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Challenge to the Council

This weekend sees a major Food Festival in neighbouring Yr Wyddgrud/Mold. It demonstrates that in spite of an enlarged Tesco in that town, plus Somerfield and Aldi, there’s life outside the corporatisation of our grocery agri-industry.

Gŵyl Fwyd Yr Wyddgrug/The Mold Food Festival is one of a growing number of speciality events and markets held in Sir Ddinbych/Denbighshire and Sir y Fflint/Fflintshire – Llangollen, Wrecsam, Dinbych/Denbigh, to name a few. There’s even one in Rhuthun/Ruthin monthly (this weekend, unfortunately clashing with Yr Wyddgrug/Mold).

A spin-off from Gŵyl Fwyd Yr Wyddgrug is the momentum required for the town to join Cittislaw, the so-called Slow Towns network. It includes two in Lloegr/England but none, yet, in Cymru. Such towns are not only cultural centres, they offer a quality of life that resists Americanisation, while emphasising quality local producers and local specialities. They offer, for example, a large range of speciality and quality cafés and restaurants.

Wait a minute. Sounds just like Rhuthun/Ruthin, doesn’t it? Our town has for years struggled to attract the sort of tourist numbers it really needs to be more sustainable. Yet, it is Rhuthun/Ruthin and not Yr Wyddgrug/Mold that has so much to offer! Wouldn’t membership of Cittislaw cement Rhuthun as a major visitor centre?

In terms of Cittislaw, Rhuthun/Ruthin has an independent retail sector encompassing:
  • A range of clothes, fashion, accessories and shoe emporia
  • An increasing and diverse number of cafés & restaurants – Ty’r Goron, Annie’s, Watergate, Siop Nain, Coffee Mill, Tanzaro, Castle Park, Off The Square, Manor House, Doodles
  • An eclectic supply of characterful pubs, inns and hotels
  • A large, famed weekly WI produce market
  • A monthly local produce market
Rhuthun/Ruthin boasts culturally:
  • A rare example of a pre-Victorian and Victorian gaol
  • Nantclwyd House (soon to be a museum)
  • Fine buildings & streetscapes
  • Castell Rhuthun/Ruthin Castle
  • A soon-to-be modernised Craft Centre
  • St Peter’s Square with the collegiate church, the seven eyes of the Myddleton Arms (now sadly renamed), old court house and the Maen Huail (and a legend far surpassing Beddgelert’s)
  • An annual weeklong festival, plus the flower show
Its geography is outstanding:
  • An enviable position, surrounded as it is by hills at the end of Dyffryn Clwyd/Vale of Clwyd, with views to the Clwydians
The Rhuthun/Ruthin monthly produce markets may or may not be a passing fad. But Cittislaw would be an anchoring certainty.

The challenge we at Rhuthun/Ruthin wish to send the Town Council is this – what is it doing to establish Rhuthun as a Cittislaw town?

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