bond Street) but the suburbs are becoming areas of filthy untidy streets with derelict shops and unregulated building (mostly illegal extensions to existing homes for extended families or for rent). Our high street that is no more than 600 yards in length has seven barbershops (there used to be one), ten convenience stores,  four vape shops, a tattoo shop, two ‘hole in the wall’ pubs and six sweet/booze/newspaper shops. These places last for six months at best, close down and within two weeks another one will open in its place, it is obvious what is really going on and our wonderful mayor turns a blind eye to all of it (he is just back from a trip to South Africa where he and his 11 'advisors' flew business class at the taxpayers expense). Meanwhile the leaders of this country live in leafy Islington and other expensive suburbs of north London and tell us we are misinformed of what is really going on.

I know this isn’t just happening in London but all over the country and the net migration figures released yesterday tell the real story, forget the headline illegal migrant figures, the really damaging figure is the one detailing the people leaving this country, mostly a younger generation and those who can afford to invest and run a business, they’ve had enough and have chosen to leave taking their talents with them.

We are in the process of finding somewhere else to live and at least 75 miles away from London!

Rant over..........

[Athame57]

Rant over..........

Nice rant Dave, I know how you feel living in East London. My favorite gripe is the lawless cycling and E-biking, they seem to think the law is beneath them, a mere option. Alas the mayor and his jackal Mete Coban want to 'encourage' cycling, maybe immunity from police is one of their incentives? 

[Otis]

Dave,

Lovely that you recognised and remembered the fabulous video. I had meant to mention that it was so many of the comments below the video that nostalgically remembered London from the time. All cities had there issues but I haven't been near London for 20 years and have no desire to ever go there again. I went to Brussels for a day whilst staying in Leuven 10 years ago and got out after about 2hrs because I was so uncomfortable and for PC reasons I shall not tell you why. London today is no different.

[Spitfire]

Apart from the obvious tourisy places London is not the place that I would want to be, we normally go down there on a coach to vist places like the tower., Wembley, museums etc.
What always hits us is the poor condition of the houses outside of the posh parts, its as if the price of houses are so high that people just do not maintain them, or more unkindley do not care about them.
The streets look very untidy and are ill kept, we lived in Thailand for a long time and one of our friends took his Thai girlfriend to where he used to live in London, we thought that she would be impressed however she was appalled at the dirt and litter and general state of the place.
There does also seem to be a lack of planning as you have some suburban streets with giant tower block looming over them, and these seem to be new construction.

Dennis

[Athame57]

WOW...this thread went places! Hey, it's my #1812 post....lets celebrate!
https://youtu.be/_ZAdEAkUTJU?si=nnIeQGl3Mns38iVG

[Otis]

So sad to see what has become of such a wonderful city.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xJLESaA_XrA&list=RDxJLESaA_XrA&start_radio=1

I am a Londoner, lived here for 63 years having been born in south London and moving to west London in 1971.

I recognise all the places in that video and sung by Jackie Trent who was married to Tony Hatch who was a composer (he wrote the Crossroads theme tune and was a panellist on New Faces and went on to discover Showaddywaddy, Roger De-Corsy with Nokkie Bear, Marti Webb and others).

Who ever made the video didn’t pay much attention to continuity, she walked through Aldgate station (the terminus of the Metropolitan line of the London Underground) and goes down to the platform to get on a train but then it cuts to her crossing Blackfriars Bridge on the Southern Railway! The guy is on a 1938 tube stock train.

Please don't spoil the illusion of a life that once was! Who said never let the truth get in the way of a good story?

I hope you find what you are looking for; West Sussex always welcomes nice people.

[K2-K6]

I hope you find what you are looking for; West Sussex always welcomes nice people.

"THE SOUTH COUNTRY"

When I am living in the Midlands,
That sodden and unkind,
I light my lamp in the evening:
My work is left behind;
And the great hills of the South Country
Come back into my mind.

The great hills of the South Country
They stand along the sea,
And it's there, walking in the high woods,
That I would wish to be,
And the men that were boys when I was a boy
Walking along with me.

The men that live in North England
I saw them for a day;
Their hearts are set upon the waste fells,
Their skies are fast and grey;
From their castle-walls a man may see
The mountains far away.

The men that live in West England
They see the Severn strong,
A-rolling on rough water brown
Light aspen leaves along.
They have the secret of the rocks
And the oldest kind of song.

But the men that live in the South Country
Are the kindest and most wise,
They get their laughter from the loud surf,
And the faith in their happy eyes
Comes surely from our sister the Spring
When over the sea she flies;
The violets suddenly bloom at her feet,
She blesses us with surprise.

I never get between the pines
But I smell the Sussex air;
Nor I never come on a belt of sand
But my home is there.
And along the sky the line of the Downs
So noble and so bare.

A lost thing could I never find,
Nor a broken thing mend;
And I fear I shall be all alone
When I get towards the end.
Who will there be to comfort me
Or who will be my friend?

I will gather and carefully make my friends
Of the men of the Sussex Weald;
They watch the stars from silent folds,
They stiffly plough the field.
By them and the God of the South Country
My poor soul shall be healed.

If I ever become a rich man,
Or if ever I grow to be old,
I will build a house with deep thatch
To shelter me from the cold,
And there shall the Sussex songs be sung
And the story of Sussex told.

I will hold my house in the high wood,
Within a walk of the sea,
And the men that were boys when I was a boy
Shall sit and drink with me.

By Hilaire Belloc (1870-1953).

[Otis]

God bless you; not seen that before so thanks for sharing.

[Athame57]

I hope you find what you are looking for; West Sussex always welcomes nice people.

...providing they have about a million pounds to buy a two bed bungalow!