All change for this town. What will it mean? And should I worry? (From Bucks Free Press)

All change for this town. What will it mean? And should I worry?

10:36am Friday 12th March 2010

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It might be my age but change concerns me. And it feels like Amersham could change quite quickly.

First of all there’s Hob the new hairdresser which has claimed to be ‘opening soon’ for months. My own reliable hairdresser tells me that they’re huge and charge around £200 for a cut.

Maybe I’m out of touch with prices (I still struggle with paying more than £1.50 for a five pack of tights.)

Now maths isn’t my strongest subject but here’s what I calculate. Amersham has around 20,000 residents. If half of these are adults and half of these are women, then that leaves five thousand potential (women) customers for the salon.

But then there are other salons in the town and some women go further afield for hairdos, so I understand.

But really £200 a go is for celebrities. Or top businesspeople. Isn’t it? How many are there here?

OK so we’ll have then five salons in the High Street when they finally arrive. Bet they’ll give balloons to children and chocolates to women passers-by when they arrive. ‘Oh, a free chocolate, I must go and get my hair cut there.’ I’ll buy my own chocs thanks.

Then there’s the high speed rail from London to... well, somewhere else. The North they say. It’ll take 49 minutes from London to Birmingham. I suppose some can’t get there fast enough.

There’ll be works for years; tunnels, dirt, digging and the lively sounds of workmen in luminous jerkins discussing their foremen or their digestive systems.

”For the town and population I can’t see any immediate benefit”

As an aside, I think Lord Adonis has one of the most spectacularly splendid names around.

Now when my son was young we’d catch the train from Hayes to Paddington occasionally. Usually a high speed train would rush by with a noisy whistling sound. No doubt technology has improved since then and quiet, fast trains can be built but I still foresee noise and for those living near Amersham station, it might be unbearable. I’d move now.

Known as a dormitory town, I think once these trains arrive Amersham will be more like an insomniac’s town. For the town and population I can’t see any immediate benefit.

Now to the cracker. Sainsbury’s. Some Year 6 children at my daughter’s school were discussing it loudly in the playground this morning. (There are some very attentive pupils there.)

“They’re going to knock down Cargo and Iceland!” “It’ll be horrendous!”

This to me seems like the least important change. Another supermarket. Another outrage. And we’ll use it anyway.

Before the small Tesco arrived, one local businessman took it upon himself to campaign for Londis and his ‘friends’ running the shop there. Worried that it might mean closure for this small, local shop, he produced stickers, posters and appeared in the local news. (The chap frequently misspelt the owners’ name so I question how intimate they all were with each other.)

Save Londis! I neither joined in nor disagreed vociferously. I felt I’d be a hypocrite. I knew I might use Tesco occasionally. As it happens, I don’t.

When I passed Londis weeks after Tesco was in business and noticed their display of newspapers with fleshpots wearing thongs and in adult poses on the street – at children’s eye level – I’m glad I wasn’t more active in the campaign.

So it looks as though Amersham might go from a pretty Chilterns town to a larger (they’re building more housing as well), more bland place. A suburb of London.

But to my mind, that’s virtually what it is anyway. To outsiders wanting to move in, it has the charm of a quaint, historic town but life here is quite hectic and most people I come across carry with them the frenzy and aloofness of London.

I wonder (in my grave cynicism) whether folk object to changes here because of the (negative) impact it might have on the value of their house. Please someone tell me it isn’t so.

I think what we really object to is the fact that some of us moved here because it was quiet, country-ish and away from the worst aspects of city life. And growth means change.

Expanding means coping with the impact of expansion: growing anonymity, an increasingly sprawling town with new homes and shops; more noise, traffic, dirt; more screaming toddlers, more mad adults in 4X4s, more crime, streets that will need widening at some stage and the loss of whatever it had before. Worst of all, it might just squeeze out every last charity shop in town – that will hurt.

”I wonder whether stylists will have conversation worth £200 a time”

On the positive side it could mean more talent, more cultural events, festivals, art, music and a little more energy. Those ghostly, empty retail premises might be occupied by exciting shops selling wonderful things we all want and the library may well grow too.

I’m here for a while anyway. So I’ll live with whatever happens. Work to start in 2017. I’ll be seven years older.

Who knows? I may well have published a book or two and will visit Hob every month.

I wonder whether stylists will have £200 conversation. I think I could demand not to be asked about my summer holidays, (‘Staying here’) my weekend entertainment (‘Nothing’)or whether I condition my hair (‘No’.) No doubt they’ll still tell me I have ‘dry hair’. And then they’ll want to straighten it with burning tongs or a hairdryer or scalding hair irons...

Anyway, I know there’ll be fights and campaigns and plans will go ahead for all new projects anyway. Age makes me concerned about change but also blesses me with stoicism. ‘Que será, sera.’