Off Topic Hull City Centre Public Realm Strategy

Barchullona · Jul 24, 2021

Chazz Rheinhold said: ↑

Just pop this here

Darker side of the once-thriving Yorkshire seaside resort where 'bad guys' now rule
Coastal town left in the 'wilderness' after tourists dried up and gangs took over
Joseph Gerrard
The East Yorkshire seaside resort of Bridlington is probably best known as a favourite destination for day trippers chasing the summer sun.

But while its promenade, arcades, bars and beaches have put it on the tourist map, there is a darker side to the town visitors may never see.

Read more: Callous crooks moonlighting as carers rinsed life savings of war hero, 96, who died of broken heart

In Bridlington South, officially the most deprived ward in the East Riding, many residents are suffering real hardship.

And as a ward councillor and locals told Hull Live, the deprivation that "grinds" people down breeds a whole host of other problems.

Streets that once put up holidaymakers have seen property values plummet and family homes repurposed into cheap flats to try and keep them viable.

But crisis for some can be opportunity for others, as drug gangs take advantage of absentee landlords looking the other way to set up shop for local drug enterprises.

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Cllr Andy Walker, himself born in Bridlington, told Hull Live "bad guys" stood at the end of a decades long process of decline which has created the conditions that allows criminals to flourish.

But the Yorkshire party's Bridlington South ward member and others are working to help locals take control of their lives to push back against the steady march of social and economic forces.

'Steep drop' in the ward which 'is everything to us'
Cllr Walker said Bridlington South was not only one of the most deprived parts of the East Riding but was also among the 10 per cent worst off in the county.

He added the fact it was as true in 2021 as it had been in the 1990s meant "we're not doing the right thing" to correct a decline decades in the making.

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Cllr Andy Walker is the ward member for Bridlington South on East Riding Council (Image: LDRS)
Cllr Walker said: "Bridlington South is everything to us councillors. But the most worrying statistic is that it's featured among the worst 10 per cent of wards for deprivation in the country.

"The East Riding has fabulous areas elsewhere, it has large conservation areas, streets with detached homes, Bridlington South has some of that too.

"Bridlington's biggest problem is that it's a coastal community, it only has half the hinterland of a town inland.

"I was born in Bridlington but I've been away from the town over the years, but people who've been here the whole time tell me that what they've watched is a gradual decline.

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"For me having being away and come back it's seemed more like a steep drop. There used to be engineering companies here that were top class, they exported all over the world.

"They were huge employers in the town, but they were out-competed and so the industry went away.

"Some businesses got taken over by asset strippers and you'd have situations where the number of employees fell from the hundreds to the tens. It takes a great deal to replace that many jobs.

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A map showing the most deprived parts of the East Riding, with Bridlington South circled (Image: East Riding of Yorkshire Council)
"That sort of devastation has hit people in Bridlington and in other coastal towns really, really hard.

"It's not universal and it's not across the whole town, but the population as a whole is still on the wrong side of the deprivation graphs.

"And that shows in things like health outcomes, crime and other areas, it grinds the community down."

Cllr Walker said mounting hardships had reached the point where they now haunted residents from cradle to grave.

He said: "There's a feeling of being in the wilderness, like with Bridlington Hospital, where the loss of services has got to the point where they'll be no more Brid kids because there's no maternity unit there any more, people can't even be born here.

"Then people are having to travel to Hull or York for treatment for other conditions, that means getting taxis or public transport if they don't drive or know someone who does, that costs them more money, it affects people right across the board.

"We feel the distance between us and County Hall in Beverley, just like the distance between Yorkshire and Westminster.

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Bridlington was once thriving, now parts of the town are struggling with decline (Image: LDRS)
"I'm known to knock East Riding Councilbut in fairness they do a much better job than others do, but the problem is too many residents here don't believe they work for them anymore.

"You can't help but read the feedback people give you when you're out knocking on doors and campaigning, there's a lack of trust there.

"The schools aren't the issue and we've got a thriving East Riding College campus here that's well staffed and got modern facilities.

"But the problem is we can't really grow our own here, if you have aspirations and want to train up for a profession you've got to go to somewhere like Hull."

Drugs gangs 'taking over' homes
Tennyson Avenue was once lined with bed and breakfasts angling for a slice of Bridlington's formerly buoyant tourist trade.

But the tourists have since left for warmer, typically more Mediterranean climes, and they took their money and much of the lifeblood of the town's economy with them.

Residents said their flight had made the street and others nearby fertile ground for drugs gangs and other criminals to thrive.

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Bridlington's sea front was once a magnet for holidaymakers (Image: LDRS)
And they added that often left them picking up the pieces as they try to get through their own lives while crime runs rampant close to home.

Kolby Clarkson-Guile, who lives in Tennyson Avenue, said: "I've been here for about four years. I don't spend much time in the street itself, it's notorious for drugs.

"I just try and look after myself, but if I could I'd probably move. I've also been dealing with mental health issues for about seven years now.

"I'm from Bridlington originally and I moved to Hornsea for a bit, but when I came back it was hard to find any kind of job. I started a college course but eventually I was told I'd have to go to Leeds just to do the practical work for it.

"Bridlington could be a really nice place, it's by the sea and has the beach, but there's not a lot of opportunities going here."

Chris, retired and living in Tennyson Avenue, said: "When I first moved here in the 1970s it was a tourist area, you had a lot of bed and breakfasts here.

"But then a lot of people started holidaying abroad, and everything changed.

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Bridlington's Tennyson Avenue was once a tourist hotspot but has since seen criminals take over(Image: LDRS)
"People who owned homes in the road turned them into flats, and a lot of people from places like Hull were encouraged to come here for the cheap living costs.

"Now they're mostly rented to people and families on low incomes."

One resident living nearby, who asked not to be named, said: "We hear about things going on in this area, drug dealing and things like that.

"It's a shame because some of the houses are really beautiful around here, but they're just rented out to anyone for the money.

"Education's alright here but at the moment they're building a lot of new houses and the problem is they're aren't enough doctors and nurses as it is. You struggle to get a dentist even, I've had to go private."

Cllr Walker said crime had only "dragged the community down" with it.

The councillor said: "We've been speaking to the police about problems we've been having on some streets with drugs, particularly with drugs gangs taking over rental properties.

"You get situations where you have a vulnerable person in there then the bad guys come in one day and say: 'we're taking over now'.

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Bridlington's Tennyson Avenue was once home to several bed and breakfasts (Image: LDRS)
"It'll be a case of them still being able to live there but they're told they can't go in a certain room any more.

"They have no chance against these people, often they won't have visitors so there's nothing they can do about it.

"You can tell which ones have been taken over because often they'll have windows or even an exit boarded up which makes it more dangerous for people trapped in there.

"The people taking them over drag so much of the community down with them and so many of the properties are run by absentee landlords who have no idea what's going on.

"It's the people who are the longest way down who are often the prime targets. And the bad guys want to keep them down so they can carry on having a market for their drugs.

"We as a community have to try and understand what's going on and find some way to address it.

"We're trying to find all sorts of ways we can counter it within the law, but it takes time and the police are doing their best so I take my hat off to them."

'I wouldn't let my grandson come here alone'
In Bridlington Skatepark, Lee Middleton watches on as his grandson Riley rides on half pipes covered in graffiti.

The 47-year-old, who lost his job during the coronavirus pandemic, said it was not a place he would want his grandson visiting after dark.

The spectre of crime is only made clearer by the sight of a Humberside Police pod standing in the distance as if on constant guard duty.

Mr Middleton said: "You get a lot of people on the streets around here, stuff like that.

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Bridlington South is one of the most deprived wards in the East Riding (Image: LDRS)
"You get a lot of older kids hanging around in here, especially after dark, I wouldn't let me grandson come here by himself.

"There's a couple of cameras and sometimes you see police officers here, but other than that there's no security at all.

"I moved here about seven years ago with my partner, there wasn't much work and I can imagine if you don't know anyone I can be a bit isolating.

"Coronavirus shut the whole place down for so long, it just stopped everything. I got laid off from work and it's been hard finding anything ever since.

"I think a lot of the businesses were scared by the pandemic and some that were open before have closed down now."

'We have enough fish and chip shops'
Bridlington South is a ward beset by problems, some unique to the area but others only too typical of a coastal town in the north of England.

But locals who have to live with them day to day are constantly in search of ways to make life better and turn the tide on decades of decline.

Osman Nasar, a local community activist, has lived in Bridlington since 2000. He said he was now focusing his efforts on trying to bring residents with disparate interests together to work towards the common cause of improving Bridlington.

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Osman Nasar is a Bridlington-based community activist (Image: LDRS)
Mr Nasar said: "The problem we have in the town is that we've got a lot of older people who have the time to help out and try and change things.

"They come and they bring expertise with them, but the problem is passing that down to the next generation. And for younger people with some of them having to work two jobs, they don't have the time.

"With the economic pressures comes anxiety and stress which combines and fuels the issues with drugs and substance abuse.

"There was a 17 year old who hung himself in a park in the Old Town last year, right in the middle of the pandemic, he wasn't at school and he had no support around him.

"We need people here working all year round, we have enough fish and chip shops as it is.

"I don't think it would be fair for us to try and just be another town after the pandemic.

"I'm trying to focus on building empowerment groups on the back of the work I've done with Black Lives Matter.

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Osman Nasar said people were 'scared' to go through an underpass near Bridlington Skatepark after hours (Image: LDRS)
"I want to try and get people from that and groups like Reclaim the Streets and Pride working together."

The activist said even something as small as replacing graffiti with art by and for locals offered a glimpse into what he had in mind.

He said of one underpass near Bridlington Skate Park: "People are scared to go down this tunnel at night.

"Some of us wanted to try and get some funding to paint a mural on the wall."

Cllr Walker said that as Bridlington emerges from the coronavirus pandemic, deprivation needed to be treated at its root, not just by dealing with its symptoms.

He said: "Coastal towns tend to feel the winds of change more sharply, in the future we'll need to bring something to the table.

"We thought plans for a marina would be that, it's a shame because in the end they said they couldn't make the economics of it work even though there's a market there.

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Osman Nasar said he and others hope to raise funds for a mural in the underpass near Bridlington Skate Park (Image: LDRS)
"But with the lack of health services, training opportunities and crime it all becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy, if people feel things won't return to Bridlington then there's a chance they won't.

"That's preyed on politically as well and has been before. I remember when I was young and I was with my mum and we saw a National Front demonstration in town.

"It was the only time I ever heard my mum swore when she said: 'we fought a war against you b******s'.

"We were delighted when we were elected and we took over the UKIP offices because there wasn't anyone from that party left in Bridlington any more.

"People deserve something better and it's so simple to do things better, if Bridlington wasn't as deprived the market for things like Class A drugs wouldn't be there.

"Times are changing, but it's so important to realise that not all residents are affected equally by that."
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You missed this article.

https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/new...news/bridlington-one-best-places-live-5046267

GlassHalfHull · Jul 24, 2021

SW3 Chelsea Tiger said: ↑

Brid is a total **** hole
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It's still home to many, and when I was there yesterday it still looked a great place to live, if you have an income. The decline is obvious in some areas, but it's not inner city deprivation. The drug problems are likely no worse than many smaller towns. The biggest problem is the lack of decent local employment opportunity. When I left Brid in the 80's I applied for a job in North London and hated it the moment I went for the interview. Lived around the world since then and there are many worse places than Brid.

originalminority · Jul 24, 2021

GlassHalfHull said: ↑

It's still home to many, and when I was there yesterday it still looked a great place to live, if you have an income. The decline is obvious in some areas, but it's not inner city deprivation. The drug problems are likely no worse than many smaller towns. The biggest problem is the lack of decent local employment opportunity. When I left Brid in the 80's I applied for a job in North London and hated it the moment I went for the interview. Lived around the world since then and there are many worse places than Brid.
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Are you David Hockney?

Barchullona · Jul 24, 2021

originalminority said: ↑

Are you David Hockney?
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A funny definition of South Bridlington in that article. The roads mentioned in that article are near North Beach. Hockney lived on the South side of Brid. I would call it central. There are some deadbeats who have moved in there from all over the place.

Barchullona · Jul 24, 2021

GlassHalfHull said: ↑

It's still home to many, and when I was there yesterday it still looked a great place to live, if you have an income. The decline is obvious in some areas, but it's not inner city deprivation. The drug problems are likely no worse than many smaller towns. The biggest problem is the lack of decent local employment opportunity. When I left Brid in the 80's I applied for a job in North London and hated it the moment I went for the interview. Lived around the world since then and there are many worse places than Brid.
Click to expand...

All the hospital services have been transferred, a hospital only built in the 1980s is virtually empty, getting a GP or dentist is virtually impossible yet a load more houses are being built. Ridiculous.

City Man · Jul 26, 2021

https://www.hulldailymail.co.uk/new...oola&utm_medium=display&utm_campaign=exchange

Sad news but it's been coming.

City Man · Jul 26, 2021

Barchullona said: ↑

A funny definition of South Bridlington in that article. The roads mentioned in that article are near North Beach. Hockney lived on the South side of Brid. I would call it central. There are some deadbeats who have moved in there from all over the place.
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Think Hockers and his entourage got off very lightly given what happened.

SW3 Chelsea Tiger · Jul 26, 2021

City Man said: ↑

Think Hockers and his entourage got off very lightly given what happened.
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yup….similar to the Barrymore event, the law are still persuing him after 20+ years, ruined his career.
Yet in this case, no appetite for action

Barchullona · Jul 26, 2021

City Man said: ↑

Think Hockers and his entourage got off very lightly given what happened.
Click to expand...

See SW3 is liking things he knows nothing about.

GlassHalfHull · Jul 26, 2021

Barchullona said: ↑

All the hospital services have been transferred, a hospital only built in the 1980s is virtually empty, getting a GP or dentist is virtually impossible yet a load more houses are being built. Ridiculous.
Click to expand...

There's a housing shortage Barca, and I'd rather Brid gets some of the current development than miss out on it. The hospital was something my Dad told me about years before it happened. I think there had been signs announcing the site decades before they broke ground. I wouldn't want to be ill anywhere, but in Brid it will soon be York or Hull to get treatment. Scarborough was far enough. Politics isn't for this site, but it may have helped Brid to have a change of MP once in a while... They're still waiting for any levelling up. Regarding dentists etc. It might not be much different in Brid than anywhere. Getting an NHS dentist isn't a shoe in anywhere I don't think.

SW3 Chelsea Tiger · Jul 26, 2021

Barchullona said: ↑

See SW3 is liking things he knows nothing about.
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ahhh my old brid friend….

So tell us what you know then……?

Barchullona · Jul 26, 2021

SW3 Chelsea Tiger said: ↑

ahhh my old brid friend….

So tell us what you know then……?
Click to expand...

I can't tell you as you wouldn't see it as you have me on ignore.

Barchullona · Jul 26, 2021

GlassHalfHull said: ↑

There's a housing shortage Barca, and I'd rather Brid gets some of the current development than miss out on it. The hospital was something my Dad told me about years before it happened. I think there had been signs announcing the site decades before they broke ground. I wouldn't want to be ill anywhere, but in Brid it will soon be York or Hull to get treatment. Scarborough was far enough. Politics isn't for this site, but it may have helped Brid to have a change of MP once in a while... They're still waiting for any levelling up. Regarding dentists etc. It might not be much different in Brid than anywhere. Getting an NHS dentist isn't a shoe in anywhere I don't think.
Click to expand...

Every couple of years or so they replaced or repainted a sign in a field stating "Proposed site of new Bridlington Hospital 1946". This went on for 40 years until it finally got built. Ironically, not in the field where the sign was which was on the other side of Bessingby Hill to where the hospital actually got built. The sign was up longer than the hospital has been there.

tigerscanada · Jul 26, 2021

GlassHalfHull said: ↑

There's a housing shortage Barca, and I'd rather Brid gets some of the current development than miss out on it. The hospital was something my Dad told me about years before it happened. I think there had been signs announcing the site decades before they broke ground. I wouldn't want to be ill anywhere, but in Brid it will soon be York or Hull to get treatment. Scarborough was far enough. Politics isn't for this site, but it may have helped Brid to have a change of MP once in a while... They're still waiting for any levelling up. Regarding dentists etc. It might not be much different in Brid than anywhere. Getting an NHS dentist isn't a shoe in anywhere I don't think.
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Glad to hear they've finally stopped kicking patients' pearlies out

DMD · Jul 26, 2021

It's good to see from the subject header and post content that people accept that the surrounding villages including Brid are suburbs of Hull.

dennisboothstash · Jul 26, 2021

DMD said: ↑

It's good to see from the subject header and post content that people accept that the surrounding villages including Brid are suburbs of Hull.
Click to expand...

Course it is
It’s effectively the same beach as Hessle Foreshore…

Barchullona · Jul 27, 2021

DMD said: ↑

It's good to see from the subject header and post content that people accept that the surrounding villages including Brid are suburbs of Hull.
Click to expand...

Oh dear, Dutch.

tigerscanada · Jul 27, 2021

dennisboothstash said: ↑

Course it is
It’s effectively the same beach as Hessle Foreshore…
Click to expand...

Geographically & geologically correct. The "brackish conundrum".

Chazz Rheinhold · Jul 27, 2021

tigerscanada said: ↑

Geographically & geologically correct. The "brackish conundrum".
Click to expand...

It’s the Bridish conundrum we have to deal with

Barchullona · Jul 27, 2021

dennisboothstash said: ↑

Course it is
It’s effectively the same beach as Hessle Foreshore…
Click to expand...

Don't fall off the cliffs, Den.

Off Topic Hull City Centre Public Realm Strategy

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