How long does it take to open a door?
The simple answer is - just a moment before a chink of light appears, a second before you can see through it, and a few more before you can walk through into the space beyond. Not so the West Porch!

Following initial discussions in the summer of 2001 about how to provide some space to accommodate the increasing amounts of church administration, plans for a development of the West Porch were drawn up that autumn. A visit of the Diocesan Advisory Committee in December was encouraging. The PCC supported the scheme in principle in January 2002, and a planning group was established. The group reported to the PCC in May, proposing an ambitious timetable which introduced the idea more widely at the Spire Open Day on June 2nd, launched the 'Opening our Doors' appeal on St. James's Day, hoped for planning permission in September, to issue tenders in October and have most of the fund raising done by December. The fund raising target was £100,000, with a third coming from events and donations, a third, we hoped, from charities and grants, and the remaining third from our own Church reserves.

What actually happened? So far we have raised no money at all from grants, despite our best efforts, but we have had a windfall in the form of a developer buying out a covenant owned by the church, some of which the PCC has agreed will be put towards the costs. But most importantly, we have raised an amazing almost £50,000 ourselves!

However, it took much longer than expected to get the planning permission, firstly because the plans had to be modified to keep the building a little further away trom St. James's Road, and then because of concerns about an adjacent tree. This meant that we had to withdraw the application and resubmit it with a report from our own tree expert. We finally obtained planning permission, with some conditions, on 22nd May 2003.

The architect is sending out tender documents, our application for a Faculty from the Diocese is going ahead and we hope to start building as soon as we can. The Bishop is visiting us on St. James's Day, 13th July 2003, and will, we hope, at least open our West Door, even if he caunot open the new West Porch this year.

Once the project is complete we will have a superb new facility for the parish and the community, including office space, a counselling room, a disabled toilet and child changing facility, but, most importantly, a clear view into the church through the new glass doors.

How long does it take to open a door? In the case of St. James's, a lot longer than you would think, but now, after a year, we are really going ahead to 'Open our Doors'!

Source: Rodney Taylor, The Spire Magazine - 2003 July

What is happening on the West Porch project? When are we going to see some building work?
The answer to the first question is that much of the action is behind the scenes at the moment. Following the planning permission, with all its problems, the architect has drawn up more detailed plans and a specification that has now gone out to potential tenderers. Tenders must be in by the end of September for us to select the builder. The plans also have to go to the Diocesan Advisory Committee to get a Faculty before we can start the work.

We have now raised more than £50,000 towards the cost of the project, and the PCC has earmarked additional funds in order that the project can proceed as soon as we have a builder and the Faculty. We shall continue fundraising to ensure that we take no more from our reserves than is necessary. So the answer to the second question is that we expect and hope that building work will start towards the end of the year.

Source: Rodney Taylor, The Spire Magazine - 2003 October