Bruv, Geez, and oi spent much of the period between 11pm last night and 4am this morning being loudly incoherent at each other in this part of Ramsgate. Waking late and feeling rather frail we headed away from Ramsgate to the more affluent civilisation of Whitstable. This is ironic really as when I moved here about a quarter of a century ago Whitstable was pretty much falling apart and Ramsgate reasonably prosperous, now Whitstable is a town with little in the way of graffiti, derelict buildings, litter and loitering Bruv and Geez.
Don’t get me wrong here I am not saying that one place is all perfect and the other all bad, but here in Ramsgate we are developing some problem pockets in the town centre and this in tern is damaging to trade.
As I sit here writing this Geez is kicking his football around in the street outside, often against shop windows Bruv and Babe are communicating with each other in a series of incomprehensible loud noises punctuated with all too coherent obscenities.
When I arrived back this evening the road behind the shop was strewn with rubbish, this isn’t encouraging.
Here are the pictures of Whitstable
and here are the next lot apart from the last four taken outside my back door in Ramsgate
I may ramble on.
You're right about Whitstable; I lived in Herne Bay (on & off) from 1985 to 1999 & Whitstable had the reputation then that Cliftonville has now. What a turnaround.
ReplyDeleteI went to St. Omer in France for a day out. They had a big market in the town square. We sat in a cafe and watched as they packed away at mid-day. The square was left in a hell of a state. Rubbish everywhere. Within minutes and army of men in yellow jackets appeared with lorries blowers and suckers. Thirty minutes later the square was spotless.
ReplyDeleteCompare this with the state of Ramsgate after the market has been there on a Friday or Saturday. All of the stallholders pay to be there. Why is some of this money not used to clean the place up? More interestingly, where does the money go? I heard that it usedto go to Margate football club. Another example of Margate being favoured over Ramsgate?
The transformation taking place in Whitstable has been long overdue and is good to see. However most of the tourism is occuring in the harbour area which is choked at the weekends. There are also problems with car parking inadequecy if the town is to develop further. The most viable reason for the improvement of the towns ambiance is the influx of new relatively prosperous families to the new housing developments around the town. The heavy promotion of the town as an artistic and culturally vibrant place is also helping. Herne Bay will have to get its act together quickly to attract the same kind of quality tourism, and is dithering too long over the restoration and development of its Pier. It also needs to develop a strong cultural vibe to attract a similar cultural mix as Whitstable. These coastal towns have the most tremendous potential given the changing trends in society but flexible and agile vision is needed, but seems sadly lacking!
ReplyDeleteha ha i have heard it all now talk about paranoid! So the fees for Ramsgate market stalls go to Margate football club, oh boy.
ReplyDelete