Re: Panopticons
 

Where have you been? Every time I say it I don't see a flood of support in the Ob. when PB says I am [personally] running the town down. Accy is now Britains Poundland capital and the whole town centre is a disgrace. A ghost town. The lunatics have won.

And what has the Town Centre Regeneration Board achieved. Nowt. Tory talking shop.

Accy needs a major overhaul. Millions investing, but not in new or more or excentric. However any ambition is simply gathering dust as Accy's residents once again go the ballot box and vote for this shower of perverbial. We only have ourselves to blame.

Re: Panopticons
 

It's her job and I'm sure that some of the £50,000 will go in bonuses if it gets built so I'm sure they will try anything.

Re: Panopticons
 

So, another whitewash then, Uncle Mick? In answer to cjay and Purplelass; it would seem to stand to reason that the people involved in bringing this project forward would want to convince the people of Accrington of the potential positive benefits accruing to the borough if it were to be implemented. They do this for exactly the same reason that they would not explain the potential pitfalls; which is, namely, that they stand to benefit from the project.

The Architect, Chris Beard, has, to my knowledge, never yet completed a project. You may imagine that his fee from NWRDA will substantially improve his salary as a lecturer. The project will also allow him to enter other competitions, something he seems to do a lot of, and stand a better chance of winning.

Gayle Knight would look a very sorry Marketing Person if she could not market this!

HBC, well, they know nothing about anything and even less about aesthetics. They are strapped for cash with an election in the offing, they will grasp at any straw that is offered to ensure that they are seen as backing the popular decision, whatever that turns out to be.

So at the two meetings you were given the hard sell, wrapped in the charm offensive, and you swallowed it, as you were meant to do. But because you allowed them to blind you with tales of hundreds of thousands of pounds of extra funding and a place on the tourist map, you missed what they did not tell you.

First and foremost is that Accrington is already on the map and has been for quite some time. It's name is known all over the world. How much more famous do you want us to be? The prospect of additional funding is by no means certain, because it is conditional. I strongly suspect that we fall far short of the criteria that would open the coffers for Accrington. The one new aspect of funding is that English Heritage may be prepared to finance the repair of the Peel Memorial. If they were going to do that they would do it irrespective of whether there was a panopticon nearby.

It strikes me that HBC do not know the first thing about raising external funding, which is why so many schemes come to nothing. There is no reason on earth why English Heritage could not have been approached for the money to repair a great many things in the borough - years ago! Likewise the Heritage Memorial Fund, which was set up precisely to finance such repairs.

It cannot be escaped that whatever the final designs for this Panopticon turn out to be, art, it is not. It is landscaping, nothing more, and while the landscape designs of Capability Brown may bring tourists to this country from all over the world, I am reasonably certain that the landscape designs of Chris Beard will attract very few and will be almost instantly forgotten. The landscaping will fall victim to lack of funding and will fall into neglect amd will become an adventure playground for off road bikers. the paths will be churned to mud because horseriders will make a beeline for the area and within five years the place will look much the same as it does now and we will be arguing about another hare-brained scheme to regenerate previous failed regeneration efforts.

Re: Panopticons
 

You can't let the lunatics win. Accy does need a major overhaul. I've said that myself many times today. I just think that we'd be a bit daft when we're all saying that Accy needs something to turn our noses up at the money the Panopticons can bring in. It's not everything but it's a start.

Re: Panopticons
 

Re: Panopticons
 

[QUOTE=Acrylic-bob]

The Architect, Chris Beard,

First and foremost is that Accrington is already on the map
QUOTE]

Think he's called Peter Beard.

Yes, Accrington is on the map but we're trading on 80 year old history. The three things that people talk about when they mention Accrington is Accrington Pals (1915), Tiffany Glass (early 20s I think, no doubt you'll correct me if I'm wrong) and Accrington Stanley (granted they're doing ok at the moment but their glory days were a long time ago). All good things I agree but I'd like to at least attempt to have something a bit more modern to attract people.

Re: Panopticons
 

Try looking beyond the pound signs. A few hundred thousands to repair a few paths, is not going to kick start anyone's economy, least of all that of a borough that is so deeply in debt as Hyndburn. As Graham say's, the borough needs funding of an entirely different magnitude. And before we get that we need to elect councillors who realise this fact and can go out and fight for it.

Re: Panopticons
 

Its crap. Clog dancing, line dancing, town centre binge drinking and crap pubs with boring DJs that repeat manufactured pop pap endlessly. It makes Accy look like hicksville mississippi. The evening economy mirrors the day time economy. Limited intelligence, limited ambition, small minds and ambitous egos.

I have banged on and banged on and banged on about Accys limited appeal with officers up at Scaitcliffe for 18 months. Rix kept going on about regneration like it was just bricks and mortar. I asked time & again what about cultural regeneration and I dont mean east meets west. I got all the contacts to book rock bands up at the civic theater only to be told its booked full with ******** clog dancing and 3rd rate prog rock covers bands!!

In the Labour budget we put monies aside to change things.. but Tories like clog dancing, line dancing, its non threatening and appeals to their own goldfish mind instinct. After all rock fans leave beer cans lying around!!

We will never make Accy great till we break out of our own parochial prison...

Re: Panopticons
 

The concrete cows are an amusement as the train grinds through Milton Keynes, but they are not what brought prosperity there.
We have whats left of some great heritage, restoring and maintaining that should be a top priority.
If we were going to have any landscape Art of any reknown, we should get Christos to put a curtain from Hambledon to Pendle so we can't see Burnley.
Bound to get a good spread in the colour supplements. :)

Re: Panopticons
 

Right, so you're saying we turn down this injection of cash. What happens when another injection of cash comes along, should we turn that down too if it's not big enough. These things add up and they lead to one another. I agree we need the Councillors who can fight for it but I don't think we should turn our noses up just 'cos we don't think it's enough at first.

Re: Panopticons
 

I have no argument with new! New is often just as good as old. But new for new's sake is a very bad idea, just as new because you cannot think of anything else is a bad idea. The borough needs innovation and quality, both of which the panopticon does not provide. Would you allow someone who has never painted a house before to paint your house? Would you be happy to allow a doctor who has never operated on a real person before to take out your appendix? But you are asking the people of Accrington to entrust the most prominent feature of the town to a person who has NO TRACK RECORD! How can this be a sensible thing to do? how does this bring innovation and Quality to the Borough?

Re: Panopticons
 

To echo what garinda has just said, the borough needs bold and courageous decisions, not banality, we have enough of that already.

Re: Panopticons
 

What the town needs is investment in industry, in jobs, in revitalisation of the town center which will bring in better shops, better shopping enviroment you need a whole new road structure because some some ill imformed planners decided to route traffic away from town,to bring people to Accrington you have to start with the people who live there make it a place people want to live in, not a chav center of excellence where they know the system will support them.
Graham I think you and Stanaccrington are the same person he wrote the above on page 3 and when I came and visted last year I was embarassed to show my American wife Accrington, I have never seen so many pound shops and a broken down system that will take years to get right. I spent over 10 years in the middle east and some third world countries would put Accy to shame and then what do they want to spend money on, regeneration,investment in the future,a complete overhaul of the system? no lumps on the coppice, that is so imaginative wow I hope that someone writes to the Sun or the Daily Star and lets them know because they could do a number on this one.

Re: Panopticons
 

Bob, I have those HBC debt figures. Our last debt is paid off in 2055. For the mathematicians amongst us there are 33,000 Council Tax Households paying an average £135 per year DISTRICT Council tax.

HBC DEBT EXCLUDING COUNCIL HOUSES
2005 £23,896,000 [+£2m just borrowed for 05/06 =£26m]
2004 £22,261 ,000
2003 £19,294 ,000
2002 £16,590 ,000
2001 £14,853 ,000
2000 £13,010 ,000
1999 £11,785 ,000 [Peter Britcliffe/Conservatives take over the Council]
1998 £11,576 ,000
1997 £11,156 ,000

Re: Panopticons
 

I could not agree more. But how do we convince the NWRDA that they are decorating a cake that is rotten? Graham is a supporter of the regional park idea, another quango generated scheme which is full of grandiose ideas and fine phrases, but as we have seen with the fast dissapearing Rapid Transit System, it is meaningless! It swallows millions and millions to conduct feasibility studies which conclude that it's grandiose ideas are just that, grandiose and impractical and too expensive!