Our once-thriving village is now barren wasteland…shops have closed, everyone’s on benefits & we’re terrorised by yobs
"HEARTBROKEN" residents have told how their once thriving mining village is now a "barren wasteland" where everyone is on benefits.
The closure of the pit has seen seen shops close down and the town left without hope, locals say.
Maerdy, in the Rhondda Valley, South Wales, used to be a bustling area, home to generations of miners.
Many joined the local collieries as teenagers, hoping to continue their work until retirement.
But when both Maerdy Colliery and Tower Colliery closed some 17 years ago, the area experienced a devastating downturn.
Retired printer Tony Evans told how life is now unrecognisable from the one he knew growing up.
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He said: "When I was growing up we’d walk the mountain and we’d be happy.
"Now it’s a harsher world for kids. It doesn’t seem as safe.
"There are a lot of people struggling around here - a lot of people with depression too. Unemployed people and people struggling health-wise."
Villagers used to be feel so safe they would leave their doors unlocked - but those days are gone, locals say.
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And the boarded up high street means people are now forced to leave town if they want to go to pubs, clubs and shops.
The borough of Rhondda Cynon Taf has seen former coalfield communities disproportionately affected by the cost of living crisis.
The unemployment rate was last noted as being over 30 per cent, according to data from the Office for National Statistics.
Over three per cent in the area were claiming unemployment-related benefits at the time of the census.
Dion Thompson, 25, who grew up in Maerdy where his grandfathers also worked down the pit, says all his friends have left the village.
He said: “Maerdy actually hasn’t changed from when I was a kid. There’s nothing around here except for an Avon (Engineered Rubber) factory up the road. There’s no work.
"Everyone around here that I know moved away when they were old enough. It was a really tight-knit community.
"When I was a kid it was like that. Now it’s barren. Nothing ever gets done around here to change things. There’s no investment.”
Dion works in demolition and as soon as he reached working age was told by his parents he had to look outside Maerdy for work.
“It’s the same for my boy,” says 53-year-old Beverley Viscount, who works in the Spar.
“My son went off to university at Aberystwyth and he’s come back and he couldn’t find a job around here. He worked hard at uni, but he ended up having to work for Amazon.”
Beverley, who has lived in the village all her life, says she wouldn’t leave even if she won the lottery, but adds there is nothing keeping young people here.
She remembers a childhood where she had “lots of aunties and uncles” and could turn to anyone for help: “You get children hanging around here now in gangs and terrorising people.”
More than 19 per cent of the county falls within 10 per cent of Wales’ most deprived areas and Maerdy comes out right at the top in the deprivation figures.
The ward which covers the south of Maerdy ranks in the bottom two per cent for employment in the whole of Wales.
It’s also in the bottom 2.5 per cent in Wales for income and health and is in the top three per cent most deprived places in the country.
It ranks as third lowest in the borough out of 154 areas for employment, fifth lowest for income and sixth lowest for health.
It is a picture mirrored across the region, while in Wales as a whole 31 per cent of children are now living in poverty as well as 16 per cent of pensioners, according to the Bevan Foundation.
Amy Adamiec is making the 22-mile trip south to Cardiff which she routinely makes at the weekends.
“When it comes to things to do, there’s nothing,” she explains.
“That’s why I’m heading to Cardiff now. If you want to do something, especially at the weekend, you have to leave.”
Amy, 24, who works in investments in Pontypridd a short drive away, adds: “It’s still a proud community. There are lots of very kind people here. But it’s been let down.”
Landlady of 22 years Adele Wilk insists the pub does get busier on an evening.
“We used to be really busy with the miners,” Adele, 54, explains.
“A lot of them have passed away now though of course - 22 years ago you’d have had the Maerdy Hall and the social clubs were running a lot more hours.
“That’s not the case anymore. I’m the only pub this side of the Rhondda open seven days a week in the day now.”
It wasn’t just the miners who lost work when the colliery closed at Maerdy.
So did Adele’s father, who was an electrician who worked at the colliery.
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“He lost a lot of work when the pits went, definitely,” she says.
“But the community pulled together and it still pulls together. It is a very good community here. People do care for each other an awful lot.”
Inside the ghost ‘town centre’ with ‘road to nowhere’ leading to shops that were never built
By Jacob Jaffa
THIS is the ghost "town centre" with a "road to nowhere" leading to shops that were never built.
Residents of Talbot Green, , say that what was meant to be a bustling new urban hub remains a wasteland after years of delays.
The road was meant to lead to a supermarket, cinema and hotel complex to accommodate the rapidly growing population in the town, but it is still unfinished more than a decade later.
The development was proposed in 2011, plans were approved by the local council and the road, complete with a roundabout, was built to service the town.
But, after that, nothing happened until diggers were seen on the site in the last few weeks.
Shopper Val Lewis, 58, fumed: "What a waste of money to build a road that goes nowhere - there's even a bus stop on it.
"It just adds insult to injury every time you drive past."
Locals are hoping that work is beginning for the promised 50,000sq ft Sainsbury's store, which is expected to create at least 150 jobs and act as an "anchor tenant" for the development.
Patrick Dunne, property director for the supermarket giant, said that the company is "pleased to be taking the final steps in our longstanding plans to deliver a new supermarket for Talbot Green".
A spokesperson Scarborough Group, which is overseeing the site in a joint venture with Talbot Green Developments Ltd said that they were "reviewing our options" and could not commit to the existing plans.
They explained: "We are currently reviewing our options for the wider Talbot Green town centre site to ensure that the proposed master plan comprises the right mix of uses that respond to the needs and wants of the local community."
Meanwhile, a spokesperson for Rhondda Cynon Taf Council said: "The council’s planning committee initially granted permission for a new supermarket on land at Talbot Green.
"Works to implement this latest permission must start by August 2023 to comply with the planning consent.
"The council has recently been advised by Sainsbury’s that it intends to start works in compliance with that requirement."