Dockland of the Dead

On days like today you could go snowblind from the sun’s reflection off the pavement.

That, and all the clammy white flesh on display around Leeds – you could be forgiven for thinking there had been a mass break-out from the veal farm.

Although my skin is fairly resistant to sunburn, my eyes are another story. I think I must be part owl or have ginger retinas or something. When the sun comes out, one or both of my eyes start to ooze pretty quickly.

Nevertheless, the sudden appearance of the solar deity’s winged chariot has turned my daily tramp around Leeds into an almost enjoyable experience. And not a day goes by on my wanderings on which I don’t learn something.

For example: getting punched in the face is clearly a much more commonplace event than I had previously thought, given the number of men and women staggering around the city centre with either black eyes or missing teeth.

Anyway, today I wandered down to Clarence Dock.

Apart from the Royal Armouries Museum, there is practically NOTHING there any more. The store directory website has four things on it...one of which is the Royal Armouries Museum.

It is pretty mainstream to bemoan the lingering death of British high streets, strangled by chain stores, stranded by traffic swarms and befouled by street drinkers, chuggers and other sundry mentalists.

Here is just the latest jeremiad I came across – in which former TV gobshite Wayne Hemingway puts a positive spin on it all by arguing that the ruination of city centres will “open up space for quirky start-ups”. Hilarious. Let them eat cake Wayne!

But spare a thought for the “luxury mixed developments” like Clarence Dock. The high street might be dying, but in terms of deadness this was like the goddam pyramids. No shops. No people. Just a barge decked out to look like a U-boat.

Which, I have to say, looked AWESOME.