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Hengistbury Head

Ancient Village / Settlement / Misc. Earthwork

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Plan for Hengistbury Head barn visitor centre submitted


Update on Goff's news May 2010 - one step nearer to getting a new centre built!

Plans for a visitor centre at a Dorset nature reserve have been submitted.

The borough council has been planning to create a £1m visitor centre at Hengistbury Head for the past 10 years.

People can comment until 3 December on plans to convert the thatched barn at the site to house displays about the area's archaeology and wildlife.

The council said developers will provide £300,000 while an application for a £420,000 Lottery grant will be made in February.

'One million visitors'

The remaining money for the project could come through government funds.

If approved for funding, the new centre would be completed in 2012.

It will feature displays showing the nature reserve's plants and animals and their habitats.

The centre will also have archaeology exhibitions about Hengistbury Head, chronicling its history from 60 million years ago when it was beneath a tropical sea, through to the Stone Age when humans hunted and camped there, to the Iron Age when it was an important trading port.

Sue Harmon-Smith, chair of the Hengistbury Head Supporter's Group, added: "Steeped in history and wildlife, Hengistbury Head is one of the most popular and important nature reserves on the South coast with around one million visitors annually.

"It makes sense that we should have a visitor centre and education facility on the site that we can be proud of."

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-dorset-11811204
moss Posted by moss
23rd November 2010ce

Comments (2)

Good find, Moss!

Will be interesting to see how this pans out... The area's already quite well-equipped, with a superb cafe and toilets, but yes, the local/historic information is pretty sparse.

We go here quite often, cos it's only a short drive away, and is a gorgeous stretch of beach/clifftop walk, with some great views. The barn is already there, so it won't impact on the look and feel of the place.

G x
goffik Posted by goffik
24th November 2010ce
“The area's already quite well-equipped, with a superb cafe and toilets, but yes, the local/historic information is pretty sparse.”

Bit outside the remit of TMA but the Sutton Hoo visitor centre in Suffolk is well worth a visit. Excellent NT refreshment area, shop and a small museum containing an audio-video room, interactive displays, a reconstruction of the burial chamber and some of the actual pieces discovered at the site.

If you can make it before 20 March 2011 you’ll be able to see an exhibition of the recently discovered photos from the 1939 excavation which have not generally been seen before. The photos were taken with, “Leica cameras and German 35mm Agfa colour slide film which was very rare in England at the time.”

The exhibition, Captured on Camera: The Summer of 1939, runs at Sutton Hoo, Woodbridge, Suffolk, from 23 November 2010 until 20 March 2011.

More here - http://www.eadt.co.uk/news/features/new_sutton_hoo_photographs_unearthed_1_734070
Littlestone Posted by Littlestone
24th November 2010ce
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