Is London a sh*t hole?

Mishap, I think your fingernail experience is more to do with the trains than London.

Here here TerriBull

I live on the edge of London and have worked in the West End for many years. It's like any other major city it has it downsides, too many people would be one, not enough affordable housing, pressure on services, expensive public transport. I am sure it's not unique in that respect.

It has it's upsides of which there are many, wonderful green parks, I was very underwhelmed by New York's offerings, Central Park, and the Battery Park in South Manhatten, the latter being on a par with the average rec over here, yet they seem to think it's something special. I live close to both Bushy and Richmond Parks, and believe me they really are something special in comparison, not to mention the fact that they have deer roaming through them Bushy has Hampton Court Palace adjacent. Then there are the ones in central London also very impressive. London has amazing museums, art galleries, theatres and palaces, not to mention both the 1000 year old Tower of London and Westminster Abbey.

Can I come and live wth you please mishap it sounds lovely, a bit like I imagine 'Thrush Green' to be.

I am only describing my experience - they are not cliches, just what has happened when I have been there. It is indeed true that when I get off the train after a journey to London, I do have to clean my fingernails - I'm not making it up! - it is just how it is.

And indeed a lot of this is common to lots of cities. See the thread about Manchester!

I loved living in London when I was a young woman but both London and I changed with the years and I was glad to leave it as I approached 60.

So many cliches in your post Mishap I don't where to begin!

"I hate the noise, the fact that you cannot walk down a road and hold a conversation with your companion because of the rumbling traffic."

This statement really is nonsense - I walk nearly every day, with a friend, and believe me we do talk!

"I hate the fumes. I hate the dirt - whenever I have to go to London I always jump in a shower when I get back and scrape the black from under my fingernails."

Rubbish - my fingernails are always clean.

"I hate the inhuman ignoring of homeless people in doorways. I hate the dominance of the car and the grim concrete flyovers. I hate the brash consumerism and garish shop fronts. I hate walking down a street and people brush past you at speed, lost in their own preoccupations. I am entirely immune to the buzz that others feel in a city."

Is this unique to London?

No offence to any Londoners on this thread but I just don't like the city at all. It's simply far too big and I feel quite claustrophobic with the feeling of people pressing in all around me and stretching out for miles in all directions. I feel as if I can't breathe. Last time I was in London I wondered what would happen if there was some emergency that required the city to be evacuated, you just couldn't get out. I like my village where people wave to me as I drive past and my children had a country upbringing.

I escaped from London in 1973, having come to dislike it thoroughly - I was still having to spend evenings in town to work though. If I'm honest I suppose I must admit it's because the place had changed so much that I had fallen out of love with the place of my birth! I've only been there once in the last twenty years, and didn't recognise most of it.

As for the comic cuts architecture... starting with the Lloyd's building that looked as though it had been built inside-out, and regressing through a building like a suppository, called, apparently, The Gherkin (why?). I rest my case. Innocent but insane is the verdict...

We have been to London a few times over the years. I think it is great. We went on a theatre break last year and had a lovely time. We had tickets for a tour of the Globe theatre and loved it. We walked along the embankment, went to Trafalgar Square (I agree re the blue cockerel, awful), Houses of Parliament etc. We enjoyed every minute of it. Of course we only saw the touristy bits.

You can't really generalise as London is so huge. There are dodgy unpleasant areas, but likewise most cities. I was in Paris recently and couldn't believe how shabby most of the stations are compared with london, where a lot of money has been spent smartening up the main stations and lots of public areas. I live in London, 20 minutes from the centre, but where I live is very quiet and leafy. I think graffiti and dog mess is much less visible in London these days than in some European cities.

DS lived in London for 10 years and I think he would agree with that statement. When he wanted to get married and start a family he came north. I dislike London and would never visit voluntarily.

You obviously like to belong, mishap, and don't feel you do in a city. I live in the countryside and like it because it is quiet but feel the need to get into town occasionally.
We go to the Symphony Hall, Birmingham, a lot and support the CBSO. I like to eat in Birmingham, as it has some good places to eat.
I suppose I like variety.

To a certain degree I agree with you Mishap. The reason we moved out with two young children was to hopefully, give them a safer environment to grow up in.
Happily this worked out. They made excellent life long friends, had great outdoor sporting activities to take part in and had excellent state education.
I do sometimes get upset at what others have done to 'my London'! x

I was born in London, but moved to Devon when I was 10 days old. Thence later to Essex during most of my childhood. I visited London a lot, as my grandmother lived there, and used to go with friends sometimes.

I never liked it, and still don't. Once we moved to Herefordshire, I realised that I am a country girl at heart - I felt at home and at peace in a rural setting in a way that I had never done before. So my dislike of London extends to most cities really.

I hate the noise, the fact that you cannot walk down a road and hold a conversation with your companion because of the rumbling traffic. I hate the fumes. I hate the dirt - whenever I have to go to London I always jump in a shower when I get back and scrape the black from under my fingernails. I hate the inhuman ignoring of homeless people in doorways. I hate the dominance of the car and the grim concrete flyovers. I hate the brash consumerism and garish shop fronts. I hate walking down a street and people brush past you at speed, lost in their own preoccupations. I am entirely immune to the buzz that others feel in a city.

I go to Cardiff for concerts - a clean human-scale city - and sometimes to Brum, where I spent 8 years at uni and working till moving here.

I feel at home here in the middle of nowhere in spite of the inconveniences of distance. I love waking to the endless vistas from my bedroom, the birds singing, the cattle and sheep in the fields, the buzzards wheeling and mewing in the summer, the tiny close-knit and caring community, the intergenerational mixing, the crazy social activities like films in the village hall with soup in the interval, the panto (pricelessly and incomparably badly acted but utterly hilarious!), the ancient church and churchyard with their extraordinary history of the Knights Templar, the fact that everyone talks to you as you walk to the village and you catch up on the gossip, the tiny village school which functions like a family and welcomes all the community, the extraordinary variety and quality of local societies (choirs, book clubs, poetry group, heritage group and much much more) - I could go on. It is where I feel at home, as I never would in a city.

My children were brought up here in a safe environment with people to look out for them and a human scale city where they could roam safely.

You can keep London!

Each to his own I guess.

"Odd times I go back to London now though I'm generally the oldest on the tube" - me too. But it still has that buzz for me. I like to walk when I get there, you see more.
I lived and worked in Hackney the late 50s to early 60s, and as Jingles says , it was a great place for young people. There was always lots to do, concerts, classic and jazz/ rock, shows eg West Side Story. Fashions for the young in the shops, different kinds of restaurants opening up in Soho.
We have a day in London every time I visit eldest daughter, she books tickets for a show.

I moved to London in 1968 for a year and it has been a long year. I love living in London and when I was younger and fitter I enjoyed going to the theatre on a regular basis, being able to get free or very cheap seats to some but not all shows. I would not describe it as a shit hole. There are a few areas where I may not want to live but as previously said, every town and city have areas where one would prefer not to live.

I very rarely get the opportunity to go to London and love the city itself when I do get there. But what always strikes me is the rubbish on the main roadsides as you approach the capital. The rain lines are terrible all the way in. People always remark on the filth in places abroad like Delhi, but London is just as bad. (Spent some time in a jam approaching the North Circular last year watching rats foraging in the heaps of discarded food rubbish)

I'd like to get to know London better. We did a week there when the children were young and took in most of the sites and I found it quite scary [and tiring]. But it doesn't have the wow factor of, say, Paris or Florence ie I don't get images in my head of a beautiful city. But then I'll see a snippet of it in a programme and think how interesting that area looks. I'll check that programme out J52; I like programes like that.

We lived in Southwark from 1975 to 1986 and enjoyed it.
Nice house ( married quarter) in a conservation area with a local pub and community atmosphere.
Excellent Primary school almost on the doorstep although the local Comp it fed into left a bit to be desired.
Pay was good , we were young with a young family and there was always something to do at the weekends.
Everywhere was easy to get to by public transport.
We missed the lifestyle when I was posted out but the secondary school was much better where we moved to and the kids were at that age.
Odd times I go back to London now though I'm generally the oldest guy on the tube and the pace seems very fast.

I am a Midlander but I am very proud of London as my capital city. I would live there for the cultural experience but I do think you would need real money these days to enjoy it fully.

I have only visited London to see relatives or for holidays. The last time I was there was to go to the Chelsea Flower Show. I like London!!! My DD went to university there and always felt very safe. I didn't worry about her at all. My late uncle lived for many years in a flat in Tooley Street with a view of Tower Bridge from his living room. He left rural Cumbria as a young man, to work in Dispensing and would not come back. He loved the life "in town".

It seemed nicer back in the sixties. Perhaps it's a young person's city.

It doesn't have the charm of other European cities. For one thing, as far as I know, it hasn't got any large open traffic free squares.

For a taste of 1950s London, there's a little documentary on BBC I player called 'a house in Bayswater'. It reminded me of the London I grew up in. X

During my working life I have visited dozens of cities world wide, I cannot think of one that does not have dodgy or no-go areas, even Singapore, which must be the safest city anywhere has a red light district). I feel safer in London that most cities. (I do not live in London)