THE AIMS OF THE SOCIETY
The Kingston upon Thames Society exists to promote high standards of planning, conservation and design in the Royal Borough.
It seeks to inform the people of Kingston about major planning issues affecting our town.
The Society provides a forum through which the people of Kingston can play a part in ensuring that our heritage of historic buildings is preserved, and that the style and scale of new developments are in harmony with the existing townscape.
Historical Perspectives
The Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames lies on the East bank of the middle stretch of the River Thames. Once in Surrey, it is now in Greater London and lies about 12 miles upstream from Westminster Bridge. In 2007, the population was estimated to be about 160,000 within an area of 37.25kmsquared.
The name Kingston - meaning royal manor (derived from Cyninges Tun or Cingestune) - first appears in an agreement between King Ecgbert and Coelnoth, Archbishop of Canterbury, at a council held there in 838. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles record that King Athelstan was consecrated there. Tradition has it that Kingston was the coronation place of other Anglo-Saxon kings. Doomsday Book records that Kingston was part of King Edward the Confessor's farm and that there was there a church, 5 mills and three fisheries.
A Royal Charter was granted to Kingston by King John in 1200. In 1603 James 1 granted the town a Saturday Market and in 1927, King George V confirmed Kingston's status as a Royal Borough. In 1965, Queen Elizabeth ll granted another Royal Charter which entitles Kingston to continue to use the title 'Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames'.
Kingston's importance stems from its position on the River Thames. This was an artery for trade and for centuries Kingston Bridge was the first crossing upstream of London Bridge. In the early 18th and 19th Centuries, Kingston was an important staging post for coaches, had leather, brewing and other industries, had markets and was self sufficient for basic goods and services. The railway came to surbiton in 1838 and a station opened in Kingston in 1863.
Kingston has been an important administrative centre since time immemorial and today it has a Crown Court, County Court and Magistrates' Court, the headquarters of Surrey County Council, a University and a College of Further Education. While there is virtually no manufacturing industry left in the town, it remains a busy shopping centre with a vibrant night-time economy. The newly-developed Charter Quay area, which archaeologists believe was the centre planned of what became the medieval town of Kingston, is now the home of the recently-opened Rose theatre as well as the river-side housing complex.
Despite considerable development and redevelopment since the Second World War little of any distinction was added in this period and it was an ill-considered plan by Surrey County Council to build a relief road parallel to the river cutting the Town Centre from the artery that brought the town into being that precipitated the formation of the Society in 1961. Opposition to the plan grew amongst architects and residents alike and was finally succesful in defeating the proposal. Since that time the Kingston upon Thames Society has continued to support higher standards of planning and the preservation, protection,development and improvement of features of historic or public interest within the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames.
Kingston Market Matters
The traffic signs coming into Kingston trumpet the approach of "Historic Market Town" and who can quarrel with that? Kingstonians new and old know we have a market and a market-place and some even know that its primacy locally is protected by a Charter issued by HM Charles ll no less. Some of us wonder at times whether we are approaching the time when we will have a market-place and no market. Once there was a horse-fair and an apple market; both have long gone.
What are the plans for our Ancient Market? Sometimes when talking to people involved in the Town Centre with its extra funds and staff I wonder if the market is as important to themas I think it should be. German and French Markets come and go, put up their tents but they are transitory. The regular market is there for the long term and should be cherished for it. The constant cry nowadays is a complaint about the anonimity and uniformity of life in our over-crowded islands and in pparticular about the suburbanization of society generally. Kingston situated so handily for the City and West End is very vulnerable to such criticism> all the more important therefore to fight to retain what makes it special.
Three things make Kingston special - the river, the bridge and the market. Rightly or wrongly, traders are not convinced that their needs and legitimate concerns receive the attention they deserve. We are told of the need for more retail space, the desirability of more up-to-date office space but rarely, if ever, have I heard about plans to improve the market for its traders and for its customers. Strategies and plans are issued for consultation ( the Society has just received notice of one such consultation about GREENWAYS) but nothing specific to the Market. The townscape of the market-place and the Market House is superb but it is more than a pretty picture on a post-card. It is a commercial centre which needs to be cared for and cherished. Do the people with power and influence in Kingston feel this too? That is the question.
LATEST NEWS
TOPIC OF THE MONTH
Heritage Open Days September 2010
The Kingston Upon Thames Society and the Royal Borough have prepared a wonderful open weekend from Thursday 9th September to Sunday 12th September 2010.
Click here so find our more information and to obtain the free leaflet about this wonderful weekend
AGM 2010 Chairman's Report
The most important thing I have to report is that the Society is still functioning. This is by no means to be taken for granted. I recently received the Hampton Society Newsletter with details of their activities and campaigns. Right at the end was a heart-felt appeal for people to come forward as officers and committee members. Otherwise the Society would collapse. But an appeal for help answered is not the end of the story. Sometimes we willing beasts of burden ask for help, receive it, and then don't know what to do with it. The Society has been guilty of just that. Somebody rallied to our call for help in sstewarding Coombe Conduit only to discover we already had meeters and greeters, which she was competent to be when what was needed was informed guides. I shall take the opportunity to announce we are re-writing the Conduit leaflet and this we plan to be the basis of a training sessionin the Spring. As a result we hope to have enlarged our pool of trained guides.
I think I can say quite honestly that any committee member recruited has found a means of contributing to the Society and its activities. The first year after I joined I was put in charge of Heritage Open Days and have continued with it ever since.It has truly been a fascinating experience. since then George Rome Innes, David Kennedy, Marguerite Perkin, and Mary Watts have each found their metier.
I have reported plans to replace the Civic Trust, our national voice which went into administration. A subject of less than burning interest to moet of you, I guess. But it is important to see how others not only cope but prosper, the ideas other societies have. One theme which is endemic at the moment is localism, sense of place, grass roots initiatives, no more top down ukases. The only trouble is I suspect that this is largely engendered by people at the top, in government or HM opposition. In fact our own local authority is going out to consultation on a new core strategy which will put a sense of place at the heart of future development. this chimes in very well with the Society's ethos. what bothers us are the acknowledged financial constraints within whinh local authorities in the sout-east have to work and the fact that the Royal Borough no longer has a dedicated conservation team. Nevertheless, when the tide is in our favour, let us make the most of it. We hope not to repeat the destruction of earlier post war decades.
We are not short of ideas for the future, ignoring for the moment the shortage of people to implement them. I was approached last year by members of the Kingston Horticultural Society with the suggestion that the Society might specifically add the Greenscape to our Townscape Award Scheme. We had included some landscaping in our awards but the intention would be to give added weight to it. I am Programme Secretary as well as chairman, and seized the opportunity to include meeting in our programme entitled rather gnomically "The Spaces between Buildings" to point up their importance. When I triumphantly told the committee I had that spaces in between the buildings were vital to a good townscape I was cut down to size by my Vice-Chairman (an architect ) who commented rather grumpily that in that case if there were a few trees in between the buildings it would not matter if they were rotten buildings. Anyhow, I should like to take this opportunity to announce this joint venture. Both the Societies will be asking for nominations in the near future. In addition to the newsletter and the web-site we now use our monthly meetings to keep members up-to-date with developments within the Royal Borough. Tesco, the Power Station Site and the Town Centre Action Plan appear quiet at the moment but there are controversial applications for New Malden, Tolworth and elsewhere.
Heritage Open Days is now organized under the aegis of English Heritage. Up to now I have unreservedly scouted for new entrants to the programme. Some of the most interesting have been the result of efforts over two years or more before victory has been achieved. Thankfully, people are more aware of what is in it for them and are less likely to regard participation as a tiresome chore. One of the few instances when I have had to admit defeat was when there was such a complete failure to see what could have been to their advantage. However trying to get as many participants as I can, may cause a problem in the years ahead. The Society needs help to cover the final cost of printing the programme leaflet. This help has been provided by a Small Grant from the Royal Borough, the maximum value of which is £750. I am told that to expand the present format of the leaflet would send costs ssky-high and would therefore be beyond us. I was only saved this year by the fact that an unusually large number of regular entries could not participate for various reasons. So by ditching the map and putting four pictures on the front instead of one we manged to squeeze it all in. The Heritage Open Days 2010 cycle has already started and I shall have to go carefully.
Finally , I should like to thank you for coming, the members for supporting us and the committee for its hard work. The Society needs an audience and people to organise its activities, it can then hope to influence the climate of opinion in the Royal Borough.
See 'How to Join', and let your voice be heard in consultations on the future of our town centre.