Royal Tunbridge Wells and nostalgia

As the regeneration saga in Royal Tunbridge Wells bumbles along one key group in the discussion has been the Aspic Brigade, hell bent on preserving the town in a time-warp.  The focus of attention has been the civic complex, which, as I have noted before, did not receive acclaim from Pevsener

An article in today's Daily Telegraph is critical of the decision to list a number of London Underground stations.

One paragraph from the article:

Nostalgia, of the kind to which the English are so prone, can be a debilitating condition. Is there any nation which spends so much time looking over its shoulder and so little time looking forward? The Underground may be a part of our cultural heritage, but it is also, and far more urgently, a problem crying out for a solution.

I enjoyed the following comment I received:

It's fine to be nostalgic. Take out some of the red tiles and build a partial copy somewhere as part of a museum of the Underground. Take a bunch of nice photographs of each of these architectural works, preserve some tiles, make some nice ...displays. Perhaps the displays can even go on tour. And then build modern, efficient Underground stations, because the purpose of the Underground is the utilitarian purpose of TRANSPORTATION.

 

The civic complex in Royal Tunbridge Wells includes a museum/art gallery which is too small, a library on need of modernisation and an inadequate theatre.

 

As my correspondent notes, a building should fulfill its utilitarian purpose.  Canterbury City Council has bitten the bullet and has demolished and rebuilt the Marlow Theatre. Kent County Council is providing funding for a new museum and library in the city.  In Ashford a new library has been built.

 

Time to stop looking over our shoulder in Tunbridge Wells  and look forward.