twowheelsgood

What will Michael's reward for a job so well done do you think? £250k I'll wager.

I saw that the road had reopened - I assume they've gone for the cheap bodge option rather than the extensive works we were told were required. BB had no telephones for several months after taking over the desks in the Rotherwas shed - this is the mentality we're up against. No one thought to go and buy a box of £10 mobiles. Pointless phoning in defects - no record - use fixmystreet.com for an independent log which can't be 'lost'. I'm sick to death of the state of this County's road - hard to see how much worse it can get. Why councillors aren't banging heads together and DEMANDING that its sorted I don't know. Perhaps they're just in it for the free shiny computers and Twix's (see Hereford Heckler).

Yes they have - or rather the other way round - the Council are to save £1.2m pa (from April of this year) by Hoople not giving audit information to the Council on how they're spending our money - looks like there was a reason for that … I'd like to think today was the beginning of the end for these dreadful arrangements that benefit no one but shareholders - see Balfour Beatty et al.

The survey is shockingly bad - note that it is being done by Balfour Beatty. Nonetheless, it is headed up by Cllr Price, he of the infamous "I don't give a sh1t what local people think" comment, so not hard to see what the outcome will be.

It does say Hereford is to remain open, but then we'll soon have parking meters on the street and that will be another nail in the coffin of the town centre. I bought a tv from the Hereford shop last year and found the staff informed and helpful. Being able to walk into a shop in town to see the product (essential for something like a tv) and subsequently park outside to load it, is a huge plus. The alternative of driving to a retail shed to park in an undersized car park and trying to get some sense out of a disinterested 16 year old on a minimum wage pushing his bonus up by mis-selling overpriced add ons is one of many reasons why people are using the internet.

One of those remote corners being Rotherwas - according to the Cllr "work has started, or is about to start, in Rotherwas."

Its not a crime - the facility is there, but it serves no point, in my view, save to antagonise or intimidate. I do think Colin should reconsider its inclusion.

The refurb has been going on for some months now, when it will be finished I'm not sure.

Seriously? What a joyous polluted place to have to live. Doesn't look anywhere near big enough for 35 flats. Whatever happened to the promised housing in front of Asda - a flagship entrance to the City we were told? Now to be a petrol station to add to the sprawl?

For Herefordshire Council yes, but the A49 is a trunk road - A49T - and the responsibility of the Highway Agency who, in their wisdom, employ Amey for maintenance, as do the Utilities.

There are 2000 miles of road in the County, divided by 1800 = 1 pothole every 1.11 miles. Really? I don't think so. Conservatively, lets say there was was one every 100 yards, that’s 176 x 2000 = 352 000 potholes. Of course, they may have 'identified' 1800 holes, but for sure there are thousands more waiting to be 'identified' and as fast as they bodge-fill them they fail again. Interestingly, exactly 12 months ago, the council were saying more or less the same thing, and the Government gave them £2.4m in the aftermath of ice and flooding. Where this went, goodness knows. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-hereford-worcester-21361614

Did Merton Meadows actually food this time round? I thought it didn't. I didn't hear any reports of Newtown Rd flooded either. Perhaps it did work after all.

Predictably - absolutely nothing. It's still closed and men are still peering down a hole. I fear this is destined to go the way of Ruckhall Mill bridge - closed for repairs and seemingly abandoned whilst endless reports are written and charged for, structural and ecological surveys are done and charged for, reports about reports are written and charged for - it's like Chancery in Dickens' Bleak House - all the money gone on fees and nothing left in the pot for the real work. Ruckhall closed now for 12 months or more is it?

Struggling to see if this is for real or a spoof. He could have at least removed all the loose stuff first. But it does show that its really not that hard to fill a hole and its surely time we moved on from a shovel of macadam and a size 11 heel to something more technologically advanced?

Actually it is. Obviously its all been under water for several weeks because the Env Agency wouldn't let them lift it a couple of feet, so that may have improved it. They're cut out of Corten, the miracle steel that goes rusty (yeah, someone fell for that marketing spiel). They're fixed into more concrete than you would put in a house foundation.

Violette Szabo is commemorated with a statue on the new Greenway route, along with Elgar (again) and Paralympian Josie Pearson MBE. According to the plaque, these were chosen by the 'local community' although no one from the local community recalls being consulted.

When Cllr Adrian Blackadder was pushing through the OLM, a friend met him and suggested that the '1% for art' should include a statue of John Venn, to which he responded that he'd never heard of him. Says it all really.

I believe there is a memorial to him just off the Fownhope to Woolhope road - it's signposted.

Albert Lee, one of the very best guitar players in the world, comes from Lingen in N Hfds. He occasionally plays in Hereford, when not in the studio or on tour with everyone from Clapton downwards

Oh dear lord, traffic lights! Whatever for? I really despair.

I meant the economic cost.

Revd John Venn. He was vicar of St Peter’s Church in the 19th century and Hereford's greatest philanthropist who worked tirelessly for the welfare of the city’s poor. He set up the Hereford Society for Aiding the Industrious in 1833 (which is still doing good work today) and brought baths, allotments, a corn mill (now Berrows House) and a soup kitchen to people in Bath Street and Portfields. Buried in Commercial St graveyard.

All well and good but it should never have been allowed to get into this state. Routine maintenance and regular checks would have prevented it. What cost to the businesses on the estate?

I believe that’s Glastonbury Close it backs onto - an adopted road and the responsibility of the Council, who have a duty of care to protect people using the highway. Report it to them and they'll have to remove it/make it safe and possibly recharge the hotel.

Nick Millington