Things you don’t see outside any more

[32475]

Roadside hedgerows without McDonalds / Costa / KFC etc packaging strength around and plastic bags stuck in trees. What a heartbreakingly dirty nation we have become.
This doesn’t apply everywhere of course but some places are very much worse than others.

 

[73202]

Car window stickers from radio stations that state their operating band and frequency.

I've still got one of those in my cars rear window. "gem 106"

 

[Cowley]

Ruined cassette tapes on street pavements.

Saw one the other day just up the road from me! I felt very nostalgic seeing that.

 

[Meerkat]

Car window stickers from radio stations that state their operating band and frequency.

Still see Radio Jackie ones around the South West London area

Those extra roadside telephone boxes provided by the AA and RAC. Members were sent a key, and could use both networks. Obviously one of the skills a driver needed was to make sure if he broke down it was near one.

There is an AA one at Devil's Bridge, by the hotel near the end of the VoR, and I saw one on the B974 down into the Dee Valley near Banchory. Looking at Google streetview (its in the triangle junction with Old Military Road) it looks like it has a modern door handle, and is marked on the OS Maps app 1:25000 with a blue phone (which isn't on the current symbols list but used to be for a motoring organisation phone)

That piqued my interest. As far as I can tell, that specific sign should never have been used on a public highway. The official Diagram 637 did not include the text 'No waiting', just 'At any time'. Also, while use of 'At any time' signs was discontinued, there was no requirement to remove existing signs, so there may still be some about.

I had a female housemate who had someone 'acquire' an "At any time" sign for her to put on the wall above her bed!

 

[bavvo]

I've certainly not seen a battery powered milk float in a very long time, they've been replaced by diesel Ford Transits locally.

Actually my milkman does seem to be using either a battery or hybrid one, it's very quiet when it pulls away.

 

[OhNoAPacer]

Never mind battery powered milk floats, how about horse drawn milk floats, I can remember there was still one in operation in the 1960's.

Edited to remove spelling mistake.

 

[birchesgreen]

Never mind battery powered milk floats, how about horse drawn milk floats, I can remember there was still one in operation in the 1960's.

There was at least one in Birmingham in the late 70s, i vividly remember this as my Dad nearly crashed into it!

 

[32475]

On Christmas Day, children trying out their shiny brand new bicycles on the pavement. Come to think of it you don’t see half as many children outside as there were not so many years ago. I wonder where they have all gone!

 

[Gloster]

Do people still wash their cars on Sunday mornings? (The act of worship that replaced church in the 1960s.)

 

[Busaholic]

Never mind battery powered milk floats, how about horse drawn milk floats, I can remember there was still one in operation in the 1960's.

Edited to remove spelling mistake.

I 'helped out' on an Express Dairy horse drawn milk cart (as they were known in my area) in the 1950s. Looking back on it, I probably did most of the heavy work carting those quite heavy glass milk bottles up steps. I was very much still at primary school, but I was always looking for ways of supplementing my meagre pocket money. The horse got replaced by an electric float a year or so into the arrangement.

 

[dgl]

I think it was BSB's answer to the satellite dish as far as I Remember ! It's a bit hazy as my family only had terrestrial at the time !

(We'd had cable in the past - rediffusion with a dial on the wall, but had given it up in favour of a video recorder).

Basically what was supposed to happen with satellite TV was the IBA would control satellite broadcasting, just like the regional franchises, and a companies would bid to run satellite TV in the UK, now BSB used their own high-power satellites and so were able to use smaller dishes/antennas than other systems.

Now as I understand it, whilst no one else was allowed to operate their own satellite TV service with their own satellite in the UK you could get around it by using a satellite owned by someone else, and thats how SKY's direct to home service started.

Now both SKY and BSB for many reasons, were loosing money hand over fist, SKY was in a better postition, though, as it had nowhere near the running costs nor regulatory burden of BSB (BSB had their own satellites, expensive headquarters/studios, more expensive transmit/recieve technology (D-MAC rather than PAL) and were limited to five channels) and they ended up merging, selling off the satellites and expesive headquarters (that were for a time used by QVC) and in the end were financially viable.
BSB might have been technically superior (PAL was not ideal for satellite TV), the lower cost of the hardware (both the recieve and dish) meant the entry price was lower, it's also why AMSTRAD pulled out of BSB during bidding, as Alan did not believe that they could get the hardware costs under £250.
Problems with getting reception equipment also hampered BSB, with problems with the Squarials (although a mini dish was an option) and with the decoder ICs for the set top boxes.

Note also that BSB/SKY were free to view at the start (as it has been iirc with SKY channel/Super Station Europe from OTS-2 previously) and so that woud have had an effect on revenue, adverts were to be the primary income stream.

 

[ATW Alex 101]

Another thing you certainly see less of these days is kids playing out in the street.

Also, the red elastic bands that the postman used to discard. I can recall going round my estate once a week looking for these and within a month made myself a rubber band ball the size of a tennis ball. I read that they no longer use red elastic bands which I guess explains why we don’t see them lying in the pavement/road.

Also on the topic of post, the green, square box atop of a column that the postman used for storage of mail on their rounds. I can’t think of a name for them, I hope fellow readers know what I mean! There used to be one at the end of my road but it was removed around 8 years ago.

 

[ABB125]

I had a female housemate who had someone 'acquire' an "At any time" sign for her to put on the wall above her bed!

On a similar theme, at my part time job at university there's a (headless) polystyrene female upper body mounted on a tripod, notionally to use so that a single person can focus theatre lights (though in reality its only purpose, for the time I've been working there, seems to be to provide amusement for the staff). We discovered a load of the university's unused coronavirus warning stickers (eg: "one way system in operation", "please use the next urinal" etc); so now, affixed to a, umm... "suitable location" on the model, is a "DO NOT ENTER except in emergencies" sticker!


Back on topic, I'd like to concur with the fact that you very rarely see children playing outside in public areas (or anywhere, for that matter; they all seem to be too busy indulging in whatever rubbish appears on whatever electronic device they happen to be using).

In addition, certainly near where I live, you seemingly don't see green spaces any more due to the constant march of "development"...

 

[yorksrob]

Basically what was supposed to happen with satellite TV was the IBA would control satellite broadcasting, just like the regional franchises, and a companies would bid to run satellite TV in the UK, now BSB used their own high-power satellites and so were able to use smaller dishes/antennas than other systems.

Now as I understand it, whilst no one else was allowed to operate their own satellite TV service with their own satellite in the UK you could get around it by using a satellite owned by someone else, and thats how SKY's direct to home service started.

Now both SKY and BSB for many reasons, were loosing money hand over fist, SKY was in a better postition, though, as it had nowhere near the running costs nor regulatory burden of BSB (BSB had their own satellites, expensive headquarters/studios, more expensive transmit/recieve technology (D-MAC rather than PAL) and were limited to five channels) and they ended up merging, selling off the satellites and expesive headquarters (that were for a time used by QVC) and in the end were financially viable.
BSB might have been technically superior (PAL was not ideal for satellite TV), the lower cost of the hardware (both the recieve and dish) meant the entry price was lower, it's also why AMSTRAD pulled out of BSB during bidding, as Alan did not believe that they could get the hardware costs under £250.
Problems with getting reception equipment also hampered BSB, with problems with the Squarials (although a mini dish was an option) and with the decoder ICs for the set top boxes.

Note also that BSB/SKY were free to view at the start (as it has been iirc with SKY channel/Super Station Europe from OTS-2 previously) and so that woud have had an effect on revenue, adverts were to be the primary income stream.

That is an interesting round up of a piece of broadcasting history that I had little knowledge of previously.

 

[Mojo]

I was going to say the old style milk bottles on the doorstep, but my neighbours have started having them delivered (from a van, not a float), they're the only ones I've seen in the area though

They’re probably more common now than say 10 years ago. Our local area has three different services in competition (Milk & More and Modern Milkman which are all over the place, and a local dairy). Ours uses an open sided vehicle like the old style milk floats but it’s a hybrid vehicle.

 

[Killingworth]

Horse drawn coal wagon, vegetable cart, Newcastle Breweries dray and rag and bone men in 1950s Newcastle.

Railway porters. Left luggage office. Platform tickets. Tickets to carry bikes and prams on trains.

 

[Kite159]

On Christmas Day, children trying out their shiny brand new bicycles on the pavement. Come to think of it you don’t see half as many children outside as there were not so many years ago. I wonder where they have all gone!

Too interested in the latest video game on their tablet device or show on Telly to think about the outdoors

 

[Non Multi]

Hearing a distinctive noise in the sky above (living under a Heathrow take-off flight path), and seeing a delta-winged supersonic passenger jet.

For those of a certain age, Scammel Scarabs, and other 3 wheel tractor units.

 

[AngusH]

Never mind battery powered milk floats, how about horse drawn milk floats, I can remember there was still one in operation in the 1960's.

Edinburgh apparently retained some horse milk floats until 1985. I was astonished when I found the pictures some time back.

Link:

Photographs by Peter Stubbs - St Cuthbert's Co-op Milk Deliveries

 

[david1212]

Folkestone for the Continent, Eastbourne for the Incontinent if you came from South of the Thames.

Having seen this on the other thread reminded me that back in the 1980's on hot dry summer Sunday in particular you were lucky to find space to sit along Eastbourne seafront between the pier and Wishtower. Dad always joked that if challenged I would be in trouble because I did not have a pension book to show as entitlement.

This year on a similar Sunday despite staycations in comparison Eastbourne was quiet. The seats ( planking on the brick wall or was there seating in front ?? ) had gone.

 

[GusB]

Hearing a distinctive noise in the sky above (living under a Heathrow take-off flight path), and seeing a delta-winged supersonic passenger jet.

For those of a certain age, Scammel Scarabs, and other 3 wheel tractor units.

On that note, the sight and sound of the Shackleton is one that I miss.

 

[Non Multi]

3 wheel 'bubble cars' and disabled drivers in old baby blue Invacars.

 

[MattA7]

Cars with a different colored door usually because it had been replaced with one from another car.

on the subject of parking restrictions further up what is supposed to be the difference between double yellow lines and double red lines

 

[Springs Branch]

Bus Stop flags (i.e. the metal bus stop sign) which included extra info such as "Fare Stage", "Queue This Side" or "Queue Other Side".


[EDIT] To be fair, today's bus stops often show info more relevant to the 21st Century e.g. a 0871 phone number / website for timetable info, or stop name as shown on Google Maps.

In place of the old Queue This Side ("Queue? What's a queue?"), maybe each bus stop should now have a sticker with a different piece of info very relevant today:- "No, missus, you can't use your free pass before 9:30"

 

[birchesgreen]

Don't see electric milk floats around Brum anymore though was pleasantly surprised to see this one in Cheltenham a couple of years ago.

 

[AlterEgo]

Dog turds that have dried and gone white. There’s no more bonemeal in dog food any more.

 

[Welly]

on the subject of parking restrictions further up what is supposed to be the difference between double yellow lines and double red lines

Double yellow means don't park there but you can stop briefly to drop off or pick up someone.

Double red lines means don't even think of stopping at all! That is how I understand it.

 

[Caboose Class]

Double yellow means don't park there but you can stop briefly to drop off or pick up someone.

Double red lines means don't even think of stopping at all! That is how I understand it.

Only place I've ever seen double red lines is on the approach to Liverpool airport.

 

[AlterEgo]

Only place I've ever seen double red lines is on the approach to Liverpool airport.

They are everywhere in London.

 

[32475]

At house roof top level: rows and rows of old style television aerials, smoke from chimneys and multi telephone cables.