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In January
2003 the owner of Dreamland, Jimmy Godden, announced the closure of Dreamland.
The park is to be redeveloped as "leisure boxes, some retail and a supermarket".
Joyland Books will provide updates on the campaign to save Dreamland and its
internationally-important Scenic Railway ride.
Click here for the latest news
Sunday, 31 August 2008
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A blast from
the Campaign past! Amusement park nostalgia website
themagiceye has
dug deep in its archives this month to present an interview
with campaign leader Nick Laister dating back to 2002,
before he set up the Save Dreamland Campaign, and with Sarah
Vickery, dating from March 2003. Together these two short
interviews provide a snapshot of the early days of the
campaign to save Margate's famous amusement park and its
Grade II listed Scenic Railway roller coaster. How
things have changed! Read on... |
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Saturday, 30 August 2008
Thanet District Council has now
completed the erection of a steel security fence around the Scenic
Railway. The £40,000 cost of the fence will now be recovered from
the owners of Dreamland, Margate Town Centre Regeneration Company
Ltd (MTCRC). This news is carried on the
BBC
News website.
The Thanet Extra of 29 August
featured news of the fence works.
The Thanet Times included
similar news on 26 August.
Saturday,
23
August 2008
| Contractors
working for Thanet District Council have entered the
Dreamland site and started constructing a
a second security
fence around the Scenic Railway, claiming that the one currently under construction by MTCRC is not adequate
to protect the ride.
The Council served a notice
last month requiring the owners of Dreamland to put up a
continuous 2.4 metre high steel fence around the entirety of
the listed structure. A further notice was served last week
saying they would enter the site and erect a suitable fence
themselves as the fence currently under construction was not
good enough. The Council claimed the current fence did not
leave sufficient area for maintenance to be carried out on
the ride and the fence was not designed to prevent potential
arsonists from climbing over. Click on the image to the
right to see the original fence and the Council's
replacement fence.
This news was covered in
the Thanet Times on 19 August. |
The new Council-erected fence at Dreamland,
with MTCRC's fence behind. Click on the image above for a
larger version. (Photo: Nick Dermott) |
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The Thanet Adscene
on 21 August also covered the fence story.
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Sunday, 10 August 2008
| An article
published in Coin Slot a few weeks after the Scenic
Railway fire (which we did not feature on this website at
the time) has just been brought to our attention. Click the
image on the right to download the article in PDF format.
Whilst on the subject of
missing news updates, the Save Dreamland Forum is a good
place to go to catch up on all the latest Dreamland-related
news, much of which does not appear on these pages. Over the
past couple of weeks, we have had updates on the
Repairs Notice served on the owners of Dreamland,
letters to the Times about Margate, news about the
demise of
potential Dreamland owner Paigle properties, and
much interest in the
lack of donkeys on Margate beach this year.
Everything you could ever want to know about all things
Margate and Dreamland! There are new posts every day, so
click here for the latest updates.
Finally, Friday's Isle
of Thanet Gazette featured an article about
the Repairs Notice, pointing out that the owners had been
asked to take an identical fence down a couple of years ago
(although the article does not mention that the original
fence was erected whilst the Scenic Railway was still
believed to be an operational ride, as opposed to an
abandoned structure needing protection from arson attacks). |
Click on the image above for the full article
from Coin Slot, the amusement arcade trade magazine. |
Friday, 8 August 2008
Today's Thanet
Extra features two Dreamland-related stories.
Sunday, 3 August 2008
| News round-up for the last
few days. Wednesday's Your Thanet featured news of
the Scenic Railway Urgent Works Notice on its front page.
Click the image to the right to download the page as a PDF.
Thursday's Thanet Adscene
featured a similar article, under the headline "Protect fun
park coaster: Dreamland owners ordered to fence off ride":
"Thanet council has issued a
notice demanding the owners of Margate’s Dreamland take
action to protect the former funpark’s Grade II listed
Scenic Railway. The ride was damaged in a blaze deliberately
started by arsonists in April, but the Margate Town Centre
Regeneration Company (MTCRC) has yet to put up a fence to
prevent further damage. A notice has been served by Thanet
council to ensure that a fence is put in place to protect
the Scenic Railway, the country’s oldest rollercoaster,
until it is repaired. The Urgent Works Notice has been
served on the owners of Dreamland. It requires them to put
up a continuous 2.4 metre high steel fence around the
entirety of the listed structure. |
Click on the image above to view a larger
version of the page in PDF format. |
"The notice was served on Monday and if it is not complied
with within two weeks from the date it was served, the
council will use its planning powers to send contractors on
to the site to put up the fence and recover the cost of the
work from MTCRC."
Friday's Isle of Thanet
Gazette also featured the news.
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Click
here for the latest news
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