I was on holiday in Sligo the other week, and I was very taken with how floral Sligo town has become. I have been going to Sligo for 40-odd years, so I remember the bleak times when the town was much more grey. The council, to their credit, have embraced our floral friends and the town centre was a riot of colour.
There were flower baskets all over the place, and as you can see from the main photo, they even had flowers over the bridges. They really added to the atmosphere and made strolling around the town a lot more pleasant.
In comparison, many of our towns are afflicted by the less pretty sight of tattered flags festooned from practically every lamppost. Far from being welcoming, the flags seem to scream keep driving and go somewhere else. You do wonder how much economic damage the flag obsessions does to these places. It must impact tourism and shopping numbers, as I know it puts me off.
Now to be fair there are campaigns like Ulster in Bloom, and I know some towns have a good deal of civic pride when it comes to these things. If you know of a town or place that does a good job of brightening up the place do give them a mention in the comments.
I help to manage Slugger by taking care of the site as well as running our live events. My background is in business, marketing and IT. My politics tend towards middle-of-the-road pragmatism, I am not a member of any political party. Oddly for a member of the Slugger team, I am not that interested in daily politics, preferring to write about big ideas in society. When not stuck in front of a screen, I am a parkrun Run Director.
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