Great war centenary

Jane Backhouse, Cranfield's western fronter is gingering up interest in planning for the 100th anniversary of the outbreak of the "great" war.  Jane is on 

email

She writes:

Dear Colleague,

As I am sure you are aware, I am very interested and involved in matters pertaining to the Great War. I am also sure that you are very aware of the date!

It would be wonderful to support all local village plans outlined by the RBL last November in Cranfield Express as well as other events in the locality.

I am feeling very strange really – humbled and honoured to be able to take an active part in such a time of historical commemorations.

Would you be able to come along to a meeting of all interested and like-minded people on the village to discuss further how we as a community begin to mark this historical period? I would be delighted if as many as possible could come along. I will be providing tea and coffee.

The venue is to be the  Village Hall and the date the 10^th February at 7pm.

I do hope that you and others will be there.

Best Wishes

Jane

Jane Backhouse

Western Front Association

The Western Front Association - Milton Keynes Branch

The Western Front Association

Feel like gambling?

Here's the latest from the Broad Green Met Office. This is not a good time to get your hopes up, or say to the family "Off the sofa etc, time we got some fresh air in our lungs. We're going down the Spinney."

Egg heading for your face...just mebbe Sat afternoon if you feel like gambling. Otherwise let them drowse on. 

Happy birthday Fil

Five to seven pm last night was a chance to forget parish council and planning and hares and culls etc and help Fil and Gabby Wain celebrate 10 years of the Hairstop in the village at their salon on the High Street. There was a great turn-out and a strong sense of celebration. 

Delicious cakes were supplied by Butterflies. I specially enjoyed the butternut squash, courgette and carrot cake. 

Proposed Emergency Temporary 30mph Speed Limit – Crawley Road, Cranfield

I have a request for a Temporary 30mph Speed Limit at the above location. Details are listed in the schedule below and having assessed the application I am satisfied the request is justified.

The restrictions are to be in operation only when the necessary signs are erected on site. The Legal Order will be made to cover twenty one day period.

If you have any observations you wish to make I would be grateful if you could let me know as soon as possible.

Gareth Hughes. Streetworks Co-ordinator

……………………………………………………………………………………

                       

Road:                                 Crawley Road, Cranfield

Application from:             Bedfordshire Highways – Silv Chelaru – 03003008049

Reason:                        Resurfacing works

Length affected:       From existing 40mph to county boundary

Date: The speed limit is expected to come into place on Saturday 1^st February 2014 – 24 hours.

Hares - the true story

Needless to say Cranfield University (or Cranfield Airport)  never intended to have the great bunny-cull slung round its neck. For the record, here is the press release it issued:

“Cranfield Airport is required by law to ensure that the airport is run safely in line with all airports in the UK.

"The airport has some areas of overgrown scrubland, which reduces visibility of airport safety areas and also harbours various wildlife that are a potential hazard to aircraft.  The airport has planned maintenance to clear areas of scrubland over the coming week.

"The University, as owner of the airport, recognises the threatened status of the brown hare and requested that the airport authorities avoid shooting any brown hares during this operation. The airport has confirmed there will not be any shooting during this operation.

"The University has also requested the airport to carry out a further study of the safety risks and population dynamics of brown hare at Cranfield Airport. The airport has confirmed that an independent study will be carried out and any appropriate action will be based on the recommendations of the report.”


PC reps met with university reps as part of a routine, twice yearly exchange of information and views. Although we talked about bus shelters and cycle track hares were the 'elephant in the room' and we did discuss the publi c controversy. We noted the problems they have with wildlife including rodents gnawing at lighting cables and, of course, deer running onto the runway and accepted the ‘duty of care’ to airfield users, which management and the university have. The airport manager stressed that they were taking advice from the Deer Initiative a “partnership of statutory, voluntary and private interests dedicated to ‘ensuring the delivery of a sustainable, well-managed wild deer population in England and Wales’.”

They were hoping to render the airfield "unfriendly to wildlife".  Dense vegetation on the south side was accessible to rabbits, hares and deer and attractive to them.  But there was no plan to ‘exterminate’ anything.


I understand scrub and vegetation clearing has gone ahead but there no plans to shoot any animals fleeing the big tidy up.

weather today

BBC weatyher for Bedford today

East of England

Forecast Summary

• Today

  Rain or showers this morning, clearing away westwards but perhaps falling as wet snow for a time in some higher parts. A brisk easterly breeze giving an increasingly cold feel to the day.

• Tonight

  A cloudy night with cold east or northeast winds. A few showers, mainly rain or sleet in the southeast and near coasts but some wintry flurries further northwest. Icy patches.

hares on the menu?

It was squeaky bum time for hares on Cranfield airfield up until yesterday afternoon. Read about the unfolding drama at local news and see local comment  on the Cranfield facebook page 
There was more up to date stuff on facebook becuase I can get on it easier from the iphone than I can with the blog. Techies are working on this.

PC reps meeting uni tonight for general chewing of fat. But I'm sure hares will be on the menu (not)

Hare today, gone tomorrow?

Forget the badgers, Cranfield Uni has got hares in its cross-hairs (sorry) because of a muntjac-aircraft collision? Sorry, I don't follow the logic either. We have a meeting with the uni this week and will seek a full explanation. In the meantime read about it here. See comments on the Cranfield facebook page

Uni threatens hare cull

Note the wifi symbol...

Never renowned for its cafe society Cranfield has another string to its bow. OSO near Hacfield Leasing in the high Street,  has been open since December. It's just moved off my peripheral vision  and appeared straight in front of me. The coconut square is to die for. Note the wifi symbol

Agenda for Parish Council 22 January

8 pm Holywell School

^1.            To receive apologies for absence  

^2.            To receive declarations of personal and/or prejudicial interests in any matter

^3.            To confirm the minutes of the last meeting[s] Clerks Report 

^4.            Health & Safety 

^5.            Reports from Committees 

5.1.    General Purposes Committee

5.1.1.    Siting of waste bins x 3

5.2.    Burial Grounds Committee

5.3.    Environment Committee

5.4.    Planning Committee

^6.            Financial matters and accounts for payment

^7.            Correspondence   

^8.            Reports from unitary councillors (and any other representative)

^9.            Highway matters

Up to date crime figures for Cranfield

Men's breakfast

 

There will be a  men's breakfast on 15th February - served from 8:30 and costing £5, at Wootton Church. The speaker is from World Vision.
If anyone wishes to go email Andrew Pearson Andrew.Pearson@eemua.org 

Crawley Road closed again??

If you thought Crawley Road was all done and dusted, think again. This has just come into the PC



We have received instruction from Central Beds Council to carry out detailed design and programming for maintenance works at the following location;

Crawley Road, Cranfield over the weekends of 1st & 2nd, 8th & 9th Feb (08:00 to 18:00)

We will not be carrying out a letter drop as there are no residences within the closure, but Cranfield University have been contacted and Cranfield F.C. will be contacted prior to the start of works.

The dates provided are proposed dates and can be subject to change for a number of reasons.

Advanced Warning signs will be erected at this location prior to work commencing.

In the meantime, if there are any issues that you would like to raise at this time, please do not hesitate to contact me. However, please understand that I may need to refer any matters regarding budget or policy decisions back to the council.

Kind regards

Geoff Parrott
Site Supervisor | Bedfordshire Highways
0845 365 6000 | m: 07725445608 | e: geoff.parrott@amey.co.uk

The great borealis Hunt

There are strong predictions that the Northern Lights might be visible over large parts of Britain tonight. So good luck to all Cranfieldians in the great  Borealis Hunt. Check it out in the 

Daily Telegraph

The scientific name for the Northern Lights is aurora borealis, named after the Roman goddess of the dawn. Northern Lights are essentially created by the interaction of the Earth’s magnetism and solar wind.
The light displays occur when solar particles enter the Earth’s atmosphere in an oval area above the magnetic pole – the aurora belt. These particles emit burning gases upon impact, which produce different coloured lights: oxygen produces green and yellow; nitrogen produces blue…
The best displays occur in the northern parts of Sweden, Norway and Finland, Greenland and Svalbard, Alaska, Canada and Russia. The best months to see them are in February and March and then in late October and November.

We are where we are

Busy parish council committees last night with nine members present and apologies from Morris, Cosbie-Ross and Clark. 

Members were very concerned about the planning application for the former Hartwell Almshouses and the proposal for three separate dwellings each with a bedroom and a 'study-bedroom'. That suggests potential dense occupation and we specified that there should be parking at the front for six vehicles. The High Street is packed tight as it is.

The latest proposal is disappointing but not a surprise. The former owner, the Hartwell Charity, aspired to modernise and sell the building as a single luxury dwelling - potentially the best way of ensuring that its historical and architectural merits would be preserved. But none of the modernisation proposals met with approval from the CBC conservation officer and fell by the way side. So as we often say wearily: 'We are where we are".

Wherever that is!

"a villainous wolf who looked as it had just returned from a bad night in Milton Keynes"

Panto triumph is bad news for Wolf?  Cranfield wows the critics. Or the critic. BTW who is Prof D. Ince? Read the review...

Times and Citizen

Superfast on the horizon?

More tentative, edging towards 'superfast broadband' in Cent Beds. It won't arrive in time for this posting lol.


Central Bedfordshire Council has been working with neighbouring authorities and BT on a project to deliver superfast broadband across the area.
 
BT has now provided us with provisional mapping to show locations and phases of possible superfast access for residents and businesses. The mapping shows that the project will support almost 15,500 premises in Central Bedfordshire to receive superfast broadband services (speeds of at least 24 megabits per second) and ensure speeds of at least 2 megabits are available for all. This means that approximately 90% of Central Bedfordshire will be able to receive superfast broadband by 2016/17 under this plan.
Please find attached the approximate map of phases. We will be publishing this on our website shortly and are sharing this with you in advance so you can assess the impact on your communities.
Below you can see also link to a postcode look up facility. https://bedford.firmstep.com/popup.aspx/RenderForm/?F.Name=WFQy9d6XAA4
 
I must emphasise that we are sharing these phasing maps to ensure the project is as open and transparent as possible, but the map and postcode look-up are only our best understanding of BT's project deployment at this stage. This is subject to change during the lifetime of the project and areas are likely to be added and removed from the plan, in light of on the ground conditions as BT assess them.
It is our intention to work towards ensuring superfast coverage for all and to this extent we are working with the Government on a Superfast Extension Programme to support areas not covered in the current programme. We are also working with the South East Midlands Local Enterprise Partnership to secure additional resources to extend coverage further.
 
We will be publishing all this information on our website today at www.centralbedfordshire.gov.uk/broadband. 

We will also be providing hard copies of the map in our libraries, and releasing information to the press.
If you have any queries please do not hesitate to contact James.cushing@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk or Trish.Etheridge@centralbedfordshire.gov.uk
 

Cllr Richard Wenham
Deputy executive member for corporate resources

Parish Council 8 January

Agenda for PC next week (provisional)

BUSINESS TO BE DONE
In attendance:
To receive apologies for absence:  CBCllr/PCllrs:  Mrs Sue Clark, A Morris
To receive declarations from members in relation to discloseable pecuniary interests:

Planning Committee
    1.    General Planning Matters
Reports – Correspondence – Agenda Items

    

General Purposes Committee
    1.    Waste Bins
    2.    Salt bags
    3.    Electricity supply
    4.    Bus shelters
    5.    Notice board
Reports – Correspondence – Agenda Items



Burial Grounds
    1.    Baby burial area
    2.    Church wall
    3.    Water supply – cemetery
Reports – Correspondence – Agenda Items

Environment Committee
    1.    War memorial green
    2.    Skate park
    3.    Tree inspection
    4.    Broad Green hedge
Reports – Correspondence – Agenda Items

Anti-flooding

I haven't carried out a personal inspection but all the anti-flood work in Crawley Road carried out before Christmas must be getting tested. Hopefully not to destruction.

Beware oil rustlers

It's expensive enough to buy and you don't want to lose it when it's safely in the tank.  See this warning from Beds Police


 RURAL homeowners on oil-fired central heating are being reminded about the risk of oil thefts as winter sets in and warned to remain vigilant throughout January and February when the demand for oil may increase.

Read more: http://www.bedfordshire-news.co.uk/News/Bedfordshire-homeowners-warned-to-watch-out-for-winter-oil-theft-20131230110038.htm#ixzz2pQIfSZFC

Find flood warnings

Flood warnings in the Eastern region from the Environment Agency 

Visit http://www.environment-agency.gov.uk/homeandleisure/floods/34678.aspx?type=Region&term=Anglian&from=fl

Flooding alert in Bedfordshire

A grium start to the year - everywhere not just Beds. But even though we are scores of miles from the coast there are still hazards

Beds on Sunday reports this morning...

PARTS of Bedfordshire are on flood alert after heavy rainfall since the start of the year.
The Environment Agency has reported this morning (January 3) that the River Great Ouse will continue to rise between Newport Pagnell, where the river level is currently at its peak, and Bedford as the high water levels head downstream over the next few days.
Levels are already beginning to rise in Tempsford while Harrold Bridge is currently closed.
The Agency expects 'low lying land and roads to be affected first' and warn further showers will be expected for the next few days.
A statement read: "On New Year’s day up to 16mm of rain was recorded in the Upper Ouse catchment. As the catchment is now saturated we have seen river levels react to this, and the peak is now travelling down the Ouse, currently around Newport Pagnell.
"We will continue to monitor the situation and update this flood alert as appropriate."

Read more: Environment Agency warning

You have been warned

Watch out for train travel on Thameslink over the next 24 hours due to predicted stormy conditions. Trouble in Cranfield has ventured out but will be getting an early train home this afternoon. 

A statement from First Capital Connect says: "As the storm will continue throughout the night, the lines have to be checked for damage on Tuesday morning before being released back to us to start running services again. There will be no trains on Tuesday in the hours of darkness and we'll resume service as soon as we are able.
"We advise passengers to check our website or contact our Twitter team (@FirstCC) before they travel and allow plenty of time for their journey. If you have booked advanced travel and are using our services to connect with other ones, we are passing all FCC tickets valid for travel on Sunday, Monday or Tuesday on any of these days.
"We are advising customers to try and get home early on Monday and wherever possible not to travel on Monday evening and Tuesday morning. Services are likely to remain disrupted until the close of service on Christmas eve.
"We will continue to monitor the forecast and update our customers as the situation develops."

Read more:Bedfordshire News

Escape pod

Need a break over the festive phase? Rellies getting you down? Want off the couch? Check out the Forest Centre opening times

 

Superfast Cranfield?

We are in Phase 2 (see below):  Superfast broadband is due to arrive in Cranfield between October next year and March 2015. CBC in partnership with MK and Beds Borough just announced the roll out of their superfast programme. CBC states:



Around 15,500 homes and business premises in Central Bedfordshire are set to benefit from new superfast broadband infrastructure, it was announced yesterday (Fri, 20 Dec).

The council is on target to deliver high-speed broadband (24Mbps) to approximately 90 per cent of premises in Central Bedfordshire by the end of 2016, with all areas set to receive services of 2 Mbps or more.

The project is a partnership with Bedford Borough and Milton Keynes Councils, BDUK (the Government’s superfast programme) and BT Openreach.

The locations and phases of delivery are now available on the council’s website at www.centralbedfordshire.gov.uk/broadband

The  programme will build on the existing fibre networks already provided by BT’s commercial investment.

Wind turbine application

From Against Cranfield Turbines 

Cranfield Wind Turbine application delayed yet again. Latest statement from FCC advises it will be submitted at the end of January.

Find Against Cranfield Turbines 

on Facebook 

Brrrrrrrr

 

6 pm: This white patch is heading for us...brrrrr

Baxter makes it back

My impression of dogs - they are a hobby for insomniacs as the gate to Broad Green clanks again at 6.30 am or it's the chair of the parish council's dog writhing in anticipation of fresh meat on the other side of her door as I knock. Does Jake listen to her plea for good behaviour? I leave  you to work it out.

Nevertheless it's Christmas and this post is for all my friends in Cranfield who I think the world of and who have dogs of which I do not think a lot. To show there are no hard feelings, here's a heartwarming shaggy dog story. Baxter makes it back 




Baxter makes it back 

Planning apps in Cranfield

New planning applications in for Cranfield include the former Hartwell Alms houses (now sold) viewable at

 Central Beds Planning

and the development at the corner of Lodge Road and the High Street viewable at

Central Beds Planning Lodge Road

Holywell expansion

Item of note for full parish council on Wednesday night.

Report of presentation by Holywell head teacher to parish councillors this month 

Before the meeting started, Mr Haddon updated members on the expansion plans for the school.  The school is moving towards being a 600 pupil school, possibly relocating the library which would be used as a village library. The school needs more land for sport which it is hoped will be a school and village facility.  The aim is to put a village sports hall with a 3-badminton hall and a dance hall – located at the end of the MUGA.