Northampton - A Documentary 

Northampton born and breed, been away for 10 years when i came back i was shocked how much this town has gone down hill. Its depressing.

R.I.P. NORTHAMPTON KILLED BY THE COUNCIL END OF

Mackintosh should be in jail after his involvement with the football club fraud.

Northampton gang

I moved here from London 2 yrs ago and what I find is that if your walking down abington st etc then look up and your see some fantastic architecture, problem is this is not transfered to street level, the council need to put in place a kind of preservation order so all shops need to have a victorian/georgian frontage and also a big re-vamp of the grosvenor to attract some better quality shops. Then they need to police it well to move all the cider drinking scum on...there's no reason why Northampton can't be like Stratford upon avon, Bath etc .....we've got the history all we need is a council with balls.

3:55 'i think northamptons got a bright future' 4 years later and its gone worst...

Born and breed in Northampton, it looks completely different since I used to live there, put the money to help the homeless of the streets, the market used to be huge in northampton, i can remember walking around it as a kid and it was brilliant

I was born in Northampton 1949. Moved away 1963. Loved the town and was very sorry to leave. Wouldn't want to be there now.

Northampton has been the victim of very poor Council administration and very poor quality policing over very many years. About a decade ago both Northampton Borough Council AND Northampton police were on the bottom of the national league table for their poor performance for TWO CONSECUTIVE YEARS. Northampton is the result of long term corruption and incompetence.

I live in Falkirk Scotland, it’s exactly the same here. People shop online, but the shops left are bookies and charity shops. I think we need to rethink town centres. Make them more a destination for eating, drinking and entertainment not shopping. Internet has already won that war.

Demolishing the Emporium Arcade was an idiotic piece of vandalism.

I was born in Northampton and and grew up their,I'm 67 now and living in Spain for the last 18yrs,i can remember watching the workmen taking down the Fountain in the middle of the market square.and the Victorian arcade at the top of the market.I drive over to Northampton every couple of years,and it has changed for the worse,seems like the private company also know as the council don't care any more.

Really nice documentary very informative, my Mum and her Mum were born and bred here, the new bus station is horrible and doesn;t work in my opinion, people say the old one looks ugly but it works, just needed a lick of paint and few structural things doing and it would have looked better.

It’s like the toilet of England, it’s a depressing place.

Northampton born and bred. This town is a shell of it's former self.

I lived in Northampton till I was 10 now I'm 15 and live in Winchester but it was fine. The town was a bit grubby like all places it's not amazing but there are much worse places to live

I hope it gets better. It's my hometown♡

Welp 2019 here nd I can confirm Northampton has gotten worse

I’ve lived in Northampton for a long time and I can vouch on homelessness, rubbish everywhere and comparing the first time I went into the market street and when I went yesterday. The difference was there. Gone are the days when it was a noisy, bustling place.

I went to Northampton today and felt like a spot on a domino.

Born here lived here and moved to Devon 9 years ago. The difference is unreal

Retail everywhere is struggling because of the shift to online shopping. I grew up in Northampton and live here now, and it was just as average in the 1970s. It's not really any better or worse than any other regional town, it's just meh. The demolition of the big bus station was a big mistake, but there was this obsession with getting rid of it after some Channel 4 programme named it the ugliest building in Britain. Well, might have been ugly but at least it was big enough for all the buses and you didn't have to march up and down The Drapery trying to find your stop.

I lived her all my life. I'll be honest I would love here rather than London

this is a great snap shot of the town recently passed, you should make an update on this see how things have improved or got worse? Who's been caught etc

Mackintosh should be in jail, why is he not being investigated?

Rushden. Kettering. Wellingborough. Northampton. Corby. All absolute dumps.

Northampton resident 1947 to 1962 - happiest years of my life

I've lived in Northampton coming up 5 years. Yes the high street is a bit grim but there are plenty of retail parks in parts of town with the usual brands. Online shopping is killing high streets all over the UK. Housing in Northampton is priced well. You have good motorway links and some lovely villages on outskirts. Yes shopping in Milton Keynes is better but I think it's a soulless place and would not prefer to live there. I used to live in London and would not go back there!

The lady at the beginning was spot on people who have lived here all there life don't like it anymore what a wise women we don't like it we don't think it'll get better but part of us hope someday it will thanks for uploading this video

Absolutely nothing to do in Northampton coming from a Londoner who has recently moved up here

This is the most depressing place

I don’t wanna turn this into some kind of race argument. But here is Northampton, a completely poverty ridden dump. Yet the majority of the ppl who live there are white, and according to modern day stereotypes that ain’t possible. Same goes for Liverpool and Blackpool ect ect, this is what I love about Britain, Britain is a prime example that not all white ppl are weak and rich 😂, imo, any city that isn’t in the south of England is automatically my favourite city, northern England is REAL England

man, now I see where Alan Moore's innate grumpiness comes from

I was born in Northampton in 1956. I avoid going there if I possibly can. It's a disgusting place to be honest with no redeeming features. Everything I remember about the town from my childhood is gone. Sad but true. Small wonder it has been denied city status on numerous occasions.

7 years on from this video & the town still hasn’t improved. So much potential but still very run down.

This is a standard state of affairs for most town centers. With bus and train fares doubling everywhere, people are reluctant to venture out. Buying fresh food leaves us all with no money because it's so expensive. The NHS is struggling with people displaying major problems because we can't consistently buy healthy food makes us all look lazy and irresponsible.

How much has closed since this was filmed, the small fountain closed you see on here, and cultural quarter signs some vandalised 😢

it reflects much of England and is a sad old place now. In the 70s and early 80s it still had a bit of life, my family in London used to come here for the market and Brierleys.

Interesting to view this in 2022 as we see the town has not improved as that Counsillor was saying it was going to and now we are loosing our market in town to another place in Northampton another reason why people do not need to come into the town to shop.

An amazing documentary. This is the kind of shit that people will look at in 100 years and learn so much. Great conflict of people hating change but major change needed to save the town.

I used to live in Northampton left school lings upper started working at Brown Bothers Engineering Bedford road to it closed down kodak 14 years cosswort racsing 20 years left moved down to noth Devon Bideford never look back

I've lived here all of my life and it depends what part is rough or not

It's heart Breaking, I used to be so proud of our town, is there really 'anybody' in charge ?

That guy ranting on about the Conservatives! Northampton has been badly run for a generation and has regularly swapped between both Conservatives and Labour, they’ve all done a bad job - every one of them. Northampton has some great architecture and great possibilities, but the town planners have allowed any old crap architecture appear going back all the way back to the ’60s and ’70s. Architecture is important, you can’t build a crap hole then expect to draw people in, certainly not the bigger spenders. Shopping needs to be a pleasant day out, something to make you want to go and spend a day there, spending money in cafes, etc. If the environment feels rundown and oppressive the only people that will turn up are people shopping for necessities, which in turn drives away the better shops so you are left with attracting only the lowest common denominator stores. If you want a day out shopping, and it being a pleasant experience we have four very different alternatives locally(-ish) that provide much better options, each one a better option than Northampton for many different reasons. If you want something compact but still lots of quality options then Rushden Lakes gives you the new, shiny shopping centre feel, Market Harborough a pleasant traditional alternative to the shopping centre. On a larger scale, if you are central/south Northampton, then Milton Keynes is the obvious choice, eclipsing all options in the area. On the north/north-west then Leicester really isn’t that far at all. If you visit Leicester you can’t help but get angry at the Northampton leadership, as it is the town Northampton was supposed to be (bustling market, traditional high street, a modern shopping centre with a good John Lewis, etc). If only those idiots who were running Northampton at the time hadn’t turned down the London train line option (it going to Leicester instead) and Northampton ending up on a spur. This typifies Northampton’s leadership for me, they just seem incapable of making a good decision. It has little to do with Mackintosh, it hasn’t gone wrong in a couple of years, it's been going wrong for much, much longer than that. For me, the best option now would be to create a development corporation much as MK had. This needs to be given a remit then left alone with no political interference for 30 years. Their remit should be to uplift the town centre, celebrate the parks (we have some great parks), mix old and new architecture but not in a way that leaves us with a hideous 70’s legacy. It needs to be done in a modular way that can be uplifted again in 10-15 years’ time. Whatever idiot allowed Rushden Lakes to happen when it should have been in Northampton centre has made that job significantly more difficult.

This is not just Northampton it's most places now unfortunately

Lived here all my life and this towns going down the toilet

Dear God I thought they were talking bout noho mass an I'm going "what the hell part of Northampton is this ? But they are talking about England's Northampton. Major brain f*** sorry .

I only missed Northampton because peace n quiet and my childhood

Born in Northampton in the late 1950's. Left as soon as I could, wouldn't recognize it now from these clips. In the 60's and 70's the council destroyed so many old buildings that would have made it a place to come, all I see are ugly, modern buildings that could be anywhere. I'm sure brexit will help.

I recently moved to Northampton for university at the start of September 2020, been here almost a year now and it’s safe to say nothing has changed since this video, if anything it’s got worse. I love the people here but seems like the council don’t.

Came across this in 2021; it's far worse in my opinion and the Governing Council appears to have not changed and developments have caused further deterioration. The new master plan; we have one, at last, you try and get your hands on a digestible version; it looks as though it was written for the 1980's! It talks for example about creating "green space", none/little consideration for the environment, modern communications, transport, try to spot a tree in the town centre? The whole planet is pedestrianising town centre's and creating entertainment hubs. Northampton has planted a bus station right in the centre and removed pedestrian area's; are they bonkers!

The town alot worse now go down abbigton st closed shops full of homeless in tents outside them even started noticing homeless even outside the centre this year done a massive impact.

I miss Spinadisc!

such a harrowing insight into the struggles of third class Britain

5:33 "I'm a lady"

Fly tipping paradise.

Milton Keynes was always going to spell disaster for Northampton...

I never knew people would rather come over to milton keynes for shoping instead of there own town

Northampton is a very destitute area. So many homeless. Charity shops, vape shops (soon to be shut down by the 100% tax), hoodies with white shoes. The roads are terrible to drive on with what looks like zero maintenance on them (apart from patching them up)... The houses are all on the verge of collapse thanks to a stupid "listed" status. Rent is very high. It's a terrible mess of a town. There needs to be more police presence, a removal of the "listed" status of buildings (just look at st. Edmunds hospital - pathetic waste of land), lower rent, new roads (not just patching potholes), newer buses (I saw a 2006 bus still operating! Are they waiting for them to achieve classic car status?) the homeless need to be housed (use the st. Edmunds hospital area to build a high rise apartment complex) ... The UK is taxed up the behind. Use the tax money to improve the terrible state of the country, not to fatten the politicians pockets.

Bus station #fail

Honestly it isnt as bad as wat they make it out to be. These people show you the shit bits but theres good and bad in every place. Yeah northampton isnt the best place but its far from the worst. And the reason why people hate it here coz they were born here.

come on you saints

How has the town got a bright future? Demolished the old bus station nearly 9 Years ago and nothing there since. Only now have they started some work were it used to be....

The council have totally destroyed this town. Its full of homeless and foreigners.

Clicked on this video because I’m doing a fifa career mode as Northampton Town and now I totally understand why their rivals are MK Dons 😂

I went on a course I Northampton I was shocked how bad the town was

Hi. Do you remember John Borg?

They blew up a perfectly good bus station

Town centre being taken over by bookmakers who are being closed down by online betting. How bad is that!

Funny to hear from the old Northerner how shite Tory Northampton is.

The dirty messy Market stalls are the problem, & the meat vans parked up with dead animals, nobody wants to see that any more. MOST high streets are closing down across the UK so instead of just betting shops & charity shops, they need to lower the rates so that they get independent retailers back & if they can't fill a unit it needs to be refurbished as some sort of art gallery where local artist can sell their work without paying to do so. If they are gonna still have a market they need to refurbish the paving & the market square with proper stalls, & it needs to be lower rates.

"Why cant we go back to the old days?"

0:55 and thats on periodt

“A bright future ahead of it” “New bus station brought new life and energy to the drapery and the market square” gridlocks because there’s no room for buses to move, demolishing the market because ‘making room for entertainment’ ? Ridding people of their jobs in favour of a Shitty pop up sand box or another random bidding for meat van? Yeah seems very bright. I love shopping in the only place open in town after I’ve said hello to the entire homeless population, love seeing the market under construction, really enjoy seeing all the ‘to let’ signs But that new train station was brilliant for bringing in new people and businesses :)

Bloody hell the Market went years ago.

Yea ok I'm not from Northampton but I lived there earlier this year, however when the local pigeons started walking around with knives I knew it was time to leave.....I happily left coz even going to the local supermarket is like the Jeremy Kyle show. I mean, COME ON when you see the local foxes signing on at the job centre then you know the town in fucked xx I've even seen Squirrels NICKING cars ffs. Full of homeless people, no shops, full of rubbish and mess everywhere. Overall the biggest dump in the UK and very dull and depressing. Council talk rubbish and do nothing driving around in their flash cars. Lol makes u laugh.

and things have only gotten worse in the last 5 years

A traditional market town which has killed off the *fish market and ignored the market square for decades. I can remember when people went to the market on certain days because stall holders would be there on those days. Now the market is really limited and when you speak with the marketers, they say rents and rates are killing the market. Many of them think the market will be an empty square within fifteen to twenty years. I hope they're wrong! *Fish market, in a central town like Northampton? Ah well, at least we've still got the Northampton lighthouse.

25 year old in 2018 noticed Positives -New train station -new bus station -new pavements in town -new building opposit the train station (not sure what it is but looks cool) -destroyed that awful looking bus station -new university going up and halls Negatives -every one is polish -shops closed down in town and left empty -shops left are all polish,Asian or bookies. -Crime -Police are corrupt (second worst in country) -car polotion -Night life is not what is was, embargoes and balestra both closed and both empty. -homelessness -parking costs, (just go favel its free) So yer, the council did go bankrupt but they added allot that i appreciated so thanks guys. Sucks about the removing of the native language, the accent is basically gone and over population has caused huge issues, gang violence and homelessness abound.

I feel sorry for the people living there, it looks awful.

3:55 CAP

I go to the hospital here I shop here but it's just a mess

I live in North Little Rock Arkansas USA , same thing is happening here ,Lot of beggars and charity shops and places for the homeless to stay and do their drugs .... i looked this up cause I love ur accents there , reminds me of seeing " Oliver" as a boy .

Little poland

On line shhopping is to blame

Its the centre of England and has a history going back centuries audio book Jerusalem will give you an idea of how its altered politics and power in English history ,as abradfordian I was intrigued by its history,look it up all you footy fans of Northampton,be proud of your heritage a

I’d rather live in Afghanistan than Northampton

Northampton

I thin the talented actor Marc Warren is from Northampton.

Why are there so many road men now

Backhander town.

That bus stop is so old, to bad they nocked it down 👀

I must disagree. Northampton was, is and will forever be the most exciting town anyone has ever been to!!

They obviously go to the town to bet otherwise the shops wouldn't be there

Going down hill always will and have

Yeah...well you didn't sort out the football stadium!!!

This didn't age well

grim

I live in this shit hole..

Don't you mean football and RUGBY stadiums?