by Peter Cook

It's great news that Eastgate House is to be developed and restored with the help of a Lottery grant. Well done Medway Council.

But it’s sad that across the river a much older building, the Frindsbury Barn, languishes derelict, despite grandiose castles in the air schemes for it to be restored for the benefit of the community.

It’s four-and-a-half years since the barn was off-loaded by the Church Commissioners, unburdening themselves of a huge white elephant. Since then nothing has happened to bring the 800 year old structure – described as the Queen of Kentish Barns – back into good repair.

If this majestic mediaeval marvel falls down it will be our fault – for failing to kick up enough fuss over its neglect.

Only the still small voice of the Frindsbury and Wainscott Community Association has been raised in protest, when what’s needed is the roar of public anger.

The problem, of course, is money. Restoration projects like these cost millions, and I’m guessing that the grandly named Heritage Design and Development Team, which owns the Barn, are not sitting on that kind of boodle.

The company has plans to build houses on a nearby quarry as a means of generating finance. But this is a pie in the sky scheme. First the quarry would have to be filled in, which would take, probably, 10 years or so.

It would also involve building roads across prime farmland to get the lorries through. And local people are set against more housing in the quiet cul-de-sac of Parsonage Lane, where the quarry and the barn exist.

Meanwhile, the barn remains unprotected and open to the elements, despite the fact that the owners told me six months ago work would soon take place to sheet it over.

The council has powers to carry out work to make it weather-tight and bill the owners for the work.

But it says it cannot do this as the timbers are sound and it is not in imminent danger of collapse.

Or put another way, you have to wait until it’s falling down before anyone takes action.

They say because the barn is open to the air, the timbers are kept healthy and free of rot. Well there’s some truth in that. Holding in the damp is a recipe for fungal growth. But restoration experts know about that and have techniques for keeping ancient structures both aired and protected.

Its present state of dereliction makes it look like an abandoned ruin, attractive only to rats and vandals.

What is needed is a properly structured project backed by the kind of people who know about restoration and pulling together the right kind of funding. Schemes of this kind can’t be managed by small private concerns, unless these are run by people with exceptionally deep pockets.

It’s time for everyone concerned with the barn, the council, English Heritage, the owners, us, to think carefully about bringing in heavyweight assistance to get the job done.

by Alan Watkins

What is stopping Medway  becoming a city? It’s the 20th biggest conurbation in the country and outside of the capital the biggest in the South East.

It is striving to improve – and hasn’t done badly with four universities, a fine campus and a new bus station. It has support in the community.

At 6/1, it was also second favourite (behind Reading) so someone fancied us. So why were we overlooked?

It could be the cavalier way that Rochester lost its city status, not once but twice (Whitehall has a long memory).

Maybe it had something to do with all the other events in 2012 and we’ve got enough to be getting on with.

There’s 200 years of the Sappers, 200 years of Charlie D, two annual festivals in honour of him and the Diamond Jubilee.

Charlie is that hirsute Victorian author and ex-news hack who wasn’t born here, spent much of his life in Pompey and Broadstairs (when he wasn’t hopping into his mistress’s bed) and died in Gravesham. Medway adopted him, but the government robbed him of his last wish, and buried him in a congested corner of Westminster instead of Rochester Cathedral where he really wanted to lie in eternal rest.

Someone worked out most of his famous scenes were set in Rochester (must have been a council researcher). We’ve bid for the City of Medway three times.

The point now is to start asking why a town like St Asaph (population 3,400) should get the title while 250,000 of us have no idea where it is.

And before any clever Welsh geographer mutters Denbighshire, that’s a county with the same size population as the district of Gillingham, Medway (93,000).

I hope the councillors are now re-examining their laid-back approach to the city bid, and comparing their lack of effort with the energy of the other contestants. Maybe Chelmsford will throw the bouquet our way next time.

It won’t make much difference: the next English city will probably be in the west, and most likely in the north-west.

I suspect the Rochester supporters will have had a collective smirk.

Right, back to the drawing board ...

The Critics Choice winner at this year’s BRIT Awards, Emeli Sande, will be performing at Lounge on the Farm in Canterbury this summer.

Emeli has stormed into the charts with her debut single, Heaven and now Next To Me. Her real name is Adele but of course there can only be one Adele in the music business.

Also announced on the bill so far are The Wombats, Chic, Mystery Jets, former headliner Roots Manuva, David Rodigan and Goldie.

News of the other summer concerts are starting to filter out. Rochester Castle Concerts are back this year with Steps headlining on Thursday, July 19. Jools Holland is playing the evening before. It will be great to see Steps back on the main stage blasting out their big classics that we remember back in the 1990s.

As the weather has been mild recently and the nights are lighter, now feels right to write about what is coming for Summer 2012. Cheryl Cole will be back with a new album and it is said she will mark her return by performing on new TV talent show, The Voice. Her American manager, will.i.am from the Black Eyed Peas is a judge, so it makes sense.

You may have been to see Kylie Minogue in concert last year. Well, expect another concert and another album from her, celebrating 25 years in the music business. I can confirm she puts on a brilliant show.

Mariah Carey and Beyoncé may have recently had babies, but that has not stopped them making music. Beyoncé has already spoken about releasing new material. She has been writing with Ryan Tedder who is the lead singer from band One Republic. He also co-wrote with Adele on her record-breaking second record 21. Mariah already has new songs ready to go – one of which she is about to debut in America, so expect to hear it here soon.

The last few weeks I have been teasing you by saying that coming soon you could be seeing Coldplay live. So, get ready to win one of the biggest ever prizes on kmfm. Win your way in to see Coldplay... live... in... Boston! We could be flying you and your other half or friend to America to see one of the world’s biggest rock bands

Make sure you are listening to kmfm in March!

Speak to you on your way home

by Peter Cook

This is my latest big idea. Let’s bring back Dickens.

Forget those old campaigns to fetch HMS Victory back to Chatham, where she was built. That plan is dead in the water. Or rather dead in the concrete.

We would need dozens of road drills to dig her out before we could even get a tow line aboard. That might wake up the neighbours.

Dickens is a different matter. And we would be doing the old boy a favour. We’d also be doing Rochester a favour and people could come and pay homage at his tomb for free, instead of having to pay through the nose like you do in Westminster Abbey.

He never wanted to be buried in Westminster Abbey with all those other puffed-up writers.

The original plan was to pop him into Shorne Churchyard. But that might be a bit close to the motorway these days, albeit quite near Cobham Woods, where he loved to walk.

The Dean and Chapter at Rochester Cathedral offered to have him interred there. A grave was even dug for him. Perhaps it’s still there under the flagstones, waiting to collapse under some preaching prelate.

Imagine the astonished looks on the faces of the choir as the Dean or even the Bishop was inexplicably swallowed up, with just a puff of masonry dust to show where he had been.

Being realistic, they have probably put someone else in there now. After all, if you’ve dug a good hole, you don’t want to waste it.

So let’s start a campaign now to have the coffin exhumed and repatriated to the city that he knew and loved – well, it soon will be a city.

Devotees would flock to Rochester from every country where Dickens is read and loved – and that’s just about every country.

At a stroke it would make Rochester High Street a commercial gold mine, offering everything from Dickens soap on a rope, take-aways from the Chuzzlewit Chip Shop, treatments at the Our Mutual Massage Parlour and so on.  Actually, it’s a bit like that now.

So I’m looking for full support for this campaign. The next Dickens Festival should be a protest march with placard-carrying characters from his books chanting Bring Back Boz.

A press release from the developer promises a park and ride facility funded for five years by Sainsbury's.

It will run to Strood, Rochester and Chatham. Another would serve areas of Strood, Frindsbury and Wainscott.

Sainsbury's press release says: "The new Park & Ride is essential to Medway’s wider public transport strategy and would be a key asset in helping to alleviate local congestion and ensuring the future vitality of town centres in Medway."

This is the same area that is to get all the improvements to bus priorities.

Where are the park and ride facilities for the old borough of Gillingham, where a park and ride off the M2?

I know politicians will immediately say Sainsbury's will fund the Rochester/Chatham/Strood P&R (providing they get planning permission for their new super store on the Medway City Estate).

The point is the council has known about these problems for many years.

If we are to relieve our busiest roads of some of the traffic which needs it more - a dual carriageway'd road network, or an over-busy, increasingly stop-start, A2?

***

Children might be getting fat and someone has spent more than £1 million of council taxpayers' money without authority, but there was still an opportunity for a smile at Medway's cabinet meeting.

This week's meeting was delayed for a few minutes for teas and coffees.

One disappointed member was the education portfolio holder, Cllr Les Wicks.

Last to the table and last to his seat, he arrived at the meeting empty-handed.

"There's not enough hot water," he protested.

The acting chairman, Cllr Alan Jarrett, who was about to reveal with Cllr Wicks the story so far known about the unauthorised spending on the school extension at Woodlands Primary School in Gillingham, was none too sympathetic.

"I would have thought you were in enough hot water," he said.

***

One of the few occasions members of the public can argue with councillors is at a site visit.

They are ordered from time to time when planning applications cannot be settled in a council room.

So they go out to the site to look and to make up their minds.

That's where the public gets a look-in.

Councillors will listen to arguments for and against the plans.

Next Monday they are going to two sites. One of those site visits is at 7pm.

Have a look outside at 7pm tonight - then consider how much the councillors will be able to see.