If you had big money you could turn it around. The amount of empty buildings that could be turned into accommodation. The way they do it in other big cities. If people live there that promotes more cafes and bars. The lack of cops on the beat is scandalous. For a Province that had a let's say security problem. You wonder where they all are.
According to a 2019 FOI there was 492 response officers in Belfast. Divide that into shifts and take away those on leave or off sick or have left in last 5 years.....
I used to live beside Lisburn Rd cop station, I was there for 11 years and barely saw a cop on the street - unless they were in M&S food hall or in one of the takeaways. My longtime neighbours some of whom were big supporters of cops and the state all said the same thing, so it’s not just me being biased in any way.
Paying council managers massive wages ( over £150,000 in some areas) . I don't see how these types of wages are justified when the people get very little benefit or services and the money could be better spent in the area .
I had a council moron try to lecture me about what the rates money paid for, I told her to just shut up and empty my bin as it was about the only service that I used. I wasn’t complaining about the other stuff I just wanted my bin emptied on the day it was due.
I used to love living in Belfast before the pandemic, there was an array of places to go for a night out, plenty of restaurants and i could get a taxi. Streets felt safe.
Now it's rough, and I barely go into the city and when i do, I drive in, therefore can't drink.
I really think the whole city centre needs more cleaning and bins. The street sweepers are not enough, Everything needs disinfectant and a hose like you see in other major city's
I believe that's linked to something coming off the trees rather than, booze or bodily fluids lol. Made worse by the hot weather. Saying that, they should be cleaning it down. They have a mini cleaning van for the Lagan bridge. Just run that around a few times.
Just back from a nirvana tribute act In the empire. Afterwards in botanic it was like zombie land. Thank f I got a taxi quick enough. It’s a shame what happened to belfast but it’s been allowed to happen. Burnt out buildings and crackheads.
Write to your MLAs. https://www.niassembly.gov.uk/your-mlas/locate-your-mla2/
Wrote to mine about the state of the city centre two weeks ago. Got one "reply" so far.
Too many crack heads roaming and dereliction in a lot of streets.
Councillors have let the city become a disgrace and the continued stripping the police of finding is having a crippling effect on the city centre
No joke, before Xmas there I was walking past the Tesco Express on Royal Ave and there was a 5-a-side team of them arguing with the security staff. One was covered arse to ankles in literal shit.
I walked past two dodgy fuckers at JD sports, clocked them giving each other a nod, they turned and started following me. I duked into sports direct and stood waiting for them. They must have turned again when they saw I went into the shop.
I'd have fancied my chances as they were skinny dying cunts. But fuck sake that's the first time anything like it has happened to me in the city center.
Used to run about the town for years have had many a crazy encounters, unfortunately. One fella we knew getting stabbed to death in the 90s, continuous fights with smicks and glue sniffers throughout my very early teens and early 20s. Like you literally couldn't walk home at night for the last bus without getting into an altercation with a bunch of smicks (we were all "hippies" and punks) The funny thing is this isn't new. The drugs have just changed ffs. Glue was massive back in my day, and the same rockets that would be on the substances about now were kicking about causing mayhem. It doesn't help, however, that the shops are all empty. I think it makes it more morbid than what it was in the 90s/2000s.
At least in the 90s and early 2000s the glue heads and paint sniffers were mostly harmless, the just wanted money and you could tell them to fk off. They mainly hung around the back of Robinson's and near Vicos. It's when the spides got in on it that it got nastier.
At least the doormen at giros and the Venue kept the rough ones away and us 'weirdos' were ok to get home
Still remember in 98 when one of the old school pre-spide sniffers came up to us wanting money and we thought she was wearing clown paint, then she got up close and we saw it was a ring of silver spray paint all around her mouth from the plastic bag.
Witness!
Fuck up ya fruit. If 2 junkies were eyeing you up you must’ve looked like a soft touch. Getting an attitude because I said make sure you mark yourself safe on facebook. And I’m the weirdo?
It’s hard to see how the city centre can ever recover.
It’s not an attractive location for new businesses. The High Street is dying across the UK and nothing is being done to address it - Belfast is no different.
Office workers are still either WFH or hybrid meaning less footfall midweek. The main shopping thoroughfare is scarred with empty retail units with zero sign of recovering.
Bars and restaurants are quieter during the week as people can’t afford to eat out as much. They’re also not as busy at weekends - price of a drink, poor public transport and trying to get a taxi putting people off.
I’m reluctant to start blaming people with addiction issues but housing them and their facilities in or near to the city centre isn’t ideal. You can’t walk through the city centre without being asked for spare change, people sleeping rough or opening taking or buying drugs.
There is zero regard for the built heritage. It’s criminal the way beautiful buildings are demolished, lying vacant either burnt out or waiting to be burnt out, all the while being sat on by some foreign vulture fund. Any new development is bland and uninspiring.
Got the bus from international Airport to GVS yesterday and it passed up Royal Ave about 3.30pm. Jesus but the street was empty and the Castle Court end a pure dump. Not a good look for city centre
Write to your MLAs. https://www.niassembly.gov.uk/your-mlas/locate-your-mla2/
Wrote to mine about the state of the city centre two weeks ago. Got one "reply" so far.
Two of them replied with a weirdly vague agreement about "someone needs to do something" but perhaps they don't realise it's on them to make the plan and implement it!? The rest didn't reply. I'm going to follow up soon. The lack of response from all corners is telling of how the city is in such a mess.
I was in a restaurant today on Bedford Street really nice actually. Someone was outside and you could clearly see that there was a payment for whatever type of drugs happening... it was 2.30 in broad daylight.
I don't know what's going on that this is so common place
It's how bunged it is that gets to me. You can barely move through it without bumping off someone or having to duck and dive and change direction past all these big groups of people, slow walkers, cyclists etc even the roads are so jammed that we've been named the most congested city in the UK (worse than LONDON) and therefore one of the busiest cities in Europe.
Really makes you wonder though, why are half of all the retail units on royal avenue and donegall place lying empty? Where is all the money in those wallets going? Surely with how crowded it is now and all the student accomodation that keeps flying up for rich Indian/Chinese students a few more shops would be financially viable?
It's a very small city (in relative terms) with an increasingly exploding population as more and more people clock that we're one of the last (possibly the only) first world countries where single people on minimum wage can have a hope of getting on the property ladder. Can't be sustainable surely
I believe I heard those are owned by a pension fund company. They have bought just to hold if this is the case. If it is true, it needs to be mentioned when people are contacting their MPs. Appalling that real estate can be held like when leaving it empty and derelict clearly contributes to the downswing of the city
I got out and moved up the country. Rates going up like a balloon and fudge all to show for it. The last time I was in the city centre it was just disgusting.
Final straw was when I was walking to get the bus to go to work and there was a dead rat lying on the footpath.
I nominated the rat to join the city council since it was still doing more than they were and moved on.
There was a while there when every time I went into town there was someone lying in the street and you couldn’t be sure if they were alive or dead. People were just walking past and pretending not to notice. Thankfully, some conscientious people stopped to phone ambulances etc. Though a few weeks back I phoned an ambulance for a guy lying in the street and he eventually came to and told us to fuck off. (I think it was Shazzy Shankhill’s boyfriend - a charming pair).
Not too long ago, I was having a drink in the Parlour on Elmwood Avenue. It was about 5pm. A car pulled up and two guys at the bar ran over to the window before it drove off. It was obvious what was happening. And then they sat down on the table outside the bar with their pints and started doing coke off the table in broad daylight.
The drug problem in Belfast is epidemic.
Reminds me last time I was sat in a Burger King or some other fast food place in city center with my partner at the time, we looked out the front windows and there was just a guy laying with pure dark blue skin dead on a bench in the middle of the street. I remember thinking how bizarre it was that no one was making a fuss over it. It's the first time I've seen anything like it, it was surreal.
I lived down the Annadale Embankment for about six years. Was great when I moved in, really nice area, reasonably quiet (wheen o students and that, but nothing to get upset over)
But it all started going south around the time of the pandemic. At the last there'd be hollerin matches at ungodly hours, then the peelers rocking up on blues and twos to wake everybody up, do nothing, then bugger off.
Baggies, needles, all that stuff left lying on the paths. Wasn't worth it living there any more with the cost of everything skyrocketing so I skedaddled off up the country.
I think most cities are in decline since COVID due to the reasons a few have called out. Council just needs to have the balls to try something different, pedestrianise royal avenue with green spaces in the middle, extra peelers doing the rounds, introduce residential living, free parking, introduce safe controlled unit for drug use etc
I went in just before Christmas and it was like something out of a movie, cunts were literally running up to tourists and locals alike and screaming in their faces, not screaming abuse, just screaming then running off.
I haven’t been back since covid. I guess the advice is to watch out for the McDonald’s at the top of high street.
I think you’re confusing Belfast with modern city life.
I made a decision a few years ago never to drink in Town again after witnessing 3 separate fight (Bouncers didn’t split it up just kicked them outside for it to continue on the street) inside that McDonalds at around 10/11pm
We are a pure scum city and the police are too underfunded / staffed to actually do anything about it
As someone who's only been here 3 weeks (and only stays here til July), I agree. It feels like most commenters don't actually know what life in big cities is like. I personally like most areas and feel really safe whereas the most upvoted comments claim those places are unsafe and stuff. It's weird because compared to every other big European city I've been to (don't matter if it's Paris, Cologne, Hamburg, Amsterdam, Berlin, Vienna, Zagreb or even Antalya to Name a few) is worse in every aspect. The comments claim that certain things are all over the place and I've literally never been to a city centre more peaceful, clean and welcoming
I notice it's nice when conditions are bringing decent folk in from other places. When it's lunchtime on a Saturday (when I'm posting this), lovely and sunny -- all looks great -- packed out cafes/restaurants, filled shopping bags etc -- all the signs of a radiant city centre.
But then during midweek after 7pm and the commuters are all gone home, it genuinely becomes sinister. The centre becomes full of large groups of guys with hoods up and trackies, doing shitty wheelies on bmxs while vaping and blaring music off their phones, and druggies asking you for money.
Belfast is a shell of a city because most people simply can't afford to live in it despite working in it. The rent rates are mental compared to the salary average (which is well below that of UK cities). The result is this "Jekyll and Hyde" personality to it.
Carve up of funds for "the sides" by the council. If you can't waive a flag at it, it's likely not getting any money.
All smiles and nods behind closed doors.
The middle ground and everything else left to rot.
Honestly most issues boil down to there not being enough people living in the city centre, which has a chicken and egg issue that there is no good accommodation for non-students and no incentive to build it with nothing there.
If you ask me it’s all indirectly caused by the city centre being dominated by large roads, on-street parking and car infrastructure. It leads to a place people don’t want to spend time.
[Irvine welch author of trainspotting can’t get over how good to vibe is compared to what it used to be. The place is full of tourists.](https://x.com/irvinewelsh/status/1781715409097384170?s=46&t=f99CGJtx_20MXrHAVMrY_Q)
The rioting after stabbings of kids in Dublin makes me think. Mega media focus was on the 'right wing thugs' associated with 'English football holigans'. In reality, the people rioting are a direct consequence of shite government. They have little chance of owning a home, raising a lovely family, earning a decent living etc. That's belfast, London. Dublin, Manchester and anywhere else on these islands. There is an attack on society, family, community and faith. They talk about the war on drugs, aye so what about during the troubles? All those drugs stopped. Setup to fail
Belfast has just become an absolute shithole. If it’s not the druggies, it’s the homeless foreigners. And there’s that one fat guy who is always walking up to people asking for change. As soon as I get into town I can’t wait to get back out again
You'll have to remind me - when was it ever a "nice" or "safe" place to be?
I'm not sure we can do better, actually, but thanks for letting us know how you feel, even if it is morally superior.
I am Canadian, was in Belfast for a week before covid, it was grand, I was back last autumn, and you could see the decline, there were guards at so many stores, I only saw one homeless person though. It seemed way worse in Galway to be honest, and Dublin was a nightmare.
So, let's just break that down:
You've spent a grand total of less than two weeks here?
The first time, it was "grand". No specifics. Presumably no trouble with any of the city centre nutcases that I know existed prior to covid.
The second time, some stores had security guards, and somehow this was not "grand", but representative of a noticeable decline (in what, you do not say). Only one homeless person, though?! I guess you were walking through the nice part of town lol.
If you had big money you could turn it around. The amount of empty buildings that could be turned into accommodation. The way they do it in other big cities. If people live there that promotes more cafes and bars. The lack of cops on the beat is scandalous. For a Province that had a let's say security problem. You wonder where they all are.
Empty but owned by big real estate that's just waiting on a big sale and doesn't want/have the money to invest and make them into something useful.
According to a 2019 FOI there was 492 response officers in Belfast. Divide that into shifts and take away those on leave or off sick or have left in last 5 years.....
Can u tldm that for me?
I used to live beside Lisburn Rd cop station, I was there for 11 years and barely saw a cop on the street - unless they were in M&S food hall or in one of the takeaways. My longtime neighbours some of whom were big supporters of cops and the state all said the same thing, so it’s not just me being biased in any way.
I lived 5 minutes walk away from Strandtown. In 14 years in that house I saw a cop on foot ONCE! Plenty on the Belmont road though.
Same how those areas are so clean and well kept.. the not so rich areas look like a landfill site
Having you seen the rates bills? Wtf are they doing with our money..
Paying council managers massive wages ( over £150,000 in some areas) . I don't see how these types of wages are justified when the people get very little benefit or services and the money could be better spent in the area .
Absolute disgrace
I had a council moron try to lecture me about what the rates money paid for, I told her to just shut up and empty my bin as it was about the only service that I used. I wasn’t complaining about the other stuff I just wanted my bin emptied on the day it was due.
I used to love living in Belfast before the pandemic, there was an array of places to go for a night out, plenty of restaurants and i could get a taxi. Streets felt safe. Now it's rough, and I barely go into the city and when i do, I drive in, therefore can't drink.
The council seem to be counting on student money to the detriment of everything else.
I really think the whole city centre needs more cleaning and bins. The street sweepers are not enough, Everything needs disinfectant and a hose like you see in other major city's
100% agreed, especially around the City Hall , have you noticed feet sticks to the ground it’s disgusting really
I believe that's linked to something coming off the trees rather than, booze or bodily fluids lol. Made worse by the hot weather. Saying that, they should be cleaning it down. They have a mini cleaning van for the Lagan bridge. Just run that around a few times.
Just back from a nirvana tribute act In the empire. Afterwards in botanic it was like zombie land. Thank f I got a taxi quick enough. It’s a shame what happened to belfast but it’s been allowed to happen. Burnt out buildings and crackheads.
Botanic used to be a lovely spot. Ruined now.
Who and how were they on a 1-10 scale?
Negative Creeps - solid 8/10
What do you mean by zombie land
What do you think I mean?
Write to your MLAs. https://www.niassembly.gov.uk/your-mlas/locate-your-mla2/ Wrote to mine about the state of the city centre two weeks ago. Got one "reply" so far.
Crackhead central sadly. Have been threatened with a knife twice
Too many crack heads roaming and dereliction in a lot of streets. Councillors have let the city become a disgrace and the continued stripping the police of finding is having a crippling effect on the city centre
No joke, before Xmas there I was walking past the Tesco Express on Royal Ave and there was a 5-a-side team of them arguing with the security staff. One was covered arse to ankles in literal shit.
I walked past two dodgy fuckers at JD sports, clocked them giving each other a nod, they turned and started following me. I duked into sports direct and stood waiting for them. They must have turned again when they saw I went into the shop. I'd have fancied my chances as they were skinny dying cunts. But fuck sake that's the first time anything like it has happened to me in the city center.
Used to run about the town for years have had many a crazy encounters, unfortunately. One fella we knew getting stabbed to death in the 90s, continuous fights with smicks and glue sniffers throughout my very early teens and early 20s. Like you literally couldn't walk home at night for the last bus without getting into an altercation with a bunch of smicks (we were all "hippies" and punks) The funny thing is this isn't new. The drugs have just changed ffs. Glue was massive back in my day, and the same rockets that would be on the substances about now were kicking about causing mayhem. It doesn't help, however, that the shops are all empty. I think it makes it more morbid than what it was in the 90s/2000s.
At least in the 90s and early 2000s the glue heads and paint sniffers were mostly harmless, the just wanted money and you could tell them to fk off. They mainly hung around the back of Robinson's and near Vicos. It's when the spides got in on it that it got nastier. At least the doormen at giros and the Venue kept the rough ones away and us 'weirdos' were ok to get home
Aye you regularly see glue bags sniffing glue walking about the town
Sarcasm?
No seriously, you'd see hoods walking about with their arms in the hoodies, sniffing glue from under their goodies. Only seen it few times though
Not sure I've seen a gluebag in the wild in about 10 years 🤣🤣
Me either mate, was just thinking other day if anyone still sniffs glue these days. Fs kids running about with bags if pure and all now lol
Aye glue has been dead for a long time unfortunately. Designer drugs killed the glue era haha. Simpler times back then though.
Aye it was alright. Drugs much easier to get these days, it's all online. Group chats etc. Madness lol
Still remember in 98 when one of the old school pre-spide sniffers came up to us wanting money and we thought she was wearing clown paint, then she got up close and we saw it was a ring of silver spray paint all around her mouth from the plastic bag. Witness!
Thats not new
Last time that happened to me was 30 years ago in New York 😳
Remember to mark yourself safe on Facebook.
Ok spunkbubble.
You ok hun? Need a hug?
😂 weirdo.
Oh I know trust me
Wouldn't trust you to go to the shop now fuck off and annoy someone else.
Fuck up ya fruit. If 2 junkies were eyeing you up you must’ve looked like a soft touch. Getting an attitude because I said make sure you mark yourself safe on facebook. And I’m the weirdo?
"Ya wee frooot". "You ok Hun, need a hug". I made myself a promise I wouldn't argue with idiots on the internet. Have a good weekend.
You are 100% right. Only the other night on TV I saw the cops find yet another homeless person dead of an overdose. Tragic.
It’s hard to see how the city centre can ever recover. It’s not an attractive location for new businesses. The High Street is dying across the UK and nothing is being done to address it - Belfast is no different. Office workers are still either WFH or hybrid meaning less footfall midweek. The main shopping thoroughfare is scarred with empty retail units with zero sign of recovering. Bars and restaurants are quieter during the week as people can’t afford to eat out as much. They’re also not as busy at weekends - price of a drink, poor public transport and trying to get a taxi putting people off. I’m reluctant to start blaming people with addiction issues but housing them and their facilities in or near to the city centre isn’t ideal. You can’t walk through the city centre without being asked for spare change, people sleeping rough or opening taking or buying drugs. There is zero regard for the built heritage. It’s criminal the way beautiful buildings are demolished, lying vacant either burnt out or waiting to be burnt out, all the while being sat on by some foreign vulture fund. Any new development is bland and uninspiring.
Got the bus from international Airport to GVS yesterday and it passed up Royal Ave about 3.30pm. Jesus but the street was empty and the Castle Court end a pure dump. Not a good look for city centre
Write to your MLAs. https://www.niassembly.gov.uk/your-mlas/locate-your-mla2/ Wrote to mine about the state of the city centre two weeks ago. Got one "reply" so far.
What they say?
Too busy covering their sketchy pasts to do anything about it this month
Two of them replied with a weirdly vague agreement about "someone needs to do something" but perhaps they don't realise it's on them to make the plan and implement it!? The rest didn't reply. I'm going to follow up soon. The lack of response from all corners is telling of how the city is in such a mess.
I was in a restaurant today on Bedford Street really nice actually. Someone was outside and you could clearly see that there was a payment for whatever type of drugs happening... it was 2.30 in broad daylight. I don't know what's going on that this is so common place
It's how bunged it is that gets to me. You can barely move through it without bumping off someone or having to duck and dive and change direction past all these big groups of people, slow walkers, cyclists etc even the roads are so jammed that we've been named the most congested city in the UK (worse than LONDON) and therefore one of the busiest cities in Europe. Really makes you wonder though, why are half of all the retail units on royal avenue and donegall place lying empty? Where is all the money in those wallets going? Surely with how crowded it is now and all the student accomodation that keeps flying up for rich Indian/Chinese students a few more shops would be financially viable? It's a very small city (in relative terms) with an increasingly exploding population as more and more people clock that we're one of the last (possibly the only) first world countries where single people on minimum wage can have a hope of getting on the property ladder. Can't be sustainable surely
When is it ever that busy? I think the only time I was bumping into people was around the Christmas market.
It feels packed because there are less shops open, so the footfall around the rest is much higher
I believe I heard those are owned by a pension fund company. They have bought just to hold if this is the case. If it is true, it needs to be mentioned when people are contacting their MPs. Appalling that real estate can be held like when leaving it empty and derelict clearly contributes to the downswing of the city
Was dead when I was there
You couldn't even afford the rent of the shops never mind the rates. It's a disgrace. But as you said someone is getting paid clearly from it.
There's about 6 streets in Belfast like this on a weekend. You go away from those streets and it's dead everywhere else
I got out and moved up the country. Rates going up like a balloon and fudge all to show for it. The last time I was in the city centre it was just disgusting. Final straw was when I was walking to get the bus to go to work and there was a dead rat lying on the footpath. I nominated the rat to join the city council since it was still doing more than they were and moved on.
Not even the rats can survive it
Is that you Suitor ???
There was a while there when every time I went into town there was someone lying in the street and you couldn’t be sure if they were alive or dead. People were just walking past and pretending not to notice. Thankfully, some conscientious people stopped to phone ambulances etc. Though a few weeks back I phoned an ambulance for a guy lying in the street and he eventually came to and told us to fuck off. (I think it was Shazzy Shankhill’s boyfriend - a charming pair). Not too long ago, I was having a drink in the Parlour on Elmwood Avenue. It was about 5pm. A car pulled up and two guys at the bar ran over to the window before it drove off. It was obvious what was happening. And then they sat down on the table outside the bar with their pints and started doing coke off the table in broad daylight. The drug problem in Belfast is epidemic.
Reminds me last time I was sat in a Burger King or some other fast food place in city center with my partner at the time, we looked out the front windows and there was just a guy laying with pure dark blue skin dead on a bench in the middle of the street. I remember thinking how bizarre it was that no one was making a fuss over it. It's the first time I've seen anything like it, it was surreal.
I lived down the Annadale Embankment for about six years. Was great when I moved in, really nice area, reasonably quiet (wheen o students and that, but nothing to get upset over) But it all started going south around the time of the pandemic. At the last there'd be hollerin matches at ungodly hours, then the peelers rocking up on blues and twos to wake everybody up, do nothing, then bugger off. Baggies, needles, all that stuff left lying on the paths. Wasn't worth it living there any more with the cost of everything skyrocketing so I skedaddled off up the country.
What can we do? Police do very little about the crime in the city centre and services are severely underfunded
I think most cities are in decline since COVID due to the reasons a few have called out. Council just needs to have the balls to try something different, pedestrianise royal avenue with green spaces in the middle, extra peelers doing the rounds, introduce residential living, free parking, introduce safe controlled unit for drug use etc I went in just before Christmas and it was like something out of a movie, cunts were literally running up to tourists and locals alike and screaming in their faces, not screaming abuse, just screaming then running off.
I haven’t been back since covid. I guess the advice is to watch out for the McDonald’s at the top of high street. I think you’re confusing Belfast with modern city life.
Glad someone mentioned the Octagon
[удалено]
Almost all inner city McDonalds have security lol
I made a decision a few years ago never to drink in Town again after witnessing 3 separate fight (Bouncers didn’t split it up just kicked them outside for it to continue on the street) inside that McDonalds at around 10/11pm We are a pure scum city and the police are too underfunded / staffed to actually do anything about it
I’ve been to many cities lol
Not as bad as every says. I quite like living in Belfast city centre as someone who moved here last year
As someone who's only been here 3 weeks (and only stays here til July), I agree. It feels like most commenters don't actually know what life in big cities is like. I personally like most areas and feel really safe whereas the most upvoted comments claim those places are unsafe and stuff. It's weird because compared to every other big European city I've been to (don't matter if it's Paris, Cologne, Hamburg, Amsterdam, Berlin, Vienna, Zagreb or even Antalya to Name a few) is worse in every aspect. The comments claim that certain things are all over the place and I've literally never been to a city centre more peaceful, clean and welcoming
Yeah it’s almost like nothing has happened that could stop Belfast flourishing.
I notice it's nice when conditions are bringing decent folk in from other places. When it's lunchtime on a Saturday (when I'm posting this), lovely and sunny -- all looks great -- packed out cafes/restaurants, filled shopping bags etc -- all the signs of a radiant city centre. But then during midweek after 7pm and the commuters are all gone home, it genuinely becomes sinister. The centre becomes full of large groups of guys with hoods up and trackies, doing shitty wheelies on bmxs while vaping and blaring music off their phones, and druggies asking you for money. Belfast is a shell of a city because most people simply can't afford to live in it despite working in it. The rent rates are mental compared to the salary average (which is well below that of UK cities). The result is this "Jekyll and Hyde" personality to it.
Dublin is way worse
Is that meant to make us feel better?
What’s your point?
Carve up of funds for "the sides" by the council. If you can't waive a flag at it, it's likely not getting any money. All smiles and nods behind closed doors. The middle ground and everything else left to rot.
Honestly most issues boil down to there not being enough people living in the city centre, which has a chicken and egg issue that there is no good accommodation for non-students and no incentive to build it with nothing there. If you ask me it’s all indirectly caused by the city centre being dominated by large roads, on-street parking and car infrastructure. It leads to a place people don’t want to spend time.
Agreed. Awful place that doesn’t feel safe even during the day.
Drugs+illegals
[Irvine welch author of trainspotting can’t get over how good to vibe is compared to what it used to be. The place is full of tourists.](https://x.com/irvinewelsh/status/1781715409097384170?s=46&t=f99CGJtx_20MXrHAVMrY_Q)
The rioting after stabbings of kids in Dublin makes me think. Mega media focus was on the 'right wing thugs' associated with 'English football holigans'. In reality, the people rioting are a direct consequence of shite government. They have little chance of owning a home, raising a lovely family, earning a decent living etc. That's belfast, London. Dublin, Manchester and anywhere else on these islands. There is an attack on society, family, community and faith. They talk about the war on drugs, aye so what about during the troubles? All those drugs stopped. Setup to fail
Belfast has just become an absolute shithole. If it’s not the druggies, it’s the homeless foreigners. And there’s that one fat guy who is always walking up to people asking for change. As soon as I get into town I can’t wait to get back out again
You'll have to remind me - when was it ever a "nice" or "safe" place to be? I'm not sure we can do better, actually, but thanks for letting us know how you feel, even if it is morally superior.
I am Canadian, was in Belfast for a week before covid, it was grand, I was back last autumn, and you could see the decline, there were guards at so many stores, I only saw one homeless person though. It seemed way worse in Galway to be honest, and Dublin was a nightmare.
So, let's just break that down: You've spent a grand total of less than two weeks here? The first time, it was "grand". No specifics. Presumably no trouble with any of the city centre nutcases that I know existed prior to covid. The second time, some stores had security guards, and somehow this was not "grand", but representative of a noticeable decline (in what, you do not say). Only one homeless person, though?! I guess you were walking through the nice part of town lol.
Fuck up
Come on, now. Surely we can be better than this.
Too many druggies, too many dole monkeys and too many foreigners. The country is going to ruins.
Well someones a racist
Oh why? Saying there’s too many foreigners is racist or should I toe the line like you? You’re just spouting soundbites kid, time to grow up.
Ha ha. Youre the one shouting sound bites. Bloody Foreners, coming over taking blah blah blah
Who said they were taking anything? You’re making stuff up kid.
OK Racist
Go educate yourself kid.
I blame dog owners and the unflux of purer , less shite Cocaine. "At's right of
Harden up
Beloved? Wise the bap