The single issue that will directly and immediately effect a large number of people in Medway is not city status, or the lumbering regeneration projects, or the Sainsbury versus Tesco supermarket battle or the new bus station - IT IS THE CLOSURE OF THE PENTAGON BUS STATION !! Many people are still not aware that this will close - they think that the new bus station is in ADDITION to the Pentagon Bus Station!
I think we should organise a publicity campaign about the closure of the Pentagon Bus Station and put the blame where it belongs, squarely on the shoulders of the conservative majority on Medway Council. We could distribute leaflets to the effect that:
The Pentagon Bus Station is closing
Soon you will not be able to catch your bus here
You will have to go to the Riverside Gardens to catch your bus
You will be at the mercy of the weather as there is little shelter there
There is also limited seating and no toilets
If you care about standing around in all weathers to catch your bus
or you worry about how older and infirm passengers are going to cope
Vote for ANYBODY but your Conservative councillor at the local elections
The Conservative councillors are closing your bus station instead of refurbishing it
This is a quick idea off the top of my head but I do think that a single issue campaign which touches all parts of the Medway towns is a good idea and the only way in which we will be able to alter the balance of the council. Please be open and honest in your criticism of this hurried idea and improve the leaflet and add your own thoughts and let me know.
A film of 30 pensioners, for instance, out in the rain at the new dynamic bus station would change a lot of hearts and minds! We need more ideas like this.
Medway Council have no right to take this (admittedly inadequate) facility away from our residents - it is a scandal and we have not properly addressed it until now. It is not the building of the new bus station that is the issue - it is the closure of the old one!
