Rotherham

Firstly I must admit to being born and bred in Rotherham (or Rovrum as its known locally).

Rotherham town centre is the shit hole of not just Yorkshire, not just England, but the entire universe. The streets are littered with drunks, junkies, young chavs thinking their hard and the general shit of humanity. It says a lot about Rotherham when the most ambitious people to lurk around in the town centre are the 2 Big Issue sellers hanging around the bus depot.

Most of the shops are boarded up and the ones that are left are either second hand charity shops or about to go bust.
The one shop to prosper is Primark, its a haven for orange skinned teenage mums, older women with saggy skin and a look of a life lived the hard way and fat men who wear vests all year round.

Rovrum town centre on a weekend night is like feeding time at the zoo. The last time I was there was in June (2011), me and a mate decided to have a couple of pints after catching the last train home from a night out in Sheffield. In the 2 hours I was there I saw 3 fights, 1 woman getting fingered by her boyfriend (or at least I think it was her boyfriend), and was chatted up by a rather large lady who promised to let me "do her up the wrong un" if I went home with her, classy. Unfortunately for her I decided to get a rubber cheesed pizza and went home.

Rotherham council have spent, and are spending a lot of money on trying to sort out the town centre, but I can't help thinking that it is a bit like polishing a turd. The new Imperial Building looks nice, and has some decent looking shops opening, but how long will they last? The council has wasted an awful lot of money on building stylish looking apartments, or flats as they should be known. Who in their right mind would want to live in Rovrum town centre?
Rovrum town centre is a nice place architecturally, but only if you look up above street level. The problem is the scrubbers have taken over and until that problem is dealt with, whatever the council do will just fall to rack and ruin.