Irvine Heritage Trail Route Letters for each plaque can be found on the map above. Start at Cunninghame House. (A) Cunninghame House Friar’s Croft, KA12 8EE OS Grid Ref – NS 31686 38744 On 26 October 1976 Cunninghame District Council (CDC) met for the first time in their new headquarters at Friarscroft. Amongst other things, they discussed the Arran Clearances Memorial, tree planting at the Low Green and welcomed the Dowager Countess of Eglinton presenting the Eglinton Trophy into the care of CDC. Firstly, however, the Chair, David White, thanked the council workers for getting the new building, Cunninghame House, ready for use. It was not always certain that Cunninghame House would be the permanent headquarters of the new council. Cunninghame District was unique amongst the fifty-three district councils and three island councils in having no obvious headquarters and money would be available from the Scottish Office to build one. Before CDC came into being (it was created on 7 May 1974 and ran in parallel with the burghs until they were abolished on 16 May 1975) the Cunninghame District Advisory Committee decided that CDC would rent offices from Irvine Development Corporation (IDC) at Bridgegate House, Irvine. The rent of £6,400 per year would be met initially by Ayr County Council. At a CDC meeting on 19 September 1974 they agreed that the new headquarters should be built on the north side of the Stevenston/Kilwinning road (A78) east of Stevenston. But at their 17th October meeting they were told that there were problems getting the site. They decided, while still looking for a new site, to look into leasing the Dundonald Army Camp before renting the new office block being built by IDC at Friarscroft. And this they did much to the horror of many staff at the thought of working at the remote Dundonald Camp. In January 1976 a list of possible sites for the new headquarters was drawn up and included; land at the Townshouse, Irvine, the former Caledonian Railway Station, Kilwinning, and Main Street/New Street, Stevenston. Then in March 1976 CDC entered into a 21 year lease of Cunninghame House (as it was now being called) from IDC. It would cost more than £256,000 per year to run out of the council's £800,000 budget for general expenses. Cunninghame House also housed Irvine Branch Library and the Municipal Bank, both on the ground floor. On the third floor were the council chambers and committee rooms along with the Eglinton Trophy. Up on the fifth floor the staff and members canteen supplied subsidised meals at 40p for three courses. The press and public took issue about this as lunch at a local hotel or restaurant cost £1.60 to £2 at that time. A typical canteen menu was: Starters; grapefruit segments, egg mayonnaise, fruit juices or soup. Main course; Scotch eggs, braised steak jardiniere, spaghetti bolognese, chicken supreme or corned beef salad, all with chips or potatoes, cauliflower with cheese sauce, green beans and carrots. Sweets; fiesta, cream gateau, peach custard meringue, ice cream and fruit or biscuits and cheese. In November 1978 CDC decided that they would remain in Cunninghame House and not build a new suite of offices. This was due mostly to the cost of £3 million. The then owners, Ravenseft, offered to let two additional floors for a nominal sum of £100 per year. They also offered to sell the building to CDC at that time or in the future. On 1 April 1996 the district, island and regional councils of Scotland were replaced by single tier authorities with CDC being replaced by North Ayrshire Council (although they ran in tandem since the local elections in April 1995). North Ayrshire Council remained in Cunninghame House and bought the property in 2005 making it their permanent headquarters. Today the Irvine Branch Library has relocated to the High Street and the Municipal Bank to Bridgegate House. The council chambers are now on the ground floor along with the Eglinton Trophy and the Burgh Provost Chains on public display at the reception area. On to the next stop Cross over the car park1 to the Asda entrance to the shopping centre. (B) Rivergate Shopping Centre 5 Fullarton St, Irvine, KA12 8EJ OS Grid Ref – NS 31744 38681 On 10 June 1973 Irvine Bridge was closed to the public and demolished. This was the start of building the £5 million Rivergate Shopping Centre by Irvine Development Corporation (IDC). The developers chosen were Ravenseft and Murrayfield Scottish Development and the construction was carried out by Sir Robert McAlpine and Sons Ltd. A footbridge was built for pedestrians wishing to cross the river at Puddleford Lane just south of the old bridge. This proved to be very unpopular with the people of Irvine. The bridge was reached by a steep 26-step stairway and was called "Heartbreak Hill". Workers had to down tools to help mothers with prams and older people were frightened to climb it. Small businesses on the west side of the river suffered badly. Clifford Beckett Photographer lost all his passing trade, the Loon Fung Chinese Restaurant lost three quarters of its evening business and half of its lunchtime customers. Commuters and visitors using Irvine Railway Station also complained about the path to the new bridge and indeed the bridge itself. Construction of Rivergate took over two years and provided space for five department stores and fifty smaller shops. A multi-storey car park for 536 cars was built and a ground level park to take 450 vehicles. The centre opened on Thursday 9 October 1975 with no official ceremony. The only shop open was Arnotts (opened on that day by Sir Hugh Fraser). A handful of shoppers were at the Bridgegate entrance when it opened at 9.30am and the first in was 74 year old Mrs Sarah Gaw of 2 Sloan Avenue, Irvine. Generally the public felt it was an asset to the town but one person said, "It looked as though it was designed by a child playing with a Lego set". Over the coming months the shops gradually filled up. The larger premises were taken by Cantors, Boots, Tescos and William Low. Other traders included Tandem Shoes, John Collier, Record and Card Centre, Hepworths Terleys, RS McColls, Fosters, Victoria Wine, Alex Munros, John Dickie, Hardys, Greggs and Radio Rentals. Goldbergs opened two years later on 24 October 1977. Irvine's High Street shops feared they would lose their trade to the new centre once it opened but shoppers came to the town from all over Ayrshire during the Christmas period. Shops outside the centre, such as, Co-op and Coopers Fine Fare in the High Street all reported high sales figures. Templetons at Bridgegate told of brisk business with their manager Alex Allison saying, "We have sold about 800 turkeys for Christmas alone and expect to sell the same number again for New Year. And we have sold more alcohol than ever before”. At first the centre was only open during shopping hours for security reasons as many of the units had shopfitters working in them and the Puddleford Lane bridge was used at night. However, once the bridge was removed and the centre opened 24 hours it was plagued with vandalism and antisocial behaviour. Originally the police were to have a shop inside the centre but they pulled out of that agreement. Eventually Ravenseft had to pay for private security between 6pm and 6am during the week and 24 hours at the weekend. The alternative was to spend £60,000 on a new footbridge. The centre had been planned to be enlarged in 1980 to extend west and attach onto the railway station. This didn't happen. Other plans for the centre that failed to appear included an integrated bus station, cinema, hotel and riverside bar/restaurant. Today the centre is as popular as it was in 1975 and still has a few of the original traders such as Greggs which opened on 13 October 1975 and Boots which opened on 10 June 1976. On to the next stop Enter shopping centre and proceed through it. Note the metal plaques taken from Irvine Bridge2 on either side of the picture window overlooking the river. (C) Edgar Allan Poe Unit 48, Charles Chester Jewellers OS Grid Ref – NS 31994 38784 Edgar Allan Poe was born Edgar Poe in Boston, Massachusetts in 1809. His father abandoned the family, and then died in 1810. His mother died the following year. Poe was subsequently taken into the home of John Allan, a successful Scottish merchant in Richmond, Virginia and, although never formally adopted, was given the name Edgar Allan Poe. In 1815, the family sailed to Britain and stayed at the home of John Allan's sister Mary at Bridgegate House, Irvine a two-storey tenement. Edgar was sent to the old burgh school at Kirkgatehead, where it is said that the teachers used to send their pupils into the neighbouring graveyard to copy down epitaphs. This may have contributed to his obsession with death. Returning to the United States in 1820, Poe failed to complete his studies at the University of Virginia and after some initial success in the military, engineered his own discharge from West Point. He died under unexplained circumstances in Baltimore aged 40. He was one of the earliest American practitioners of the short story genre, came to be considered the inventor of the detective fiction genre, and is further credited with contributing to the emerging genre of science fiction. He has also been described as one to the first authors to have made, or attempted to make, his living solely from writing.