OT. Village life changing

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daisymay
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OT. Village life changing

Post by daisymay »

Today is very cold but sunny & bright & we decided to go to a village/small town we have not been to for a few years. My friend left there 3 or 4 years ago to move south nearer to her son & family.

How surprised we were at how many shops & businesses have closed. These include 4 Banks, 2 building societies gone & post office barely existing. Still several hairdressers, beauty parlours & estate agents though. A new small cafe opened as one closed. Don't know how long that will last The supermarket has gone downhill too; although it was only small it was handy to save a bus journey into the nearest larger town. 2 new businesses opened & tried to inject life into the place tried but closed down in a short time. A children's clothes shop & home furnishings store. Neither big name companies but people trying & create new types of businesses. Even the librarian we knew has retired!! :lol:

Went into one of the charity shops & I immediately felt at home as there was a PUFFIN fridge magnet no less!! From the Shetland Isles. There were 6 of them & the puffin was on top. Cant stop them getting around can you Wendy?! They hop up everywhere it seems. Although they don't hop do they? Don't they mostly just waddle along? Anyway this cute & colourful bird made me smile.

We did have a lovely ride home through the countryside & saw snow on mountains but it seems sad village life is changing quite considerably now. And now some bus companies are thinking of reducing buses running through really small villages which will mean people will be unable to get about as much in summer. I expect this happens in many other parts of UK too not just here.
Daisy :)
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wendywombat
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by wendywombat »

I hope you gave that Puffin a Good Home!

How sad to see village life deteriorate. As we've had to go back and forth to Portsmouth so much recently we've been going to some of the places we knew when growing up. A small town I used to go through every day on my way to school has almost died! There's a precinct which I remember being built back in the 60's and it's now so shabby. Shops boarded up and even the charity shops are closing! :shock: Yet there are so many new roads and housing estates surrounding the place surely there must be a need for the shops....but no! The town seems to be served by Superstores, one of each of the Big Names! Another town not so far away seems to be thriving. Weird!
It's happening here in France too. Sign of the times...whatever that means!! :roll:
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poppy
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by poppy »

The little village near us is full of cafes, nail parlors and charity shops. No more small shops!

Glad that you still had a good time with your friend, Daisy :)
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by nannyrainbow »

we have that round us too - many places just part post office, part convenience store . buses cut to twice a day instead of every couple of hours. Not everyone wants to keep a car when older - not many places to get petrol for one thing, so it is getting more difficult to get around in the countryside.

Lot of people order on line now, those who do not have a computer get family to order for them. 2 of my friends do that. thankfully we are on Internet.
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by richardandtracy »

In the 1990's my parents lived in N Devon. The bus was cut to one a week to Bideford. Now I really do mean one a week. To return, you'd have to take a bus to Bude, wait a week and arrive back at the bus stop exactly one week from leaving. And that stop was 1.75 miles from their house.

The service has doubled since, there is now one return bus a week.

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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by Squirrel »

How sad to read of all these villages quietly fading into the sunset. Sadly it seems that life is more about making money than providing a basic infrastructure for these villages to keep going. I have lived in cities all my life, although having said that where I was in Melbourne's outsikirts was more a village but we had a great train service to other 'villages' or a bus to go further than the rail line.
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daisymay
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by daisymay »

Can understand no daily transport Richard. In the mountains there are farms along dirt only single track ways & they are nowhere near a bus service.They go to closest town every so often in their Land Rovers for groceries. Even some only 3 or 4 miles out from a main town only have school buses each day, & that is along a single track road. My BIL worked in local council offices & the family then lived in converted stables they rented on a small sheep farm only3 or 4 miles away from town. Any visitors were told when the school bus went along the single track winding lane so as to avoid having to reverse quite a way to find a passing place.

Some places are really hamlets dotted here & there where school bus journey is almost an hour but I was thinking more of those small places & other villages with a small population where residents have to go to another town for the doctor, dentist & shopping & to meet friends They take pull along shoppers with them as buses here have a deep drop down step which makes getting on the buses easier.
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Lulu22
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by Lulu22 »

The village I grew up in just four miles from where I am now doesn't even have a bank anymore and I wouldn't class it as a small village there are plenty of houses and pubs just no places to shop, sad times.

Where I am now has doubled in size, in fact my husband and I went for a walk along the salt marshes last week, we live in the old part of my town and have done for 20 years, we decided to walk back to the car via the 'new build' area and got completely lost, my husband had to get out google maps to navigate our way back, they build houses so close together nowadays it was like a rabbit warren and its not a very attractive place to be honest, I know for a fact if we try walking through it again the same thing will happen, I'm not keen I think I stick to what I know!
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daisymay
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by daisymay »

Lulu, amazing how different the new area must be. Must have been a weird sensation not knowing how to get out of the maze of new streets.

Sally, DH & I recently saw Melbourne for a few minutes on TV. Can't remember what for but we both said how lovely it looks there.
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Mabel Figworthy
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by Mabel Figworthy »

It's sad, but happens at least partly because people won't use the village shops/library/post office because it's more convenient and cheaper to shop in the superstores or online. I've noticed it in our own village (which is one of the lucky ones, still having a post office, doctors' practice and chemist, community library plus a newsagent or two), where some of the people who complain loudest that local shops are closing down don't set foot in one from one year to the next, and just expect the shops to be there when they happen to want them.
I know there are also lots of people who DO support their local shops, and they are the ones that keep things going.

Even so, sometimes it's hard to explain why it works in one place but not in another. Our village and my in-laws' town (you get pilloried if you call it a village :-) ) are about the same size, 2500-3000 people or so, yet whereas we have no useful every-day shops besides the ones I mentioned (we do have a wedding shop, FOUR hairdressers and THREE picture framers), they have two thriving grocery shops, a great butcher who also does veg, a cafe, a newsagent, plus everything we've got. It's true a large proportion of their population is at the older end of the age scale, and so perhaps more willing to shop locally and forego the pine nuts and pomegranate seeds for which you need a big supermarket, but even so, there seems no very obvious reason for it.
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by wendywombat »

My home town is in the Portsmouth area. It's changed so much I have to use a Sat-Nav to find my way around. :tizzy: New roads and Huge housing estates. The village I grew up in has merged with the 2 either side so it's suburbia all the way. The green fields are no longer.
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daisymay
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by daisymay »

What a shame there are less green fields where you grew up Wendy, must have been very disappointing for you to say the least. Can't imagine what it was like to see the 3 places merged into one urban sprawl.

Mabel, your mother-in-laws area sounds lovely. Many older people where we live do the same, support local shops - leaving health foods etc. to a major shop in nearest large town once in a while. It is good to choose own fruit, veg etc. Also have weekly clubs in old school. Weight Watchers & exercise classes there other days/evenings - wonder why? :lol: Good to see the old stone school being used as it is a lovely building with beautiful tiles on roof. Chapels/churches hold coffee mornings so places to meet friends & have a chat if you want to. Oh yes, lovely bakers which makes wonderful cream cakes, lovely meat pies etc. They do well by older people but many younger ones go to nearby supermarket.
Daisy :)
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Re: OT. Village life changing

Post by wendywombat »

daisymay wrote:What a shame there are less green fields where you grew up Wendy, must have been very disappointing for you to say the least. Can't imagine what it was like to see the 3 places merged into one urban sprawl.
Ah well! At least here we have Green Fields either side of us, some years we have them full of Sunflowers :wub: We have woods behind us where there are deer, hare and wild pigs. Very little traffic and a Wonderful Saturday market. The only thing I miss is the Sea! :cry: But we get beautiful sunsets and a far reaching view.

I moved from Portsmouth back in 1967 so I can't really complain. We lived in the Bristol area for 25 years+ and left there in 1998.
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