twowheelsgood

Yes, my first and subsequent thoughts on reading this news were 'how much has this cost us'?  Because, lets face it, the council were over a barrel, as a result of their own stupidity (not for the first time), and the two key players knew it. But weren't Jewson's due to be cleared out anyway? So probably a double pay day for them.

Idiotic own goal by the Council - no way was there ever going to be 20000 people, but no doubt a lot have stayed away as a result. Walked down Bath St a couple of times this morning and its been deserted.

The salty hulk (partly) opens tomorrow - on the Councils website they say 'We expect around 15,000 to 20,000 visitors to Old Market on 1 May. For those planning to travel inside the city, walking and cycling is recommended.' Oh dear lord, the traffic will be stationery for a 10 mile radius. At say 2 to a car,  that’s up to 10,000 cars - the council, in a masterly understatement to avoid widespread panic, say 'with large visitor numbers anticipated, car parks on the Old Market site may become full.' For once, they may be right. Never mind the jambs, count the money from the car parks … 

Here here. The missus spends more than £10 on a pair of knickers? What a woman!!

Assuming that is what they will be selling and you must buy from there, then yes. Other breakfast burger joints are available however, which further underlines the nonsense of it all. I prefer a nice bowl of muesli ...

It’s a box ticking exercise - the planning application has to have a 'Statement of Community Involvement', so the applicant holds a very short public meeting, displaying the proposals, for as short a period as possible, in a difficult to access location with no parking. Public consulted - highlight vague feel good statements such as 'providing exciting development opportunities for youth in the city' - comments collated - statement to say they've been considered - box ticked - job done. I'll wager the planning application will be submitted within a couple of weeks.

The planning permission that has been implemented is for 'change of use of ground floor restaurant to food take away ...'

There is a condition which restricts the sale of hot food between 1.30am and 12 noon to protect the residential amenity of nearby residents.

However, the applicant has subsequently stated there is no intention to open as a takeaway, so who knows what is happening.

Their website is here http://www.hereforhereford.co.uk

An extremely intelligent and erudite bunch who have consistently shown the Council's approach to theCore Strategy, bypass et al to be deeply flawed and worse.

There are 1000 spaces if you factor in Garrick House car park as well, and don't forget this is 24/7 as well. The council have been boasting about £1m+ pa income from this car parking to deflect opinion from the £30-60m they have had to pay for this development (or, rather, we have had to pay, at the expense of every other service), yet people don't seem to connect the two. 

'For an hour of free parking spend £20 or more in Waitrose' it says on the new website. That’s about the only concession. How that’s going to work I've no idea. I can imagine there will be some sort of friction between the developers and stanhope about these charges - they're going to deter shoppers without a doubt. Typically myopic council thinking - grab the money and sod the consequences.

http://www.oldmarkethereford.co.uk/neighbourhood

What about some innovation? Free electric shuttle bus between the station and the OLM for instance. Concessions for cycling as they do for the Eden project. 

Planning will ask for pre-application forms and a fee and then make purchasers wait 4-6 weeks for a reply ...

It’s a great initiative - like so many other things, small and not so small items just not done over a number of years have left the city looking increasingly shabby. I think the money megilleland is referring to is the 20% profit going into private pockets.

This is a very good question, to be honest although this is labelled as a service yard I just automatically assumed that any traffic would enter and exit from Blackfriars Street side, it never once occurred to me that they may enter and exit via Edgar St, surely this is just while the building work is continuing?

It is a service yard for goods deliveries - there is a second one off Newmarket Street. The Edgar St one will have a very narrow slip road - just 2m wide (no one thought to measure the width of a lorry) and the length of one lorry, where deliveries are expected to park up whilst they open the gates or wait for a space in the yard. Alternatively the driver has to hop out, avoiding being run over and ask at the intercom for them to open the Newmarket St gates because there is nowhere for lorries to pull up here. Did someone say not very well thought out? As for exiting, it will entail pulling out across all lanes ...

Well done Jim - the hours that I and so many others have wasted sitting at these lights whilst nothing happens beggars belief, not to mention the impact on the poor souls who live on Ledbury Road. They were never needed in the first place, no one was consulted, it was one councillors ill judged stance that pushed them through, with an uproar once put in, which the council ignored. Not even MP Keetch could get them to rethink, so its about time something was done. In many respects this would be a good test at a minor junction - get rid, see the improvement and use the argument to get rid of more. Mind you, at the rate they're planting the damned things around the OLM we might never catch up!

I believe a couple of years ago there was a scheme on the table to remove the lights at the end of St Owens St/Bath St junction - I discussed it with Cllr Hubbard several times and I've seen a drawing. The red light running there is insane. It could still be done - presumably there is 106 money available from the flats currently being built next to The Victory?

There are around 12 more months of this to swallow.

Worse still - http://www.herefordconservatives.com/become-a-councillor/

These (imo idiots) plan to continue their reign.

That page is years old - it features the former councillor Nick Vaughan - long gone I'm pleased to say. There were questions about expenses and work for a lobby firm in London without declaring it, with one of the lobby firm's principal clients being Amey. Glossed over as a clerical error ...

Any hope that these will be saved do you think?

I can't but it should be good - Angus is always good entertainment. I don't for one second think that a Design Review Panel would have made much difference to what has been delivered however. There are murmurings from within Planning for the need for a DRP - it would at least allow them abrogate yet more duties to a third party.

The Council don't build social housing (one in a long list of don't's). They will offer it to a 'preferred partner' and beaver away at a secret deal 'to preserve commercial confidentiality'. They still refuse to disclose any information about the Merton Meadows housing which may, or may not, be developed by Sanctuary at some point. The Council say no deal has been done, yet Hereford Futiles claim all manner of the opposite and Sanctuary keep a safe distance.

No loss, it was a cheap and nasty scheme which should have been kicked back to the developers to do better. Also, with them declining to provide even a temporary haul road in to the site off Plough Lane (as the previous scheme had indicated), the residents of Baggallay St would have been subjected to 18 months of heavy plant going up and down a single width road, no doubt taking out cars in the process.

I will check but I am pretty sure that you can choose to ignore members - posts|signature|messages within your Profile>My Settings

 

Just for the record, the FRONT PAGE is only a snap shot of the top 15 current topics and posts, in order to read older topics and post just click on the FORUMS tab on the main page or click the NAVIGATION tab at the top and a choice will drop down for you to choose from.

 

Once a member reply's to a post within a topic, that topic automatically bumps back to the FRONT PAGE, regardless of how old it may be, that is why some topics reappear, its usually because a member has responded, so it's always worth checking the last post to see what has been added.

Never look at the front page - it takes far too long to load. I use 'Navigation - View new content' and keep that as a bookmark. Its whole topics rather than members posts I want to block.

Is there a way to block a topic from loading? For instance, I have a link to 'new content' which takes me straight to a list of updated topics. It overcomes the very slow loading front page. However, I don't want to see again and again a thread I have no interest in eg eating after 1.30am in the morning. I'd like to just hide it - is this possible?

and for those of you who are interested I have just learn't something interesting that might sum up your reactions to my original post and makes it clear that my referencing the Holocaust was a poor move on my part....regardless of how I try to justify it: 

 

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/news/6408927/Internet-rules-and-laws-the-top-10-from-Godwin-to-Poe.html

But I will defend my right to say whatever I PLEASE so long as I am big enough to suffer the consequences which I am..

It's others that have to suffer the consequences of what  you say you should be mindful of.

I have to agree with Aylestone Voice. I don't agree with Mr Bramer's politics or his handling of the first station debacle, but I really don't think we should be descending to a personal abusive level - not the least  because there are laws of libel.

There are no public toilets in the OLM?

The OLM is private - why should there be? The council could have insisted on them as part of the deal but … I'm sure Waitrose do a nicer class of toilet.

'Cabinet councillor defends fire station land swap deal' - link here - http://tinyurl.com/oegsztr

'Defending the deal, Cllr Bramer said that as the council continued to consolidate its locations to cut costs it was “likely†that further buildings would be sold or transferred.' Presumably ignoring public opinion in the process.