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Inverness - the City of today


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12 hours ago, IBM said:

It is not any worse than the Idea's that are on the go just now!

You are dead right IBM! What is it about this cabal of councillors who simply won't listen to overwhelming public opinion on that tilting pier nonsense? Between one thing and another, Inverness hasn't covered itself in glory in the field of public "art".

Walk down the mankiest and most depressing street in the town - Baron Taylor's Street - and look upwards opposite one of the several fast food joints it has in addition to a multiplicity of bookies and pubs (and the Health Shop!!!). What you see is officially sanctioned graffiti polluting the environment. Round the corner in Church Street, someone has had the delusion that slanting pavement stones with trees (and now weeds as well) growing out of them and obscure inscriptions also qualify as "art". And at the back of the Eastgate Centre you have these massive murals of Forty Pockets etc which just about scored pass marks when they went up but which have already become so eroded that they are a dreadful eyesore.

This is hardly surprising though, given Inverness's historic ability to shoot itself in the aesthetic foot, with older nonsense ranging from the rusting biscuit tins that used to sit outside Eden Court, again masquerading as "art", to monstrosities like Bridge Street and the building housing the 147 club which replaced the Methodist Church when it burned down.

Partly prompted by my earlier failure to spot that new pub in Baron Taylor's St, I took a wander round the town centre last week and deliberately observed my surroundings. I was shocked. Boarded up shops, trees growing out of gable ends, shabby, run down buildings, the stink of p!ss in the alleyway between High St and Lombard St, emaciated druggies at regular intervals, drunks smoking outside The Keg and the Market Bar, long term scaffolding here there and everywhere.

OK and having said all that let's just add in the legion of roadworks absolutely everywhere, these dreadful Kessock Bridge traffic lights and catastrophic traffic flow throughout the city. Having lived here for over 60 years, I don't think I can recollect a period when doing so was less pleasant.

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The tilting pier reminds me a bit of a medieval witches ducking stool.  Perhaps therein lies the solution of what to do with those Councillors who are ignoring the views of the public on this matter.

I am actually very much in favour of public art but it does need to be a little more thought through that most of what Inverness has to offer.  And Charles is right: the City centre is a complete disgrace these days and money needs to be spent on tidying it up rather than on ill thought through "art" projects which simply add to the shabbiness once their freshness and novelty is gone.

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2 hours ago, DoofersDad said:

The tilting pier reminds me a bit of a medieval witches ducking stool.  Perhaps therein lies the solution of what to do with those Councillors who are ignoring the views of the public on this matter.

I am actually very much in favour of public art but it does need to be a little more thought through that most of what Inverness has to offer.  And Charles is right: the City centre is a complete disgrace these days and money needs to be spent on tidying it up rather than on ill thought through "art" projects which simply add to the shabbiness once their freshness and novelty is gone.

If the Common Good Fund has money that can be squandered on the likes of the tilting pier (great suggestion for its use, though, DD!) then that money could indeed be far better spent on refreshing the city centre. I also am not at all averse to SENSIBLE public art which is genuine art and not pandering to the self indulgence of some pretentious chancer who is in the business of churning out stuff that a 9 year old messing around would be equally capable of.

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Oh man - where to start with this topic !!! The town centre is a mess, the priorities of the planners seem misguided (to be kind) and whoever is responsible for that cluster**** that are the lights on the Kessock bridge needs a P45 ! .... and dont get me started on the future incidents of infrastructure myopia waiting in the wings such as the "airport" railway stop that wont be at the airport, or the 'ring road' swing bridge that should have been a tunnel !

It has been interesting (and depressing) to look at the decline of the Town Centre as well as the infrastructure around the whole area on our last few trips home. This is supposed to be the capital of the Highlands, the hub to all points north and west yet the decision makers blunder from one bad decision to the next burning through endless amounts of cash in the process. The only good decision I think I have read more recently has been the idea to move the courts nearer the police station (this should have been done decades ago to save on costs/transportation and bureaucracy) and make the castle - our most imposing and tourist worthy building - the focal point of the town centre that tourists can visit without encountering the jakiest citizens of the burgh on a daily basis.  

I dont know the answer for our town centre but it is not some tilting bridge or some flagstones that look like they just weren't installed properly and have lifted ! There must be some local artists who can be showcased for a lot less than this. Heck, why not use the empty shop frontage or even the shops themselves to showcase local artists and give them a leg-up in spaces they might not have been able to afford .... We have a ton of tacky tartan souvenir shops all over the town but I know from our own trips elsewhere where we always seek out at least one good quality local souvenir that we can put in our cabinet as a reminder, that many tourists might appreciate the opportunity to buy some real local art and plough money back into the local economy. Even if a shop cannot be leased out or allowed to be used for these purposes, perhaps sprucing up the frontage might be a good idea ....

I20090508-Shops@DonMills_murals.jpg am struggling to find it now, so the image to the left will have to do, but I remember taking a picture I had intended to give to Mike Smith (former ICT Chief Exec and now City Centre Supremo) of what they did when revitalising a huge shopping mall here in Toronto that struck me as a potentially good and cheap idea for Inverness. A corporation basically bulldozed the old "Don Mills Centre" and replaced it with the "Shops at Don Mills". This went against the norm at the time because it was demolishing an indoor shopping mall and replacing it with an outdoor space with a "small town centre" feel. When they opened, more than half of it was empty, but in the empty spaces they put window displays or painted streetscapes or just added some local art. It made it look very nice. The feelings from around the time were mixed to say the least (not least because many pensioners in the area lost their gathering spot in the old decrepit mall) but nowadays its a trendy and fashionable urban village with not an empty space to be found. Even if it did not work out that way in Inverness, perhaps some sprucing up and making the most of some of our most architecturally interesting buildings would at least make the town centre feel less depressing.

2009 article : http://www.blogto.com/city/2009/05/the_shops_at_don_mills/

2016 article : http://urbantoronto.ca/news/2016/05/cadillac-fairviews-shops-don-mills-becoming-more-pedestrian-friendly

 

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GOOD REVIEW HERE !!

Inverness may appear to be a bustling, sophisticated city tucked waaaaaay up north in Scotland, and during the day you might be right but once night falls during the week or more obviously the weekend “S**t get’s real” to use the parlance of the “town eh”. There are 2 destinct types of breed to be found in the city. We will call them Estate dwellers and Cruzers.

Estate Dwellers can be found in the thriving dole communites of Hilton, South Kessock (or the ferry as it’s locally known), Raigmore, Culloden, Smithton. These sparkling examples of social housing are generally the terrain of the locally known and laughed at “Neds”, these interesting species are easily identified as they are suitably attired in Trackies, Fred perry/Nickelson polo kneck tops, gelled spikey hair in the fasion of a recent cancer patient and their destinctive mink accents. Phrases you will most likely here are “Yoou starteeeen eh?”,”faack of eh ya wideo”,”You lookeen at me eh?”,”Im gonna burst ya eh?”,”Here you, cum heere eh, run ta f**k eh”, “Im blazeen eh!” and occasionally solliliquising with “thats a bangeen tunne eh! or the more common “OOOAAAH WHAT A TUUUUUUUUNNNNE!”. The more obesrvant of you will have noticed that each phrase is punctuated with “eh?”. Studies have shown they are unsure of what they are saying to you and are looking to you for guidance. Games you can play with this scum include saying to them “I dont know kind sir if I am indeed looking to engange in lighthearted fisticufs with yourself but it seems to me you approached me wishing to have a square go” this generally prompts a visual response upto and including whisps of smoke from the top of the head, suspected to be caused by a combination of the lack of using the word f**k and constructing a sentance using more than f**k, blazeeen, eh and bangeen tuune eh!.

So onto the areas outlined above. The chances of being mugged,beaten,stabbed,murdered or offered class A’s ranges from the probable to its going to f*****g happen, mind you this is all dependant of the time of day, weather it’s dole day and state of inebriation. It has been hypothesised that the cretins of the great ****** of Inverness need to maintain a BAC of 0.4 % at all times less running the risk of realising what a dump you inhabit. The ferry being the worst of these as where else in the world would a woman be in the midst of a savage beating at the hands of her boyfriend when a kindhearted male local steps in to save her then finding himself being told “lay the f**k off my man ya c**t!” before being savaged by the local tag team domestic champs or having a disabled man stabbed in the heart “just cos he was there eh, and i was in a bad mood” and the assailant stood watching as the poor fellow died on the streets while paramedics tried to revive him or finally and most comically at 9am on a Sunday morning would a man walk down the street in a plad shirt just in his boxers and carpet slippers pissed clutching a bottle of half drunk coop whiskey in one hand and a bat with a 6″ construction nail hammerd through it in the other? This den of minks, bucks, wuddys, bifters, Junkies and alchys also plays host to an interesting time paradox known locally as “The ferry Time Warp”.

The ferry or Merkinch as it’s known.

There are many no go areas in the Inverness but paticulary Merkinch or the Ferry as it is fondly known. The Ferry is home to the largest Ned population north of Glasgow. Walking from one side to the other is highly risky and if you are lucky you will be mugged. If you are unlucky chances are you will be raped or stabbed. If you should attempt this journey wearing anything other than Ned clothing you are most likely to be stabbed, raped, mugged and neutered before you even have a chance to scream. In fact the inhabitants of the Ferry are trained from birth to track outsiders so they can shoot, stab, mug, rape and neutor them whilst smoking three fags and drinking a bottle of Buckfast Tonic Wine. The only way into the Ferry from the city centre is over “The Black Bridge” (yes that is its real name, I swear!) then under the railway bridge. If you are on the run from the police then this is your best chance of escape, even the police dare not challenge the people of the Ferry, but a life sentence in prison is a thousand times better than what you will face across that bridge. Merkinch is the “gentler” side of the Ferry. The residents there tend to be more aggressive but full of hollow threats.

All in all….Inverness is rough as boar ***** and twice as disgusting.

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5 hours ago, IMMORTAL HOWDEN ENDER said:

Phrases you will most likely here are “Yoou starteeeen eh?”,”faack of eh ya wideo”,”You lookeen at me eh?”,”Im gonna burst ya eh?”,”Here you, cum heere eh, run ta f**k eh”, “Im blazeen eh!” and occasionally solliliquising with “thats a bangeen tunne eh! or the more common “OOOAAAH WHAT A TUUUUUUUUNNNNE!”. The more obesrvant of you will have noticed that each phrase is punctuated with “eh?”. Studies have shown they are unsure of what they are saying to you and are looking to you for guidance.

That's a very interesting and accurate observation, but I'm not sure I fully concur with the "studies". I think they are indeed quite sure of what they are saying and the "eh?"-suffix is more of a hostile interrogative, goading the ned's interlocutor into a response which - irrespective of its nature - will render him or her liable to "a doeen".

Examples include - "What ya doeen in West Drive, eh?"..... "So ya think yur hard, eh?"..... "Did ya touch ma Alsatian, eh?".... and "So you were the ref at the Clach game, eh?" More frequent repetition of the suffix tends to indicate a  more imminent attack - eg "Wha'yalookeena'meliketha'fur.. eh?...eh?....eh?"

I more associate the conclusion of the "studies" with the "eh"-suffix as used by the less well educated from the less salubrious areas of Edinburgh rather than Inverness - eg Ian Black. Here it's not so much a hostile interrogative nor even an interrogative at all, but tends to emerge in a more neutral, elongated and almost conciliatory tone - as if the speaker is even looking for some kind of reassurance that what he/she has said is actually correct. eg "This is the bus stop for Niddrie...ehhh"

This broad similarity did cause me some alarm during my earliest Edinburgh University days and, before I got used to it, a perfectly innocuous statement would be in danger of triggering my flight reflex!

Edited by Charles Bannerman
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And here was my thinking that the not unusual use of the word "eh" at the end of sentences was unique to Canada .. not necessarily, nor singularly, used only by the "low peloi" being the somewhat less well educated defined as the "lower classes."  It might also be something of a plea to the person to whom it is addressed  to acknowledge the remark , thus giving substance to both the speaker and to the substance of his utterances..

Mostly it's more of a joke in Canada now used by comedians to elicit laughter and re-assure the audiences that they are of a higher class than the comedian and can safely laugh  at his antics as he attempts to portray the character as less educated than they are.   Or something... 

Looks like I may have led a sheltered life in Inverness, IHE, before leaving that hallowed fold. That bad, eh?:laugh:

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11 hours ago, Scarlet Pimple said:

And here was my thinking that the not unusual use of the word "eh" at the end of sentences was unique to Canada .. not necessarily, nor singularly, used only by the "low peloi" being the somewhat less well educated defined as the "lower classes." 

Scarlet... I think the expression you are looking for is "hoi pelloi" although I can see that you are possibly trying to create an opposite of it here to convey a notion of the lower orders. However "hoi polloi" is actually a Greek expression which itself refers to the lower orders so needs no adjustment. It is often mistakenly attributed a meaning opposite to what it really means - possibly due to confusion with "high" and "polite".

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C.B.-- You must be the only person on this site who relishes posting such comments just to remind us all how erudite a person you are i.e. well above the standard of the average poster..eh? But whatever useful, point that  you are attempting to make here probably escapes the majority of the members on this site, including me, because, apparently, none exists. Is there something/anything at all which is constructive in your comments?

What made you think S.P. did not know the Greek meaning? Why, if you had ever taken the time out from admiring the movement of your lips in the mirror and viewed a series of documentaries on the T.V., as I have done in the past few years, you might find that these videos are filled with such historical facts. Such as the one both I and S.P recently enjoyed , hosted by a very widely travelled and erudite lady (was it Joanne Lumley?) who was commenting upon the Parthenon and it's surroundings and mentioned that very phrase in advising us about the outdoor "Parliamentary" gatherings that they had and who attended.The whole point S.P. was trying to make had nothing to do with the spelling of "Hoi Polloi" and you are correct in your second-line assessment in your reply. But, Since 100% of the other members on here also understood that, then  I ask again .."what is your point."?

C.B. You know, I've noted that for about the last 9 months, minimum, you lurk in the shadows and ONLY answer posts from S.P when you see what YOU feel is a mistake or spelling error, with the sole intent of pulling the S.P. down. So far I can recall about 4 to 5 incidents  Then you pounce and firstly damn the poster by faint praise (makes you look generous and fair-minded.eh?) and then gleefully point out the mistake or spelling error to the world, thus (in your mind) discomfiting and belittling him whilst, of course, re-emphasizing how smart and knowledgeable you are. No comment is made on, or about, the heading of the thread and recently you appear to be foolish enough to openly admit that you wasted hours of your time to make sure you have verified the facts that you present (but have nothing to do with the thread content!) 

If my boy, now an old S.P., inadvertently hurt your feelings in replying to one of your posts way back in the past just remember that "facts are chiels that winnae ding" and you really must try to get over it. So, tell you what?Just have the courage to send him a line by the internal mail here and I will ensure that you get an adequate reply that will smooth your feathers so you can fly off for a long holiday in the Martian atmosphere. Fair deal........eh?

:crazy:Love ,  Daddy Pimpernell:amazed:

 

l

 

 

 

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49 minutes ago, Scarlet Pimple said:

C.B.-- You must be the only person on this site who relishes posting such comments just to remind us all how erudite a person you are i.e. well above the standard of the average poster..eh? But whatever useful, point that  you are attempting to make here probably escapes the majority of the members on this site, including me, because, apparently, none exists. Is there something/anything at all which is constructive in your comments?

What made you think S.P. did not know the Greek meaning? Why, if you had ever taken the time out from admiring the movement of your lips in the mirror and viewed a series of documentaries on the T.V., as I have done in the past few years, you might find that these videos are filled with such historical facts. Such as the one both I and S.P recently enjoyed , hosted by a very widely travelled and erudite lady (was it Joanne Lumley?) who was commenting upon the Parthenon and it's surroundings and mentioned that very phrase in advising us about the outdoor "Parliamentary" gatherings that they had and who attended.The whole point S.P. was trying to make had nothing to do with the spelling of "Hoi Polloi" and you are correct in your second-line assessment in your reply. But, Since 100% of the other members on here also understood that, then  I ask again .."what is your point."?

C.B. You know, I've noted that for about the last 9 months, minimum, you lurk in the shadows and ONLY answer posts from S.P when you see what YOU feel is a mistake or spelling error, with the sole intent of pulling the S.P. down. So far I can recall about 4 to 5 incidents  Then you pounce and firstly damn the poster by faint praise (makes you look generous and fair-minded.eh?) and then gleefully point out the mistake or spelling error to the world, thus (in your mind) discomfiting and belittling him whilst, of course, re-emphasizing how smart and knowledgeable you are. No comment is made on, or about, the heading of the thread and recently you appear to be foolish enough to openly admit that you wasted hours of your time to make sure you have verified the facts that you present (but have nothing to do with the thread content!) 

If my boy, now an old S.P., inadvertently hurt your feelings in replying to one of your posts way back in the past just remember that "facts are chiels that winnae ding" and you really must try to get over it. So, tell you what?Just have the courage to send him a line by the internal mail here and I will ensure that you get an adequate reply that will smooth your feathers so you can fly off for a long holiday in the Martian atmosphere. Fair deal........eh?

:crazy:Love ,  Daddy Pimpernell:amazed:

Well said S.P.  As a former editor and originally a compositor, I seem to remember some years back there was a period when there were several posts on here critical of the grammar or spellings being used in posts, but thank goodness it was all halted.

C. B., I agree, seems to take pleasure in decrying other people's opinions.  But any grammatical errors or other mistakes he may unintentionally commit, I would be most reluctant to criticise or even comment on !!!!!!!!

The best way to react to anything that perhaps upsets you is - IGNORE IT !!!!!!!!!!!!

Love, Daddy Jock :laugh:  Laugh and the world laughs with you :smile:

 

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I'm warming to you Jock!:wave:; it's good when there's warming among the "hoi polloi"

One day we'll have a beer in Sneckie

Over a "Ferry "table complete with nods and beckie(s).

By then we'll both be wreckies, our canes under the chair

Och....Life's nae sae guid after seventy fair.

I've just today bought a new mattress to ease my aching back

Now my  money's paid I ken I'll never get it back.

But ane thing's certain, tae ..I do enjoy yer craic. Ah ken it tae, and so do you, you crafty heeland man, that yer much smarter than any bearded oldie oughter.

And you have the charm of that cultured look but ah'm still no gonna let youse near ma daughter.

Yese may be auld but not without that wicked, winning smile. 

So, no sirree , not within a country mile. 

I ken yer type too well.

You'll chat her up with crafty, sleekit , leggy, Caley jokies, and  you'll deffo ring her bell.

It's time to go, before the mo, and ah hiv only wan thiang tae say: " mosey down tae New Orleans and get yersel a Southern lassie. Ye'll nae understaun a word she says but she'll charm ye oot yer kilt with classy and sassy, lilting phrases which yer still young enough tae enjoy, cos Daddy know that yer young at heart and in reality still a boy.......

:wink:

 

 

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On 6/20/2016 at 4:37 PM, Scotty said:

Oh man - where to start with this topic !!! The town centre is a mess, the priorities of the planners seem misguided (to be kind) and whoever is responsible for that cluster**** that are the lights on the Kessock bridge needs a P45 !

 

There had been an inquiry into the usefullness of the lights and they have decided last week to KEEP the lights, but change the timing on them, then have another think about whether they work or not in September. Farcical!!!

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5 hours ago, SMEE said:

There had been an inquiry into the usefullness of the lights and they have decided last week to KEEP the lights, but change the timing on them, then have another think about whether they work or not in September. Farcical!!!

You are right SMEE, it was much better before and when the are out of order the traffic flows easier!

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2 hours ago, Scotty said:

yup, I read that. very silly. but at least the tilting bridge is cancelled .....

They could use some of the money to repaint the murals :wink:

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