What is the correct balance between conserving our heritage and encouraging investments which improve the town? When Brend Hotels put forward their application to convert the building on Bideford Station platform into holiday accommodation, there were howls of protest from residents, but the council decided that the benefits outweighed the disadvantages. Of course we need restrictions to make sure that treasured buildings are not pulled down or defaced with insensitive additions, but sometimes the law goes too far – or our expectations exceed what is financially viable. 

So many of our town centre buildings are Grade II listed but falling into disrepair through lack of investment. This blights the High Street and, as shoppers disappear, there is little incentive for anyone to spend the cash needed to bring the buildings back into functional use. Even some of the shops which have tenants are leaky and rapidly becoming unfit for purpose. How can we get landlords to invest in them, or sell them on if they are not interested in doing it themselves? 

Some abandoned shops would provide great living accommodation which would help solve our housing crisis as well as bringing new life into the town centre. Grants would help, and surely some are available for those who know where to look. But some of those buildings, like the old New Look shop, need major works, inside and out, to make them habitable. The costs are enormous even to get an application into the planning system, with no guarantee that expensive changes won’t be required before the project can get off the ground. We all want those buildings to retain their historic frontages, but what about the interiors? Should they be sacrosanct too? 

Sometimes the vagaries of what is or is not designated a heritage asset can produce some contradictory situations. The old collar factory by Westcombe Lane has been slated for demolition because, however much we might value it locally, it was not of interest to Historic England. Yet other projects around the town remain undeveloped because of failure to get approval from planning and conservation teams. Too much anchorage in the past can be a drag on regeneration, allowing our heritage to disintegrate before our eyes. Sometimes bringing a building back into functional use means making some sacrifices for the greater good, remembering that we are making heritage for future generations as well as preserving that of the past.