Today, I went on my own to the St. Bartholomew Councillor's Surgery (first Thursday of every month, 7:30-8:30pm at Hyde Parish Hall). As it is the time of the summer holidays, not a lot is happening at the moment, so the answer to most of my requests for updates was predominantly 'no news'. As always a few short notes from my conversation with Jim Maynard:
Council house development
No updates for this at the moment: the next Housing Delivery Committee meeting will be Wednesday 18 September!
Note: The next step should be planning application (which should include the appropriation). Depending on what kind of planning application it is (if it's just with outline planning) there could even be another one (with detailed plans) but as it's just for a few houses, it's most likely going to be a detailed one straightaway.
Pedestrian improvements
Last time at the surgery we talked about the footpath opposite of the allotments and I was wondering why this should be part of the mitigation for the housing development in Abbotts Barton when it's clearly used by many people on a daily basis and we already get more people in the area due to the Abbotts Walk development. A lot of young children don't like to go along there when using scooters as the surface has become very bumpy; this means these families will walk on the road past the rugby club which is not quite as safe without a proper pavement away from the cars. The path is also getting narrower as the edges are crumbling away and at some places it's only wide enough for one person these days. I was assured that a while back Jim Maynard took some photos of the path and that he sent them to the council to show them the bad state of the path. He has asked for an update but there was none at this time.
Play areas
I wanted to know if there was any movement on the MUGA / skate park plans for the North Walls Play Area but there is no news. As I had recently read that the council had got a donation in shape of an inheritance I was wondering if any of that money (it's meant for homes for the elderly) could at least indirectly help the skate park project along which seems to be slightly short of funding. Jim Maynard promised to ask about that.
Again, there are no news on the planned play area in the Abbotts Walk development.
In previous conversations with the councillors Jane was talking about the dilapidated goal post in the Abbotts Barton park and we were promised that a replacement would be requested, if at all possible two of them to allow for a proper game of football: according to Jim Maynard these are on the council list of things to be done, however, they seem to be pushed down again and again. I also asked about adding some benches/picnic benches for outside of the fenced-in play area, it would be very nice to have those and whether or not the new houses are going to be built this is something we should insist on getting!
What is a public meeting?
A while ago I was reading that the Winchester Town Forum wanted to hold some public meetings for some issues (for example the River Park Leisure Centre). As all council meetings are normally public I was wondering what would be different here. It turns out these would be bigger meetings with the public invited that are normally held in the main hall of the Guildhall and they would serve two purposes, a) to inform and b) to get an insight in the public's opinion.
Crossing for Worthy Road
Again, no news, and this is something that Dominic Hiscock is dealing with. Unfortunately he wasn't at the surgery.
Fracking
Lynne had forwarded this question to me, to find out what the council knows about a fracking license being issued in King's Worthy (see this article in Hampshire Chronicle). As the council has no say on this anymore (decisions have been moved to other departments to make it harder to stop plans) there was no answer at this time. I requested to find out whether the council has any position at all as people have concerns about the groundwater getting polluted.
Don't forget: The next Councillor's Surgery will be Thursday 5 September!
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