AERIAL VIEW OF THE HARBOUR WHERE PASSIONS HAVE BEEN RUNNING SO HIGH BECAUSE THERE ARE SEVERAL VIEWS AS TO WHAT IS BEST FOR PENZANCE.
Never in my wildest dreams did I ever think I would warm to or indeed appreciate the, to me, previously irritating phenomenon of “tweeting”. However after previously suffering from a “Meldrewesque” sense of outrage that Cornwall Councillors were tweeting in the Council Chamber during meetings, this afternoons real time reporting via a series of tweets relating to the meeting of the Cornwall Council Strategic Planning Committee forced me to revise my opinion of Twitter.
Unable to make the crucial planning meeting, I saw on the excellent “This is Cornwall” website that twitter was being used to disseminate the latest titbits from the fast moving hard hitting debate as the drama unfolded, I took a look and was soon hooked by the constant bite size updates that were flashing up on my screen.
The fractious, convoluted and needlessly costly, long delayed, process to build a ferry terminal to serve the Isles of Scilly has finally been approved by Cornwall Councils Srategic Planning Committee marking a significant victory for commonsense, laying bare, in the process, the flawed arguments of a collection of vociferous granite hugging recidivists who came so close to blighting the future of Penzance as a living breathing constantly evolving commercial Port.
The “Friends of Penzance Harbour’s hollow victory at the previous Planning meeting in December was the final straw for the sensible silent majority who suddenly realised that they needed to nail their colurs to the mast and urgently get their case across. Subsequently a lot of latent support has emerged for option A while Mr Maggs and his cohorts have rehashed the same tired arguments ad nauseum.
It increasingly appears to have been a good strategy to have let Mr Maggs have his say for so long as most right minded people soon saw through the very flawed arguments that he peddled with such evangelical fervour, eventually, as is always the case, he became yesterdays news, by having nothing new to say the Gentleman simply became tedious.
Hopefully todays good news will become the catalyst needed to kickstart Mounts Bay’s long awaited, desperately needed renaissence, being the first step towards realising its stunning marine based economic potential.
At the very least the bruising process thus far has been a rip roaring, rollicking example of democracy in the raw, neither side have any room to complain that their arguments were not fully and frankly aired, in the end, quite simply the best argument carried the day but it was close. It certainly reinforces the fact that the silent majority must never be complacent while organisations like the “Friends of Penzance Harbour” take it upon themselves to speak for us, ignore the likes of them at your peril.
THE HOTLY DISPUTED FERRY TERMINAL LOCATION IS NOT ACTUALLY VISIBLE FROM THE TOWN.
