A Terminal State ... Continued

goods shed behind, which lay on the other side of the track bed, had been dismantled. This was preparatory to the construction, in 1987, of the Meirose town by-pass, which roughly follows the line of the removed buildings.

The restoration and conversion of the station house, which was completed in 1986 and opened in July of that year by the Rt. Hon. Malcolm Rifkind, Q.C., M.P., successor to the Secretary of State who listed the building in 1981, provides accommodation on three levels. The volume of the building is such that the third level is enclosed within the original roofline, and it is virtually invisible from most viewpoints from the outside. With a restaurant, craft shop, gallery, model railway centre and museum, and craft workshops, the Meirose Station Crafts Centre provides a lively focus for a number of complimentary activities and is becoming well-established both

within the local community and amongst visitors. Local arts and craftspeople value the opportunity to present short one man or group exhibitions in the gallery.

Of course the crafts industry is not, and likely never will be, a highly charged commercial activity. It is not an industry that offers high turnovers, or large margins. So the rents on the workspaces, and for the short lets of the gallery, are modest by other commercial standards, and the margins in the craft shop are not those of a high street mass market retail unit. In short, the match of use to locality to building is not a typical profit-

proposition, but one that in the particular set of circumstances that arose in this instance served to suggest the realisation of a number of objectives. However, although the building has now been saved, the development has yet to reach its full operational potential.

Borders Regional Council was instrumental in supporting the initiation of the project and in securing the offers of financial

support from public sources that were essential before even the acquisition of the property could be justified. But ironically that same local authority has displayed an almost unbelievable lack of enthusiasm for authorising the directional signposting that visitors need in order to find the property.

Hopefully, after two years of effort in research and lobbying, this matter will shortly be resolved, and for its third operational year, 1989, Meirose Station will at long last have achieved the directional signposting to which it is entitled and which it requires in order to function properly.

Projects such as the restoration of Meirose Station need all the support they can get, from all parties acting in unison. Scotland possesses many examples of major historic buildings which are in desparate need of “eleventh hour” treatment, and without the assurance of continuous backing, at all stages from inception through to operation, others will be deterred from tackling them.