Great news – Roz Smith re-standing in May elections

Roz Smith – brings energy and enthusiasm to the Headington Lib Dem team.

Altaf and Ruth are delighted that our close colleague Roz Smith is re-standing in the local elections in May.

We know that Roz feels privileged to have represented you as county councillor for the past four years, and has received a lot of support from people in the area.

She lives locally and is involved in many of our community organisations as school governor, fund-raiser and committee member, so unlike other candidates she has first-hand knowledge of what goes on in the area, and what Headington people are most concerned about. She champions Headington issues at County Hall

Roz knows how important it is to keep people informed. As part of the Headington Lib Dem team, she attends monthly Ward Focus Group meetings and street surgeries, listens carefully to comments from residents, and takes action to champion their concerns.

Together, Roz, Altaf and Ruth work hard throughout the year to represent your views.

With your help, Roz and the team have achieved positive results for Headington – just two examples are getting the London Road re-built rather than just re-surfaced, and working hard to get positive changes to the Access to Headington scheme so that as many trees and as much on-street parking is saved.

When Roz meets people at community events or on their doorstep, residents tell her they are worried about cuts to local vital services, neglected potholes and air pollution due to the amount of traffic movements we suffer in our area. If re-elected, we know Roz is determined to work hard on your behalf to tackle these issues and any other concerns to the best of her ability and her track record is one to be proud of.

If you wish to contact Roz, she would be pleased to hear from you. Her telephone number is 07584 257156. We hope you, like us, will give her your full support.

Breaking: proposal for new build at JR. Consultation dates 28-29 April

We have received the following from the University. The access route and timing may coincide with the Access to Headington works in Headley Way if proposals keep to the timescale in this communication, we are working with the County to address this

PROPOSAL FOR THE DEVELOPMENT OF A NEW NEUROSCIENCE RESEARCH FACILITY AT THE JOHN RADCLIFFE HOSPITAL

Dear Stakeholder,

We would like to invite you to attend a public exhibition to view proposals for a new building on the John Radcliffe Hospital Site at Headley Way.

The new building is intended to provide purpose-built facilities for the Centre for the Prevention of Stroke and Dementia (CPSD), as well as providing additional research and desk space for the Oxford Centre for Functional MRI of the Brain (FMRIB). Both of these organisations are component units of the Nuffield Department of Clinical Neurosciences (part of the University’s Medical Sciences Division).

When the development is complete, it will create the UK’s largest dedicated centre for stroke research and will help to maintain the University’s position as a world-leader not only in the research it undertakes, but also in the quality of teaching it provides.

Oxford City Council’s Development Plan allocates the John Radcliffe Hospital Site for new development which comprises hospital related uses, including associated administrative and academic floorspace.

A planning application is expected to be submitted to Oxford City Council in July 2017 to take forward the development of this new facility with construction to begin in early 2018.

As part of this process, the University is inviting members of the public to discuss the proposals with members of the project team on the following dates: 

Day 1: Friday 28 April 2017 between 4.00pm and 7.00pm 

Venue: Osler House, Osler Road, Headington, Oxford, OX3 9BL

Day 2: Saturday 29 April 2017 between 10.00am and 12.00pm

Venue: Osler House, Osler Road, Headington, Oxford, OX3 9BL

Members of the University and the design team will be available to answer any queries you may have. In addition, hard copies of a feedback form will be available at the consultation sessions and an online version will follow on the University’s website together with an electronic version of the display information. The University will review all feedback and will take it into account before details are finalised and the planning application submitted.

If you have any queries regarding the event please do not hesitate to contact the University at the following email address: public.consultation@admin.ox.ac.uk.

Old Headington power cuts – latest

We understand the frustration of residents in the Old Headington area who have experienced a series of power cuts over recent months. We are liaising with SSE and they are keeping us up to date with developments.

There was a further power cut of around 2 hours last night. The software that they had put in at the substation to monitor this did work – it detected fuses blowing and replaced them one by one but couldn’t completely prevent the power from going off.

This matter has been escalated within SSE, it has been brought to the attention of the Head of Network Sustainability and head of customer services for the area.

The problem is that the faults happen intermittently and are underground. In these sorts of cases, if water seeps into a nick in the plastic casing around the cables in one place, the fault may manifest itself some distance away at a joint. The software is trying to isolate the fault to a stretch of road between two specific location points – once the stretch of road is identified, SSE will dig it up.

Once the likely site of the fault is determined, the process would be that SSE schedules the digging up of the road and gives 7 days notice to residents. In cases of extreme urgency (permanent rather than intermittent fault), SSE could invoke emergency procedures and give only 48 hours notice, but this is unlikely in this case.

If you wish to talk  to SSE directly, the number to ring is 0800 980 1395 and the reference is 31598

One extra piece of information we learned: SSE does offer ‘suitcase’ packs to households to ensure power can be maintained while works are carried out and the main power is turned off, this may be useful for anyone needing power supply for medical equipment etc.

We are keeping the Friends of Old Headington informed

Book your stall NOW for the Headington Festival!

This year’s Headington Festival takes place on the first weekend in June and  bookings for stallholders are being taken now for the festivities on Sunday 4th June, in Bury Knowle Park.

This two day community festival attracts thousands of people each year, and features a host of free entertainment and family fun.

Support our event, and your local community, by hosting a stall to sell your produce or crafts, or to advertise your group or services.

Applying is even easier this year.  Just head to this website www.headingtonfestival.co.uk and click on the links for the “Stallholder Information” (boring but important) and then the link for “Stallholder Registration”.  Once the completed form is submitted through the website, it will be processed within a week, and your space will be confirmed.

Construction access management to Beech House – update

We understand that from today till 28 April Winvic will use a traffic marshall / spotter on the junction of Lime Walk and All Saints Road to assist with lorries turning in to All Saints Road and marshall pedestrians on the junction as and when required. The marshall will check lorries and turn away any unauthorised deliveries so there should be no more low loaders or other vehicles arriving at unauthorised times at the site and being turned back. This should reduce the amount of turning vehicles in Latimer Road and stop vehicles turning into/out of the Brambles or blocking driveways.

We are still awaiting the planning decision on whether to accept a revised construction access plan.

Pedestrian crossing at Old Road/Gipsy Lane junction – change requested

Roz and Ruth have requested that a high level repeater can be put in at the pedestrian crossing in the centre waiting section in Old Road. Here is the email we sent to the Access to Headington team for discussion. The County Council officers are currently considering this request.

Residents have drawn councillors’ attention to the fact that groups of schoolchildren cross here when they get off the bus on the southern side of Old Road to reach Cheney School. This means groups of (anecdotally up to 30) students try to use the puffin crossing at the same time.
This also means that when there is a crowd of children immediately next to the red/green man box, and because there is no audible signal it’s not easy for them to see when the green man sign comes on because they are all squashed together.
Please would it be possible to find some money in the A2H budget to put in a repeater at a higher level so that everyone can see it? Roz and I think this would be a great safety improvement so near a school if this is feasible and affordable.

Service of dedication at the JR on Saturday to commemorate repatriations

In October 2016, 456 daffodils were planted at the John Radcliffe by ex-services and police personnel to commemorate the Repatriations that passed through the entrance to the hospital.  These daffodils are now in full bloom and, on Saturday 8 April at 11am, The Lord Lieutenant of Oxfordshire, Tim Stevens, will unveil a plaque at the daffodils followed by a short service of Dedication.

Headington Swap Shop needs an organiser

Many thanks to Kate Hart who has run the popular Headington Swap Shop for many
years. Sessions are held on the 3rd Saturday morning of every month at
Headington Community Centre in Gladstone Road. Kate is stepping down soon, and
so far no-one has come forward to take over.

Here are the jobs that need doing – there are already other volunteers happy to
carry on helping out but someone is needed to take on these responsibilities:
– count the cafe takings each month
– calculate and pay volunteer expenses annually
– collect the PAT kit from Orinoco the week before the swap and return it
afterwards
– compile and enter the stats on the CAG database each month
– put the banner up the week before the swap
– publicise the swaps on the Oxford Mail events page
– be the point of contact for queries and CAG news & updates, volunteer
coordinator, open up and lock the centre on swap days

You can find more information on the HSS at
http://www.lowcarbonheadington.org​.uk​/headington​-swap​-shop​.html

If you are interested, or you know someone else who would like to volunteer,
please let me know or get in touch with Tanya via the website link above.

It would be a real shame if this community resource has to close.

Underground electricity fault in Old Headington area

There has been a series of power cuts over the recent past from the substation next to the garage in London Road through a fairly large area comprising St Andrew’s Rd, St Andrew’s Lane, Laurel Farm Close, Osler Road, Old High Street (and we would assume) Larkins Lane.

The Customer Relations adviser at SSE says there is an intermittent underground fault which could be caused by a number of factors including subsidence, or a knock to the plastic casing of a cable or joint which has induced seepage of water.

When the fault occurs, a safety fuse blows in the substation and has to be replaced. SSE has put in some software to monitor this in the substation – it’s called a Kelvatek “bidoyng” and for those of you dying to know what that is, please click here (thanks to Alexandra for the link)

Apparently it detects a blown fuse, replaces it and also does a search of nearby lines to try and track exactly where the fault is happening. They have also carried out back feeding to try and identify the source. They have ruled out overloading though.

If we get any more details we will post them here. There is currently no guarantee that another power cut won’t happen again but it should be rectified much more quickly – SSE Community Officers have been out door knocking to give advice to their customers.

 

Beech House construction traffic – response from Planning Enforcement

As promised, here is the response from the City Council regarding the requests from us and from Highfield Residents’ Association for enforcement action regarding the change of access route for construction vehicles to/from the Beech House site in Latimer Road via Highfield residential roads.

I have reviewed the original planning permission, the Construction Traffic Management Plan and the information sent in by yourself and the local residents.

Whilst the Construction Traffic Management Plan does limit the access to the development from London Road, on to Latimer Road and into the site, having discussed the matter with a number of council officers and under the circumstances, it is the council’s decision that is not expedient to take any enforcement action against the breach of planning control in this instance.

The National Planning Policy Framework advises that “local planning authorities should act proportionately in responding to suspected breaches of planning control”. In this instance, the developers are not wilfully choosing to breach their planning conditions under normal circumstances but have been forced into a temporary deviation due to other unrelated works that affect access into their site. It would not be reasonable to prevent deliveries from accessing the site or stop the site from developing whilst the Hospital’s energy pipework is installed.

Even if the council did decide that enforcement action was expedient and proportionate, the amount of time it would take to prepare, serve a breach of condition notice and the time for compliance allowed to the developers would likely exceed the time the London Road/Latimer Road junction is temporarily closed for. Any prosecution the council tried to bring against the developers would likely be dismissed as the developers would have a more than reasonable argument as to why they couldn’t temporarily comply with the condition.

The council is working with the county Highway team and the developers to try to make the situation as manageable as possible during the road closure and ensure residents are impacted as little as possible.

During the temporary closure of the London Road/Latimer Road junction, issues of highway safety should be referred to the Highway team at the county council or to the local police force who have the jurisdiction to deal with such matters.

I appreciate that this is not a welcome decision for you or the affected residents but I hope you can appreciate the reasoning why the council have arrived at the decision we have.