Things have been pretty tough for towns and cities across the country since the Covid pandemic - and the current uncertainty as the world teeters on the edge of recession isn't helping things.
But having talked to a number of people in Ipswich - and visited a number of similar centres across the south of England over the last few months - I find it really concerning that Suffolk's county town seems to be faring much worse than most.
The blunt fact is that other town centres seem to have rebounded much better than Ipswich - which still has far too many closed businesses and little to attract visitors and even its own residents.
If you walk a few yards from the Cornhill the centre of Ipswich now feels decidedly tatty - and really there doesn't seem much prospect of a major transformation any time soon.
I've always tried to defend what has been my home town for 36 years now, but when discussing the town centre it's becoming more and more difficult.
Too many shops are closed. Too many pavements are cracked and with loose stones. Too much time has to be spent dodging rough sleepers in the doorways of empty buildings.
Times are tough across the country - but Ipswich seems to have a more downbeat feel than Bury St Edmunds or Kings Lynn that I have been to over the last few weeks.
In the summer we visited large towns and cities in the south of England like Winchester, Petersfield, and Alton. All clearly had some closed shops and signs of difficult times.
But the only place that came close to Ipswich in the run-down stakes was Portsmouth City Centre - although if you took a short walk to the Historic Dockyard and Gunwharf Quays there is a very attractive area.
What Ipswich needs is a real push to try to improve itself - and it really needs all the parties to be pulling in the same direction.
As I said money is tight - but other places seem to have stretched their budgets to do some work and I can't help feeling that Ipswich has been a bit slow.
Take Arras Square. It's been tatty for years. The borough has accepted it needs reconstruction. It started looking at this work in 2019. We still haven't seen a plan - shoppers still have to watch their step on broken and loose paving bricks.
We recently saw the completion of a very impressive restoration job on the former merchant's house on College Street. But it's still on the edge of a council-owned "bomb-site" car park with one of the ugliest brick walls in town hiding it from traffic.
Why hasn't the council continued the good work on the house and started turning the wasteland next to its newly-restored building into an attractive open space at the entrance to the Waterfront - and taken a wrecking ball to that ghastly wall?
I suspect it will happen at some point in the future after years of discussions and working parties and applications for funding to various government departments.
By the time the area is improved the College Street building will probably need a refresh because it will have been damaged by the fumes from years of traffic!
The issue I keep hearing from those trying to improve the town is that the bureaucracy they find in Ipswich is stifling. As one business leader said to me: "It's a well-treacled machine."
The main culprit, most say, is the borough council: "They are one of the best councils we work with for service delivery, but it takes a long time to get them to actually progress any projects," the business leader added.
To be fair the borough has overseen some improvements.
It finally found a tenant for the Old Post Office after years of its sitting empty. It is now finally starting the much-delayed rebuilding of the town's museum. And the Cornhill is finally showing its potential as an open space.
It's also fair to point out that Suffolk County Council hasn't exactly been helpful to the town centre by not insisting that contractors who dig up roads and pavements replace paving like for like - or moving very fast on road changes when needed.
Ipswich town centre badly needs more money spent on it - but it also needs the various authorities and organisations representing business to work closely together.
And most of all it needs those in a position to improve the town to spend much more time looking for solutions and less time trying to find problems, even where they don't exist!
Comments: Our rules
We want our comments to be a lively and valuable part of our community - a place where readers can debate and engage with the most important local issues. The ability to comment on our stories is a privilege, not a right, however, and that privilege may be withdrawn if it is abused or misused.
Please report any comments that break our rules.
Read the rules here