At a time of the credit crunch. Cllr Eade wants to spend money on Mark Pritchard ‘pet project’ instead of spending the money on meal and wheels projects and alike

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Grey: You must be an optimist if you think such a project run by the council will ever turn a profit. It will be a fiasco like the town park, making their own silly rules up (remember adults unaccompanied by children in Town Park?).
I really cant the the educational need, are schools totally incapable of teaching anything these days?
The Wrekin is just a little hill – not even a mountain! When you have climbed every mountain in England and Wales you will see the Wrekin in perspective. Its an insignificant little hill and this visitor centre is championed by people who are totally ignorant. They would be better investing the money for school field trips to areas such as Snowdon where there is unique alpine flora, wild mountain goats, mining relics, etc, etc.
This centre will be a focal point for burger eating and coke drinking – will do nothing good for anyone.
Its just a pathetic folly!

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Lucy, it may not be a mountain but it does have a significant influence on those who have grown up in its shadow. Many people are attached to it, how many people feel as if they are home when they see it?
As for educational benefit, many would agree that hands on learning leaves a greater impression on young minds than yet another boring day in the classroom. The geological make up of the little hill could be taught, the historic impact as a stronghold of the Cornovii as well as the fact that the Wrekin is arguably the most accessible of all of the hills in the Shropshire Hills AONB. This visitors centre could be the gateway to the AONB and provide a real boon to the tourism industry in the area.

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Grey: The Long Mynd is far more accessible – you can drive up it if you are disabled. It also has ancient earth works, mining relics and a far better bio-diversity than what is a commercial woodland on the Wrekin.
And I never found classrooms boring except when I had uninspiring teachers.
If we are teaching our kids that commercial forrestry is a area of outstanding natural beauty, they we are doing them a dis-service and the environment one too!

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Y Mab: Re #9, OK then if a coffee shop is viable, let private enterprise do it. This is not what the state should be funding. May be some information boards en-route – but a visitor centre! Its ludicrous and will spoil the area and end up like Snowdon which was once famously described by Prince Charles as Wales’s “highest slum”.

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Lucy W the visitor centre will be at the bottom of the Wrekin not the top.

Plus it will be of educational benefit and encourage people to walk.

Its a very good idea.

It will also increase tourism revune.

You should be all for it.

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jj: We have loads of “trails”, they are shown as red dotted lines on OS Maps and known as Public Footpaths and Bridleways.
Why do people need a colour coded sticks to follow before they will go for a walk?

Y Mab: There is a cafe on the Horse-shoe pass, but you hardy see anyone walking out there.
People will go into a visitor centre and see that it is a lump of vocanic rock, covered in trees and some people used to live on the top oncw upon a time. Then they will have a coffee and cream cake and go home as there is nothing to see.
Have you been to the Secret Hills Centre, near Craven Arms? Well I have. OK people are in there, but I’ve never seen anyone on the paths/trails outside it.
But lets get a perspective on this – its a forestry plantation on a hill, with a hill fort on top. Nothing to really get excited about, there are loads in Shropshire, far better than the Wrekin.

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Y Mab: Caer Caradoc. Impressive Iron Age Hill Fort earth works on the top to rival any in Britain. The fresh water spring on the top that fed the fort still runs today if you look hard enough for it. It was the strong hold of Caradoc who was one of the last of the British to resist the Roman Invasion in 43AD. It was on the hill he made is last stand before being captured and taken to Rome. The prehistoric track way can still be walked along to the fort. The top destination for Megaliths and Prehistory worldwide. Breathtaking views at 459m asl, wildlife, flora and fauna, what more could you ask for? And you can pop down to one of the lovely tea shops in Church Stretton if you really feel the need for a stick bun and cuppa.
The Wrekin is only 406m asl so the moral of the post is: Size does matter!

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Y Mab: And there’s also Brown Clee. I wont tell you everything so as notto spoil its discovery. But there are no hills south of Brown Clee, higher than it – not a lot of people know that. Can’t say the same for the Wrekin though.

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