Introductions and First Steps!

Welcome to the St Mary in the Castle Drivers Group blog!

By way of introduction, the Drivers are an unincorporated interest group of volunteers set up in July 2024 after a meeting of local residents and traders as well as council members to discuss the future of the building. We meet monthly to discuss key issues and come up with action plans where possible, always thinking how to practically steer this building back into use. There’s been lots to cover as we’ve set things up but now the process is starting to pick up, it’s a good time to share the journey with you all!

We started with ideas for the general direction of the venue. These were informed by the community’s ‘red lines’ stated in the initial meeting, which were that the building needed to remain a cultural venue and could actually be built upon to draw in visitors to the town.

Before it’s possible to go forward with this vision we need to know whether it’s feasible, which is why the Architectural Heritage Fund has given some money to support an ‘options appraisal’. This process will look at the space’s current condition and assess what practical works would need to be done – and whether this will be feasible. With feasibility in mind, it will also involve creative visions of what else the building could be used for in order to generate enough revenue to keep it stable in the long-term.

This began in April with sending out invitations for Expressions of Interest from organisations who could undertake the work of assessing a building’s viability. The great news is that we’ve received many exciting submissions and created a shortlist, from which we are currently interviewing potential candidates! Whoever’s selected will do further research into the building’s potential and creatively explore options for St MinC’s future with the community.

Before that, though, there have been some challenges that are immediately apparent. Once inside the arcade you can see that water has been coming in and is beginning to cause damage which will only worsen the longer the building is in dis-use. We’ve speculated that this is being caused by a fault with the drainage on the roof, a potentially lengthy job to repair as this would require ripping up the asphalt that’s currently in place. The fact that the roof road area is currently being used as parking could potentially be causing this fault as the structure wasn’t originally designed to bear such heavy loads as parked cars.

However, this presents a potential chance to take care of the problem in a relatively quick and direct way. If we can campaign with residents that the space needs to be cleared of cars, this could help ease the water ingress and speed along the restoration of the building without needing to undertake lengthy and costly road works. A socially-minded project like this is driven by collaboration, so we need to have a unified vision for the space where everyone co-operates to take care of our built environment.

We hope to engage even further about what this collaborative vision can look like by holding an event with the public. This is yet to be confirmed, but if you’re interested in attending or in becoming part of the Driver’s group, please email the contact below to get in touch:

Contact us

Written by Claire Innes