What a thoroughly depressing place..........

Why does it affect you if they don't speak English? If they did would you talk to them? Do you talk to everyone you encounter in the street that can speak English?

 

No I don't speak to everyone in the street but I don't believe in moving to foreign countries & not speaking the language.

If I decided later in life to live abroad then I'd make sure I knew & used the language.

 

I'm not labelling the whole of Bradford here, because the area we live in is beautiful and there are other areas/parts of Bradford that piss all over anything that Barnsley has to offer. But on a whole, I much prefer Barnsley. Some parts of Bradford are like something out of an apocalypse movie. Many areas are unbelievably run down, left to ruin etc. The traffic in parts is ******* nightmarish. Because of the many different nationalities living here, especially the Muslim community, we attract the likes of the EDL and other morons far too frequently for my liking. The football club is situated in the worst place possible. Awful location. The city centre is a worse visit than Barnsley town centre, barring Centenary Square which is quite nice when not full of protesters or local news channels which is far too often. And the bus and train interchange is a right shithole. Barnsley pisses all over that for starters. There's some lovely old buildings here but nothing as remarkable as our Town Hall. And the so called 'poor' areas of Barnsley are quite lovely in comparison to the likes of Holmewood etc.


Hate threads like this. Course it's not perfect. And there's myriad reasons as to why that's the case. But if r lass didn't have all her family here and a job she loves etc, I'd be getting her to move to Tarn with me. Best place int world. My home.

 

True!!!

 

Redevelopment is going ahead..This time without dependency on the private sector.

Also all stores are Independent aren't they? Some are just bigger than others

 

If this is aimed at me then all I can say is go ballax...

1) I wasnt outside wetherspoons as it was lovely weather so I had a walk on trans pennine.

2) I got tonight off so will be doing the quiz in wetherspoons at 8pm, dont want to be ballaxed for that do I?

 

no it wasn't....twas just a jest really.

hth

 

Personally I would not live anywhere else on this planet . The town centre does need improvement and at last is now getting it . Like every town we have our rogues n villains , but the majority of Barnsley folk are the salt of the earth to me . I,d like to finish by saying " people in glass houses should,nt throw stones . You,ll know who you are , won't you . Love Barnsley .

 

So the credit crunch didn't hit Doncaster, Manchester, Leeds, Wakey where a fortune has been spent on the town centre in recent years? Barnsley Council have an abysmal record of redevelopment, road building and obtaining business - surely no-one can deny that. They've been redeveloping the Market for 20 odd years, new ring road on the cards for at least 15 years. The only new builds are bugger all to do with the council.

 

I live in Wakefield and most of the city us a bigger shithole than Barnsley, also the trinity walk shopping area is losing money hand over fist. The ridings centre has shops closing every week. The best thing about wakefield used to be the market, but they built over that for the trinity walk !

come on Barnsley !

 

Trinity Walk OMG. I hope Barnsley Council can do better than that. Been once and won't be going back.

 

You can in Barnsley, they are the ones in the pubs from dawn to closing, unless they ar standing outside smoking their fekin heads off...

 

Admitted town needs some refurbishment etc but that doesn't make it ****
Smack heads etc frequent every town ,city and village its a fact of life nowadays so that doesn't make it ****.
Pound shops etc are a good source of bargains for shoppers of all incomes doesn't make it ****
I meet loads of old friends and have conversations with plenty of very friendly Barnsley people when I go into town which makes it a very pleasant experience.
But I suppose in your case with your attitude you wouldn't have many friends so I expect it is **** for you.

Hth

 

In addition to that MM, I heard a spokesperson for Barnsley market traders, say they were delighted in the way Barnsley Council are going about this before,during and after the redevelopment.
As I've mentioned earlier in this thread, this redevelopment is not dependant on private investment, but there is scope for this to happen at a later date.
The last plan was heavily relyiant on private investment, not least of all Debenhams.

 

I'm Barnsley born and bred but as the name suggests now newly resident in Yarm, a beautiful market town with a High Street lined with fantastic shops, pubs and restaurants. I moved here for work and wife reasons.
Over the years I have lived in other 'highly desirable' areas including Cambridge, Crouch End and Headingley, all for study/work reasons.
In between I have always moved back home at the first opportunity because despite Thatcher's destruction of its lifeblood and communities and the vandalism wrought on its architecture by successive dunderheaded councils it remains a place like no other, unique and set apart from its neighbours by its spirit, its accent, its warmth, its characters, its famous sons and its steadfast refusal, no matter what comes its way, to give up.
Yes it's grim in tarn but I need only travel a few miles to find similar scenes in Stockton and Boro, other downtrodden northern towns with just the same kind of problems both, as it happens, like Barnsley, surrounded by stunning countryside that the knockers never seem to point out.
So as much as I like Yarm, I love Barnsley, warts 'n all and am genuinely gutted knowing that my kids are not going to grow up there and feel proud to be from such a very special place.
As for redevelopment the planners could do worse than getting a set of the old Barnsley Street books with a view to putting it all back together.

 

Superb post Yarm , that came from your Anglo Saxon heart mate .

 

Now Wakey is a **** hole

 

Having been to many places recently to watch Barnsley, I can safely say there aren't too many town/city centres with areas as nice as the ones around our town hall, college and arcade. However, they aren't the main shopping areas and many visitors won't see this part of the town. They'll see the market area, Alhambra and the crappy areas on the way to the ground.

What needs improving is:

1. The architecture. The brutalist nonsense dominating much of the town is dreary an depressing. Knock it down, replace with something nicer.

2. The shopping experience. What town centre needs two icelands and two poundlands? There are literally no highbrow shops in the centre, sod all for teenagers e.g. River Island, H&M and the Alhambra is among the worst shopping centres I've ever been in for actual "shopping". Some decent shops makes all the difference to a town centre. Watford is a complete dump yet has a John Lewis and House of Fraser in a huge, newly built shopping centre right in the middle of town, automatically making it less of a dump than places like Barnsley.

3. The scrotbags in the town centre, swearing and smoking and drinking. Unfortunately, there's nothing that can be done about this and it affects pretty much every town and city in the country.

Thankfully, I understand the first two are to an extent finally being sorted. New cinema complex with restaurants and yorkstone replacing the chewing gum-ridden concrete flagstones we call pavements. I just hope we're not waiting ages for them to be finished.

 

This speaking English business needs a bit of pinning down. Many years ago I was sent off to Spain for a year to acquire a better knowledge of the language and culture. While I was there, I spoke Spanish to the natives - had to, or starve/have nowhere to live/be unable to take part in life. However, whenever I met somebody from England I spoke English to them. When we hear foreigners speaking languages other than English here, perhaps we need to bear in mind that it is natural to speak your own language - being in a foreign country for a long time makes you feel very isolated; a good gab in your own tongue cheers you up no end. I recall meeting a lad from Wath while staying in Granada and having a great drinking evening in broad Yorkshire. The locals must have thought we were those Code Speakers from WW2 I'd be much more worried if somebody had been born here and was second or third generation and still couldn't/wouldn't speak English.