Whats it like....
 

Hey Guys!!

Hope you are all set for the Christmas period! :D

I was just wondering from your everyday personal experiences what the crime is like where you are.

I'm not asking you to compare it to the UK or tell me the statistics. I would be very interested to know what its like in your area.

Do you feel safe where you are and are the people friendly?

I could sit and compare statistics til I'm blue in the face but as many have pointed out it is never the accurate picture of living somewhere so I thank you all in advance who reply :)

Oh and I hope you all have a great Christmas!! :thumbsup:

Re: Whats it like....
 

I feel a lot safer in the UK than I did in Canada, but then I lived in a much more urban environment in Canada, whereas here I live in a very rural safe area where we leave doors unlocked, lawn mowers out on the front lawn all night etc. No crime here to speak of, but it will be very different for somebody living in central Liverpool, and the only place I've ever been a victim of crime was in Toronto.

So my guess is that it will once again depend on where the person was in the UK and is in Canada. As you say, statistics don't really give you the true story as they'll tell you that murder per capita is higher in Canada, but petty crime is less than in the UK, but again it will depend on region/city.

Not sure that my ramblings were much use really, but my point was that it will depend so much on everybody's individual circumstances. At least I think that's what it was............:lol:

Re: Whats it like....
 

There are some dodgy areas in the major cities and there is sporadic gang activity across the country but in general, I personally feel just as safe in Canada as I did in the UK.

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That sounds like a lovely area that you are living! :D Where abouts are you if you dont mind me asking?

In Canada are the newspapers all doom and gloom like they are here? Puts me off readint the paper because of what I read in there :)

Re: Whats it like....
 

I feel safe where I live, yet we've had items stolen from our vehicles on our drive and from our garage. We live in a "nice" area & moved from Essex. Go, as they say, figure.

Re: Whats it like....
 

I feel safe here and don't think twice about walking the dog in the park at night or down the high street. Doing so brings clucking, if not expressions of alarm, from cradles. Even a poster on this board described the town square as being, approximately "the dodgiest place I've ever been". The worst that's happened is that a beggar who I'd ignored starting shouting obscenities, most people seem busy with their meth and their crack and don't want to know about passers-by. I feel no more threatened here than I do in London.

Re: Whats it like....
 

No better and no worse than where we were in the UK, outskirts of London, Ontario here as opposed to a village in NW England 12 miles from Manchester in the UK. TBH petty crime here is probably non existent due to potential troublemaking kids being spaced out on pot most of the time who can't be arsed doing anything.

Re: Whats it like....
 

Crime is crime it can happen to anyone anywhere. Doesnt matter if you live in Moss Side or Mayfair, Regina or Peggys Cove crime knows no boundaries.
Statistics can be made to make a certain place look good or bad so I wouldnt use them as a 100% basis of moving to or avoiding places in Canada.
I feel safe where I live but I take note of my surroundings and live accordingly.

Re: Whats it like....
 

I feel a lot safer here than in the UK. I have no qualms with walking around the downtown core of Toronto at 4 in the morning alone, but you wouldn't have caught me in a city centre in the UK after dark, especially after pub kicking out time.

Re: Whats it like....
 

We lived in a "nice" subdivision in Calgary, crime wasn't really an issue at all.

We now live in a "nice" village in England, crime isn't really an issue at all.

In both places I suspect that if you go looking for criminal activity to worry about you will find it easily enough.

Drunk driving is very much more prevalent in Canada than in England.

Re: Whats it like....
 

Interesting that you say DUI is more prevalent here than the UK.
I do know over here that the police implement the RIDE programme at certain parts of the year. I tend to think there are multiple factors as to why Canadians drink and drive more than UK residents.
Greater distances to drive home from the pub to home
Lack of public transit in certain areas especially after midnight
Cost of taxis (greater distances)
Willing to risk it type of attitude
Too cold to walk home, or too far and too pissed to walk

Re: Whats it like....
 

Social acceptability. It wasn't usual in the UK to drink at the wheel and throw the empty bottles out of the window as you went along at any point in my lifetime. It is here. That is, of course, part of the "moving back in time" which people value.

Re: Whats it like....
 

I have seen that too. Many a time I've been out with someone and then had to take a taxi home while they not only drove drunk, but drove with a drink in their hand. Its sick really but that's the prevelant attitude over here.

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I put it down to the awful radio, all that "classic rock" makes it seem acceptable to have a beer on the way home to beat the wife.

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That's the nail on the head..

In the UK drink Driving was a form of social leprosy, if you did it you didn’t publicly acknowledge it..
Here they share the location of the ride program, still drink and take an alternative route rather than public transport

Re: Whats it like....
 

I've personally noticed crime here more than i did in the UK.

I've had 2 ipods stolen, there have been a couple of murders just down the road, every day i see (and smell) drug use, and you should see some of the clothes people wear :ohmy:

I didn't have anything like that when living in the UK.

That said, i feel no different with regards to safety in both places, and perception is all that matters.

Re: Whats it like....
 

Which area is this if you don't mind me asking?

Re: Whats it like....
 

A nice area of Vancouver

Re: Whats it like....
 

Where I live there are some "downtown core" areas I wouldn't walk around at night, other's I would feel totally safe to do so.

http://spotcrime.com/on/hamilton (This is for a 2 month time period)

:)

Re: Whats it like....
 

I suspect that might depend on one's choice of paper, as it does in the UK.

The letters page (and comments page of the website) for the local paper has a few comments by the hang'em flog'em, "this once great country" brigade but the newspaper itself is very much positive.

It's worth seeking out the websites for newspapers in potential target areas and looking at what's reported.

We've had three crime waves since we've been here.

One was washer/dryer machines in the laundry rooms in apartment buildings being broken into for the coins; another involved car drivers filling gas and driving off without paying and the latest one has seen sex toys and underwear disappearing from homes in a small community out of town.:blink:

Re: Whats it like....
 

Oh dear!
So you advise keeping sex toys and kinky underwear under lock and key, then?
Or maybe just handcuffing it to the S&M gear in the dungeon is the safest thing?....:p

Re: Whats it like....
 

And your wife isn't suspicious of your special chest of drawers with "Mrs Smith @ No 62", "Miss Jones @ No 116" etc written on each one?

Re: Whats it like....
 

In the UK it was my experience that living in a "nice area" was the worst thing to do from a risk or burglary point of view because the scumbags from further up the railway line/ road would travel to go on burglary sprees and then trot back home to sell their ill-gotten gains.

They would then return once they were sure the insurance had paid out and do it all over again...

Luckily, the village I lived in in the UK was so small, everyone knew everyone else, lots of old people home all day and the neighbours in general so nosey/caring (depending on your attitude!) it was hard to burgle anyone without being spotted, so we had very little crime at all.

The only other bad place I have experienced to live is in a student area where they have shared houses - burglars can usually count on multiple televisions, computers, i-pods, stereos, laptops, phones and other pinchable stuff all under one roof so they get targeted regularly.

So far :fingerscrossed: I haven't experienced crime in Canada as far a it affecting me goes.
I smell pot very frequently and strongly in the street and at events here (Foo Fighters at Rogers Arena was absolutely drenched in it:blink:) and also when cars pass by, which I find a bit of a worry.

I do notice, however that many restaurants here have a designated driver discount and will give the DD free soft drinks and even in some cases a free meal which I didn't see anywhere near as much in the UK.
Lots of companies at this time of year also offer shared rides and taxi services at discounted rates or even free from their work Christmas parties, which I have never experienced in the UK.

Maybe the acceptance of DUI is changing here as it did in the UK.

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There is none. Its rural. Very little anyway. Just the occasional serial killer base comander, but hes pretty much the exception to the rule. He collected underwear too to start with...

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Cross reference this with the paper house thread. Every now and then there will be an incident where a gun is fired - the bullet might pass through 3 or 4 houses. I'd never heard of that happening in the UK.

Re: Whats it like....
 

I'd like to see a bullet go through one wall of any of the houses I have lived in in the UK, never mid 4 houses worth.

Come to think of it, I have lived in UK houses where the Anaglypta wallpaper and accumulated layers of paint was practically armour plating on its own:eek:

But then they do not really build houses here that sturdily, do they?
Wood frame, SIPs, some flimsy planking on the outside and a lick of paint inside and that is about it.
I see them going up in Langley and Surrey and think they look like doll's houses.

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Ive seen them go up in the UK like that too... just fewer people with guns in the UK is my guess...

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Most new houses everywhere (UK included) are wooden framed.

Still, I told my neighbours that we don't have to replace roofs in the UK, just the odd tile every now and then. They were all impressed and complained about how people in Canada are always being ripped off etc etc

Re: Whats it like....
 

Did you point out too that the weather in the UK is somewhat less extreme too;) Yes, even in BC.

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The weather has nothing to do with it. Tile is more durable than shingle in any weather - and even if it's the same or worse, you don't need to replace the whole roof when one falls off.

Re: Whats it like....
 

Not sure a constant freeze thaw freeze thaw cycle would do tile much good, but I dont really know. The absence of any local material is probably a factor too.


But we digress....crime wasnt it?

Re: Whats it like....
 

Have you got a source for that? The last time I read anything on building types in the UK timber frame construction was still very definately not the norm and it was still mainly double leaf masonry.

I've noticed in Calgary in some of the nicer areas with more expensive houses probably built about 20 years ago or so have proper tiles (concrete or clay I can't tell) and they seem to weather quite well. The wooden type tiles here don't seem to last long and the covering that seems most common would be considered suitable for a garden shed in the UK.

Re: Whats it like....
 

Wow, I've never experienced that here...just goes to show how much it varies.

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As long as she doesn't hear all that humming. :eek:

Re: Whats it like....
 

I disagree with you about statistics. I think they are a lot more reliable than the press, which is how most people get their impression of the risk of crime. But never mind. This is my personal experience.

The second night I was living in Edmonton, there was a knife fight in the street outside our house, that spilled over from a party in the basement suite below us.

Within a few days we became aware that the people in the house next door were in a bad way, with drugs and drink. However, they were harmless. They just sat on the porch all day, stoned.

After a few weeks, early one morning we were woken up by a police raid on the house next door. The police were waving guns and tasers around. The inhabitants of the house were led out in handcuffs and made to sit cross legged in the back yard until the house was cleared and then they were driven away.

We thought it was a drugs raid. But, no, we were told the police were just evicting the tenants for the landlord, because they had stopped paying their rent.

The same evening the tenants moved back in, because the landlord had not secured the property.

Another few weeks went by, and then the police evicted the tenants again. This time the landlord did secure the property. A few days later his new tenant moved in -- the local crack dealer who went by the name of Pitbull.

Move on another few weeks, and I'm patching up one of Pitbull's customers, who has failed to pay for his fix, and got beaten up and left on my doorstep. My husband drives him back to his dad's house, and I ring the police. I haven't done so before, because it is fairly obvious that the police take a cut from local drug dealing activities, but I've had enough.

When I say I want to make a complaint about the drug dealer. the cop on the end of the phone tells me that there's no point. There's nothing they can do about it because local people won't complain. I point out that I'm complaining. I don't get the impression that he is writing anything down.

I ring the landlord of the house next door. I tell him that I've complained to the police. That I will keep complaining, and complaining about the police if necessary, and I will keep telling people that the landlord knows he is renting to a drug dealer. The landlord reacts by disconnecting Pitbull's electricity the next day.

Pitbull connects a lead to our exterior socket and gets his electricity from us for a few ours, until I go and knock on his door and tell him I'm disconnecting him.

Pitbull moves out. A couple of weeks later our purchase goes through and we move to a more salubrious area.

The first couple of years I'm here (06/07) there are a lot of mentally ill people on the streets. Some seem very disturbed. Their numbers have decreased in the last few years, but I'm not sure why. Since this is Edmonton, I think it is too much to expect that they are actually getting help. Probably the police are just dispersing them and spreading them around a bit.

One day, walking through the snow downtown, a drunk gets hold of me and tells me to give him my boots. What he gets is a kick, and proof that I can run quicker in my boots than he can run in his.

I know you don't like statistics, but Edmonton has a murder rate significantly greater than inner London.

Re: Whats it like....
 

Erm. The police cannot evict anyone for non payment of rent. Only a civil enforcement agency can, and only following an Order of the Court permitting them to do so.

Re: Whats it like....
 

If you say so. But the landlord told me that it was an eviction and that he'd paid a fee to the police for it.

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Safe as houses around here. Not so where we lived in London - burgled once, car broken into twice.

Re: Whats it like....
 

What's crime??? Don't experience it here,keys are in our vehicles,haven't seen the house keys for years....
Live in a town of 1800 pop.crime isn't an issue,somebody steps out of line and they're dealt with pdq,usually involving a trip in the bed of a pickup truck down a grid road for some education!!!!
Call it what you want,but it works,and the results are a peaceful community to live in.Not pc,definately redneck,but a damn sight better than life in the U.K.

Re: Whats it like....
 

I feel way safer here (rural Ab no visible neighbours) than in the UK - however being born then brought up in the following council estates in Leicester - Thurnby Lodge, Northfields and Eyres Monsell - I think playing with a match in a dynamite factory would be safer :)