Joyland Books

Hi All,
Our day at Margate triggered a lot of response from our save dreamland T shirts. Margate is unaware of whats going on, People came up to us, Is dreamland closing ?, Can you stand still so we can take down the web site. We need more awareness in Margate.

Dave and Colin on the Scenic Railway said they need more people to use the ride as they are only just braking even.

All the best

Alan

I must agree, the couple of times I've been down I was expecting to see 'Save Dreamland' posters or something in shops and B&B windows but there was nothing.

The Save Dreamland Campaign relies entirely on people helping out with their time and funds. Sarah and I are both busy lobbying, holding meetings, writing letters and representations, dealing with the media, running this website, etc, etc. Plus there is the small matter of us both having full-time jobs. We simply don't have time to do many of the things that - in an ideal world - we would do.

We would love to hand out hundreds of T-shirts to the people of Margate (and beyond). It would be great to have posters in windows of shops. But Sarah and I just don't have the time or resources to do it ourselves. We are entirely reliant on people coming forward with suggestions and doing it themselves!

If any members have any ideas about how we can raise the profile of the campaign locally (or if you are able to print off some posters and get them stuck up in shop windows!) then please get in touch with either me or Sarah. Our contact details are here:

http://www.joylandbooks.com/scenicrailway/press.htm

Nick

Hi Nick,
I am so sorry I feel you think I was criticizing, I was`nt, I know you are both working hard & it was great to see everyone yesterday, I did not expect people in Margate to be lacking knowledge of what is happining to Dreamland.

One idea is, (If poss) Have a poster on the web site, So it can be printed off by all members that wont to.


Alan

Hello everyone,

Sadly, I didn't make it to Dreamland on Saturday; I set out for the journey but realised on-route that I'd have been in too much of a rush to get back to Maidstone for work at 2pm. (I was also recovering from an early start the day before).

I was there the Sunday before though and also came to the possible conclusion that not many people were aware of Dreamland's threatened future. I just put it down to possible apathy as I had no response to my Save Dreamland shirt I was wearing; not even in a local bar afterwards.

I would find it quite amazing in today's multi-media age that very few local people in Margate are aware of the current situation at Dreamland. I find it hard to keep up with local TV news due to shiftwork but surely people have some time to hear the local radio news now and then. This apart from internet access, which just about every other person seems to have these days.

It could be a case of "wake up Margate" before it's too late. I think the window poster idea is a great idea to raise awareness. I know on my last visit that the Scenic Railway operators were enquiring about them getting some Save Dreamland Campaign t-shirts. (If any operators are listening please e-mail Nick Laister about this; there is a link on this website's "latest news" below the picture of me modelling the said shirt!)
If they are all able to wear them on the ride it would be a great awareness boost to the public.

Bye for now,

Martin

I think the reason we got a good response, Our T shirts have large letters on the front and the back.

Alan

I agree that local awareness is key to the success of this project. Of course Sarah and Nick are totally snowed under with all the work they are doing. Maybe it's time for a meeting of all supporters to work out a practical stratergy for getting posters out?

If we could prevail on Tracey Emin to knock up a design in black and white that can be easily photocopied we could soon have a very high profile poster in circulation and possibly another news worthy story. If we got her to sign a special edition we could auction a number off and raise funds as well.

Just a suggestion

Hi bingocaller,

Yes, I think your idea would be quite novel; I assume you meant printing Campaign posters (not pictures of Tracey Emin). I must admit to my ignorance to having never heard of this local celebrity before; she was featured by the way, on Friday July 18's glossy ES Magazine front cover with the Evening Standard, having hit 40 and being single.

In view of the rapidly deminishing 2003 Dreamland season I think time is of the essence now. I'll happily do all I can to help out but only really have Saturday 9 August free, if it has to be a on a weekend, owing to my anti-social shiftwork patterns.

I also have a local Scenic Railway commercial support idea I need to pursue asap. I think we have to pull out all the stops now in this final important period. Anything to capture the media's attention would be very welcome. After the recent formula one racing car whizzing round on the tracks of Blackpool's Big One roller coaster I'm sure we could dream up some gimmick; any ideas for the Scenic Railway? - not sure if we could emulate the Big One's antics but we could try something.

Bye for now,

Martin

I think that the first step is for someone to approach Tracey Emin and see if she is willing to help us out. Without wanting to add to anyone's worklaod it might be something that Sarah could do as I think she is the one with the contact, if she doesn't feel able to do this someone else can help out - It think no one wants to step on anyones toes!

Once we have a suitable design (which I think should be A4 black and white so that it's easily photocopyable) we should then divide up photocopying and distribution duties.

It would be good to know if this is a plan that supporters agree with...

I have been emailing Thanet District Council re their scrutiny committee which is a forum for local people to bring topics that they are interested in to the table.

I don't know about what everyone else thinks but I am always of the opinion that a good old fashioned petition is a hard thing to ignore - maybe this is already underway.

As a 14 yr old living 3 hrs from the park apart from writting a letter (which I've already done) there's little I can do. However I going to try and do a presspack for the Newsound website when I go to Dream Land next Weekend and get it published on the Newsround website. Obviously you don't automatically get reports published but as the website gets over 1 million visitors a day if it does get put on it could make a massive difference.