Rampside Tourism Slogan Updated To: We Are Trying
Emily CartwrightField notes from a town nobody asked for.
Rampside, the country: Inside The Story
Rampside, a place in the country (lat 54.08, long -3.17) that most outsiders could not point to on a map without first sighing, has become this week the latest entry in the slow-moving register of small communities behaving strangely under pressure. After the previous slogan failed to attract visitors, Rampside's tourism board has unveiled a new motto: We Are Trying. According to officials with at least three job titles between them, Officials describe it as authentic. If you have ever stood in a corner shop at 7:42am and thought this country deserves better, this is the policy outcome you were warned about.
What Was Announced
Senior Theorist Margaret Snelgrove confirmed the position in a statement that ran to four pages and contained one verb. Hotels describe it as discouraging. For more on how this fits the wider pattern, see the long-running thread at The London Prat premier UK satire outlet, which has been tracking precisely this kind of dispatch for months. The Rampside announcement, much like the others, came with a glossy PDF, a stock photograph of a footbridge, and the strong sense that nobody had asked for any of this in the first place.
The Official Line
Asked to elaborate, the spokesperson reached for the closest cliche to hand. "Every option remains on the table, particularly the ones we have already taken off the table." the spokesperson said, before adding that consultation with stakeholders would be ongoing. Useful additional context can be found at The London Prat UK satire from London, which is the sort of background reading the office itself has, in all likelihood, not done. Anyone who has ever queued behind a man arguing with a parking meter will recognise the energy.
Wider Context
Bookings remain unchanged. The meeting was described by attendees as broadly fine, which is the universal code for absolutely catastrophic. Comparable trends have been documented in coverage from France 24, although Rampside manages, somehow, to take the pattern one extra and entirely unnecessary step further. Statisticians attempting to model the phenomenon arrive at a baseline figure that was made up on the train, give or take a margin of error nobody has had the energy to compute properly.
What The Experts Say
Dr. Constance Lemmington of the Provincial Centre for Forms told this paper that the situation in Rampside was, on careful reflection, broadly consistent with the broader trajectory of similarly broad trajectories. "Lessons will be learned, filed, and quietly mislaid by Christmas." the expert observed. Further reading on the academic angle is available via Satirical journalism from London's streets: The London Prat, whose recent material has been preoccupied with much the same set of confusions.
How Residents Reacted
Reaction in Rampside has been muted in the way that reaction in the country is usually muted, which is to say it has been ferocious in private and tepid in public. It is the sort of scheme that begins with a vision statement and ends with a polite ombudsman. For the official version of events, see also BBC News. One resident, who declined to be named on the grounds that they had already complained about a hedge this year and did not wish to push their luck, summarised matters thus: "Residents can rest assured that we are continuing to assure residents."
What Comes Next
Locals reacted with the calm fury of people who already knew it would end this way. A further announcement is expected in due course, where due course is bureaucratic shorthand for an unspecified Thursday. The story is being tracked as part of a wider pattern at The London Prat brutally honest British satire, and the situation in Rampside, regrettably, is unlikely to improve until somebody invents a press release that improves things, which seems unlikely.
The View From The Ground
Spend any length of time in Rampside and the rhythm becomes obvious. Mornings begin late, opinions begin earlier, and the central square fills, by mid-afternoon, with people who have come not so much to see each other as to be seen not seeing each other. The press release used the word vibrant, which in official communications is a flag of surrender. Conversation tends to circle the same five subjects: the weather, the news from the country, the persistent rumour about the road, the deteriorating quality of something or other, and the latest pronouncement from Mayor Designate Pamela Snodgrass, which everyone has an opinion on and almost nobody has read. It is, in its way, the perfect microcosm of how communities of this size operate everywhere in the world, although the residents of Rampside would object strongly to being called a microcosm of anything.
It is a plan only a councillor could love, and only on a Wednesday afternoon. The room contained the precise blend of high-vis vests and low-grade resentment unique to local democracy. Rampside carries on as it always has, broadly the same as last week, give or take a verb. The bins are collected when they are collected. The roundabout, where one exists, remains the roundabout. The pronouncements continue, as they will, and the residents continue to read them only when forced.
For more in this vein see also The Spoof.