I remember seeing this a few years ago. I think the videos were taken form the 'Peeps in the Past' books. I remember my Nana bought them (the books) and it was interesting to see the change in culture from the 60s to the 80s. One thing that sticks in my mind was a 1960s picture of Bank Park (if I've got that right) which is next to Bridge Foot. It was pristine, fulll of flowers and people were using it. Bridge Street in the background looked well-kept and prosperous, with tidy buildings and smartly dressed people going about their daily business. You could be forgiven for thinking it was somewhere like Windsor. If you look the town from the 80s onwards, everything has declined immeasurably. I guess that's partly due to the reality of post-war investment honeymoon and rebuilding period slowly dying down, but it's clear that not all parts of the country have suffered this way. There aren't many towns in the South-East with which you could draw a comparison and say the same. I think Luton is probably the closest example, and you could argue that's almost in the Midlands.
The strange thing is, Warrington isn't a town that's economy has collapsed due to the end of industry (such as mining towns). In fact, it's one of the more prosperous in the North and has been for some time. There is also a disproportionate level of affluence if you consider the surrounding Cheshire villages as suburbs, compared with places like Wigan, St Helens and Widnes. It's a shame we weren't able to regenerate our town centre into something like they've achieved with Stockton Heath. Leeds has done a tremendous job with their city too. We certainly aren't going to get people to take pride in the town without first giving them a few things to be proud of. Hopefully that will start with a Super league title for the RL team next year
