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NO-ONE said it was going to be easy.
Eight years ago when a group of Nantwich people set out to restore a
little bit of Nantwich's history to a neglected area just outside
the town centre, they would have little realised just what they were
letting themselves in for.
Their mission was to save
for posterity, and restore to a semblance of its former use, what
was little more than an overgrown site. But this was a piece of land
with a royal connection. This was the former garden of Townsend
House - long demolished - to which King James the First paid a visit
on August 27, 1617. He was a guest of the Wilbraham family, who
lived in the house for 200 years and who had built the house in 1580
when Queen Elizabeth I was reigning.
 He
had come to see the town's salt workings.
Battling to save the land
are members of Nantwich Walled Garden Society (NWGS) who have taken on a number
of property developers over the years.
But while they found the
townspeople were behind them, Nantwich Town Council,
whose job it is to represent the town and its interests, are
apparently not
behind the project and have not supported the
views of the townsfolk. (Well, some of the members have, but in local democracy
the majority decision prevails).
Indeed, one member of the
council has called the project to turn the former garden into a
tourist attraction "pie in the sky". Cllr Bill McGinnis - who is
also a leading contender in the battle to get the town's First
Responder scheme restored to its former standard of service - said:
"There is no other viable option for this site, which is in a
terrible state, other than this application (to build six homes and
two apartment blocks)."
Quoted in The Nantwich
Chronicle (February 18), he added: "It is like a jungle in there."
Developing his "pie in the sky" theme, he said: "Not only would it
cost £1million to buy the land, there are huge extra costs like
maintenance. It would never happen."
There are two things there.
". . . in a terrible state." "It is like a jungle in there."
(See below). Doesn't
Cllr McGinnis know that untended gardens grow wild and that they can
soon be tamed into a thing of beauty?
Not unnaturally, the NWGS
disagrees with the verdict that "it would never happen." They believe they could get the land for much less
than £1million and can
"restore the Elizabethan garden
in four phases over four or five years
for a basic recreation cost of £140,000
through sponsorship and by seeking a Heritage Lottery grant."
The
current developers, the Dowhill Group, has submitted new
plans to Crewe and Nantwich Borough Council (which will disappear
from the local government scene on March 31 when the new Cheshire East
Council absorbs it into a new local authority). The latest plan
included more car parking - in a one-acre area which would have seen the new
homes all but wipe out the former garden. Despite a call by the Government for more homes, do we really need more houses in
Nantwich? (When I went to get the pictures on this page, I noticed
that more houses were being built. See below.) As far as I am aware, the
houses at Stapeley Water Gardens - which include cheaper, more
affordable houses - haven't been started yet. And I see that
some houses in Imperial Court, Millstone Lane, are being offered for
let (others are for sale) which may indicate that people are not
rushing to buy there.
In the
wall of the garden, which is listed as Grade 2 by English Heritage,
are three recesses described as bee boles, where wicker bee hives would
have been installed. Cllr McGinnis, in his enthusiasm for the
revised plan, says the bee boles would be repaired - "which is a big
improvement on previous plans," he said. But the
bee boles would
be only a small part of the whole plan.
And NWGS Secretary, Dr
Nicola Booth, told The Chronicle: "Extra parking spaces means more
of the garden will be eaten up." She added: "We still hope to open
this is a tourist site and it would be great for school children to
visit."
 Dowhill's agent, Robert
Holmes, is quoted as saying: "This will lead to a slight absorption
of car parking spaces but we do want to keep as much of the precious
garden as possible.
"However, we cannot ignore Cheshire County Council's
requirement for adequate spaces and Nantwich Town Council's desire
to keep cars from spilling on to the Kingsley Village estate."
There will be no parking
space on the walled garden site - according to the NWGS Garden
Plan (see
this external website). But many sites which attract
visitors, not just in Nantwich, do not have on-site parking, relying
instead on the town's, or city's, public car park. Visitors to the
walled garden will park on various town centre car parks.
The Town Council should
be backing this unique area, not more housing.
Back in the late
1970s, when I was Chairman of the amdram society, Nantwich Players, members
voted to support financially the conversion of a derelict building.
If they had been as negative as Nantwich Town Council is currently
being there would be no Nantwich Players' Theatre. I told the
Players' members to have faith, take a leap into the future and back the
conversion. They did, and it paid off. Nantwich Town Council should do the same.
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