Blacon Area Committee.

Wednesday 29 January 2008.

The following is the Blacon Area Committee Officers report to this meeting. Many thanks to Janet Gittins

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Blacon Area Committee
Area Managers Report
January 2008

**For further information on any of the items listed, please contact Janet Gittins on 01244 402486 or j.gittins@chester.gov.uk, unless otherwise indicated.**

1.Christmas in Blacon
Blacon Area Committee’s first winter newsletter went out to all properties in Blacon prior to Christmas. We would welcome your views on this, please contact Janet with your feedback.
This years Christmas lights competition has been a huge success with fantastic Christmas light and decorative displays throughout Blacon. Organised by Blacon Area Committee and judged by residents and pupils from Blacon High School the winning property was 133 Stamford Road. Congratulations. An awards event was held on 9th January where Paul DeSantis from FIRST bus and Cllr Reggie Jones presented vouchers to all the winning residents for their creativity and for providing such colourful and attractive displays. Congratulations to all the winners and to all residents who helped to brighten up Blacon this Christmas. Thank you to First Bus for giving the prize money and supporting this event.

2.Blacon Open Spaces
a)Blacon Trees
Over 130 trees have now been planted at locations throughout Blacon. A traditional planting ceremony took place on 29th November. Press coverage was in the Chronicle and Standard week 12 December.
b)Play Areas
Saxon Way Play Area: Work onsite to refurbish the present play area with new toddler equipment will begin end February/March with completion within 6 weeks of starting on site.
Meynell Place: There are funds available to replace a unit of equipment at this play area. Play specialists have been asked to advise on the most suitable piece of equipment. New safety surfacing will also be placed alongside the existing slide. Works to be completed March/April 2008.
Treborth Road: As part of the new housing development a new play area will be built of Treborth road. From the old play area the slide is in good condition and can be relocated to add play value to an existing local play area. It has been suggested that Western Avenue would be a good site to relocate this equipment to. (Please relay any comments about this work to Janet Gittins)
c)Blacon Escarpment
Pupils from Blacon High School worked with the Area Committee prior to Christmas to get the recycling message across to residents. Year 7 pupil Phoebe Barker produced the winning poster that went out to 210 properties around the escarpment along with extra green & red bags just before Christmas. Environmental awards are to be presented to pupils to thank them for their involvement in their work.

Clearance works of the large items fly tipped at the escarpment took place week 21 January.

3.Road Safety
With Saxon Way play area being refurbished, residents have raised concerns about the speeds of vehicles using Saxon Way. As a result residents and Councillors will be going out with Community Safety Wardens and the Speed Indicator Device equipment (SID) to raise awareness of the speeds drivers are reaching on this stretch and to record data. Results will be shared at Area Committee and be passed onto County Highways and the police for comment.
In addition Blacon Area Committee is working with the County Highways road safety officer to set up a project with the local primary school. Children will be encouraged to assess any road safety risks in the area and produce signage to draw attention of these dangers to others.

New street signs are now in place at Melbourne place and Tregele Close.

4.Blacon Insulate and Save Scheme
Residents who own their homes can now apply for reduced cost or free insulation to reduce their household bills. Contact Cath Forkin on 01244
402423, or Blacon Community Trust. This is a partnership project between Chester City council, Blacon Community Trust, APS LTD, and Cheshire Fire Service.

5.Area Committee Payments 2007/8
Blacon Area Committee’s has an annual budget to enable local action to address local issues. In particular the Area Committee wishes to support local initiatives and activities that help improve the area. If your group or organisation has an idea and wants to apply please contact Janet for an application form. This will then be put forward at the next Area Committee for a decision.

6.Lottery Success: Great News For Chester
December brought success for Chester in the bid with Sustrans for funding from the Lottery Peoples £50 Million competition. A week of TV programmes culminated in online and telephone voting that saw Connect2 win the £50m prize to be spent on 79 projects across the UK. This will bring £1.25m to invest in Chester’s Green Network over the next 5 years, encouraging walking and cycling around the City, and helping to improve the quality of the environment for everyone.
There are 4 projects in Chester:
Handbridge to Huntington – Bridge and Cycle Route
A bridge has been an aspiration for many years; it appeared in the 1994 Chester Waterways Study and more recently in Project Chester. It would provide significant benefits to the City’s transport links by creating an alternative, traffic free route.
Improvements to Curzon Park/Roodee Foot Bridge
This bridge is open to walkers but it is not easy to take a bicycle across. Improvements would allow much better cycle access to the city and the riverside path for the residents of Curzon Park, Lache and Westminster Park.
Guilden Sutton & Mickle Trafford Greenway extension
The extension of the Sustrans Millennium route out to Guilden Sutton and Mickle Trafford will create a safe, traffic free route into the city and link into the growing greenway network.

River, Canal and Greenway link
This provides a multi-user cycle way and footpath between the Sustrans route on the old railway line and the new cycle route along the banks of the River Dee.
Winning is an important step forward but a lot of work still needs to be done. The projects are at different stages of development and we still need to raise further funding, but work on bringing each of the projects forward will start early in 2008.
Chester City Council and Cheshire County Council will be working hard together to make this happen.

7.Chester Northgate Development
The Northgate Development was scheduled to go ‘unconditional’ at the end of last November – meaning all the legal documents would be signed and both the council and ING would be committed to carrying out the development. However, this did not happen and the unconditional date has been delayed. This is due to the credit squeeze and its impact on the international money markets, rising costs of construction and the consequent negative impact on property values.
The City Council and ING remain committed to the scheme and are working closely together to resolve the issues and ensure the go ahead of the Northgate Development. At the moment we do not have a new programme but are hoping that a start on site can take place as soon as possible in 2008.

8.Draft Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) Sustainable Development
The Council are currently preparing a Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) on Sustainable Development. The SPD will set out Chester’s commitment to achieving sustainable development through the planning process. The SPD will cover the following topics,
Location of new developments, the need to travel and building design
Reducing water consumption and choosing appropriate methods to dispose of surface water
Improving waste management techniques
Energy requirements for new developments
Protecting and enhancing natural landscapes & biodiversity

In March 2008, the Forward Planning Team will be circulating the contents of the document to all Area Committees as part of the formal consultation exercise. During this time, the Council will be seeking resident’s views and comments on the SPD. If you have any comments at this stage please send your comments in writing to: The Forward Planning Team, Chester City Council, The Forum, Chester, CH1 2HS Or you can send an e-mail to: forwardplanning@chester.gov.uk

9.Ward Walks
CDHT will be leading area ward walks at
Australian Roads area – 7 February, 10.30am at Library
Cathedral Roads area – 12 February, 10.30am at top of Durham road near the school
High Rise area, 26 February, 10.30am at Foyer Plas Dinas
Welsh Roads area, 13 March, 10.30am outside Dee Point School

10.Date of Next Meeting
The next scheduled Blacon Area Committee meeting will take place on
Wednesday 19 March, 6.30pm at Blacon High School (Community Wing), Melbourne Road, Blacon CH1 5JH.
The regular informal pre-session and refreshments will begin at 6.00pm

Treborth Road Development.

A meeting of the Residents Association took place this week to discuss possible new names. Cllr Reggie Jones Chairman of the Blacon Area Committee was among those present.

The meeting resolved the following —
Conway Grove)
Caernarfon Grove) These four roads are all culdesacs
Denbigh Grove) the towns are also along with Chester,
Beamaris Grove) members of the Chester and North

Wales Walled TownsFriendship Circle Link.

Other names agreed were Afon House, Snowdon House and Deganwy House.

All these names will be put to the Area Committee in January for final determination. I don’t envisage a problem.

Letter From Welsh Water
Further to our telephone conversation, I am emailing to inform you of our scheme to help relieve the risk of residential wastewater flooding in Donne Place, Blacon.

The scheme will involve constructing a new combined sewer pipe that will provide increased capacity in the local wastewater network. These essential improvements will offer protection to those properties that are currently suffering from internal sewer flooding. We anticipate that the scheme will start in January 2008 (exact dates TBC) and will take approximately 18 weeks to complete.

During this period we will relay a new pipe from the existing manhole on the junction of Shelly Road/ Blacon Ave across the playing fields to the corner of Durham Road. We will then relay pipes back across Blacon Hall Road, going under the disused railway bridge, to the existing manhole on St Chads Road.

There will be 3 way traffic lights on the roundabout and a road closure has been applied for on Blacon Hall road.

If you have any queries in relation to this project please don’t hesitate to contact me on 01244 529 700. I will be in touch in due course to confirm start on site dates.

Kind regards

Sara Hayes
PR & Communications

Costain Ltd on Behalf of Dwr Cymru Welsh Water
The North Wales Team
Vista
St Davids Park
Ewloe
Flintshire
CH5 3DT