Been a while since I posted on the Politico blog, RL and other things to blame.
I took a stroll around the Castle neighbourhood and town today, and the news is not good.
I am going to go into old fart mode here, ten years ago there was:
A “proper” paper shop.
A “proper” sweet shop
A chemist
A green grocer
A post office
Five pubs
All these amenities were within ten minutes walk of the Castle.
Today there are;-Two Pubs, and a “multi-store”/”convenience store, that’s it, bugger all else.
So I drove down the town and parked on the road after paying the road toll which I have paid many times over with my council tax. And I walked around what used to be a vibrant, busy Victorian “shopping centre”, and is now a deserted “modern mall”. There is a thing called the ‘Wellington Centre’ which was expanded with ‘The Galleries”, the Wellington centre now consists of a few shops-Boots, W H Smith (with integral “main Post Office”), Argos, Superdrug, Peacocks, New Look, Millets a Chinese Medicine do dah and assorted phone shops.
The new super duper Galleries is empty, WTF is going on? There is a project next to Tesco, just out of town to provide a Morrisons (bit of competition) a cinema (of which there were three and now there are none) and assorted cafe’s and restaurants (much needed), but the “Galleries” management is trying to stop it because they want all the trade in their expensive boring empty “centre”.
So who is to blame? The Gov, the Council, the “Management” or Uncle Tom Cobbly?
Personally I would go for the first three because “Uncle Tom” doesn’t exist, between them they have managed to cock up the economy, the town and the Castle neighbourhood, between them they have managed to take away the heart of my dear old town and replace it with a stone, and in doing so have made life worse for all who abide here, and used to enjoy the basic right to shop in a place that had a decent spread of emporiums.
Now it seems that no one goes to the town anymore, and it has become a place ruled by estate agents, fast food vendors, bars and bugger all else, I certainly won’t be using the “new” Aldershot town centre any more and sadly it seems that thousands of others have the same attitude.
Angus
I took a stroll around the Castle neighbourhood and town today, and the news is not good.
I am going to go into old fart mode here, ten years ago there was:
A “proper” paper shop.
A “proper” sweet shop
A chemist
A green grocer
A post office
Five pubs
All these amenities were within ten minutes walk of the Castle.
Today there are;-Two Pubs, and a “multi-store”/”convenience store, that’s it, bugger all else.
So I drove down the town and parked on the road after paying the road toll which I have paid many times over with my council tax. And I walked around what used to be a vibrant, busy Victorian “shopping centre”, and is now a deserted “modern mall”. There is a thing called the ‘Wellington Centre’ which was expanded with ‘The Galleries”, the Wellington centre now consists of a few shops-Boots, W H Smith (with integral “main Post Office”), Argos, Superdrug, Peacocks, New Look, Millets a Chinese Medicine do dah and assorted phone shops.
The new super duper Galleries is empty, WTF is going on? There is a project next to Tesco, just out of town to provide a Morrisons (bit of competition) a cinema (of which there were three and now there are none) and assorted cafe’s and restaurants (much needed), but the “Galleries” management is trying to stop it because they want all the trade in their expensive boring empty “centre”.
So who is to blame? The Gov, the Council, the “Management” or Uncle Tom Cobbly?
Personally I would go for the first three because “Uncle Tom” doesn’t exist, between them they have managed to cock up the economy, the town and the Castle neighbourhood, between them they have managed to take away the heart of my dear old town and replace it with a stone, and in doing so have made life worse for all who abide here, and used to enjoy the basic right to shop in a place that had a decent spread of emporiums.
Now it seems that no one goes to the town anymore, and it has become a place ruled by estate agents, fast food vendors, bars and bugger all else, I certainly won’t be using the “new” Aldershot town centre any more and sadly it seems that thousands of others have the same attitude.
Angus
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