Top ten best and worst places to live in the UK

[Flabio]

I'm from St. Anns in Nottingham. It always used to be a bit run down before I left home. Over the last few years, each time I've gone back to visit it's seemed worse. My parents have sold up and moved away now, so I never have to go there again. I don't miss it at all.

[gilesgoat]

Yet despite supposedly having the lowest crime rate in Wales I heard about all sorts of awful things out there, from violent break-ins at the halls, to rape right through to stabbings in the street.

I think some of the stories you hear are just rumors that go around the student population and are not based in fact, we had a few reports of some highly violent attacks in The Cambrian but nothing ever backed up these rumors. I always felt safe walking around the place and none of my friends got mugged ( unlike Brighton ).

Yes, there were a lot of rumours that didn't seem to be true, but the two incidents I am thinking of were in the news. In one of them someone was attacked with, as the papers were calling it, "a sharp implement". I later learnt that said implement was actually a short sword used in one of the martial arts. Can't remember which or what type of sword it is. The violent break-in at halls was in Penbryn. Someone got assaulted and their computer nicked. Again it was in the papers. Plus there was the tramp who OD'ed in the toilets in the Weatherspoons. Never heard of anything like that before or since.

But besides all of that, my point was that although I heard about lots of shit there it was by far one of the best places I've ever lived, and I've never felt as safe anywhere else. Yet Newbury is supposedly a nice place, I hear about very little crime, yet I constantly feel intimidated if I go out at night.

What make a place "safe" or "unsafe" is that a thing like that been a
"once in a blue moon" incident cause some weirdo and/or if in the span
of one year let's say you can read about 20 incidents like those.

If it's "it happened only once" thing it does not count really, despite of
course media can make it very blatant.

If then crime or not you hear stories of incidents, weird things, disturbance
by people and all going every day of the year then .. well .. it can be maybe
"safe" but yet not pleasant to live in.

One single case it's not the thing, is the sum of things that counts.

[mightyzim]

Horsham? Horsham! Yes its picturesque but I wouldn't want to live there.

[Ducki]

Pity the old Clocky in Newbury is no more. Fantastic metal pub that was, inhabited by shedloads of biker types. They were generally all excellent guys to hang out with and you could be pretty certain nobody would try anything on with that lot around, so it felt extremely safe .

Last time I passed through Newbury it was changed into a fucking IRISH THEME PUB. Bastards .

Yep, Newbury is just screaming out for a decent metal pub. Nearest we've got now is the Monument and that can be a scary place. Where is this Irish theme pub, I don't remember seeing one?

[Yak]

Pity the old Clocky in Newbury is no more. Fantastic metal pub that was, inhabited by shedloads of biker types. They were generally all excellent guys to hang out with and you could be pretty certain nobody would try anything on with that lot around, so it felt extremely safe .

Last time I passed through Newbury it was changed into a fucking IRISH THEME PUB. Bastards .

Yep, Newbury is just screaming out for a decent metal pub. Nearest we've got now is the Monument and that can be a scary place. Where is this Irish theme pub, I don't remember seeing one?

It was down by the clock tower (from which the Clocky got its name). Haven't been through in a few years though, for all I know it may be gone by now.

[GeeZa]

We got married in Hackney Town Hall last year and had our do in Hackney in probably the best Italian restaurant in London (we know the owner). Keeping it real for my homies. If it's the worst place to live in Britain why does every cunt want to live there?

Manchester is shit though, what a dump.

[Barney]

Lived for a while in Tunbridge Wells, and hated it. Seriously stuck-up bunch of arseholes. Good schools though (I attended the Grammar School, until I was ripped away to Crowborough).

Crowborough I absolutely adored, it had a large expanse of wooded nothingness to one side where you could spend days camping without hearing or seeing a single car. Heaven.

These days, I live in Scunthorpe. What a shithole that is - just ask Amy. Orkney appeals as there's no social aspect to the place whatsoever. I don't do "people" very well and avoid social contact as much as possible. Both me and my partner were brought up in villages (myself, I spent my formative years on a farm) and so hate large gatherings of people. We go out into town twice a year to do the anniversary/birthday meal, and that's the only time we get drunk.

Makes me wonder what the hell I'm doing training to be a nurse, but there you go. Having worked in the A&E department, I avoid alcohol and the places that serve it like the plague. It's a shame that people can only imagine doing their socialising over a pint...

[D.J.Fudge]

Pity the old Clocky in Newbury is no more. Fantastic metal pub that was, inhabited by shedloads of biker types. They were generally all excellent guys to hang out with and you could be pretty certain nobody would try anything on with that lot around, so it felt extremely safe .

Last time I passed through Newbury it was changed into a fucking IRISH THEME PUB. Bastards .

Yep, Newbury is just screaming out for a decent metal pub. Nearest we've got now is the Monument and that can be a scary place. Where is this Irish theme pub, I don't remember seeing one?

It was down by the clock tower (from which the Clocky got its name). Haven't been through in a few years though, for all I know it may be gone by now.

It's now called Broadways

[punkrulesok]

Pity the old Clocky in Newbury is no more. Fantastic metal pub that was, inhabited by shedloads of biker types. They were generally all excellent guys to hang out with and you could be pretty certain nobody would try anything on with that lot around, so it felt extremely safe .

Last time I passed through Newbury it was changed into a fucking IRISH THEME PUB. Bastards .

Totally agree there Yakkie. I've allways made the old style "biker pubs" my locals, cos they're allways the most "normal pub" style, have decent jukies and are trouble-free.
Luckily where I used to live over in Crosby, my local - the Birkey was such as pub. So much so that I stayed there for ten years until I moved over here to the Wirral. You could say it was more of a Family than regular drinkers .

The Tap is the best pub round our way now. A lovely old style pub overlooking the Mersey. Again, a biker pub. Brill jukebox and ace crowd .
It smells like a pub should do - of beer and fags with a hint of dog and crisps . Can't feckin' stand it when you walk into one of these new "Bar" type places, and all you can smell is aftershave and perfume .

When you walk into a pub, you should see an wooden bar, obviously well used, preferably a wooden floor and seats with fag burns on them . And some real ales on tap, too.

I'm fecking gasping for a pint now. I may well have one later, with it being Friday .

Oh and yeah - got quite a few mates that are Bikers. And Bikers are generally all really nice guys .

[Tmuk]

Are there any biker pubs left? Certainly don't seem to be any around our way.

[swith]

Are there any biker pubs left? Certainly don't seem to be any around our way.

There's one on the seafront in Weston called Scally's.

Wall to wall with sex pests, it is.

[gilesgoat]

Lived for a while in Tunbridge Wells, and hated it. Seriously stuck-up bunch of arseholes. Good schools though (I attended the Grammar School, until I was ripped away to Crowborough).

Crowborough I absolutely adored, it had a large expanse of wooded nothingness to one side where you could spend days camping without hearing or seeing a single car. Heaven.

These days, I live in Scunthorpe. What a shithole that is - just ask Amy. Orkney appeals as there's no social aspect to the place whatsoever. I don't do "people" very well and avoid social contact as much as possible. Both me and my partner were brought up in villages (myself, I spent my formative years on a farm) and so hate large gatherings of people. We go out into town twice a year to do the anniversary/birthday meal, and that's the only time we get drunk.

Makes me wonder what the hell I'm doing training to be a nurse, but there you go. Having worked in the A&E department, I avoid alcohol and the places that serve it like the plague. It's a shame that people can only imagine doing their socialising over a pint...

Eh .. it seems to be quite an UK thing, on the other side if you look at
things one could say "and where else you go if not in a pub ?".

In Italy I continue to see an ever increasing number of people avoiding
alchool that forms quite a distinction between people into it and not.

The concept of Bar we have in Italy anyway it's pretty different from the
UK pub, it's not even really such a socialising place but it's really more
a kind of "showplace" and/or really a "functional place" where you have
a "quick and go" and you generally don't stop more than 20 mins in.

Don't ask me how people socialise in Italy nowadays I really don't have
much clue, in North Italy at least we could say we have "problems" it looks
like that "the new way" is to go to places like gymns, yoga courses, fitness
centers, martial arts, jogging, swimming pools and such .. and those
are in all effects "socialization centers".

Disco and dancing places once were "the places" but today it's really
a bit like "just for occasional encounters" because "it's just a girl/guy I
found in a disco" (i.e. "nothing serious").

Restaurants and agri tourisms and/or some "bar with a theme" seems
to be "the other alternative places", you have to go in those places that
for some fashion-of-the-moment-reason are considered "in" or "cool".

Buddha Bar, Cafe' Latino, fake Mexican pubs .. that kind of shite

That's what I heard, it looks today it's all a matter of knowing "the in places" and the
ever chaning fashion codes.

I like to spend a lot of time home doing my own stuff.

Besides, taking advantage , have you ever had any expriences in
handling donkeys, we need info here

[GeeZa]

I have to say though, Newham *is* a dump. Lived there for four years and it's horrific. The whole length of the Romford Road North and South of it is almost a post-holocaust urban free for all. Well it's not quite that bad, but some parts are. And Maryland through to Leyton, yuck. Having the Olympics there is HILARIOUS.

The stories I could tell.....

[Flabio]

Having the Olympics there is HILARIOUS.

They'll compulsory purchase and bulldoze most of it.

[Kamineko]

Middlesborough, Southampton and Liverpool are all poop.