LONDON — Staines wants the world to know it’s no blot on the landscape.
Sandwiched amid Heathrow Airport, a cluster of reservoirs and a bleak industrial park, some in this London commuter town feel Staines has received some bad press — and needs a change of name to change its fortunes.
Middle-class Staines was picked by British comedian Sacha Baron Cohen as the home of Ali G, his tracksuit-wearing wannabe gangsta. He cast the town of 45,000 as an urban wasteland whose main attractions include a traffic circle and a KFC.
The town initially welcomed Baron Cohen’s fame, but the negative connotations lingered.
Business leader Alex Tribick argues for changing the name to Staines-on-Thames or Staines- upon-Thames, highlighting the area’s proximity to the river. It might even boost business and tourism in time for the 2012 Olympics, he says.
Some critics say the proposed rebranding would be prohibitively expensive and note that the proposed names might draw the same kind of ridicule. Anne Damerell of the Staines Town Society called the idea “pretentious nonsense.”
