'In 2002, Barnsley Council and partners launched a major consultation exercise called "Rethinking Barnsley". This led to a regeneration programme centred on Barnsley Town Centre called "Remaking Barnsley". Developments include a new transport interchange, a new cultural centre in the old Civic Hall, a Digital Media Centre (opened August 2007), and new offices and apartments throughout the Town Centre.' Wikipedia
Once the pits closed Barnsley should have been allowed to return to its 200-strong population and most of the rest bulldozed. Its population would have done so much better being re-sited to where there was modern industry and new housing on the model of the Garden Cities.
So many of the old, industrial settlements have been preserved and refused natural death and decay, just to maintain Labour 'strongholds'. The generations since the mining cultures that existed, necessarily, where workforces to dig coal were required, have been trapped with a completely nonsense narrative of their cultural importance and worth. Better was deserved, could have been provided and has been wilfully refused, with an immense waste of resources and destruction of life-chances and hopes.
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4 comments:
Wasn't that another of Prescott's stupid ideas?
Why do governments and councils always build such crap.
Who wants a new arts centre? very few.
A skateboard park would probably get as much use. A multiplex considerably more.
People will migrate themselves eventually. Didn't Bristol used to be the biggest city?
Excellent point.
Shirley Porter was prosecuted for less.
"Once the pits closed Barnsley should have been allowed to return to its 200-strong population and most of the rest bulldozed."
Leaving aside the view that economies should be run for people rather than vice versa, this view just demonstrates a stuuning lack of understanding about Barnsley. The town has a long standing glass blowing industry which exists to this day and it is also a market town for a large catchment area of towns and villages involved in textiles and engineering.
The idea that old industrial areas cannot change and adapt with some government assistance just isn't true - look at the Nissan plant in Sunderland which is now the most efficient car plant in Europe.
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