Anke: Royal Tunbridge Wells

Town Centre Meadows

The town centre is about to get just a little bit greener. Those large grass patches that run alongside London Road are being left to nature to become seasonal wildflower meadows.

It’s looking rather short now, but let’s see this spot again at the end of summer.

This was in the news last week but getting this blog redesign up and online meant I had neglected to post it, but thanks to some lovely weather I had no excuse but to go out with camera in hand and take some photos.

These stretches of grass are usually cut short over the spring and summer months, but this year they are to be left to their own devices to develop into wonderful colourful wildflower habitats. It is being called “An Experiment in Biodiversity.”

The beauty will be in the surprise, just what wildflowers will pop up? What insects, butterflies and moths will make their homes here? If anything it should at least attract some interesting bugs for Ian Beavis to kidnap and identify.

As someone who lives very near to these patches I am very much looking forward to seeing their progress, although I think my hayfever might have something else to say about it.

The grass will be still be cut in places such as edges, pathways, and so called “badger lines”, these are the lines that people naturally take when making their way across the areas. There is talk of cutting other specific spaces for picnicking and pursuits too.

Another great piece of flora and fauna news is that to coincide with the upcoming Royal visit there will be another in our long line of Royal tree plantings, this time on the patch between Church Road and York Road. Check back later in the week ahead for some photographs of that.

One thing the Commons Conservators want your help with is feedback. What do you think of the idea? Why not leave me a comment.

The Polished War Memorial

I stopped by the War Memorial in passing today and had a quick chat with Ally, the stonemason tasked with its restoration.

Ally cleans and fills in the cracks.

As the monument has recently been given Grade II listed status following recommendations by English Heritage, the Council has decided to give the memorial a well-deserved sprucing up.

A stonemason, namely Ally, has been given the task of repairing the cracks, refurbishing the lettering and cleaning the stonework. Another craftsman will be giving all the brasswork and the statue itself a good polish next week so it's really going to look stunning.

The Memorial is a tribute to the fallen heroes of the First World War and was designed by Stanley Nicholson Babb (1874-1957) in 1922. It was unveiled in February 1923 by Colonel Viscount Hardinge. The plaques were added later to remember the fallen of the Second World War.

Ally cleans and fills in the cracks.

Oxfam Bookfest Walk

Sixteen of us gathered outside the museum on a gorgeously sunny Sunday morning. We were here to take a tour of town, a tour organised for the Oxfam Bookfest by a local blue badge tour guide, Catherine.

The tour group walks along York Road.

You may think that taking a tour of a town you live in would be pointless, after all you live here and know everything right? Boy you couldn’t be further wrong. This tour was specifically aimed at locals who wanted to know the deepest darkest secrets of the Wells.

Being a “New Town” tour, we were told that there would be no visiting the obvious hotspots and we’d be concentrating on our more recent history.

I’ll give you a brief rundown of the tour and some of the highlights as I really want you to go buy yourself a ticket and enjoy it for yourself.

Starting at the museum we had a brief talk about the civic buildings and what they had replaced. When shown some of the old images of Calverley Terrace the group collectively let out a lot of ooohs and there was some furious head shaking going on. Leaving Civic Way the tour walked towards the Opera House, it was supposed to take in the Adult Education Centre but as it is currently undergoing some restoration that was skipped and it was straight into the Opera House for a brief behind the scenes tour.

We all assembled in the fabulously named Crush Room Bar for another history talk. Everyone was then invited to take a walk out onto the balcony to take a look out over the new town. Living up to its name there literally was a crush to get out.

The group take it in turns being careful not to disturb the ghosts of the haunted box.

We then climbed to the dress circle to hear some more history about the performances that once were and the history of the building’s construction. There were a few gasps of disbelief to the fact that the butchers underneath used to be a Sainsburys (see comments before for more), amongst other fascinating tidbits.

If you book the tour you’ll be able to find out who once raided the opera house, who Bambi the Cat was, and what is missing from the ceiling. You’ll also be able to find out which of the boxes is haunted. Legend has it that three builders fell from the scaffolding when working on the ceiling and two of them died. As these two used to sit and have their lunch in same box every day they are said to now haunt it. Everyone naturally made a beeline for the box to see if they could feel anything. Can you smell their ham sarnies and tea in there?

Jolies Laides Part Three: Five Ways Toilets

Old plans from the town archives of the toilet block. Click for larger.

Jolies Laides (French) [ʒɔli lɛd] - Pretty-Ugly.

The third installment of my popular Jolies Laide series is probably quite a controversial one for there is probably not a more disliked section of our town than Five Ways.

Bear with me for this jolies laide has some hidden talents. Firstly, and let's get this out of the way straight away, I quite like the clock, I know most people don't but I think the more street art we have the better, and it's better than nothing. A giant statue to Decimus Burton would be more fitting but until I can get my Decimus Statue Campaign off the ground we'll have to make do.

Secondly, how many people knew, or have lived in town long enough to know that, as you stand underneath the clock wondering what the time is, there is ornate accommodation underneath your feet?

The “accommodation” provided was classified under ladies and gents, the ladies with 12 WCs, 6 basins and flowers, and the gents with 14 urinals, 8 WCs and just 4 basins, there was even an attendant down there to wash and brush you up. Yes, it was a toilet.

Back before the plans were drawn up for a new Five Ways in 1989, and before Calverley Road was pedestrainised, all the five roads that meet at the millennium clock each met at a set of traffic lights and cars passed through freely. You can imagine that this wasn't very conducive to a nice shopping area so plans we drawn up for the creation of a “Town Square”.

Some detailed old plans of the toilet blocks.

It was proposed to create beautiful raised flower beds and an impressive pantheonic clock tower (below). Along with the provision for a central taxi rank for Starline Taxis, this blocking off of the roads and creation of better pedestrianisation meant the unfortunate end of the Five Ways toilets.

Plans showing the raised flower beds with clock tower above.

The removal of local amenities such as toilets are always going to cause concern, and several complaints were raised. The Civic Society were against the erection of the clock tower, “There is no entablature and no bases to the columns, in fact it looks as if the “designers” have simply used the standard details of the office block, which in itself is total unsympathetic to the 19th Century terraces of Lime Hill Road.” Oddly, an internal Council department fought against another department to keep the toilets as they were so heavily used by the public. It does beg the question why they did, as the stairs weren’t even in the roadway (below). TW British Pensioners Association also filed their concerns to keep the toilets open, or at least move them. To no avail.

Plans went back and forth to the Council on many occasions each time being whittled down to the bare bones to get the job done, this meant the loss of the proposed clock tower and flower bedding to create just a plot of bare land. The Starline Depot was demolished to also make way for the road alignment, this was a large building for the hire of lorries, coaches, buses and taxis meaning that anyone wanting a taxi had to walk down Mount Pleasant.

Plans showing where the toilets related to the new roadway.

There was a planning application I discovered buried deep within the town hall which suggests that there was a plan to backfill the toilet block with concrete, although as this was an extra cost of £50k it makes me wonder if it actually happened? Perhaps they are still down there in perfect condition. Perhaps we should start a campaign to get them reopened? Anyone got Time Team’s phone number?

Is there an attendant faithfully still waiting down there with a fresh towel waiting to shine your shoes? See, you can find beauty in the strangest of places, even if you can't quite get to them.

'ello 'ello 'ello, What's All This Then?

Lady Justice watches over the Station in this detail from the frieze above the entrance.

It came as a great surprise last week to be followed by the local Police. No, I don’t mean literally, I mean virtually. To welcome the local bobbies to the new online world of social media I dropped them a line and said hello with a cheeky request for a tour of the Police Station, not expecting to get one of course. So you can imagine my great surprise and joy as half an hour later I get a message saying “sure, come along for a guided tour”.

So, armed with a couple of friends and their kiddies we joined up with the Chief Inspector and District Commander, Martin Wilson for a look around.

It’s an intriguing building on the inside as it is trimmed with much of the same architectural details as the familiar Assembly Hall. It’s also an interesting building in its context as it is Grade II Listed for its configuration rather than its construction - one of the few civic buildings in the country to be built together in one structure with a Town Hall, a Theatre, a Library, an Art Gallery and a Museum. There were plans for a Fire Station too but that remained on Grove Hill Road where the old Police Station used to be too. One of the main reasons for moving the Police Station up from Grove Hill Road was a prisoner escaping by smashing through one of the thin brick walls.

We had a chat with Martin about local policing whilst the kids got to play at dressing up games and handcuffing each other, they had great fun trying on the stab-proof vests and oversized helmets, a far cry from the stiff uniforms of the old Force.

Back when the picture above was taken, bobbies wore a navy blue uniform with a swallow-tailed coat with a raised leather collar to protect against garrotting. The ensemble was topped off with a high stovepipe hat until 1865 after which the standard Custodian helmet was introduced. There were mixed feelings about the loss of the stovepipe hat since they were so sturdy they could be used as a seat to have a rest and they formed a useful step to look over high fences or into windows.

Tunbridge Wells Police, late 1880s.

As much as the old uniforms weighed the men down with their heavy materials I bet they didn’t weigh as much as the equipment today’s coppers have to carry, the poor kids couldn’t move under the weight of it all.

Although our town has been around since 1606, we didn’t actually have a Police Force until nearly 250 years later. This is because as we weren’t a Borough until 1889 we weren’t actually obliged to have one. Like today, this being such a safe part of the country, there wasn’t actually a lot of crime to police back in those early days, however, there was concern that other misdemeanours were commonplace; the wanton mischief included smashing windows, defacing and destroying of fences, continual noise and disturbance by drunkards leaving public houses. So, to combat this, the Tunbridge Wells Improvement Act was passed in 1835 and the Tunbridge Wells Police Force was formed, consisting of a Superintendent and five constables.

Stairs leading from the cells below to the dock.

All these petty criminals would’ve been tucked away for the night in one of the many cells on the ground floor that today have been converted into equipment locker rooms and have had all their heavy steel doors removed for safety reasons. You can still feel it is a place you really wouldn’t to spend very long though, what with the small window and high ceiling accentuating the tiny dimensions of the room. The barred doors in the corridor still remain though, we had great fun pretending to be locked in behind these on the tour.

The next stop on our tour was the courtroom, right above the cells, where the prisoners would be brought up to for sentencing. Alas, not used today but all the details remain, even the judges gavel. We each took it in turns to stand in the dock and bang the gavel, the kids especially enjoying the banging part.

Guilty! The regret is plain to see on the face of this miscreant.

Back in the 1840s, when the force was in its infancy, to fully train the new policemen in their duties, a sergeant was sent down from London to give his valuable advice. One of Sergeant Sillwood’s recommendations was to stop calling the hour during the night. This was the practice of an officer walking around town and shouting the time at the top of his voice. Sergeant Sillwood correctly surmising that criminals would hear the Policeman shouting and commit crime somewhere else. Based on his advice the local force issued a Police Instruction Book, which you can see at our local museum today.

In fact, why not pop along to the local museum and have a look at the Police exhibits, there are some great examples of truncheons and badges.

Our vehicle fleet of 1942. Today there are too many cars to store in this old yard.

We all thoroughly enjoyed the tour and it showed us all just how friendly and approachable the local Police really are and how safe Tunbridge Well is because of them.

Remember, don't have nightmares, do sleep well.