News, Local history and Thanet issues from Michael's Bookshop in Ramsgate see www.michaelsbookshop.com I publish over 200 books about the history of this area click here to look at them.
Showing posts with label East Kent Maritime Trust. Show all posts
Showing posts with label East Kent Maritime Trust. Show all posts
With our wonderful open local government of course it will only be a matter moments before the council tell us exactly what happened and why.
Perhaps it will also only be a matter of days before the maritime museum is open and the historic ships returned to The King George IV Maritime Heritage Pontoon.
Of TDCs asset disposal program the two assets that I have found people to be most interested in are Northdown House and Ramsgate Maritime Museum.
TDC know that a lot of people in Ramsgate wish to retain the Maritime Museum and frankly we only seem to have lost it because the trustees forgot to renew the lease.
With Northdown house however probably a similar amount of people wishing to keep it as a public venue and according to the press release below the council actually listend to them..
With Northdown house the council are implying that that they have capitulated due to popular demand so why not the Maritime Museum too, perhaps I am being cynical here, but could it be that they are only extending the consultation period and even considering transferring it to the community itself (whatever that means) because they can’t get round the legal covenants that say it must be used for the benefit of the local community.
In 1985 the steam tug Cervia was leant to the East Kent Maritime Trust, a legal agreement was drawn up to the effect that they would be responsible for fully restoring and subsequently looking after her.
In 1986 they were granted a Manpower Services Commission project to restore her and restoration work started, unfortunately Manpower Services ceased to be.
In 1996 Cervia’s steam engine was restored to full working order, things were looking good at that time and we visited her on numerous occasions, something my children enjoyed a lot.
Then about 10 years ago something went wrong and the trust seem to lose interest in the Cervia, which is now in a bad state due to neglect and the dry dock, which leaks badly during spring tides.
In 2005 the EKMT commissioned a report on the way forward for two major heritage assets in its care - namely Smeaton's Dry Dock and the steam tug "Cervia". The report's conclusions were that an achievable joint restoration project should be put together with a possibility of securing funding from a number of sources including the Heritage Lottery Fund, the European Regional Development Fund, other E.U. grants and private sources. This would be of benefit not only to the ship and the dock but also serve to revitalise the Ramsgate Maritime Museum and increase its visitor numbers.
They seem to be much better at commissioning reports that they don’t act on than doing anything to preserve our maritime heritage.
The owner of the Cervia tried to get the trustees of the trust meet with him on numerous occasions, in order to come up with a plan for dealing with the problem, they however declined.
So now in desperation the owner is taking the trustees to court, the court case is on the 3rd December and will be a very costly matter for all involved.
The owner of the Cervia is prepared to drop the legal action if the trustees will meet with him and sort out a viable plan of action for the Cervia, as the cost of restoring the Cervia would probably be in the order of £2,000,000 and according to the legal advice I have sought the trustees, past and present could be liable to pay this, it would seem to be a sensible course of action.
If only a small proportion of the money that will be wasted on legal fees is spent on getting the Cervia onto the slipway and assessed this would surely be much better.
As an example of how bad things have got click here for some recent pictures the trust have disconnected the electrical supply for the bilge pump, so there it is probable that the Cervia will sink were she is, adding considerably to the costs.
Having written to the trustees myself last week, suggesting that there could be a more sensible way out of this, I was quite surprised not to get any response either and can understand the owner’s frustration.
We have a great many sparrows in our garden and there was quite a kafuffle this morning when a sparrow hawk turned up for its breakfast, I didn’t really see what happened but I think it must have got at least one, as we peered out of the window awaiting events the whole scene changed it started to snow and a robin turned up.
It’s been an odd sort of week in terms of bookshop business, a mixture of panic caused by the recession on the one hand and having bought some particularly good review copies and bankrupt book stock on the other.
With an overall shop stock of about 30,000 books it is fairly difficult to make much of an impact on the stock, right across the shop, but this batch has.
It’s very helpful to have a lot of obviously brand new books at secondhand prices with the recession and Christmas coming up.
Then there is the business of the museum closures, with The Maritime Museum we are fast approaching the deadline for the public consultation on the use of the building, if you would like to see it continue to be used as a museum please send an email to that effect to hannah.thorpe@thanet.gov.uk word is that the trustees forgot to renew the lease and that has caused the problem.
It would seem to me that The East Kent Maritime Trust don’t seem to have been particularly good at looking after the vessels in their care, one historic fishing vessel left to rot, chopped up and disposed of, another historic vessel seemingly abandoned and left high and dry for the elements to finish off and the last ocean going steam tug left to rust away.
I also noticed this little gem about the damage done to Margate Library, a lot of my customers use Margate Library and much of what they have to say about Thanet Gateway is unprintable.
Thanet Gateway Plus is one of five projects shortlisted in the efficiency and modernisation category of the prestigious Local Government Chronicle Awards, which recognises the best in UK local government.
Firstly for those of you who are interested in old Ramsgate businesses click here for the commercial appendix to my publication Ramsgate illustrated, I have just put it on the web.
Now a bit of a Sunday meander, first having given some thoughts to the asset sales, it does seem that the council lacks any sort of proper plan for Ramsgate.
Selling off the maritime museum seems pretty stupid, one would have thought selling off the tourist information office and relocating it to the museum site with a restructured museum, run by volunteers would be a much better option.
Losing control of a large chunk of the harbour also seems like muddled thinking, one gets the impression that instead of a proper plan for the future of the harbour and port, there is an approach of how much money can be bleed from it.
I gather that a lot of the business that could have come to the port when it left Folkestone was lost because of the council’s lack of action.
I still haven’t had any answers to my questions about the Sericol leak, but have had an answer from TDC saying that they are consulting with the environment agency and will soon produce some.
I am assuming that since there has been such a long delay getting answers to the questions, are crops being irrigated and washed with contaminated water, and are the fumes coming out of the ground at Westwood? Something is probably seriously wrong.
Having done more research on the subject I am fairly certain that Cyclohexanone would have spread to a fairly large area around the site, and that the vacuum extraction plant would be unlikely to have removed as much as half of it from the ground.
TSR18 Museums and grant to the East Kent Maritime Trust (Saving £100,000) The Council currently grant aids the East Kent Maritime Trust, who provide museum services and supervise collections at Margate and Ramsgate. Sadly the council grant of around £100,000 a year supports services that are used by only around 10,000 visitors each year – equating to a subsidy of around £10 per visitor. This is not sustainable in the current financial climate and the Cabinet believes thatthis grant must cease in 2008/09. The Council will discuss with the Trust the best way forward to achieving the following objectives:-
A thorough review of the current museum exhibits, with the aim of establishing a series of high-quality themed exhibitions which can be displayed at various venues across the district and, possibly, county. The presentation of a core, static museum display on the ground floor of Albion House, Ramsgate – in rooms not required for civic accommodation The release of accommodation currently occupied at both Ramsgate and Margate for potential alternative commercial or community
As part of this change programme, the Council is willing to fund a post for two years to support the reconfiguration of the Museum collections.
Ed. as for tourist attractions in Thanet one thing can be said there is nothing much else to lose
