From the 'bottoms' to a top place for shopping

LOOKBACK AT HIGHS AND LOWS OF POPULAR SNEINTON MARKET

- By GEORGE PALMER-SOADY

PHOTOS from the Nottingham Evening Post in the 1960s show Sneinton Market when it was a thriving fruit and vegetable wholesalers, supplying greengrocers across Nottinghamshire with fresh produce for their shops.

It can be hard to imagine now that the Avenues were once bustling before dawn, with vans loading up and barrow boys flying up and down, rather than the rows of bohemian cafes, bars and vintage shops we see today.

The units that make up the Avenues were built in the 1930s by the Nottingham Corporation to replace an area of slum housing known as 'the bottoms' at the edge of the larger market place opposite the Baths.

Five streets in total formed the new, thriving wholesale market - Nelson Street, Avenues A, B and C, and Freckingham Street.

But changing shopping habits, coinciding with the arrival of supermarkets and cheaper goods, set about a decline in the market from the 1970s, and the once busy wholesalers, with fewer greengrocers, fishmongers and fruiterers to sell to, moved out, leaving the Avenues to fall into disrepair.

The adjacent public market, with its many stallholders selling everything from shoes to furniture and second-hand clothes, still drew shoppers to the area on market days, retaining a sense of community.