Iron Bridge

[admin]

The total raised at the auction on Friday looks like being a little over £800. There are several pictures left, including some particularly nice ones. If anyone would like to make us an offer for one of these, then let me know.

There is a more detailed report in the Campaign Diary at www.marple-uk.com/ironbridge.htm and you can take a look at what sold and what is still available in the on-line version of the catalogue at www.marple-uk.com/ironbridge/ironbridge16.htm

Thank you to everyone who helped in various way and to those who braved the awful weather on Friday night.

Our perception of the night was that it was a success, despite the low attendance. We would be interested to hear your views if you were there on the night and any suggestions for further fund raising will be welcomed.

Quote (admin @ Aug. 07 2002,18:14)

(Should ramp up the bandwidth a bit Steve:)

In a good mood today, so will let you off ;-)

[admin]

Well done Alastair! It works fine for me, takes about 3 minutes to download and then plays in Realplayer, but I've got Broadband. I'm not sure how it will be for visitors with a conventional modem.

I guess they can but try. If you want to listen to Peter's chat on the radio then click here.

Please let us know how you get on and if you have any technical difficulties.

(Should ramp up the bandwidth a bit Steve:)

[alastair]

Well have got it down to 5Mb is that any better for ya can re put it back up on the server for you to help you out!

ALASTAIR

We provide hosting for All Saints' Church, too... and they produce audio files of sermons that run in at much less than 62MB (and never known a sermon be less than 5 minutes at All Saints... they don't use this do they?!! lol)

It certainly can be done sir...

[admin]

Peter appeared on Mike Craig's Saturday morning show on GMR Radio to plug the auction of paintings this Friday 9th August. He did a great job, chatting with Mike for over 5 minutes and gaining some much needed publicity.

Of course I recorded this with the intention of putting an audio file on-line for visitors to listen to but unfortunately the resulting file was 62Mb large! The CD version will be out by Christmas '>

Seriously though, if anyone out there knows how to compress a wav file down to about 500k for the Internet without loosing too much quality, please let me know.

See the Events topic for full details of the auction on Friday.

[Peter]

Despite a poor turnout at the area committee meeting last night, and no doubt helped by the intervention of H.M. Queen Elizabeth II, the application for funding towards the full investigative survey on the Iron Bridge was granted.
This now means that we can make the proper application to the Lottery Heritage Fund for the remaider of the £15,000 needed for the survey.
This is a big day for the campaign as it means that all the talking stops for a time and some actual headway on restoring the bridge begins.
Thanks to the councillors involved and everyone for their help so far. We will update the campaign diary with any further details in due course.

[admin]

A great crowd in the Ringer's last night and they seemed to enjoy the quiz. We raised £129 on the night which, when added to last month's £75, makes a total of £204 towards the restoration of the bridge.

Thank you everyone - don't forget Wednesday night 24th July 6.00 pm  - Marple Library.

For more details follow the link in the previous posting.

[admin]

The campaign diary has been updated again, click here for more details.

The most pressing item at the moment is when we request "kick off" funding from the Marple Area Committee on Wednesday 24th July (6.00 pm in Marple Library), it would be a great help if lots of people turn up to show their support. Please be there if you can.

There is lots of other news in the diary, so take a look and please show your support if haven't already done so.

Hope to see you at the Ringer's quiz in about half an hour!

[admin]

Whilst searching for information about the Salford Ironworks, the firm who constructed the Iron Bridge in Brabyns Park, I recently came across a web site containing a comprehensive history of the engineering firm Mather and Platt, written by Marcel Boschi and David Drew-Smythe. Mather and Platt took over the Salford Ironworks in 1837, 24 years after our bridge was built. The Mather and Platt site had a brief mention of the Salford Ironworks and Bateman and Sherratt, the men who started the company, buried with its pages.

Hoping that they may have more information about these than they had included on their site, I wrote to Marcel several days ago. Their response has been extremely good and first of all they incorporated my letter into their web site, in the hope that it may be spotted by someone with more information. You can see this page by clicking this link. and then clicking the link on their introduction page below the large picture of the Mather and Platt works, which says "23 Jun 2002 - An interesting project - can you help?"

Since adding this page Marcel and David have gone even further and re-written their history to include a page about the Salford Ironworks with more detailed references to Bateman and Sherratt and their part in the founding of the company that became Mather and Platt. This new page, entitled "The Salford Ironworks" can be found by following the links above or below my letter saying "The Salford Ironworks now on this site."

Obviously we're extremely pleased by this and grateful to Marcel and David for their time and effort. Hopefully it may also lead to us finding out more about Bateman and Sherratt, the latter who may have been the designer of our bridge.

[admin]

The Campaign Diary has been updated again and a catalogue of the paintings and pictures donated by local artists to raise funds for the restoration is now on-line.

Follow this link to view

[admin]

Thanks to everyone who signed the petition during Carnival Day, we've now collected in the region of 1,200 signatures.

On Wednesday night this week, 19th June, the monthly funquiz at the Ring o' Bells on Church Lane will be in aid of the campaign to restore the bridge. We hope lots of people will come along to enjoy themselves and to show their support. Twitchers and Nuclear Physicists should do well as John and Lisa Bintliff are setting the questions! The quiz starts at 9.00 pm.

We're still urging people to write and show their support for the campaign and we've now produced a standard letter to make it easier. Just download the letter, fill it in, cut it into three and post it to the addresses shown. It'll cost you the price of three envelopes, three 2nd class stamps and about three minutes of your time, so please make the effort.

PLEASE CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE LETTER

[admin]

We had a good meeting with SMBC on Friday 17 May. It was well attended and included senior representatives from Parks, Highways and Heritage, and we can confirm that SMBC do not want to demolish the bridge. We were particularly pleased by the contributions from the new Heritage Officer, Paul Hartley, and the general enthusiasm displayed for the project by everyone was encouraging.

We can also confirm, as suspected, that SMBC does not have the money available to fund the restoration. However, they are keen to establish ways of financing it and actions were taken that will help to determine the best strategies to use when applying for suitable grants.

The first stage in the restoration process will be to carry out a full investigative survey and prepare a detailed report of the work needed to repair the bridge. This is necessary to establish an accurate specification and costing to support an application for a grant (or grants). This first phase is going to cost in the region of £13,000, an amount the council does not currently have at its disposal.

Ways of raising this initial amount have to be found in order to make real progress and investigations are to be made into suitable grant schemes for this phase. It is also possible that this could be partially funded by donations or other money raising activities from within the local community.

We agreed to meet again to review progress on 28 June.

The main actions undertaken by ourselves involve helping to build a case for the restoration based on its history and heritage and also to demonstrate that it has the support of the local community.

The letters we have already received and the offers of assistance from local businesses will help to show that the community is behind the campaign. The petition we have started will also help to strengthen this case and we hope everyone will take the time to visit one of the outlets where they are available to add their signature.

If anyone has time to do more than this, then every letter of support that is written strengthens the case for restoration, much more so than a single signature on a petition. We therefore urge everyone who cares about this to write to us expressing your support, with copies to Ged Lucas and Ingrid Shaw to ensure they are aware of your concerns.

Even leaving a message here and voting in this poll will help to show there is support from the local community and I can’t see any reason why we shouldn’t have at least 50 votes or more!

Of course, if there’s anyone out there able to write a cheque that will help get the first phase of the work underway, please get in touch! We’d also like to hear from you if you are aware of any potential sources of funds, or have any money raising schemes that could contribute towards this.

Finally, if you are able to help with any historical information about the bridge, Salford Iron Works or Nathaniel Wright, please get in touch too.

The petition is currently available in the following outlets:

Compstall Post Office, Cote Green Wines, Marple Post Office, Grey’s Tea Rooms – Marple Bridge, The Toyshop – Hollins Lane and the Marple Bookshop.

If you would like to help us collect signatures, let us know.

The addresses for letters are:
Ged Lucas, Director of Community Services Division, Town Hall, Stockport, SK1 3XE
Councillor Ingrid Shaw, 28 Woodfield Road, Cheadle Hulme, Stockport, SK8 7JS
Mark Whittaker (The Marple Website), 72 Woodville Drive, Marple, Stockport, Cheshire, SK6 7QX

[admin]

Your information is not totally correct Harry. The council don't want to demolish the bridge, but probably can't afford the repairs themselves. We have our second meeting with them next Friday to discuss how to progress towards the mutual objective of having it restored.

The petition you have heard about is being organised by Peter and myself and should hit the streets early next week. Its objective is to demonstrate the level of public support for restoration. It's supported by the Local History Society and the Marple Community Council. It has been announced in the Stockport Times and this month's Community News. We'll tell you more about where to go to sign it when we've got it underway.

The people using the recreation centre in Brabyns Park, namely members of Pen Reed's Iyengar Yoga Group, have all put their signatures to a letter addressed to Peter and myself. We hope they have also sent a copy to Ged Lucas and Ingrid Shaw, as we have been requesting in the Stockport Times over the last few weeks. The group were prompted to do this by a gentleman called Steve Riva, who has also written to support the campaign and wrote the letter on their behalf.

With respect to the last paragraph of your post, we agree with the sentiments and intend to comply with your suggestions. We hope to place the petition in several busy local spots, like the Post Office, Library etc. If anyone has contacts at a local outlet like this, we would be delighted to provide a poster and sheets for signing, just let us know the details.

As far as setting up an on-line petition, well it's here! This is it! - You can post your messages here and vote in the poll. All the messages here will be combined with the 'real world' petition - This is why it's slightly frustrating that there are 50+ members registered on the forum but only 9 votes in the poll.

You should also know, if you've seen copies of the articles in the Times and the News, that we have had some great offers of support from the local business community and the public. I have not put the latest updates about these on the campaign diary yet, but hope to do so before the weekend's over.

If you work for, or own a business that you feel may be able to lend practical help, or offer financial support to this campaign, then please get in touch.

[Harry]

I have just been told that the Council are proposing to demolish the Iron Bridge as repairs are estimated to be in the region of £100,000.  I am also told that somebody from Marple History Society is organising a petition in protest. Evidently people using the Recreation Centre in Brabyns Park were asked to sign this petition last week.

I think the councils over the years have destroyed enough of Marple's history.  I hope this petition is made public throughout Marple, not just in Brabyns.  Perhaps the site admin could put up an on-line petition to collect names from remote users also.  What do you think Mark?