Waste of an old Aberdare School

The most popular photos on Aberdare Blog for the past week have been those of Tabernacle Chapel, Aberystwyth.

Sadly the Chapel was destroyed in a great fire and subsequently demolished last Saturday.

This is such a waste. But perhaps we can draw a useful lesson from Aberystwyth by looking at our own communities and considering the empty buildings on our own doorstep!

We draw your attention today to a magnificent building several times larger than Tabernacle Chapel, Aberystwyth… the old school on the outskirts of Aberdare.

It was the old Welsh junior school - Ysgol Gynradd Gymraeg Ynyslwyd - before this school closed and moved to Cwmdare.

The photos (below) were taken in 2006. Click the photo thumbnails for larger versions.

Today the old school windows are boarded-up.

Are vandals stealing the copper from the electrical supply system and metal to sell on as scrap ?

Are local drug-addicts and the homeless using the building as a refuge ?

What is really happening to Aberdare’s largest public building ?

People may argue that this is a Victorian building which is too expensive to maintain and unworthy of further upkeep.

That is a reasonable argument, but there is an even more reasonable argument which says the community of Aberdare and district has invested considerable energy into this building and its natural life should not come to an end by an ‘accidental’ fire such as that which gutted the Aberystwyth Chapel or the neglect of the Labour-controlled Rhondda Cynon Taf County Borough Council.