Following a meeting with WCBC regarding the Trevor Basin Master Plan and spend of the ￡4.2 million Levelling Up fund, it appears that WCBC and partners do not have sufficient money to build a new Visitor Centre at the Trevor Basin.
We have, therefore, decided to help WCBC and its partners by repurposing the Ebenezer Chapel as the Pontcysyllte World Heritage Site (WHS) Visitor Centre. This project will work well with our primary goal of putting our community, The Cefn, including all surrounding villages in the central section of the WHS, on the tourist map.
Our community has not fared well since the UNESCO Inscription in 2009. Cefn Mawr was rated as the second poorest community in Wrexham County and one of the poorest in NE Wales by the National Office of Statistics in 2023 after 15 years of postindustrial depression and isolation from the WHS.
This should not be, given that our community surrounds the aqueduct, and with a visitor count of more than half a million people every year to the aqueduct, our local economy should be booming. Appropriate linkages need to be made.
A Major Tourist Attraction
Establishing the Ebenezer as the Visitor Centre at the very heart of the World Heritage Site Corridor will give our community a major tourist attraction. It will work well with the new parking facility that WCBC & partners are planning (P/2024/0105).
We fully support WCBC & partners on this as we applied for something similar back in 2012. This was what we called Windborne Gateway Parking, halfway between the Aqueduct and Cefn Mawr Village Centre.
With the provision of appropriate linkages between this major parking lot and our village centre and the repurposing of the Ebenezer as the Pontcysyllte World Heritage Site Visitor Centre, we should see a much-needed upturn in our local economy.
A current criticism of the aqueduct is the limited visitor dwell time of 60 minutes or less. Encouraging people to explore the wider area, rather than just visit the aqueduct, will also mean they are out of their cars for longer.
With over half a million people visiting, this represents a significant reduction in CO2 and NOX emissions. Therefore, encouraging people to come into our village centre as well as see the aqueduct is a very practical application of sustainable tourism development that will help the Environment and our economy.
Plans for the Ebenezer Opening in Early May:
- A tourist information point
- An art gallery showing local artists’ and artisans’ work
- Community cinema
- The Stair Way to Heaven
- The Climate Crisis Mitigation Centre
- Back to the Future for Cefn Mawr Project Room
- The Linkage Room
- Light menu offerings from Cafe Florence and Moon Bakes
- Coffee and wine bar with premium lagers
- A program of art exhibitions
- A program of performing arts and musicians
- Small earth science technical reference library.
So, we are hoping that we can please most people and attract them to our community. Find out more about what’s on offer at the Ebenezer and in Cefn by following the QR codes or checking out pkcgroup.wales.
We are kicking off with a performance by the AUDIO DRONES on Saturday, 4th May.
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