Primrose
USA
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106 of 264
Tue 9th Sep 2014 1:53pm
Autopia it may have been, and may very well still be, but the baby was thrown out with the bathwater. The ring road is aesthetically unpleasing or just plain ugly. It limits the organic integration of the city center into surrounding neighbourhoods and forces development around it either to be utilitarian or futuristic sealed highrises (who wants to see, hear or breathe it?), or to incorporate schemes to accommodate or mitigate its impact. There is no question that Coventry's road system had to be modernized but I question whether such a stranglehold needed to be applied to the city centre. Current thinking, of course, encourages walking, cycling and public transportation as means of reducing the number of vehicles on the road. |
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Mike H
London Ontario, Canada
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107 of 264
Tue 9th Sep 2014 3:11pm
What makes me laugh is that most in this forum would have been kids in the years before the war, with no thoughts about how difficult anything was, no experience of the slum dwellings within the centre, no idea that industry was all over the city centre. "It limits the organic integration of the city center into surrounding neighbourhoods and forces development around it either to be utilitarian." The immediate surrounding neighbourhoods were like the centre, part industrial plus low grade housing. You only have to look at the suburbs built in the 30's to see where the greater majority were living. Only down-and-outs would have to put up with life in the centre of Coventry. The planners faced a huge task, as do all city planners, and they had to envisage a very different way of life that was starting to show itself in the 30's. The Ring Road has NEVER been a barrier to public transport. If anything, it made it far easier for buses to get in and out, the RR taking all traffic which wasn't all headed for the middle but still trying to get to other areas. When I put it to members of this forum who want to see a vibrant city centre that they should lead the charge, Philip was the ONLY one who came forward and said that he would rather stay put in his suburban house if that was ok. There was stony silence from all others, but they were all thinking the same as Philip and who can blame them. So much for wanting a vibrant centre, eh. The only idea which came forwards was to get out of town business people to buy apartments in the centre. How nice!! We don't want to live there ourselves, but others should be made to do it.  |
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Mike H
London Ontario, Canada
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108 of 264
Tue 9th Sep 2014 3:13pm
On 9th Sep 2014 9:14am, pixrobin said:
Yes, there were ways of avoiding the town centre in the 1950s but the roads used couldn't cope with the traffic levels of today.
Absolutely there were, and if you didn't mind weaving through tens of suburban streets, you might even get to where you wanted to be. |
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Primrose
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109 of 264
Tue 9th Sep 2014 4:13pm
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Dreamtime
Perth Western Australia
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110 of 264
Tue 9th Sep 2014 4:18pm
Too true Primrose !  |
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Mike H
London Ontario, Canada
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111 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 1:17am
Why are you taking it personally? I doubt that there is anybody here of an age that they would remember how Coventry grew in the 20's and 30's, and almost nothing about business at first hand. How many were drivers in that period? Again, probably none. So, realistically, how old were we when we started to develop a sense of our surroundings, not just the streets where we lived, played and went to school? Ten y.o maybe? These factors apply to ALL of us, the main difference being that for me, my own first hand memories and thoughts were based in the mid 60's, 70's and 80's. Pix has ten years on me, so his would start in the 50's, and for somebody my mothers age, it would be early 40's mainly due to the horrendous impact of the Blitz and what it did to society. So we are left with photos of times gone by and the memories of the older people in our lives who ACTUALLY experienced what is shown in the photos, and to these we add our own. Do you ever wonder what the people in the old pictures are thinking? Do they look like everything is grand and just the way that God intended? We don't know, so we apply our own memories and thoughts to times where nothing seemed to change and everything was safe and assume that is what the people in the photos had in mind. The Coventry planners changed everything that we thought would last for a 'thousand' years and gave us a pedestrian area free from cars and buses, and put in a rather strange inner Ring Road to service it and provide access for the growing numbers of cars and buses. It has worked remarkably well this past 40 years, and 40 years on when all of the centre has been properly developed and Coventry has found itself again, visitors to Coventry will marvel at the way the planners put such a useful road in between all of the high rises.  |
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Primrose
USA
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112 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 2:21am
I do not agree with you on this topic. Sorreeee!
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dutchman
Spon End
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113 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 3:11am
On 10th Sep 2014 1:17am, Mike H said: The Coventry planners changed everything that we thought would last for a 'thousand' years and gave us a pedestrian area free from cars and buses.
...and people! 
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Mike H
London Ontario, Canada
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114 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 4:19am
Unfortunately, the planners didn't see that one coming, nobody did at the time. |
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pixrobin
Canley
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115 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 8:26am
The lack of people is not entirely due to the RR. People's lives changed. The large out of town supermarkets gave them a different 'offer'. Free parking. Closer to home. So people didn't bother to do their bulk shopping in town any longer. My 'going shopping' has changed again. The retailer's way to my wallet is now through the internet. The bulk of my groceries are ordered online and delivered to the door. Some weeks my carer only needs to pick up one item from the town centre. All the entertainment I ever need is in my lounge.
On the other hand I'm not sure that Mike understands the trepidation that pedestrians feel when faced with crossing the RR either by bridge or tunneling underneath. The planners of the 1940s and 1950s could never have imagined the different world of today. And I don't mean just the physical world: people's mental image of the world has changed too.
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morgana
the secret garden
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116 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 9:29am
I have to agree with Pixrobin then you buy what you need not what you want saving money  saving money and knowing you're safe, no bus fare no parking fees and most of all you have variety and choose affordable quality clothes and goods which you don't see the same in every town/city. As the saying goes variety is the spice of life. |
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Mike H
London Ontario, Canada
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117 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 12:33pm
Pix, town/city centres have no place in sprawling conurbations anymore. Narrow streets, difficult access, bad and expensive parking are not acceptable, and the malls and plazas take full advantage of downtown constraints. I don't go anywhere where I have to pay for parking unless there is absolutely no option, and don't do downtown London for these reasons plus I can't walk too far no matter how 'quaint' some of it might be. Like many here, I too rue the passing of what was an important part of life, and I agree with much of what is said (more than any impression I may give) but I also have to accept that progress goes nowhere without change. There is no mileage in crying over spilt milk If a city needs a four lane highway, then so be it. If a city requires high rise offices with the infrastructure to support 100 computers on each floor, then so be it. One can't have services that are reliable and on hand 24/7 without the infrastructure to get the goods in and out fast. Suck it up, boys and girls, because there is no turning back. Within 20 years, many of us will not even be around, so does it really matter? if you want to find out, ask your kids what they think, and don't get too upset that they do not have or want your values.  |
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AD
Allesley Park
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118 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 2:43pm
Actually this is where I can use family info to negate your point Mike.
My grandma's family used to own a business just up from Swanswell Pool. It did a decent trade from the 1930's onwards, mainly from passing people on the way in and out of the centre.
It stayed that way until the RR was built, at which point trade dropped off massively and within five years of the section around them being completed they had closed. The number of people passing the shop had dropped dramatically because people no longer wanted to walk into town underneath the flyover.
And you've never answered the question of how often you used the pedestrian parts over/under the RR? Having spent a number of years using them and a number of years since using it as a motorist I can appreciate it from both sides. Even after learning to drive and living in Allesley I walked into town because it was quicker than sitting in the queues on Allesley Old Road and Holyhead Road. This at a time the city was much less economically active and more decentralised than it had ever been.
For me it's like having a football team that scores 8 a game. Sounds great until you realise the opposition score 9. Take off the solely motorist-tinted glasses and look at it holisically. Then you'll see the massive damage it has done overall. |
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PhiliPamInCoventry
Holbrooks
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119 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 6:17pm
Hi all 
Moderator Intervention.
Whilst passions on a subject may run high, the forum is not a two way email connection, neither is it a television soap court room, in order to outwit another member. Please restrain from such. Members have indicated to us that distasteful arguments just drive them away.
This post is not for open discussion.
The moderating team do not operate in isolation & do take notice of feelings of the membership in general. Intervening is a penultimate act, which we try our best to avoid & only do so when necessary.
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Mike H
London Ontario, Canada
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120 of 264
Wed 10th Sep 2014 10:29pm
On 10th Sep 2014 2:43pm, AD said:
Actually this is where I can use family info to negate your point Mike.
My grandma's family used to own a business just up from Swanswell Pool. It did a decent trade from the 1930's onwards, mainly from passing people on the way in and out of the centre.
It stayed that way until the RR was built, at which point trade dropped off massively and within five years of the section around them being completed they had closed. The number of people passing the shop had dropped dramatically because people no longer wanted to walk into town underneath the flyover.
And you've never answered the question of how often you used the pedestrian parts over/under the RR? Having spent a number of years using them and a number of years since using it as a motorist I can appreciate it from both sides. Even after learning to drive and living in Allesley I walked into town because it was quicker than sitting in the queues on Allesley Old Road and Holyhead Road. This at a time the city was much less economically active and more decentralised than it had ever been.
For me it's like having a football team that scores 8 a game. Sounds great until you realise the opposition score 9. Take off the solely motorist-tinted glasses and look at it holisically. Then you'll see the massive damage it has done overall.
There is never a decision which is going to suit all people. All I do know is that there is not much else that could have been done, so I sucked it up and made the best of it. What other option did I or anybody else have open? CCC painted a bus lane on Tile Hill Lane from the A45 up to the Newlands, and double yellows almost everywhere else. It cut our passing trade down to almost zero. We approached the WMPTE dept in the council and the guy there didn't even know that there was a bus stop in front of the shops. They stood by the Godiva cinema, worked out that there was enough width to put in a bus lane and went ahead with it. Re your questions, no, I didn't, but I didn't live in Coventry from 1965 onwards.. |
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