Best & Worst of Warwickshire

[Will]

This is always an interesting topic to see develop, what do you think is the best and worst that Warwickshire Has to offer?

[Lex]

The county has some damn nice countryside.

[Abbie]

Here here! I'd say one of the worst things is how touristy the place is, and how locals are forced to pay tourist prices to go and see their local history!

I also think the lack of affordable housing is a disgrace!

[Madhatter]

Worst is that the south of the county gets all our rates to promote its tourism and make the towns pretty, while we get next to nothing and very little help.

Best is that the north warwickshire towns have people in them that are hard working and have built up their own tourist trades through dedication and hard work with very little or no help from the county.
Everything here has been done either by the town council with a very limited budget, flowers, cctv, parks, christmas lights or the public, events, including the shrove tuesday ball game in the street, fun day, carnival, scarecrow festival, free market square parties, vehicle show, war weekends, christmas dickens night, plus many other local just out of Atherstone events helped and supported by Atherstone people and companies, baddesley toe down, Shackerstone familly festival, Caldecote steam show.
Tourism has been encouraged initially by getting the town back to its historic roots, which was a process of regeneration started many years ago, adding the floral displays, reusing derelict land and by the starting of Atherstone booktown project. Next project in Atherstone is development of tourism on our canal which was started by the town council with installation of cctv and is being built on by the town council with the adition of a canal side park and will continue with further improvments and events.

What do you people down their do for your town, and what does your local council do for you.

[Steve W]

I only really know Leamington.

The best are the parks such as Jephson Gardens.

The worst are the abundance of drunks, drug users and mouthy chavs roaming the place.

[Leofric]

Originally Posted by Will

This is always an interesting topic to see develop, what do you think is the best and worst that Warwickshire Has to offer?

Best:
Warwick's a nice old town. [Castle is expensive and overrated.]
Kenilworth Castle [A fine ruin]
Draycote Water
Leamington Spa's Parade.
Warwick University (For academic pursuits) and the Arts Centre (For live music and the arts.)


Worst:

Stratford - overhyped, touristy and UNINTERESTING.
NOTHING of significance happened there. Shakespeare's Mum's Egg was penetrated by his Dad's Sperm. That's it. Compared to Coventry, which has seen battles, cathedrals demolished, castles, royalty, blitzes and world famous industries, Stratford is a DULL market town filled with charmless chainstores and a few nice old buildings of the type you get everywhere. Kenilworth and Warwick are also much more interesting. It shows the emptiness and shallowness of the tourist industry. People flock to places that have no story to tell.

Rugby, Nuneaton, Bedworth - unremarkable towns with little character.

As for Coventry:

Best: Earlsdon, southern suburbs, City Centre [If you take the time to find out and explore, it's far more interesting than anywhere else in the country, with some real stories to tell.] Allesley Village, Whitefriar's Alehouse, Windmill, Alma Deli, redevelopment, Coventry Jazz Festival, Coventry Godiva Festival, some decent restaurants [At last!] and a good diversity of population, parks & the canal.

Worst: Sprawling and ugly retail parks, north east corridor -> Bedworth -> Nuneaton - horrible stretch of conurbation. Rubbish shops. Chavs. Ugly Architecture. Ringroads, dual carriageways, subways, lack of live music.

I'll prob. get slated for this, but i've found most Coventry folk to be friendly, if sometimes a little mad! [I'm not local.]

Cov City council do a lot - they arrange and fund the Jazz festival, one the best in Europe, and the Godiva festival as well. They've also managed to get a lot of investment into the city - huge developments like Park Court, Belgrade Plaza, Friars Road, Ikea, the station recevelopment, Swanswell, etc. The city's not going to be recognisable in a few years time.

Madhatter, what is there in Atherstone to see? A colleague of mine who lives in Nuneaton is less than complimentary about the place.

[Leofric]

Originally Posted by Steve W

I only really know Leamington.

The best are the parks such as Jephson Gardens.

The worst are the abundance of drunks, drug users and mouthy chavs roaming the place.

What annoys me about Leamington is the way they've RUINED the parade by filling it with ugly and awkward street furniture - traffic lights, road signs, bollards, fences. Ugh. The lot should be torn out.

[Steve W]

Originally Posted by Leofric

Best:
Stratford - overhyped, touristy and UNINTERESTING.

Could not agree more. Stratford has nothing, and is far too overrated as somewhere to visit. There really isn't a lot to see there.

Originally Posted by Leofric

What annoys me about Leamington is the way they've RUINED the parade by filling it with ugly and awkward street furniture - traffic lights, road signs, bollards, fences. Ugh. The lot should be torn out.

The parade is ok, although I feel they should have taken the opportunity to pedestrianise the road between Regent Street and Warwick Street (where Woolworths is), or even a compromise, and only have buses using the parade.

[Lex]

Despite my many gripes about Stratford (being touristy & expensive are 2 of them), it is actually still a really good place to live. If it just happens to be the birthplace of the man who has contributed more to WORLD litrature than anything bar the Bible, all the better.
It doesn't have the concrete sprawl of Cov, or the general chav trouble of Leam (Leamingtonians have told me they prefer S-o-A). I'll show you around 1 day & let you know what all the good points are.

[Steve W]

One thing Stratford does have that Leamington desperately needs, is a live music venue such as Cox's Yard.