Guest 868- Registered: 25 Jan 2013
- Posts: 490
The £27 million project is progressing with the moving of roads, new vistor centre and parking, and shuttle buses moving people 1.5 miles away from the site to "enhance the visitor experience"
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-21499114
What has just left me flabbergasted is standard admission for an adult is going up 78% from £7.80 to £13.90 (and £4.70 to £8.30 for a child) from November 2013 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Does anyone else think English Heritage are losing sight of what they should be doing ?
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
that issue has been featured on here before and seems to be a frivolous spend when people will visit there anyway. as we all know the western heights could do with some money spent on it, doubtless there are other not so glamorous sites that english heritage own in a similar position.
if money has to be spent at stonehenge maybe they could re-arrange the stones so that they look tidier?
Guest 868- Registered: 25 Jan 2013
- Posts: 490
Suppose we could be thankful the original £470m project didn't come to fruition, but I struggle to understand how they can justify the price increase of 78%
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1494480/Sun-sets-on-470m-Stonehenge-tunnel-plan.htmlBrian Dixon
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
now you why i will not visit dover castle.
Guest 767- Registered: 30 Aug 2012
- Posts: 458
Paul,
In reply to your opening comments, after 25 years working with EH I do not think they have lost sight of their brief, this is because they could never see it in the first place! With regard to that price hike, they do it because they can and no-one can anything about it, EH is, has been, and always will be a law unto itself.
Guest 703- Registered: 30 Jul 2010
- Posts: 2,096
Phil, do you know the status of EH as an organisation? Or who it is responsible to, I was never able to work it out but assumed it was some government department.
Guest 868- Registered: 25 Jan 2013
- Posts: 490
Phil Wyborn-Brown wrote:Paul,
In reply to your opening comments, after 25 years working with EH I do not think they have lost sight of their brief, this is because they could never see it in the first place! With regard to that price hike, they do it because they can and no-one can anything about it, EH is, has been, and always will be a law unto itself.
Guest 868- Registered: 25 Jan 2013
- Posts: 490
Ray Newsam wrote:Phil, do you know the status of EH as an organisation? Or who it is responsible to, I was never able to work it out but assumed it was some government department.
English Heritage is an executive non-departmental public body of the British Government sponsored by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport (DCMS)
Guest 703- Registered: 30 Jul 2010
- Posts: 2,096
I can see then how it easily gets left to do it's own thing, not high on anyone's list of priorities to keep a check on!
Guest 649- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 14,118
It would have been better spend up at the highs,you can see stonehenge from the rd and cost you nothing and read about it on your Pc.
Guest 868- Registered: 25 Jan 2013
- Posts: 490
I'd also like them to look after Dover Castle properly, just look at the anything outside of the main ramparts
The Officers' New Barracks (Mess) could have some great uses if only they would allow it (rumour had it that a large hotel chain was interested in spending millions on it but would only offer something stupid like a 10 year lease)
Apparently next on the big projects list is looking at parking at Broadlees, something that tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of ££ of feasibility was spend over 10 years ago. What was wrong with people just parking down there and walking through Fitzwilliams Gate rather than shipping people in on minibuses at hundreds of pounds a day ???
Paul Watkins- Location: Dover
- Registered: 9 Nov 2011
- Posts: 2,226
English Heitage heirachy.
Baroness Andrews Chairman,
Simon Thurley Chief Exec.,
Andy Brown SouthEast/Southern Director,
Ed Vaizey Minister responsible for English Heritage.
Watty
Guest 767- Registered: 30 Aug 2012
- Posts: 458
Paul and Ray,
What you both say is correct, EH is run by small people with very big egos, they spend these huge sums of money because the cash is not theirs, so why worry. While there are a few very good people within EH most managers, local/regonal/national, are riding a gravy train. When staff at Dover took a paycut followed by a freeze some years back our managers recieved payrises, to save money they close the place, to provide a service to the public they made redundant 25+ staff, many with 15/20 + service and now staff the site with zero hour contracts, part sesonal only staff.Costs? must be cut down, Dr Thurley once took a taxi home from Dover.....to Norfolk!
Guest 868- Registered: 25 Jan 2013
- Posts: 490
I also hear murmerings of getting volunteers to help at the Castle !! If they cannot run their second biggest flagship site in a profitable way they don't deserve to be CUSTODIANS of it....
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
i cannot see many people volunteering when they see the admission fees english heritage charge, last week they put an extra pound on the child admission fee to cover costs of pencil and paper for their "spy" event.
Guest 767- Registered: 30 Aug 2012
- Posts: 458
There have been rumours concerning volunteers at the castle ever since I joined the staff there some 27 years ago. There are two simple reasons why it won't work, 1) It's a great place on a warm sunny sunday afternoon, and hell in the winter months when you have to stand at Palace Gate to keep people out of the keepyard when it is closed due to bad weather! Cleaning up after peoples dogs, doing the litter bins, checking the loos etc etc, and all for no money? I think not! 2) Working at the Castle is not now (as it used to be) about history, it's about selling, selling and more selling. It's not the job most people think it is! and lastly try dealing with 700/800+ school children a day! Enough to drive a saint to drink let alone an unpaid volunteer.
Some folk may do a season, but no-one would do it for long, and then there is EH and the way they treat the site staff........
Guest 868- Registered: 25 Jan 2013
- Posts: 490
Certainly not a nice indoor job like the National Trust that the idea is compared with !!!
Definately not about History or knowing about the place - in the autumn I said to one of the new staff that he needs to get over to Fitzwilliams Gate quickly as a couple of people were climbing through the fencing at the top of the tower - he looked like me like I had just landed from Mars
Guest 767- Registered: 30 Aug 2012
- Posts: 458
Sadly the days when 95% of site staff knew the site have gone(along with most of the staff!) It is not enough to know the history of the Castle, but to understand castles, their role in this or that time period, why they were built and how and by who,
To understand the major time periods and the major players within them and on and on it go's. Now, when I was last up there I was 'sold' membership three times and a guide book five times, but little else! Some of the old guard are still there and I am sure that as I and others taught them so they will teach others, but learning about military fortifications is not a task to be completed overnight.
What a shame that the staff member that Paul met did not know about Fitz William's gate, or that Adam Fitz William was one of the original eight knights charged with manning the castle, or that he had a Stone Hall built at the nearby village of La Don.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
a couple of years back there was a special event on and the queues were lengthy, made even more lengthy by the hard sell of membership to each and everyone. after 15 minutes i gave up and came home.