The Battle Of Canterbury 2012 — The Opening Of The Westgate
A tale of pedestrianisation, history and traffic jams
I have a little bit of a secret to admit. A controversial opinion, something you don’t go shouting about in Canterbury unless you want an argument. No, not Brexit. Not the Council election results. Not even Veganism. Are you ready? I believe that the Westgate Towers and St Dunstans Street should be pedestrianised where possible, and going car free is the best way to boost an area.
Well, maybe not car free — but certainly a lot less, and certainly the priority being electric vehicles and eco friendly public transport options. Think of how quiet the traffic would be near the tables and chairs of the Kent pubs and Canterbury cafes sprawling and bustling like market day in Chaucer’s time — oh the wonders it will do for preservation of our beautiful older buildings too. Visitors to Canterbury from London via train would be able to walk on foot right into a welcoming street with an imposing gateway to walk through — just like the Romans intended! You know what they say, first impressions are everything.
Now imagine stepping off the train from London into CBW and not having to cross a busy road, walk past a multi story carpark, continue along a thin path towards the Towers which when you arrive at you have to walk away from, down to a crossing where you wait, then walk around the outside of the towers — cross over another road — and you have missed everything and end up at the kebab shop on the corner instead. Welcome to Canterbury.
I’m not draconian enough to suggest banning all vehicles, if someone has a good reason to get from A to St. D then that’s fine — the elderly, disabled folk, blind people, parents with kids, deliveries and residents should all have varying levels of access to be able to get where they need to go in the way that’s easiest for them. But everyone else needs to adapt, and everyone else won’t mind the extra effort because it will have so many positive side effects — like better air quality, increased spend from footfall, better framing of our history, just so much potential.
I don’t believe that pedestrianisation will work everywhere, I’m dead against it in Norwich City Centre — but it would work in St Dunstan’s, a road with thousands of years of history, vaulted by a majestic medieval archway, the last stand of our city’s battlements. This is something to behold, not to drive a bus through. Along with the Cathedral and other special city sites, it’s one of the magnificent stones of our very own Stonehenge, our grandkids will thank us for preserving it.
The traders of today that line the street aren’t that dissimilar to those of Tudor times- we have drinking parlours and wine merchants, inns, pubs and haberdasheries, vegetable merchants and foods from the empire. There was no Jaguar showroom, there were no cars. It was a Kentish way that would continue for 400 years — until the car came along, 100 years ago. In that short time, we have dedicated the priority to cars, not people on foot. And we wonder why people are putting weight on — in exactly the same time!
I realise that for some reason holding this view is extremely divisive, and a lot of that reaction is based on the failed traffic trial of 2012, and love of the status quo. The ‘Traffic Trial’ was doomed from the offset, and the giveaway was the name. The focus shouldn’t of been the traffic negatives, but the pedestrian positives. Given time the faults of the experiment would of been rectified — but even with 622 years of history, we couldn’t just give it a few more months. It’s important to always remember that just because an idea has been badly executed in the past, that doesn’t mean the idea was bad, just that the execution was.
I believe we should be proud of the city we live in, we should be bold about changing it for the better, and we should be willing to do what’s best for its future, rather than what’s best for our commute to work. It’s time we once again looked at opening the Westgate — to pedestrians.
Original Version Published in A Fresh Perspective, Kentish Gazette, 2019