4 C O N T E X T 1 5 0 : J U L Y 2 0 1 7 © Science sceptics From Stephen Howard Gray, East Sussex The articles in the May issue of Context on green retrofit were excellent. However, although the thermography equipment and other tools of the trade are new, the science is no different to that taught by Conrad Smith when I was a student at the Brixton School of Building in the 1960s. My concern would be that the science might be too much for members who come from a professional background that is not science-based. This could frustrate appropriate retrofit proposals or falsely endorse inappropriate proposals. FromTwo Friends: Rabindranath Tagore andPatrickGeddes, byArthur Geddes (Patrick’s son), 1961 Together, Patrick Geddes and his wife Anna spent the first 10 years of their married life in the heart of Edinburgh’s Old Town, among a mixed community of working folk: respectable artisans, rough but decent labourers and also the demoralised and the ‘down and out’, while nearby the barracks in the Castle spread its fringe of pubs and prostitution. The folk dwelt packed into small crowded flats of one to three or four rooms, opening off a multi-storeyed common stair. As a boy 30 years later, I had said of the Old Town’s poverty, suffering smells and squalor, ‘This is almost more than I can bear’. I still remember the look on my mother’s face as she answered quietly, ‘This is nothing to what we knew!’ And when my children say much the same to me I can recall her answer and echo it to them: though all too slowly, improvements have been going on, partly due to the personal efforts of my parents together. What was distinctive in this was that they dwelt and worked among those they wished to help, to teach, and to learn from. With their own small capital for a start, they bought historic dwellings and also ancient ruins which they cleared to make courtyards letting in a glimpse of the sun, where children could play and old folks rest, and graced with a tree and a few flowers, green and bright against the dark, high tenement walls. They lost their capital, of course. But when in later life Geddes replanned old cities with citizens’ money, with public funds in Scotland and then in India, he remembered that in the end ‘it [is] always the poor who pay’. No home was ever pulled down without good cause, unless it could be replaced by a better one. No neighbourhood, no community, should ever be uprooted unless transplantation will renew its life. With the ruins of the past to clear away like rubbish, there is always an element of half-forgotten, half buried heritage to conserve, respect and cherish. The Mid-Cheshire Community Rail Partnership has commissioned a series of 1930s-style railway posters promoting attractions of the Mid-Cheshire Railway Line.They feature scenes of cities such as Chester, Manchester and Stockport, and sites near stations such as the Lion SaltWorks Museum and (seen here) the Anderton Boat Lift. replacement guidance itself, but that the industry was welcome to fill the gap. Urban Design London responded by commissioning the new document. The Design Companion includes a contribution from IHBC president David McDonald on the historic environment, and the book is edited by Context editor Rob Cowan. It provides explanations, examples, tips and practical advice to help the reader understand and apply national design policies and guidance, such as the National Planning Policy Framework and the online Planning Practice Guidance. It draws on Urban Design London’s 11 years’ experience in training planners and placemakers. How would decision makers on listed building applications know which was which? It would be so easy to just say no, rather than risk a mistake. (I recall a conservation officer who could not differentiate between silica, silicon, silicone or siloxane, and thus assumed that they were all harmful to historic fabric.) Scepticism of science, like that of the climate-change-denier currently in theWhite House, is a challenge to our future. Not everyone can have a scientific understanding, but those who do not should get someone who does to advise them, not make (or avoid making) decisions on the basis of ignorance. Stephen Howard Gray Letter
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MjgyMjA=