Buildings. Who Cares? - ACE152.3

Commentary describes Chester as adapting, like all the other cities, to life in the 20th century. Town Crier. Tourists. A city of contrasts and mixtures, with a feeling of continuity and evolution. Street scenes showing old buildings next to new. Years of destruction through neglect are now over; Chester is being "cared for". Commentary says that it’s essential to understand the features of a city that give it its particular style and identity. Roman city wall; the route goes round the city. The mediaeval cathedral. The Very Rev. T.W.I. Cleasby, Dean of Chester, says the cathedral, the Rows, and the Roman walls are the essential features of the city; a survey of visitors revealed that many had come to see the cathedral. Andrew Brown, City Conservation Officer, says that people come to Chester to live, to shop, and as tourists. The conservation programme will keep the city characterful, attractive to visitors and therefore prosperous. The Rows shopping centre, and nearby streets. Conservation is about the buildings themselves and how people relate to them. Insall describes Victorian paintings from Chester City Museum illustrating what Chester might have looked like in earlier times. "Trying to restore things to what they may have been is like trying to put the clock back. Conserving them is about recognising that it has to go forward." Some of the many Victorian half timbered buildings with which Chester abounds, now a major part of the city’s image.