Guest 700- Registered: 11 Jun 2010
- Posts: 2,868
I think they should go ahead with the Cable Car, too.
(I am still wondering how they would fit silencers to seagulls......... )
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Lincolnshire Born and Bred
Guest 725- Registered: 7 Oct 2011
- Posts: 1,418
Perhaps I've been a little hasty in my condemnation of the screen. I think we should embrace modernity. It's vital to move forward and not look backwards. Indeed Burlington house is a prime example. It's a masterpiece of modern design, although there are those who pine for the quaint and the old in architecture, and fits in fantastically with the future shape of the town. The detractors who consider it a blight should see it, alongside the screen, as iconic. I'm sure, indeed hope, that Burlington house attains listed building status and others who are shortsighted (yes I was one of them) should positively see the screen as something of a symbol of aspiration.
I'd like to see perhaps two or three more screens sited in the area. Perhaps Pencester gardens or the Western heights which would serve as a great tourist attraction and could screen programmes pertaining to seafaring.
A blight? Why no of course not. It's just what this town needs. There is little money to pay for any real regeneration and it's not going to happen in any of our lifetimes which is why the town needs more screens.
Move forward and not backwards was Churchills favourite sayings and I happen to agree with that.
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
you are on the money as ever philip, took this earlier and as you can see does dover no credit whatsoever.
if a big screen was to be installed at st martins battery we would not be subjected to this eyesore.
Guest 725- Registered: 7 Oct 2011
- Posts: 1,418
OMG Howard I didn't mean a word of what I posted earlier. The giant telly stinks. Get rid of it. Blight, eyesore, demeaning, anti-progress, embarrassing, a symbol of national decline, cheap and tatty, bad example for the younger generation, pathetic, depressing, worse than a wind turbine, did I mention demeaning?, symbol of a clueless local council bereft of ideas and vision.
Apart from that it fits into the local surroundings reasonable well.
Jan Higgins
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 5 Jul 2010
- Posts: 13,894
I am not against the idea of the Big Screen if it was in the right setting, for example set against somewhere like Burlington House it would not look so out of place.
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I try to be neutral and polite but it is hard and getting even more difficult at times.
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Guest 651- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 5,673
We can have it on Walmer Green, I am sure it can get some good use there and be more appreciated !!
Been nice knowing you :)
Guest 725- Registered: 7 Oct 2011
- Posts: 1,418
.......and what good use would that be?
Brian Dixon
- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
Guest 730- Registered: 5 Nov 2011
- Posts: 221
How much power does it consume, does anyone know? A screen that size visible in bright daylight must consume quite a bit of electricity. Aren't we supposed to be saving energy?
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
i think you are being over optimistic brian.
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
Sarcasm like yours, Philip, is part of the reason Britain became rubbish, and fits poorly with the can-do post-Olympic spirit.
Burlington House serves no purpose whatsoever whereas the Screen does.
Guest 725- Registered: 7 Oct 2011
- Posts: 1,418
I didn't realise I held such sway when it comes to Britain's decline. I'm sure the wife won't believe it no matter how many times I tell her.
Actually I don't really think that my opinion amounts to sarcasm. Surely it's based more on empirical observation than wit.
I think you will find the reason for Britain's decline is slightly more complicated than one Man's sarcasm.
Where to start?
Decades of abysmal policies by successive governments, environmentalism, the European union, health and safety and human rights laws, red tape, the welfare state, awful education policies, etc. etc.
As for Burlington house I agree it serves little purpose at the moment but spend some money transforming it into luxury appartments and you may well find it transformed into something quite useful.
Guest 710- Registered: 28 Feb 2011
- Posts: 6,950
" Burlington house"?
Part demolition, down to two or three floors, with a roof garden. The whole to be used for housing.
Ignorance is bliss, bliss is happiness, I am happy...to draw your attention to the possible connectivity in the foregoing.
Brian Dixon- Location: Dover
- Registered: 23 Sep 2008
- Posts: 23,940
may be so howard,what ever the case it might disturb the wildlife up there,and we dont want to do that do we.
Guest 664- Registered: 23 Mar 2008
- Posts: 1,039
I assume you wilfully misunderstand my point Philip. I'm talking about a widespread attitude of mind that amounts to a national trait.
In a country in decline, sarcasm and cynicism become a kind of disguised competitiveness - survival of the glummest, with anyone daring to be too forward-looking portrayed as somehow naive or risible in order to put them down.
It's a pretty sick game and something I find very alien and frustrating. I hoped the Olympics' positive spirit had changed something.
One or two pseudo-intellectual forumites into niggly one-upmanship will be chortling at this, in which case, QED.
Guest 725- Registered: 7 Oct 2011
- Posts: 1,418
Wilfully eh?
sarcasm and cynicism?
I think there is not enough cynicism in the world. If there were then politicians and those in power in other ways might have more to fear from lesser mortals. The only sick game is when you hear politicians being interviewed and managing to get away Scott free with their policies with nodding donkeys pretending to force the truth from them.
You are suggesting, therefore, that we appeal to authority and let them ride roughshod over us all. That really is sick.
As far as describing other forumites as pseudo-intellectual smacks of reverse snobbery. How do you suggest they frame their opinions? Would it be better if they were to subtract any flowery and interesting words which help to put across their point and stick to mere facts? (or what they and others consider to be the facts?)
I suggest you start reading more about current events and what has led up to those events taking place in order to reach a conclusion regarding why you consider the country is in decline. It has little to do with sarcasm I think your'll find.
PS. Some might consider using the latin QED rather than the English "which was to be demonstrated" equally as pseudo-intellectual.
SWWood- Location: Dover
- Registered: 30 May 2012
- Posts: 261
It's one thing pulling down eyesores because they serve no purpose (Burlington House for example), but if we got rid of every eyesore in Dover the town would be left looking like it did in 1945. And PaulB would be homeless.
Guest 670- Registered: 23 Apr 2008
- Posts: 573
Very true SW Wood. Here is my top four for demolition:-
1/ Burlington House and associated complex.
2/ The Discovery Centre (ghastly piece of architecture) a prime example of how not to do it.
3/ The Charlton Centre, the worst of the 60's and another prime example of the Council knowing best when in fact they were clueless.
4/ The Gateway Flats, a remnant of communist architecture.
Anybody else have any ideas?
howard mcsweeney1- Location: Dover
- Registered: 12 Mar 2008
- Posts: 62,352
all getting a bit "doverish" now where we routinely slag off buildings that we know will always be there,burlington house excepted.
the screen gets the most flak and i still stand by my original support for it.
at the planning commitee meeting at the town hall i sat next to cllr nigel collor(remember him?) and we both agreed that dover had earned a reputation for saying no to anything new.
until this year the screen was invaluable in promoting the town. district and events therein, once the para olympics are over hopefully this will happen again.
Guest 670- Registered: 23 Apr 2008
- Posts: 573
Nigel Collor, Howard, now there's a blast from the past, was he the one that shut the lavatories and put parking charges up.
When everybody was talking tourism he single handedly must have turned hundreds away.
