Unregistered User
Andy. Thanet has population of 140,000 and Westwood is out of town and killing the town centres. Now if you want Whitfield to have those facilities fine. Developers will queue up. Complete about turn . I think. Folkestone town centre development is both a planning and economic setback.
Watty
Brian Dixon
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
paulw,so going to happen to ditz in the st james area and the buckland paper mill now.
Unregistered User
Sorry folks DTIZ and Buckland Mill are not planning issues they are financial viability & commercial issues. All have planning briefs that allow fullest flexibility. It is not DDC's planners who have thwarted either scheme.It is the requirements of government quango agencies.
Watty
Guest 693- Registered: 12 Nov 2009
- Posts: 1,266
Paul
Thanks. I don't believe I said anything about Whitfield - you know how I feel about that, I think! - but I was referring to the DTIZ..... I know there's more about that than the Encyclopaedia Britannica, but essentially the point I was trying to put across in my addled way was that the DTIZ is foundering in its own history. There seem to be so many entrenched opinions, reports, rumours, counter rumours and plain lies that I believe we not only need to start over, we need to do so with people who seem to have some very valid forward-thinking ideas about them. That's how I see it, and your point that Thanet has four times the poulation of Dover is all well and good, but I see that as precisely the sort of stumbling block that would be presented as a reason to prevent any decent development.
And, you say that Westwood is killing the town centres, presumably as an analogy against a similar development at Whitfield doing the same to Dover town centre; have you seen the town centre recently? The town centre is slowly dying as it is.
What I'd like to see is a development in the DTIZ area that is on a more modest scale than Westwood Cross that would stimulate Dover town centre rather than a massive development at Whitfield that would kill it, and I believe there are people in the town that could bring it about.
Just for clarity's sake, Paul, I take it that you mean the Folkestone town centre development being an economic and planning setback is referring to the devlopment being a setback for Dover on the grounds that we cannot compete with it?
True friends stab you in the front.
Brian Dixon- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
paulw,i agree with andy here in what he said.IT would be nice to see those eyesores disapear for good,with some atractiff buildings put in place.
Paul, Surely what we should look for is what Adam Smith described as the 'invisible hand of capitalism'. (Or the invisible hand of the market).
I would expect it to be restrained by my Council but not totally castrated.
Guest 696- Registered: 31 Mar 2010
- Posts: 8,115
If we were to use the old cinema in Castle Street - after renovating it - as a theatre and opera house for performances (Shakespeare, Greek tragedies, modern theatre, not so modern and so on and for musicical groups including traditional folk music), apart from the usual down-grading any proposal I ever make gets, would it attract an audience?
Unregistered User
It is not your council that is either castrating or restraining. It is a planning system that bequeaths on outside agencies the ability to thwart development.
Andy I was not referring to competition with Dover but the failure to deliver the retail margins at Folkestone and also THE PLANNING CARBUNCLE.
Without financial viability you get neither development or good design Brian.
On every occasion over past years it is financial viability that causes the withdrawal from schemes.
Why are they not queueing to come to Dover?
I'd love to be having a beauty contest for leisure, retail and commercial. Just maybe, just, if the right package is put forward. Currently nothing that meets Forumites aspirations has come forward despite wide ranging planning briefs that invites all those components or combinations of the same.
The recent meeting that considered "the Lanes" concept has been around for years yet no developer has put it forward for realistic competition.
Watty.
Unregistered User
Alex D. who is we?
If the private sector can't support it ,what hope is there for the public sector. Forumites keep telling the public sector and the council they are useless.
Look forward to June 22nd!!
Guest 696- Registered: 31 Mar 2010
- Posts: 8,115
Paul Watkins, what will happen on the 22nd June?
As for the idea of a theatre/opera house in the former cinema in Castle Street, if it were a Council project, and provided it attracted audiences, may-be there would be a handsome profit involved for the Couincil, to invest in Dover, and also some jobs going, as well as the chance for a formation of local Dovorian and Kentish theatre and musical groups. So much could come out of it, you know! Unfortunately, my proposals never seem to come to anything!
Unregistered User
Alex D.
AN AWARE PERSON LIKE YOU NOT KNOWING WHAT IS HAPPENING 22ND JUNE!!
Guest 693- Registered: 12 Nov 2009
- Posts: 1,266
June 22nd is my birthday, that's what's happening!
True friends stab you in the front.
Brian Dixon- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
paulw,why cant the buildings along townwall street demolished or tarted up to make that area look tidy.
Unregistered User
Wish you well Andy. The rest of us might not be so enthused with other events, despite the need for firm,swift action.
Watty
Unregistered User
Difficult to divulge without letting out commercially sensitive info. Brian.
Watty
Guest 693- Registered: 12 Nov 2009
- Posts: 1,266
Yes, I think this budget will be a bitter pill to swallow; despite that, I shall not be denouncing the Government. We all know who is to blame for all this.
True friends stab you in the front.
I am not the man for the Planning job. My first action would be to seek the urgent removal and demolition of Tesco's. They, single handledly are destroying the very fabric of our town centre; there is no competing with them. They have been the same since their very early days and the "stack 'em high and sell 'em cheap" was specifically aimed at destroying the competition. Nothing has changed 35 years on. They are a blight on every town centr they are close too. Nothing will flourish until they are gone. But, should that most unlikley of things happen, we lose the jobs they bring.
Sadly, we are beyond the point of return and I suspect Asda finally realised as much.
However, if we drop regeneration of the town centre as the main aim and look to a liesure complex similar to Ashford there may be hope, not much at the speed we move, but some possibly.
I like the Lanes idea, but how would the traders survive when most of their customers choose the Whitfield TC Killer store first? We are not Brighton and don't have either the local population or influx of tourists to keep such a retail area alive. There is nothing to attract people here in the winter, so traders would hav to compete with Tesco and still be able to afford 6 months of near total shut-down, AND stil pay excessive business rates.
I could go on, but this will do for now.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
think you are being a bit over sensitive there paul, all councils around the country are denounced by the local residents.
it is like listening to people say "we have an excellent member of parliament", very rarely said.
Unregistered User
I'm not a sensitive one, Howard, neither a shrinking violet.
Watty
Unregistered User
Nearly there Sid.
Watty