Well, I am pleased to see that this topic has so far been quite civil; I'll try and endeavor to keep it that way.
I personally found general chat was a good way to connect to people across maps. While I do not think that lag has spiked up as a direct result of the removal of the chat (and people sitting together in larger groups), I must find myself saying that I favored it over Local. I don't know quite why, but that's how I felt.
Now, as for the removal of it, well, I can't say that I envied the choice that had to be made by staff, but I feel like the complete removal of it was a tad drastic.
Again, I risk sounding like a broken record, but the source code would have helped to filter and restrict General chat to a more manageable size, among other things.
Am I sad it's gone? Yes. Can I do anything about it? Obviously not, but such is life, so I don't spend much time mourning it.
Edit: removed the whole tangent I went off on in the spoiler. Felt like it didn't quite tie into the post, not to mention that I was describing flamers more than trolls as per definition of dictionary.