Forum Topic

Children playing on the street...

Does anyone remember when we as chidren on Brentford streets playing on the streets on summer days and nights, kicking a football,  water fights, running up and down our street, laughing and playing until our parents called us in?  And in the winter when you woke up to snow, having snow ball fights in the road...ohh to be young again... All the mothers and neighbours watching, laughing and enjoying the childen... why is it not like this anymore....?

Fran Naughton ● 5746d13 Comments

Kiddies still play on the street where I live as there are so few cars as I live on a crescent.

Keith Iddon ● 5745d

Yes, fivestones, skipping, tim,tam, tommy, all those were played.

Vanessa Smith ● 5745d

Oh I also remember playing hopscotch and 'jacks' on the street for hours as well. (the ice cream van was alot busier in my childhood)

Fran Naughton ● 5745d

We also used to go to Gunnersbury Park all day.  We would leave in the morning and leave sometimes when the park was being shut.  We also used to make our own go carts and race up and down the street. We also made our own stilts.  Anyone remember pogo sticks as well?Fran

Fran Naughton ● 5745d

Miserable sods, as long as they're not vandalising the area what's wrong with them?

Vanessa Smith ● 5745d

Too right Mick, my Mum always referred to it as 'street raking'. But seriously people are paranoid about letting their kids lead a normal childhood these days. We used to take our bikes up to Chiswick House with some sandwiches and stay there all day, similarly Gunnersbury Park. I dare say there were as many weirdos then as there are now, but we were always told to stick together, and NOT to go off with anyone at all. The world is a dangerous place at times you just have to learn to live with it.

Vanessa Smith ● 5745d

One of the things we like about living here is that kids do play in our road, kicking a ball around or skateboarding in the street. Last winter there was a lot of snowball-fighting, which had the handy side-effect of partially clearing the snow off my car!

Holly Hodges ● 5745d

Almost everyone over the age of say 35 will be able to remember playing outside and of course the older you are the more imaginative the games were.  When I was a child cowboys and indians was certainly my favourite but it's no longer PC for children to have toy guns etc.  Strange but I really don't believe all the boys and girls I played with grew up to be murderers as a result.  Parents were definitely not paranoid about letting children roam freely and there must have been nutters about even then but perhaps with the lack of tv news everyone was less aware.  Then of course as Mick says, there was virtually no traffic and streets were therefore safer from that point of view.  I lived in Chiswick until I was 8 but I had to get myself to school in Brentford.  This was not unusual children travelled unaccompanied on busses and were sent out to do shopping etc, certainly things my grandchildren are never expected to do nowadays.  In fact you would probably be reported to someone or other if you gave your children any sort of independence.  I think we all know this is a change for the worse rather than the better but I suppose we are stuck with it.  Time moves on but things do not necessarily improve as a result.

Bernadette Paul ● 5746d

We had such fun in York Road Fran. When the road was icy we slid down the hill from Bill's dairy. Warm summer nights we played "knocking Dolly out of bed" and hid in the alleys. We had a wonderful stage on the step outside the hall at the Duke of York. Lovely memories.

Audrey Walton ● 5746d

When I was young (many, many years ago) we could play in the street as there were so few cars. Between the ages of 5 and 10, I don't remember there being anyone in our street who owned a car. There was only 1 TV in the street for some years - I remember the whole neighbourhood squeezing into our neighbour's house to watch the Coronation in 1953.We had a whole selection of street games that we played - "Giant Strides" etc - when we weren't playing war games and throwing grenades (big rocks) at each other or climbing trees in the woods. In many ways it really was a completely different world and we were children up to the age of about 13 unlike nowadays where kids seem to become teenagers at about 8 years old.We may not have had i-pods, PCs and Play Stations, but I think we had the better deal.

Mick Brent ● 5746d

Sorry Vanessa,See what you mean..BUT what I am saying is the neighbours in the road do not want to see the children playing in the street... Fran

Fran Naughton ● 5746d

sorry..????!!!

Fran Naughton ● 5746d

Paranoia.

Vanessa Smith ● 5746d