Recently I returned to the city of my birth, York. I stood in Coney Street dodging the rain while the smell of urine drifted up from disused shop doorways.

Looking around it was hard to believe how many shops were closed and how tatty the buildings had been allowed to become.

When my ears were assaulted by bagpipes, a couple of 12-year-olds murdering The Jam and a painful operatic aria I gave up and moved on to one of the very many nicer parts of the otherwise lovely city.

William Eastwood,

Station Rise, Riccall