@FionaRadic @eddiemurphy4pcc View of cathedral will be gone. View of trains on the railway will be gone. And people will be unseen + unsafe.
— New Listener (@New_Listener) March 13, 2016
@FionaRadic @eddiemurphy4pcc Part of the railside barrier is to conceal trunking. The raised roadside barrier is completely unnecessary.
— New Listener (@New_Listener) March 13, 2016
I attended a workshop hosted by Civic Voice and as a result have joined a Peterborough “Asset of Community Value” group founded at the workshop. The workshop explained how an “asset of community value” can be registered with the local council and what that means should it be or become threatened. The rules were explained and what and what was not eligible.
The new group is not a “political” group in that peoples’ views on the legislation may be strong, but those views are not the point. I would describe this as a “technical” alliance between people prepared to share knowledge and help people in Peterborough who want to do this. I was quite shocked to learn that Peterborough has only registered two Assets of Community Value (the Green Backyard and the Football Ground) whereas Chelmsford identified seventy which needed to be registered.
What about the Lido? We need a little list.
Cllr Andy Coles acted as spokesperson for the Peterborough group at the workshop and he was an obvious elected councillor lead. For those who don’t know him he is a keen supporter of The Green Backyard and used to be its beekeeper. He has also supported the parishing of Westwood (a project currently in abeyance, but which I strongly support) and he currently holds the council’s “community” brief.
Alun Williams volunteered to look after the membership.
You can join the new group on face book. You will then be added to a google group.
The previous cycle route ran to the RIGHT of the vehicular one. (It was one of two city centre roads which require moving to the wrong side of the roads and was a top local knowledge quiz question.) It was used by cyclists to EXIT Long Causeway onto Broadway. During recent new surfacing work, inexplicably the old route has been blocked off by a new bit of fence.
Long Causeway is one way for vehicles but two way for cyclists.
No entry signs at the EXIT of Long Causeway don’t make sense, even to car drivers, who wouldn’t see them, if they were driving in the right direction. The road is one way for cars, (isn’t it?) which would be coming towards you in this picture. The only vehicular exit is via Cathedral Square. Which is behind you.
Only council permitted vehicles are allowed in past the rising bollards. Although they are not currently working, it looks as if a new monitor has been installed.
An exit is required onto Broadway for cyclists. At the moment cyclists are cycling straight past the completely pointless no entry sign and over the potentially rising bollards.
Is the council planning to
We did have a Council Leader who wanted to abolish cycling in the whole city centre. He lost his seat in May.
While he is gone, I for one am hoping the Council will be able to resolve this particular road sign nonsense quickly, sensibly and constructively. And if whoever is responsible for traffic signs in the city wants to comment below, he or she is very welcome.
There is hope. The view in the other direction makes a little bit more sense, (except for the temporary signage).
For a second day running it has not been possible to see the sun in Peterborough at 09:30. I had made a note to check where it would be on Friday (tomorrow) when there is a chance to witness a near total solar eclipse. People have made plans and some have plotted parties and bought cameras, filters, projectors and protective eye wear, ready for the big day.
Instead we have “fog”. This is a polite word for particulate laden and polluted air. It might be a lot more accurate to call it “smog”. Yesterday it almost lifted just after lunch and shafts of sunlight penetrated into the city centre. Today we have what looks like heavy cloud. But it is more likely that the smog has simply floated up a bit. The government website is predicting worse pollution levels on Friday than today.
I joined the Green Party in 2007 as I tried to reverse Peterborough City Council’s decision to support the incineration of domestic waste. This was a battle which we campaigners lost. We saw a neighbouring proposal fall in the face of a far more successful campaign. Lessons were learned, as they say. And I started to consider the vexed question of what exactly drives politics in Peterborough.
A key supporter of incineration of waste is Cllr Marco Cereste (he is also a director of Peterborough Renewable Energy Limited which builds slightly cleaner incinerators than the one the council is building). As leader of the council he personally attracts huge amounts of anger, frustration and suspicion: some of it reasonable, some of it less so. But in the last couple of weeks he has told the story of his signing (on behalf of the city he represents) a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on his facebook profile (shared with his facebook friends). This MoU is with an entity locals understand is a Chinese government funded organisation, possibly what we’d call in the UK, an “NGO” (non governmental organisation).
Then in an online discussion elsewhere entirely about this morning’s fog, someone shared this video which I hadn’t come across previously. The story of this video’s making and removal from Chinese social media is available online. I just wish that we’d had this video at the time the council’s decision was still not made. At the notorious moment when Pam Kreling (then one of the councillors making the crucial decision about whether or not to use incineration) said words to the effect that if she couldn’t see anything emerging from a stack, then there was nothing there and there was by implication nothing which could do anyone any harm. As campaigners we weren’t allowed to speak at critical moments in meetings: in fact the chair of one of the meetings offered to have me and Richard Olive thrown out when we stood up to tell them they were being hopelessly misinformed by their advisors. But as I observed this pantomime (there was no beadle to implement the Chair’s desire) I was left reeling from a deeper revelation. I still wonder how people in key positions got through even basic level schooling, what exactly went on in their science lessons and what their marks were.
Dear Ms Radic,
Thank you for contacting me about fracking, I understand your concerns with this matter and appreciate your correspondence.
Shale gas is a promising new potential energy resource which could reduce our reliance on imported gas and help with keeping energy costs low. It could create thousands of jobs, bring in billions in tax revenues and secure our energy supply for the future. However, let me assure you that I strongly believe fracking operations should be safe, and must not be at the expense of local communities or the environment.
Safety is the top priority of the Government. The UK has over 50 years of experience in regulating the onshore oil and gas industry and we have a strong regulatory regime for shale gas extraction. The Health and Safety Executive is responsible for checking all aspects of operator’s plans and designs. No site will be given the go ahead without first meeting strict safety criteria.
The risk of water contamination is low when the correct regulations are followed. The Environment Agency will work with the Health and Safety Executive to ensure high standards are maintained and that the quality of our water is properly protected. The Environment Agency will make an assessment of any chemicals an operator proposes to use in fracking and will not authorise the use of hazardous substances where there is an unacceptable risk they would enter groundwater.
Water for fracking operations has been provided by local water companies, which are obligated to produce and update a long-term plan every five years that has contingency reserves in case of a drought. Therefore water companies will assess the amount of water available before providing it to operators.
Thank you again for taking the time to contact me.
Yours sincerely,
Stewart Jackson
Member of Parliament for Peterborough
