A mum was left devastated when she found out the windows of her home had been smashed, before she had even moved in.
Hoole Road, Birkenhead, was the scene of what the ECHO called a 'week of horror' last month. Three people were injured, with one left in critical condition, in three separate incidents that included a man being shot multiple times in front of a young girl. People who live on and around the road have since called it the 'worst part' of the area to live.
In a Facebook post, one Wirral mum described how her house on Hoole Road, which she hadn't even moved into with her children yet, was attacked in the night and had its windows smashed and the kitchen flooded when the taps were left on. She also described how after she paid to have the damage fixed, her windows were again smashed.
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Replying to the woman, one person said she had picked the 'worst sport to move to'. They said: "I'm the other side of the shops and have been trying to move now for months.
"There are cameras all over Hoole Road but yet nothing ever gets done."
Another said similarly: "Love the estate but Hoole Road, especially by the shops, is the worst part to live, and it gets worse during the summer months."
One said: "Breaking windows seems to be the new ‘fun’ thing to do. I have seen and heard of loads of windows being broken on the estate"
People living on Hoole Road who spoke to the ECHO said that anti-social behaviour has long been a problem, but that crime, such as that in the 'week of horror' is not as common an occurrence. Some even said that the reputation Hoole Road has gained, as the 'worst part' of the area, is exaggerated.
Gary, 52, who has lived alongside Hoole Road for 48 years and raised his kids there, said: "There were a lot more people here when I was young and it was very cramped back then. But it's a lot quieter now, there's less people, but it's still the same old stuff going on that has been for years.
"The anti-social behaviour is not as bad as they make it out to be on this estate. Apart from around the shops, really, there isn't much that goes on on the estate.
"A lot of [the complaints about the area] is just people on Facebook. We've had a lot of people move in on this estate because we've had a lot of new houses go up.
"It's not the worst. A lot of the estate is very quiet.
"A lot of it is the younger lads, they've got nowhere to go on the estate. If they go down the bottom they get hassled by police, if they go to the park they get hassled, so it's like they're forced into the middle of the estate round the shops.
"You get a lot of people hanging around in gangs, but it's only round the shops. Most of the other people around here, most of the kids, are pretty well behaved.
"But you can get certain groups who will be a menace, but I think you get that everywhere. Hoole Road gets a worse reputation than it should, because a lot of things happen around the shops so people assume the whole place is like that.
"I've never really had any problems on this estate and I've lived here 48 years."
Robert Sparks, 57, another father from the area, said: "We've been here 30 years and we've never had any problems.
"Personally I've always found it alright myself. When we moved in, because we are so close to the shops, we worried that there'd be trouble because you used to get a lot of gangs hanging around there."
Lesley Ferguson, 56, who has lived there for 30 years, told the ECHO: "It's when you see the gangs on the bikes you get a little sick feeling and feel worried about going outside.
"There seems to be more and more gangs on their bikes at the moment, they can be really intimidating.
"There's been quite a few houses around this area that've had their windows put in. It seems to be young kids, who think it's fun to throw stones through windows.
"They get away with too much. I think people and parents say that their hands are tied and there's nothing they can do because they're so young. They torment the police.
"When the anti-social behaviour starts it doesn't stop until the early hours of the morning."
Lesley said that the disruption gets worse over the school holidays. She said: "Everyone says 'they've got nothing to do, if they opened somewhere up for them it'd die down', but there was a community centre and they just abused it.
"You can't use that excuse all the time."
