When in younger days I lived in the area, social mobility was poor.
Transport to the town centre or the school run, was bus driven. Very few had cars and certainly supermarkets were a rare phenomenon.
The big shop consisted of a weekly visit to the town centre about two miles away and independent shops.
Only the haves had a car and certainly never two!
The new rich, moving into the area, as they were the only ones that could afford the house prices, were from out of town and many were coming here from the closest city.
It wasn’t a place of people trying to move up, it was more of a place to live in which those that had achieved a higher standard of job, business or living already, resided.
So it continued, as the fields were built upon, the independent shops disappeared, even they could not afford to live in the area anymore.
Times change of course, but the ethos of the immediate area remains as strong as ever. Perhaps I just see it more now as I’m not blinkered by my rose-coloured view from childhood, where I was sheltered from reality, by my care-free days?
More and more people moving into the posh houses, as they climb the ladder of “success” in their working lives.
The people though, I’ve noticed, mostly come from an area 30-35 miles away, the closest city.
They already have the higher paid, top jobs. There are few local people whom have climbed the ladder.
many locals remain on or around the main road through the area. While the crime-free area, with plenty of street and drive parking plods on regardless.
“Shop local” we minions are told, at every opportunity.
Hard to do when the local prices are what our parents would call extortionate!
The town centre street is full of artisan bakeries and coffee shops, often owned by those that have reached the levels of standing that only they can afford and networked via social media accounts of people in the area.
What other shops remain available to all? Charity shops.
No longer can a week’s shopping be obtained via the local high street, as quaint as the cobbles look.
A quick scan of the area reveals many whom live there, are also owners. This maybe explains the prices being charged? Some are struggling so pass their costs on to locals?
Much of their business is done via networking.
Families, whose children become friends, with parents that get together occasionally.
Even the market place, that bastion of bargains that people have been using for decades, has gone by the way side, now a fancy pizza eatery, at £8 per slice, but they’ve had their business profiled in the local magazine of popular choice and a converted outdoor stall is a pop up beer selling pipe dream, selling made up ales which people boast about at the golf range, while having absolutely no idea or knowledge of where they come from.
When one household needs a service or business, it’s those that they live closest to, that get the business, regardless of price and visa-versa.
Despite dolling out the virtues of shopping locally, perceived struggling with the latest cost of living crisis, etc. they continue to have several holidays abroad each year, as they try to out-do the neighbours, with imaginative places, advertised to the local circles via social media.
(Stay-cations now recategorised as staying in the area, instead of the original meaning of staying at home!)
The frequent meals out, which always seem to be in eateries that exist in areas that they originally came from, before moving here, which have been improved since they moved away.
Meanwhile, the amenities here prior to the increase in population have declined, some have disappeared altogether.
The shops and choice available to those that can only venture out at a distance have decreased.
The pubs that many locals frequented, labelled an eyesore by some who moved into the area, have long closed down and now house the latest niche shop of a turkish barber or nail bar, charging over the odds for a shaved trim or glued on painted nails.
But their time will come.
They don’t realise it yet, but the friendly local newsagent that stocks their magazines, “Just for them,” resides in a city over 35 miles away. Money earned here is not spent locally at all.
They may well continue to have the social mobility and finances that recovering governments and local councils wish to dip into to claw back money, which for a time, they will flaunt, but others are better prepared for any financial blasts in the future, as must surely land on our doorsteps.