Wednesday 3 June 2009

Final week

It has been a hectic final week before the local election. A part from all the canvassing and leafleting a number other things have happened this week.

Firstly the solar photovoltaic panels are finally being installed on Greenfield School roof. They should be working by the end of the week. I am now planning a community event to give everyone the opportunity to see them and learn more about them, probably in the first week of July.

I attended a meeting between the Parish Council and Highways on Monday to confirm the details for traffic calming at the bottom of Pulloxhill Road and High Street Greenfield on the approaches to the school. We should be seeing two roundabouts at the end of Mill Lane and the end of Pulloxhill Road with other "tabletop" type traffic calming following on after consultation.

On Tuesday I had a meeting with the planning department regarding a possible new school to determine criteria for acceptable sites. This follows on from a recent Governors meeting where a new school was discussed with the new Director of Children's Services at Central Bedfordshire Council.

On Tuesday evening I had a meeting with RATS (see earlier blog) to review investigations and actions which have been taken over the last couple of years to find a solution to the lorry problem in Greenfield. One of the main stumbling blocks has been discovering that whilst the original planning permission for Pulloxhill Industrial Estate in 1986 did limit the hours of operation of the site this was lifted in 1987 by a supplementary planning application. I am now asking Highways to investigate whether night time restrictions for loading and unloading can be imposed on top of the 7.5 tonne limit. Note the 7.5 tonne limit only applies to through traffic and not to lorries loading or unloading at the Industrial Estate.

Feedback from canvassing has been interesting with many people indicating that they will vote. With many keen to vote on local issues we are finding a lot of support. The backlash against the main political parties seems to be affecting the voting intentions for the Euro election with some voters even saying they will vote Green or UKIP i.e anyone other that the main three parties.