Coventry voted an ugly city

I watched the whole video and was delighted to see this couple really enjoy their trip to Coventry. They showed some great places to visit and suggested a couple more. Not everyone want to go fancy places - I always like to visit the local market and I liked that they were impressed with the food. They showed the Music Museum , Spon Street and Fargo Village, which I missed completely this summer, as interesting places to go for younger people. I hope when they get home they'll sing the praises of my hometown.

lindatee, I think that that couple are living in the UK at present

Hello, or Hiya, I had a form master who resembled Phil Silvers. As you might guess I called him Bilko.

Come on Philip, name or it didn't happen!

Great that Earlsdon got a big section in the video

We try not to name individuals bohica, you never know if their relatives might read and be upset.

As Coventry was voted "ugly" back in 2013. Has there been any more polls for ugly cities and if so how have we faired in the voting? Also, is the voting restricted to just cities or do towns count?

Wherever you go, you take your attitude with you. Last time we visited Cov, the Sun was out, we visited all our favourite places and found everywhere friendly. There are lots of good things to look at and we had some great meals and some nice trips out. The worst place we went was Leamington which looked tired and drab, which was a surprise. Curiously enough we stayed in Kenilworth as Coventry Hotels were all too expensive or didn't have a car park.

I was born in Sewall Highway in 1942 and left in 1970. To me the 1960's in Coventry was some of my best younger years from shops, cafes, dance halls and numerous working men's clubs, and of cause the rise of CCFC under Derrick Robins and manager Jimmy Hill. My Gran, b1896 d1983, never wished to go anywhere else as she loved Coventry but always said she prefered pre-war Coventry. She first went to the seaside on a coach trip from the Navigation Pub when she was 68 years old and I think it was Dreamtimes Parents who organized the trip.

Most likely Mr. Blue Sky. Your Gran would have been at the Harvest Festival held in the bar too.

Read this morning that the Lancashire Post ran a survey as such. "15 things someone would notice if they had left Preston in 2000 and returned today" So lets have your list (good or bad) for Coventry over the same time period.

Hi Mick, I'll kick this off, not with groans of young folk issues which are rampant on other media sites, but this. Although going further back in time, the minelium was a changing culture habit of this. Going to school morning after morning, how often would you see shop keepers washing down their shop fronts, frontage pavements or at least brushing. It didn't matter if it was a sweet shop, veg or whatever. On an opening up procedure notice to staff, shop frontage hygiene & cleanliness was paramount. Some still might do it, but what I do see & hear nowadays is "Leave it to the council, we pay enough rates". Only a thought from memory. I do mine at home about once a week. I pay enough rates too. No longer entitled to single occupancy discount now.

Not having been much of a city centre person since my younger days, I guess the main things I would notice are 1 No BHS 2 No ramp in the precinct 3 No Owen Owen 4 Lots of colourful student accommodation buildings. 5 The elephant swimming pool closed 6 No Woolworths 7 No Evening Telegraph offices 8 Car parking charges 9 The ice skating rink 10 Lack of public toilets I'm not sure if all of these would have been in the last 23 years, so I am open to correction.

I am afraid my City centre days goes back to the 60's and early 70's and there are a lot more shops that we could add to that list that made it an interesting place to go and sop. I am sure Dreamtime will agree with me. I think if a city is an interesting place to visit and to shop you don't notice the architecture it was what was in the shops. 1960's Coventry would not have been described as attractive. I think the last time we came anywhere near Coventry was to a wonderful leather shop in Radford.

I think that the shortage of interesting shops is the same everywhere. Towns used small businesses as a cash cow and at the same time encouraged out of town supermarkets. The internet and covid have made the problem even worse. I don't know that I have 15 changes as many of them are lumped together in my head. Coventry was probably at a low point when I lived there in the 90s. I only visited the city centre a few times a year. The outskirts of the city are much busier, built up and slightly scary. The Axa building used to look like 70's mirrored sunglasses and now looks like a 90's duvet cover but despite that it's an improvement. The student buildings mostly look clean and bright with the exception of that weird one at the Gosford end. Lots of areas and buildings have been spruced up, with a few still in the pipeline. The cross is improved. All the planting and prettyfication for the City of Culture is nice but will it survive? Especially if the shops are empty.