Environmental wardens

A few months ago we reported that the environmental warden job - that's been based in the ward for five years - has been saved.

However it's well known we're having a bit of a battle to keep the warden based in the ward.

The ward councillors have responded vigorously to a city consultation on the future of wardens.

What's happened is the city has found money from the Working Neighbourhoods Fund to continue employing all 40 environmental wardens in the city. Most, like ours, had been employed locally through the Neighbourhood Renewal Fund.

City managers came up with a plan to keep 20 wardens in a central team and place 20 in each constituency - that would be one shared per ward. The central team would do blitzes, which managers in regulatory services feel deliver their objectives.

But there's a big difference between being in a team and working on your own. And we've said this repeatedly. We think the wardens should be based one for each ward. They can be brought together in teams, locally or city-wide, when necessary.

A good warden working in the ward can take on board a problem and keep working at it, chipping away at it. Like the pub that sometime ago agreed to having recycled bins on its car park. But now it's got two problems - the car park being used for commuter parking and people dumping by the recycling bins. We need the warden to work on this.

Every neighbourhood is different. Ours has acres of land at the back of properties, used for access drives, and with no clear ownership. Most of it is now gated to prevent burglaries, dumping and anti-social behaviour. But it doesn't always stay clean and often there's local dumping.

Our wardens have worked with residents' groups on neighbourhood clean ups on the. They can coordinate the delivery of skips and make sure they are used for clean-ups, not for dumping household rubbish. They've also helped coordinate the installation of security gates over the last year.

Then there's the problem of dog fouling by a local school. It's been going on for years, on and off - there's something about the neighbourhood, perhaps because the school's on the way to a park. It's nasty when it happens and can pose a severe threat to the health of young children. It's also very illegal.

It's hard to catch people who do this and if residents or the school rings the city contact number when it happens, the response is far too slow. A locally based warden knows there's a problem and can organise, possibly with the police, a fast response.

As things stand the warden is with us until next April after we stepped in to prevent his removal to the city team. The same applies in neighbouring Oscott ward. We're hoping we will win this battle - but if not we have contingency plans!

Amazing school improvement!

Congratulations to Perry Beeches secondary school which achieved England's most dramatic improvement in its GCSE results this year!

Last year just 21 per cent of pupils gained five GCSEs, including English and Maths, at grade C or above. It led to the school repeatedly being targeted by the government as one of England's so-called "failing" schools and also a devastating Ofsted report.

This year that figure shot up to 51 per cent. That's an increase of 30 percentage points.

Perry Barr ward councillor Jon Hunt wasn't surprised at the result. As chair of the city's children and education scrutiny committee he's been taking a close interest in the school's progress.

Jon says: "I'd paid several visits to the school and the head Liam Nolan, deputy head and several pupils came to the scrutiny committee and several pupils came to give a presentation on their work in June.

"It was an impressive presentation - and these results now show that everything they said was justified.

"It also highlights the disgraceful way lists of so-called 'failing' schools were issued during the summer term by the Government just as pupils were sitting their exams."

In the press the school has stressed aspects such as hard work and discipline. But the school has pushed pupils hard. Most pupils sat some English GCSEs early last autumn. That meant that many had the crucial English exam under their belts by the time they came to sit more exams this year.

This is all good news for Perry Beeches which has traditionally been seen as one of the least successful local secondary schools.

And it has some other interesting implications.

For in Handsworth families have been complaining for some time they cannot get their children into Perry Beeches. And in July some information was compiled for the Perry Barr constituency committee on school admissions.

This showed that it was easier over the last year to get into Great Barr school (which is a much bigger school) than Perry Beeches if you lived in Handsworth. So people in Handsworth need to start applying to Great Barr rather than Perry Beeches.

For people in Perry Barr and Great Barr this means, that when applying for school places this autumn, they have an equal chance of getting access to Great Barr or Perry Beeches. And both schools now have respectable academic results - so there's going to be many families with a great deal of thinking to do about their school choices.

Turnberry Park walkabout

Yesterday a committee called the Perry Barr neighbourhood tasking group took a walk-about in Turnberry Park accompanied by Jon and Ray. The group brings together the police, councillors, council officers from various departments and community representatives. We also had with us some of the youth workers who operate from the Trehurst Centre and Pete Short the local parks manager. So, as you can see, it was quite a large group.

The police community support officers have undertaken a project which has suggested a number of small ways and big ways of improving the park. The police have special concerns about the safety of people who use the footpath from Trehurst Avenue to the main park - and the youth workers seemed to share a few of their concerns.

The parks department have already made a start on some of the simpler suggestions and it was good to see a big effort had been made to cut away the undergrowth on this footpath. They had also taken a digger in to clean the main drain, which sits between the playing field and the wooded area. One of the questions is how much it will take to drain the playing field so it could be got into use for football all the year round.

There are quite a few ideas in the plan, some more achievable than others, and once it has taken more shape it would be good to see it published for full consultation.

The party walked up to Cardington Avenue, where we met residents who want some more fencing to protect the back of their properties. One of the issues the NTG has resolved is that all future fencing around the park will be green and will, preferably, be reasonably attractive.

Other ideas being kicked around include:

• put some markings around the basketball hoop in the middle of the park and maybe add a second hoop;
• maybe also a kickabout wall in this area where footballs can kicked off;
• get some banners on the lampposts at the main Turnberry Road entrance - a simple way to let people know there is a park there. At the moment there's nothing to tell you - and for years people called this land by at least three different names!
• regular clean up teams around the wooded area;
• There's a question about whether it's worth putting more lighting on the footpaths. Two or three years ago we lit the main path across, known as Forger's Walk, but this was comparatively short compared with the long path to Trehurst;
• removing some of the barriers at the Trehurst entrance - while keeping it secure. The entrance here is forbidding and the barriers have had the perverse affect of providing a hang about area for young people, enabling them to jump on neighbours' garden walls;
• extend the toddlers playground just behind Turnberry Road.

We've done various consultations with residents in recent years about the future of this park and they have generally been positive about developing it. Some ideas cost more than others - but there are also possibilities for funding. For instance the planning permission for the development on Booths Lane requires funding to be put into this neighbourhood.

If you have ideas, please feel free to post them here!

Swans back

The swan family in Perry Hall Park returned this week - sadly minus the father. The family were taken to the Wychbould Swan Rescue centre after the father got into a fight with a dog. Unfortunately he failed to heal and the rest of the family was returned this week.

Dog-owners have been urged to take particular care - and the rescue centre has posted notices all round asking people to restrain their dogs. The dog-walkers group, Bark for the Park, has been helping raise money for the rescue centre in recognition of their efforts for these delightful birds.

Karen backs petition against post office closures

Perry Barr constituency Liberal Democrat spokeswoman Karen Hamilton has declared full support for the campaign against post office closures which will devastate Handsworth and Perry Barr.

Meanwhile Perry Barr MP Khalid Mahmood states he is opposed to post office closures - and yet that's not how he voted in Parliament.

Quoted in the Evening Mail he says: "This restructuring of the Royal Mail is an absolute nonsense."

Could he explain then why he voted AGAINST the following motion which was supported by as many as 19 rebel Labour MPs?

A few more rebels could have changed the whole situation, as it has done on other issues recently.

No wonder the Post Office proposes to slash the number of offices in his constituency by four. The proposed closures are:

• Church Vale, 60 Robert Road, Birmingham B20 3RU, Birmingham, Perry Barr.
• Coopers Road, 53 Coopers Road, Birmingham B20 2JU, Birmingham,Perry Barr.
• Greenholm Road, 210 Kingstanding Road, Birmingham B44 8JP,Birmingham, Perry Barr.
• Sandwell Road (Temporarily closed), 225 Sandwell Road, Birmingham B21 8PD, Birmingham, Perry Barr.

Constituency Lib Dem spokeswoman Karen Hamilton said: "This closure programme is indeed a nonsense and our party has consistently said so in parliament and locally over the years.

"It will devastate local communities, undermining local shopping centres.

"Our local MP says one thing in Birmingham and does something else in London. It's time he explained himself properly."

This was the motion that Khalid Mahmood voted against:

Post Office Closures — Suspend for issues to be re-assessed — rejected — 19 Mar 2008 at 18:45

* This House -
* regrets the proposal to close up to 2,500 post offices;
* recognises the vital role post offices play in local communities;
* notes the concern and unpopularity amongst the general public of closing such a large portion of the network;
* has concerns that the access criteria laid down for the closures consultation do not adequately take into account local geographical factors and public transport networks;
* is concerned that the consultation period is only for six weeks rather than three months, as recommended by Cabinet Office guidelines;
* believes that post offices must move with the times in the services they offer and that options for business expansion and developing business opportunities with local authorities should be explored further; and
* calls upon the Secretary of State for Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform to instruct Post Office Limited to suspend the compulsory closure of sub-post offices while these issues are re-assessed.

An alternative motion was proposed and voted through in the following vote.[2]

The alternative motion which Mr Mahmood and most Labour MPs backed appeared to endorse the restructuring programme. This is what it says:

The majority of MPs voted in favour of the motion:[1]

* This House
* recognises the vital social and economic role of post offices, in particular in rural and deprived urban communities;
* notes the decline in post office customer numbers in recent years and the financial losses of £174 million incurred by the network in 2007;
* further recognises the effect of changes such as direct debit facilities and increased use of the internet for payment and communication;
* commends the Government's action to support the post office network with investment of up to £1.7 billion up until 2011, including an annual subsidy of £150 million;
* further notes that this subsidy did not exist under the last government and that without it thousands more post offices would be under threat; and
* urges the Government to continue working with Post Office Limited to ensure a viable and sustainable network for the future.

You can find the Evening Mail petition forms here.

Source: publicwhip.org.uk

Midsummer morris dancing

Here's some midsummer madness...Ray Hassall morris dancing with the Bishop of Birmingham!

This occurred at the 175th anniversary of St John's Church, Perry Barr, last weekend. The video's not very clear but Ray's in the light purple shirt on the left and the Bishop in the dark purple towards the right. Father Crispin Pailing of the church can also be spotted in the line-up.



St John's has an interesting history and a fellow blogger at Liberal England explored some of it recently:
the rock musician who was a choir boy
the Villa player who was murdered

Ward-based cleaning

We had some good news last night.

We circulated a freepost survey to about 8,000 homes over the spring as part of an exercise to find out resident priorities. It's an exercise we've done by different means most years - but this was one of the most wide-ranging surveys we've done.

In the past these surveys have shown anti-social behaviour to be the major public concern. With neighbourhood policing teams, improved youth facilities and police community support officers - along with a focus on solving problems - you would hope this had improved. And it has a little.

So this year street cleanliness has emerged as the major issue. ASB is still a concern and we're going to do some more analysis of what people are telling us about this.

Now last night we heard that preparations to introduce "ward-based cleaning" in Perry Barr ward are nearing completion. This is an idea that has been tested in one or two areas in the city with success.

The council's own figures showed why our residents are reporting a problem. Dirt levels on the street in our ward are about half as high as in neighbouring Oscott where ward-based cleaning was piloted.

The reasons: well we get repeated complaints about refuse ending up on the street. One or two neighbourhoods were also especially littered - notably the Serpentine site used as a car park by Villa. We've been deploying the monthly Xtra clean up teams effectively and they've been picking up about three times as much litter as in other wards.

We have fought fly-tipping vigorously, fencing off affected areas. But sometimes these areas continue to be blighted by one or two anti-social residents - and this is a hard problem to tackle on what is defined as private land.

What the new teams will do: all street cleaners and refuse collectors will have a single Perry Barr ward manager, supported by a team leader in charge of street cleaners.

They will clean on the streets and off them. There should be a notable impact on neighbourhoods such as Trehurst Avenue where different bits belong to highways, housing and local services. They will seek to follow the refuse crews round, cleaning up after them.

That's what we know so far. We are waiting to find out more and work with the new manager. There are for instance a number of public alleyways that are a constant battle to keep clean - that should change. Examples are the path from Rowdale Road to Perry Park Crescent and the path from Northolt Grove to Scott Arms.

We also intend to keep the enviromnental warden based in the ward. We were out with him the other weekend assisting with a neighbourhood clean-up in Witton organised by the churches' group Hope 08. There's a discussion about how the post is funded but we are keeping the money aside from community chest until it's resolved.

Hopefully the warden will be able to spend more time on jobs such as education in schools and making sure dog fouling does not happen.

Here's hoping our next round of surveys shows people really feeling the difference!

Speedway

The planning application amendments for the Speedway at Perry Barr were agreed by planning this week.

Residents living around the Speedway track were concerned that shifting some events to Sundays and Bank Holidays would cause disturbance on rest days.

There was as big a battle over this amendment as there was over the original application although, in fact, it won't mean additional races, just some changes of dates. However by the time it was submitted residents had experienced regular events - and quite a few did not like it, including Speedway's immediate neighbour, the City University.

However the real debate is likely to be later this year when Speedway puts in an application for permanent planning permission.

Coincidentally, Jon went round the area with the noise consultants employed by the Speedway on Wednesday night. One concession has been that the Speedway withdrew their request to cease noise monitoring and this was part of regular monitoring.

Jon says: "I learnt a lot from walking round the area during the race and getting information about what was happening at each moment.

"In terms of excessive noise, it peaked at about 85 decibels at the front of the City University. That's above industrial safety levels - although only very briefly. However you can see why the university is objecting so strongly.

"It was also notable that 100 yds away at the student flats quite a few windows were open. Up here the noise is dampened by the stadium and clearly the students aren' t too bothered by it.

"At Nash Square, where residents have suffered particularly, it is not excessively loud - but it is irritating. The noise is like that of a Spitfire diving and that happens 60 times during a match. It is almost certainly caused when the bikes come round a bend at one end of a track where there are no buildings shielding the square from the track.

"There was a similar noise at the Seventh Trap, at the back of Teddington Grove, but it was a little louder.

"I also went into the pits when the bikes were warming up and the noise was deafening. But the pits are sound-protected and the noise doesn't carry far so far as I can tell."

So where does this leave the Speedway?

It's pretty clear that buildings and sound-damping walls make a massive difference. During continuous racing the sound in each direction is intermittent, when the bikes go past gaps in the sound barriers.

So there's a good chance that a complete circle of sound barriers - including, for instance, more advertising hoardings to the south of the site - would make all the difference.

The Speedway say they will put them in if they get permanent planning permission - because that will justify the investment. But if they don't put them in now, and the university and some residents have some bad nights over the summer - especially if it's sunny and still - there will be a battle royal when they come up for renewal.

Jon will be writing to the Speedway reiterating his advice that they put extra sound barriers in now - to show they can work.

Queslett Road safety

Good News today!

Highways are moving ahead with the installation of two speed cameras on the Queslett Road.

Here's the map showing the location of the one in Perry Barr ward - just west of Tyler Grove.

This is progress of a kind. We're still waiting for the installation of the traffic light junction just east of this to enable safe access to the roads off Queslett Road.

Highways confirm that the number of serious accidents on this road makes it a priority for road safety measures. The new traffic lights went in for the St Margarets site about a year ago and although that made many speeders stop they still tend to accelerate once they get away from the lights.

We've given our whole-hearted and instant support to this latest proposal. It will now go to cabinet member Len Gregory for approval, once the Oscott ward councillors have also approved it, and hopefully the cameras will be up in a few weeks.

Celebration at the allotments

The Lord and Lady Mayoress paid a visit to Thornbridge Avenue Allotments on Saturday - as did respresentatives of the Air Ambulance.

The Lord Mayor Cllr Randall Brew was there to open a new community room. The ambulance staff were there to receive a cheque from some of the energetic fund-raising at this busy allotments site.

The first picture shows Ray Hassall with the Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress. The second shows the Lord Mayor making a presentation to the Ambulance, watched by allotments member Lyn Claxton.

There is plenty to celebrate at this centre. The allotments site has been extended towards Hassop Road and new plots added. And in addition to the community room, there's a new greenhouse. What is the greenhouse being used for? Volunteers are growing nursery plants in it and selling them on with proceeds being donated to the Air Ambulance.

Over the years this allotments site has raised thousands for the ambulance and for the Edward's Trust centre by the Children's Hospital from Christmas and summer fairs. We salute them!

Gates and gates

This is a reopened right of way on Calshot Road with security gates reinstalled.

It's a situation that has been dragging on since 2003 when somebody fenced off the right of way, top and bottom, with a view to claiming possession of the land.

You can see the remains of the fence, removed by the order of a judge in court last week.

The closure affected about 100 households in Calshot and Cramlington Roads, removing one of the accesses to the rear drives. Local residents took action, backed by the Booths Farm Neighbourhood Forum and the local councillors.

The forum is now planning to arrange for locks and keys on all the gates on this block and get it properly secured again. And as I write a tidy-up is getting under way to clear the drive and get it reopened.

This is great news and a sign of our commitment to ensuring that
a) residents can use the rear drives to get vehicles off the road
b) that these open areas are properly secured.

In the last year the ward has channeled some £21,000 into gating and fencing schemes in this ward and prior to that we'd been grant-funding resident initiatives up to 40 per cent since 2003, helping to kickstart many schemes.

Mostly it's great when residents can get together to organise one of these schemes. Sometimes it means there's a band of people willing to work together for the neighbourhood and, indeed, it was one such group which prompted the founding of the Forum...back in 2002. Many of its officers have devoted considerable energy and resources to the Calshot Road situation and deserve the gratitude of the whole community. We will now be encouraging the community to back the forum, alongside the Booths Farm neighbourhood watch - to ensure we continue to have a robust community.

But sometimes things go awry....

And the National Trust must be quaking following comments by the local MP in the Evening Mail yesterday. Mr Mahmood appears not to understand the difference between a public footpath and a public highway - even though it is the present government, which, to its credit, has done quite a lot to extend the footpath network over the countryside.

So the MP states that a public footpath has to be paved and lit. No it doesn't. Imagine lighting the coastpath network that the National Trust maintains! It's not practical and would defeat the object of many footpaths.

He's got involved on one side, five years late, in another situation that erupted in 2003 when some residents wanted to gate across a well established footpath linking Ipswich Crescent/Hatton Gardens to Beeches Road. At the time this led to crowded and noisy ward committee meetings and the ward councillors, regretfully, had to withdraw the grant we had proposed making to this gating scheme. It was a shame the organisers did not agree to look for compromise solutions to allow those residents continued use of the footpath - and at the time we indicated we would put more grant in if necessary.

As a result an application was made for it to be formally declared a public footpath. It doesn't necessarily mean the removal of the gates..it would still be possible to restrict vehicle access but in an openable side gate. As Jon stated in the paper, had they compromised originally it would have been possible to have a sidegate locked at night - or even with keys issued to other local residents. Now if it becomes declared a footpath, any side gate would have to remain open.

It's an unfortunate situation and since then we've tightened up on the guidelines for grants and applications. What happens to these patches of land is largely a private matter unless, in this case, there may be a public footpath involved. But we can influence people using grants and we can help share experience of what works and what doesn't. So several subsequent schemes have put in side gates to deal with this kind of problem.

Wardens saved

The annual city budget meeting on Tuesday...and quite a lot of good news.

For the third year in a row, the city has kept the council tax increase to 1.9 per cent.

At local level, we'd been worried about the loss of the neighbourhood renewal fund.

This has been paying for, amongst other things:
the environmental warden;
skips used for residents' clean ups;
youth activities;
some of the gating and fencing schemes that have gone in in recent years.

The government had replaced this with a Working Neighbourhoods Fund, which, it is intended, will focus on employment.

However the council has now secured agreement that environmental wardens can be paid for from this fund...so that's good news. Over the last few years our wardens have led a great many initiatives. As well as performing statutory duties, they've worked with residents on neighbourhood clean ups and over the last year have taken the lead in identifying and putting in place the big gating and fencing project.

We've also been told we will get £100,000 "community chest" per ward, again. If we don't have to pay for the warden from this money, there may well be scope for developing some activities.

So we're planning to consult local residents on their views. Where do we need extra effort? Youth activities, younger children, street cleanliness, security?

Bin bags and boxes - update

We made a point of asking some precise questions about this project on Thursday night at the meeting of the Perry Barr Constituency Committee.

The situation is that:
the collection crews are now under very clear instructions to collect from people's properties;
the official colour leaflet that was meant to notify residents of this has not been delivered properly. Many households have not received it.

This means that residents can continue to insist on their rights to have their rubbish and recycling boxes collected from the front of our property. This is important because in our area many residents live up steps and have struggled to carry the boxes down to the road.

To sum up:

• The refuse collection contracts say collection should be from the property;
• the council policy says it should be from the property;
• the crews have been instructed to collect from the property.

So if you have any problems with collection, please let us know!

Most residents in Perry Barr ward know this now because we have nearly completed delivery of our Focus, which goes to every household.

The failure to deliver the leaflets means the second part of the project cannot be implemented for a while. The official leaflets warn that ultimately residents who continue to use the verge to deposit rubbish will be fined.

There've been more mixed messages in other quarters.
For instance I heard that a meeting of elderly residents was given recycling leaflets which tell them to put their boxes on the pavement. These leaflets are wrong! Very unfortunate, also, because these are the very people who need help in putting their boxes out.

The Evening Mail on Saturday states the scheme has been "suspended after residents ignored council notices."

That's misleading. The enforcement side has been suspended but would not in any case have started until a great more work was done to ensure residents understood not to use the pavements and verges - and indeed to ensure the crews were doing collections properly.

The reason for the delay is nothing to do with residents ignoring the official notices and everything to do with non-delivery of the leaflets themselves.

The piece quotes the vice-chair of the constituency committee Cllr Linnecor but was probably written before we clarified things on Thursday night. It may be that ours is the only ward where the councillors are taking the trouble to let residents know of their rights...

Well, it's not unusual for changes to refuse collection to cause mayhem and confusion. Thankfully the recycling schemes introduced in the last couple of years have largely gone without problems. This latest scheme is suffering from a few hiccups - but it also represents a turning of the tide against the the slack practices and tide of detritus that erupted when it became unofficial practice not to collect rubbish from bins.

PS We've now been passed a copy of the "offending" recycling leaflet. In fact it's ambiguous. It states recycling boxes should be left "on the edge of the property as near to the street as possible". This probably means on the end of your drive or footpath but it's far from clear. And residents who are elderly should be able to expect collection of the boxes from their front doors.

New buses

To St Phillips Square this morning for the launch of the new super-express buses that are now running down the Aldridge Road.

Of all the new bus services brought in over the last few months, this is the most exciting.

The new buses will afford luxury travel with leather seats and air freshening systems. The new buses also offer the first glimpse of TWM's new red and white livery. In time all TWM new buses will be incorporated into the National Express fleet - so a simple glance will indicate the quality of a bus.

These buses are travelling on the 997, 993 and 934 routes. So the only draw back is that to catch them you'll have to go to the City University stops at Perry Barr. These buses link Birmingham City Centre with Perry Barr and Walsall and its suburbs. If you can use these stops however you'll find a luxury bus service arriving every few minutes to take you into the city.

Chatting to National Express boss Richard Bowker I learn that the existing Aldridge Road buses - which are already quite good quality - will be shifted on to the new 51X service, which is providing high speed city centre travel from Great Barr and is also proving very popular.

The scale of change in the West Midlands is now so fast that we were graced with the presence of transport minister Rosie Winterton MP for the launch.

More good news came with the announcement that the new bus routes launched over the autumn are picking up more passengers, with increases ranging from eight per cent to ten per cent. That's terrific when you consider that on the Queslett Road, 451, there have been fairly small changes including new buses and bus shelters. And the improved 377 service, Walsall to Sutton Coldfield, has attracted its fair share of controversy because it got linked to changes in some other local bus services in the Kingstanding area.

Travelling to the city centre this morning in the wake of the rush hour it was possible to see the impact of small changes. While cars got stuck at Newtown and traffic continued to pile up, the buses zipped by on the bus lanes.

TWM's attention is now shifting to Dudley and the Black Country. So there's still a great deal of improvement to be made in Birmingham. But it's still gratifying, during my short time as Passenger Transport Authority lead member for buses, to be involved in so much progress.

Jon

Jan 1st - B-Day!

The way our bin bags are collected in the Perry Barr area will change on January 1st - and we hope for the better.

If it works, there'll be no more sticking bags out on the verge, maybe less of foxes, cats, squirrels and drunks breaking them open and hopefully less litter left behind after the crews come round.

From this date crews will be instructed they must collect bags and recycling boxes from the front of residents' properties - that includes the old-fashioned bin of course.

Residents should be getting leaflets over the New Year period informing them of this - and advising them that they no longer need to put bags out on the verges.

Strictly speaking this is no change - the crews have always been required to collect from the property. But, of course, once bags started going out on the verge, those few people who insisted on their right not to put them out increasingly found themselves missed out - so everybody put out their rubbish and even official advice started telling them to.

So what's been organised is a "big bag bang" approach. Residents will keep the bags on their properties and the crews will have no excuse not to go looking for them.

We'll have to see how it goes. No doubt there will be teething problems - as there always are when anything changes.

The exercise is being applied across the Perry Barr constituency, we understand - that includes Perry Barr, Oscott, Handsworth Wood and Lozells wards. Obviously where the housing is terraced and has no front gardens, such as the Yew Tree estate, this won't be possible.

Councillors in action

Earlier this year Jon Hunt led a scrutiny consultation with parents about the future of special education.

A report was produced on the consultation and Jon presented its findings to the city council in October. It's helping to shape the review of special education that is taking place and showed how valued are the facilities are in many of these highly specialist schools - as well as areas for improvement.

This became the first city council debate ever to be videoed and so provides an opportunity to for people to see what councillors get up to in the council chamber. The video is an edited version of the debate but shows all speakers, including Ray Hassall who also spoke. You can view it by clicking on this link (it will probably ask you whether you want to download or open a video browser:
mms://helix.bgfl.org/scrutiny/debate.wmv

As it was the first video of its kind it's taken a little while to be published.

You can find out more about the consultation and the work scrutiny is doing on special needs by following this link here: www.birmingham.gov.uk/scrutiny

Red light jumpers

Jon Hunt writes:
In the last ten days or so I have witnessed at least five vehicles jump the red lights at my local traffic light junction, where Perry Avenue meets Walsall Road.

When I say jump the lights, I don't mean going through on orange, I mean going through on red.

This suggests there are some incredibly dangerous and stupid drivers on our roads. I wonder whether this is unique to this junction or whether it's happening elsewhere.

Either way I'll be writing to the Chief Constable asking for action. I'll also in future be taking notes and details of vehicles myself and reporting them.

The latest and possibly the worst incident happened today, Sunday, at about 10.30am. Six cyclists, in yellow jackets, including children, approached the junction. It was obvious they were intending to cross to Church Road. As I was turning left and was directly behind them, it would not have been possible to safely overtake them so I waited for them to cross through the lights before attempting to go through the lights myself.

As I waited I heard a hoot behind me. Then the lights changed to red and I stopped. A white car, racing-type saloon car with rear wings, shot past me, through the red lights and turned right onto the Walsall Road. The car was dusty and had scrawled on it something like "...kill" and "don't hunt" (ironically).

A few days ago I crossed the Walsall Road to catch a bus on the pelican crossing just past Perry Avenue. The pelican went on green (and its traffic lights on red - I checked) just as the exits from Perry Avenue and Church Road went onto green. As I was almost halfway across, a small white van with a woman driver shot out of Church Road and zipped past me, over the pelican crossing. The people of Perry Barr were mercifully spared a by-election!

On another recent occasion I was crossing on green from Church Road to Perry Avenue when two cars shot up the Walsall Road in my path. To be frank I didn't take in what was happening, but my teenaged children were with me and confirmed that in their view, those cars must have jumped the red lights on the Walsall Road.

The first incident didn't place me in any personal danger but rather dramatically drew my attention to the problem. In this case I was crossing on foot to Perry Park to catch a bus during the rush hour when a car skidded round the left hand bend from Walsall Road to Church Road just after the lights switched to red. As it happened a truck was turning into Church Road, doing the right turn from the Walsall Road, where there is a green filter light. Again a narrow escape.

These are several narrow escapes but given what I have seen I fear for the safety of people using this junction.

We all know that traffic lights can be a nuisance and frustrating. But if you don't understand that driving is about give and take you shouldn't be behind a wheel. Traffic lights are there to share road space out fairly - and that includes pedestrians, cyclists and other motorists.

So let's get reporting...

Wheelie bad idea part 2

It was Ray Hassall's turn to speak for Perry Barr in last week's city council debate on wheelie bins.

Ray stressed they are totally unsuitable for this word. A few years ago a resident, who did a lot of walking, surveyed the ward and counted the number of properties for which bins would be totally impractical. His estimate was about a third.

These are properties through which access is gained through steps and where there are no front drives. In many cases residents are elderly. Some roads are especially steep. In roads like Stanford Avenue the pavement itself is steep. Bins left on the pavement would soon topple over.

Proponents of wheelie bins say some households could stick with a bag collection. We say this would condemn most of Perry Barr to a second class service.

Our areas in Aston are not much better. In the Yew Tree area, residents live in terraced, two bed roomed housing with front doors directly on the pavement. Nowhere to put wheelie bins except massed on the pavement. We do need solutions in this area and maybe communal wheelie bins, collected a couple of times a week, would help residents dispose of surplus rubbish.

It's welcome that the Perry Barr constituency office has been looking at other solutions and may soon embark on a "keep bags off the verge" scheme. This would see both crews and householders being advised that rubbish collections are from the property where possible. According to city policy and bin collection contracts, residents are still entitled to a doorstep collection and cabinet member Len Gregory stressed this in last week's debate.

The council agreed to allow some constituencies to put forward proposals for pilot wheelie bin projects. We will oppose any such move in Perry Barr because, as we've stressed, we want collection services improved for everyone, not just a few.

Safer Travel

A respondent comments on the new high-tech CCTV on the new 451 buses. Fair comment but what's not readily appreciated is that Birmingham is way ahead of most of the rest of Britain (London excepting) in terms of bus security.

In 2004 the city council set aside some £700,000 for bus safety in a pioneering initiative. Half of this went to bus marshals in the city centre.

The other half went to the Safe Travel Team that was being created with some additional money from Centro and the Police Authority. This project means that police community support officers do indeed travel on buses where there are reports of antisocial behaviour.

They've had a special focus on school buses and on visiting schools to talk to children about behaviour. I've spent some time with them recently as part of my PTA role.

They are still spread quite thinly and will therefore organise themselves to investigate routes where problems have been reported.

You don't have to dial 999 or the other police number to report problems. You can also use their web site www.safertravel.info to report problems informally. I'd advise regular travellers to bookmark this page. You don't need to suffer in silence!

Jon

New gates and fences

This area has a proud tradition of resident self-help when people have banded together and created gating schemes to secure rear accesses and backland over the last 15 years. This has helped cut burglary rates and prevent flytipping.

Since 2003, the ward committee has been pump priming this by offering grants of up to 40 per cent of schemes. All schemes have been entitled to apply and almost all have been assisted. There's been further progress in the Aston part of our ward with help from Aston Pride

This year we've had a windfall and secured some £20,000 to secure some of the mopre complex areas. It's taken everyone by surprise and within days of the project being agreed contractors have been on site erecting posts!

Some large areas of back land off Foden Road, Perry Wood Road and Rocky Lane are among areas being secured.

And last night a telephone call illustrates exactly why this work is needed. A resident called to say he'd seen the posts and when were the gates going in - as somebody had been round with a truck and flytipped a lot of rubbish, including old heaters. This was on the land between Rocky Lane and Kingsdown Park. It's being secured with gates on Rocky Lane and Coleraine Road and a trip rail on the edge of the park. There's a whole area of wasteland here which does not belong to the council and is overgrown.

St Basils Sleep out

Karen writes:

This year's sleep out was a lot drier that last year. We only had a few showers but it was really windy. Some shelters did not survive the wind but there was help on hand from fellow rough sleepers. Around 3am it became really cold.

I was impressed with the number of young people who were taking part especially as they stayed for the whole night.

Cardboard is no subsitute for a mattress and no protection from the damp and cold. Though I have discovered that wrapping yourself in a wheelie bin liner is a good insulator. Thanks Dave for that tip!

The Lord Mayor and Lady Mayoress paid a visit during the night and talked to some of the rough sleepers. Nikki Tapper (BBC) and the Bishop of Birmingham the Rt Revd David Urquhart were also in attendance.

Although it was a really difficult night, I am really pleased that so far I have raised £420 in sponsorship and I have been told that some people donated directly to St Basils. This makes it all worthwhile.

Buses!

Jon Hunt writes:
I'm doing a couple of launches of the new or revamped bus services in my role as bus lead member with the Passenger Transport Authority.

It's timely as for 20 years or so bus use has been declining. I think this may change, automatically, in the near future because rising fuel prices and pinches on household budgets will make people seek out public transport and cut down on vehicle use. I've certainly resolved to use the bus and foot more than in the past. Running round all over the place, I'd got out of the habit of organising to use buses, which can be pretty convenient.

Today, aided by some Latin dancers, was the launch of number 1 service, which doesn't affect Perry Barr but now provides a frequent shopping service to the Town Hall through Moseley and Acocks Green.

Tomorrow Tuesday is the revamped 451 running on the Queslett Road to West Bromwich and Sutton Coldfield and the launch is to be at Asda Queslett at 10am . The key feature here is the revamped buses which, I understand, includes improved CCTV with screens which demonstrate it is really working!

At the same time we launched a big document on buses today at a PTA meeting. Nothing's set in stone but we're working to a new era where all routes are covered by agreements between the passenger authority and the bus companies. We're also working to create a more efficient network, which allows more people to go swiftly to wherever they want to go - not just the end point of some existing bus service.

The key to this is electronic signage and the smartcards that will surface next year for the first time and soon will enable new fare structures - allowing passengers to purchase a single "ticket" to go from one place to the next and also to change buses easily if necessary.

This is important because there's a lot of "turbulence" around at the moment and that's upsetting some existing bus users. For a number of reasons the companies are cutting back some of the smaller services, forcing the PTA to run round and assess the impact and if necessary to purchase subsidised services. In the Queslett Road area one or two passengers have been distressed through the loss of the 655 that ran from Booths Lane to Aldridge. This was carrying an average of two passengers a journey. Now, the Booths Lane estate is right off the Queslett Road and most people will benefit from better 451 services. It is steep and some people may struggle to make the walk and one of the challenges for the future is to ensure we identify these little estates and ensure that there are services to collect such people and get them safely to the main bus network - enabling them to go to all sorts of places.

In the near future, as I stated, the public authorities will get new powers. The bus companies know this and are keen to demonstrate they can provide better services. Hence the Latin dancers - "It Takes Two to Tango!". We're doing what we can to ensure this turns into instant benefits for travellers.

Coming up...

We've fallen behind on reporting local issues on this blog. That's not for want of things happening!

We hope to report soon on issues including the following:
-new gating and security schemes;
-ideas for improving street cleansing and bag collection;
-neighbourhood clean ups;
-the proposed Booths Lane development and (substantial) contributions that may arise for improving local facilities.

River Tame and Perry Hall Park

There was some alarm when the Environment Agency announced it wanted to rework the banks of the River Tame south of the central bridge in Perry Hall Park.

We had a useful meeting the park last week with Agency officials and a number of users.

The agency proposes to get the work done over the winter months with a view to stabilising the banks. The earth banks will be replaced with stone banks - as has been done further upstream. By using "natural" rocks, a good wildlife habitat is created with refuges for voles and other animals. Practice in the past has been to wiremesh foundations which prevents access for animals.

This will create a firm line of banks and prevent them encroaching into the river. There was some discussion about maintenance of the banks and concern that regular cutting may destroy bird nests.

Having looked at that part of the river we walked upstream and looked at the lake that was created during the Euro-funded work a couple of years ago. It had been hoped this would become another habitat for birds but it was plagued from the start by dumping. A shale island has silted up but has not sprouted any vegetation. Some of the park users feel that it never will as the river periodically rises over it, sweeping anything away.

So the Agency are going to get one of their experts to look at it and maybe suggest simple planting ideas that could move this lake forward. I think a bed of reeds would create a stable environment. We shall wait and see.

Jon Hunt

Speedway controversy

An application to vary the conditions for the Speedway at the Greyhound Stadium has caused some controversy in the neighbourhood.

Amongst other things the application asks for eight additional Sundays, including four bank holiday weekends. It also asks for the removal of the requirement for noise monitoring that was placed on the organisers.

Speedway was given a two year temporary permission until September 2009. The application has been useful because it has enabled residents to be consulted on their experience of the first season - and, unfortunately, many are not happy at all.

It was hoped that the new speedway format would see less noise impact, especially as there are now developments closer to the stadium than there were originally, such as Nash Square and the UCE (sorry, Birmingham City University) halls of residence.

As well as letters we have received visits at our advice bureaux from groups of residents and have also had some telephone calls.

The following are some of the comments I have submitted to planning on this matter.

Jon Hunt

"Further to my initial comments on this application I would like to reiterate my concern.
I will be forwarding to you today a number of letters I have received from local residents, five objecting to the variation and one supporting it. I understand that a number of petitions have been submitted through a colleague...
In terms of the detail of the application I object to the removal of the requirement for noise monitoring.
I have received some explanation from Speedway of the reasons for the application and hope to discuss this with them more in the near future.
However I am concerned that there should be no extension of the time during which noise from the event may be experienced in the neighbourhood. There should also be no increase in the number of Sundays on which events are held.
The consultation on this application has raised real issues in the neighbourhood about the impact of speedway. Prior to the original application there was of course no experience of the event in its current form. Given that much of this summer was wet and rainy this is quite disappointing and suggests a long dry summer might cause significantly more problems..
An example of comments from residents is: "Although I expected some noise..I was totally unprepared for the sheer volume that would be produced" (400 yds from stadium)
I hope the result of this consultation might be to provoke further work to address and resolve these issues.
Councillor Jon Hunt"

St Basils Sleep out/Sleep in

The next St Basils Sleep out/Sleep in will be on 30th November. Last year Karen spent a night sleeping rough in Birmingham city centre to raise funding for St Basils.

St Basils work with young people who may be at risk of homelessness or are actually homeless offering them support and advice.

Karen said “Last year, I thought I had an idea what it would be like. I wore 2 pairs of trousers, a t-shirt, jumper, sweatshirt, padded coat, hat and 2 pairs of socks. You could say I went prepared!”

She added “However, it rained heavily for most of the night and though we had a golf umbrella, our layers of cardboard and plastic sheets could not keep out the dampness and the rain eventually got the better of us. I couldn't sleep and was freezing cold for most of the night. I hadn't counted on how wet it was going to be. Everything was damp.

It taught me a lot. As bad as I thought it might be to be homeless, it was actually much worse and my experience was not even a full one as I knew I had a hot bath and comfortable bed waiting for me when I got home. Imagine spending night after night like that? I know I couldn't have done another night. I managed to get over £200 in sponsorship and it renewed my passion for helping people who have become homeless.”

Undeterred Karen will be taking part again this year, with more waterproof clothing!

To take part or to donate see St Basils Sleep Out/Sleep in.

And one we missed....

August was a busy month for us as ward councillors. Carnivals, holidays etc meant that we missed the open day at Walsall Road allotments.

It was a really successful day with plant, cake, book and craft stalls and they managed to raise £1008 for the County Air Ambulance, which was recently presented to the organisation.

The harvest at the allotments this year has not been as good as they plot holders would have liked because of the poor growing conditions we have had this year.

Nevertheless, this Sunday they have the heaviest Pumpkin and Marrow competition at 11am. I don’t think this year’s crop will break any records but they still have some sizeable vegetables growing there!

Visit Walsall Road allotments at http://www.growit.ik.com/

Ward Committee

Resolution passed at Perry Barr ward committee on Monday night:

(i) That the Ward Committee note the comments (of officers and members of the public about the Carnival, held in Perry Barr Park in August)

(ii) That the Ward Committee calls for a fundamental review of the Birmingham International Carnival, including the question of whether Perry Barr Park is capable of sustaining the event’s development in its present form

(iii) That the Ward Committee requests a response to be provided regarding (ii) at the next Ward Committee meeting.

Karen adopts greyhounds

Karen Hamilton has adopted two greyhounds. One from Perry Barr and one from Hall Green Retired Greyhound trusts.

Karen said “Greyhounds face such an uncertain future when they finish racing. The work that the greyhound trust is doing is fantastic. Thousands of dogs retire from racing each year from as young as 18 months and the greyhound trust works hard to find homes for them.”

She also added “Greyhounds are really easy to look after. They are wonderful dogs. They just want to sleep all the time. The have short bursts of energy but get tired really quickly. Two short walks each day normally wears them out!”

For more information

See http://www.rgtperrybarr.co.uk/ and http://www.hallgreenrgt.co.uk/

Congratulations to Kingsdown

Congratulations to Marie Fitzpatrick and the Kingsdown Residents Association who organised a wonderful multi-cultural community day in Kingsdown Park on Saturday.

Marie and her colleagues put an awful lot of work into this event and raised substantial sums of money to ensure there were free rides and free entertainment for people from the Kingsdown and Hamstead areas.

We discovered that the park has a natural bowl in the middle which is a great venue for small-scale open-air entertainment - in this case Indian and Irish dancers and a steel band.

This is pretty well the only community summer event left in the ward excepting the Thornbridge Avenue Allotments annual charity events. Others have been deterred by high insurance and the complexities and commitment required to organise events.

Well done Marie, Chris and the KRA!

Carnival noisiest ever

We've now had the official decibel readings for the Carnival and also some feedback via our residents' surveys from neighbouring roads such as Curbar Road.

Two years ago we asked residents of Curbar for feedback on that year's carnival and had very few complaints.

This year it is different and it is hardly surprising.

The decibel limit for the reading is meant to be 65 dbA. It rapidly reached 70 dbA and during the evening hit 80 dbA in readings taken at the adjoining Perry Villa estate.

It then peaked at 84 dbA during the live band performance. Over 80 dbA is a level at which an employer would have to provide ear protectors. It was apparently the loudest outside event ever held in Birmingham.

It was notable when the procession arrived that every float packed heavy sound equipment and frequently little else. In addition we understand a number of unauthorised stalls were set up.

This will come to the ward committee on October 1st to be held at Perry Hall Methodist Church, Rocky Lane.

The truth is that this level of noise is unacceptable. Some people may enjoy it but it also deters others and makes the Carnival a non-inclusive event.

We think it's time for a fundamental review of this event. It could be made better and more enjoyable and involve more people across Birmingham.

Making the buses better

Ward councillor Jon Hunt was appointed lead member for bus and highways at the West Midlands passenger transport authority a few weeks ago.

Jon reports here:
This doesn't mean I'm running the buses but does give me a key role in pushing for improvements. It's not rocket science - people will use buses if they are reliable, safe and comfortable.

We've been pushing through the city council for some time for these things to happen in face of steep falls in the number of bus users.

I've been pleased to be involved in my first few weeks in promoting a new ground-breaking partnership with Travel West Midlands. This involves TWM and the PTA/Centro investing in six routes to see what achievements can be achieved.

This has been approved by the PTA and a signing with TWM is imminent. The project involves more buses on some routes, new and refurbished buses, electronic signing, including some of the new electronic interchange signs and new bus stops. You can see one at the Fox and Goose - it's as good as the displays at New Street Station. There will also be text messaging available to find out how buses are doing and CCTV at bus stops.

Several of the affected routes pass through this ward, travelling from parts of Walsall down the Aldridge Road to One Stop. Here's the list:

Route 1, Acocks Green to Moseley and Five Ways. Changed from every 20 minutes to 12 minutes with further improvements at weekends.

377: Walsall to Sutton Coldfield, 20 to 12 minutes.

934: Birmingham to Pheasey via Kingstanding. From 30 minutes to 20.

933: Birmingham to Streetley via Kingstanding. From 30 minutes to 20.

997: Birmingham to Aldridge and Walsall. From 20 minutes to 15.

451: West Bromwich to Sutton Coldfield via Scott Arms. Improved buses and stops.

The three 934, 933 and 997 routes are likely to get new buses with good air conditioning, I understand.

Carnival time

It was the hottest day for months yesterday for the Birmingham Carnival and it brought out the crowds in their thousands.

Perry Park was heaving with people to an unprecedented level, having a great party.

We wanted to know whether the extra steps that had been taken would reduce traffic pressures.

Two years ago the procession was 90 minutes late setting off, leading to road closures being extended and thousands of cars blocking off the Aldridge Road.

This year the procession left on time and was just half an hour late.

From our point of view the event was not problem-free and calls of complaint have been trickling in today about different aspects. Some are distressing to hear about like the woman who was prevented from driving to her home off the Walsall Road when it was closed at Tower Hill. She had an access pass but some jobsworth could not be bothered to use their head to let her through.

The ward councillors spent the day trouble-shooting. We learnt early in the day that a number of roads, mainly smallish cul-de-sacs, had not received residents' access passes. There will need to be an inquiry as to why. It means that about 100 passes went astray. So we went on the doors getting passes for residents who needed them and explaining to others what to do if they did decide to go out.

The big issue for the carnival is to get cars into official car parking spaces and sadly this continues to be problematic. At about 5pm we noticed Perry Avenue and the access to car parking in Perry Hall Park had been closed and a few minutes later that barricades protecting Derrydown Road had been closed. Thankfully event manager Kevin Brown was in the neighbourhood and he and Jon Hunt rapidly walked the patch.

We found that stewards were operating Chinese whispers, passing on incorrect messages there was no more room. Additional problems were caused because the cricket pitch south of Rocky Lane was meant to have been used for parking - instead two cricket teams got on to it and nobody moved them off or reported the matter to the right managers. It didn't matter - there was space for cars if they could be directed into the car park - a whole grass area that could be used. So that free car park was reopened.

Thankfully Derrydown was only open for a short while but maybe a dozen vehicles got up there. All this may have contributed to problems on Beeches Road and Dyas Avenue as during the procession cars were coming north up Walsall Road without being directed to car parking.

However a walk to the other side of Perry Park revealed mayhem on the Aldridge Road. In future private properties here should be included in the exclusion zone. There were hundreds of cars here jammed on to every pavement and grass verge. Some more cars could have been admitted to the car parks in Perry Park - again too hastily closed - but only a fraction.

Two years ago the problem was the procession starting so late. That was solved. Four years ago the exclusion zone broke down as stewards abandoned their posts under pressure from aggressive visitors. That was solved as the police provided back-up on key junctions. And in addition the ward councillors insisted on being represented on planning groups. It feels like different problems are being solved each time.

Conclusion: there were hiccups in the running of things this year but if there was a traffic problem, it was almost certainly because of unexpectedly large numbers of people. If future events take place, they must put adequate resources in to car-parking and properly stewarding cars into car parks.

Perry Park closed

A couple of weeks ago developers moved on to Perry Park to build the extension to the Alexander Stadium, the new gymnastics training centre.

Unfortunately nobody knew they were coming and nobody thought to tell anybody they intended to fence off the entire north-west corner of the park. Although this is tucked away from the main park, it is the access point for residents from the Beeches Estate and from Perry Park Crescent, a green area where children can kick balls about.

We've now fixed a residents' meeting with the developers Thomas Vale next Monday July 9th at the Alexander Stadium at 7.30pm.

The extension was already controversial and was bitterly opposed last year. It nearly fell after we exposed a technical error that required the planning committee to reconsider it.

What's annoying is that as part of the re-consideration the council was required to come up with - and consult on - a community use strategy for the park and also long-term plans. Part of the objection was the piecemeal development of the stadium which was encroaching on this well-used area of greenery.

Unfortunately in the haste to erect the extension, the community side was forgotten. Problems for residents of Perry Park Crescent have been aggravated by demolition crews moving in to the neighbouring site, the old Cold Storage factory, which has permission to be converted to a nursing home. This conversion was welcome - as it gets rid of an eye-sore - although there is now a new application which needs scrutiny.

Ward councillor Ray Hassall is city cabinet member for leisure and is keen to stress the advantages of the work that will be done to enhance facilities, including the green space in the north-west corner. But locally we are back to the same old running problem - who exactly runs our parks?

Exactly the same problem as we've had in Perry Hall Park where we cannot find out who actually gave permission for it to be used as a base for checking all the taxi-metres in Birmingham and Solihull. Or who decides how many cricket pitches go in. There's confusion because it's partly the constituency office and partly leisure services. There's also confusion because maintenance is done by contract.

We're trying to encourage Friends of Parks groups to be set up. They have all sorts of rights and access to cash and the park warden is keen to encourage this. Maybe a group will come out of next week's meeting we've called. But it's not going to work if nobody takes responsibility for consulting them about closures and changes of use.

This question had to be deferred from last week's ward committee because of the flooding issue - but we're still out to find the answer!

Delays added to devastation

A sorry tale of delays and confusion emerged on Monday night as some 100 residents met with us, the local councillors, and officials of various agencies to discuss what happened in the Witton flooding.

First of all it emerged that the Environment Agency had indeed failed to put out the flood warning - despite alarm bells sounding at 7am on the Friday.

What happened was that a duty officer saw that the gauges were reporting the River Tame about to break over the flood walls at Brookvale Road - but did not believe it. So instead of activating the Floodline warnings - which would have generated a series of telephone calls to the local community - he sent out a worker to investigate. The worker got there at 830am - by which time the Tame was already in full flood in the neighbourhood.

It seems that nobody recognised this as a major emergency until much later in the day. To their credit the fire service were on the scene quite early and used boats to evacuate three factories and about 12 other residents. Most residents seem to have simply moved upstairs.

But the police admitted they did not arrive until late morning. Because of the camber of the roads - with a high centre - lorries continued to thunder down them, in some cases drivers abusing distraught residents. This created waves of water which flooded even more into the houses. Nobody closed the roads.

The water was dirty and smelly but no public health official ever visited the site to declare it unsafe. So in subsequent days the fire service refused to provide pumping assistance to get the water out of cellars and houses (except on payment of a £399 fee). On the Saturday nobody could get through to the environmental health office duty line.

Once things got going all sorts of measures were taken - evacuation centres opened but not used etc. And local council staff have been brilliant since Friday in running advice centres and ensuring a plentiful supply of skips (from the skip allocation that we purchase for Perry Barr ward, please note!). Local churches have also been great. Aston Parish Church is hoping to organise some donations of furniture for those who have lost theirs whilst others have rallied round to release hardship funds.

But this was a forgotten emergency. Maybe not as bad as they've had in the north this week but by far the worst and least reported incident in that first round of flooding when a whole month's supply of rain fell in just six hours.

This is not just about hand-wringing. Karen Hamilton is going to chair a Flood Action Group, working with a group of local residents and with the city council's emergency response team. The work, we hope, may help other areas to ensure that responses to flooding incidents are tightened up. The group will also look at measures to flood proof local homes - and where we can get cash from to make this possible. Aston Pride will help I hope. After all there is talk of putting more housing in this neighbourhood. The Environment Agency has promised to tighten up its floodline procedures and also review the defences on the River Tame.

Flooding

The Brookvale Road area was badly flooded last Friday and we estimate that at least 50 householders, mainly on Tame Road, suffered severe damage from the water and loss of property.

We spent time in the area over the weekend assessing the extent of the damage and providing information to householders. We've also identified some local charities which can help with small grants for those who did not have insurance.

The council's local constituency staff have been brilliant and have been running advice sessions at Witton Community Centre throughout the week. Extra collections have been arranged to enable householders to get rid of flood-damaged material.

We all know that the rain last Friday was exceptionally heavy - but there are still big questions about the emergency response to this incident.

As it happens, Perry Barr ward committee is to meet at Witton Community Centre on Monday (7pm) and the bulk of the meeting will be devoted to discussing what happened with senior council officers and, hopefully, other agencies.

Many households had signed up to flood line to get flood warnings - but received nothing. The roads were not closed and heavy lorries continued to use them. This created waves which flooded into the houses, aggravating the damage. We also need to know whether the work on Perry Hall Park was effective at creating a safe flood plain on the cricket pitches to mop up water from the River Tame - that was plan when work was done on it two or three years ago.

It's clear this very deprived neighbourhood is woefully unprepared for this kind of flooding and we hope to involve Aston Pride in discussing how houses can be properly protected (such as through flood barriers at doors).

Jon's back in!

Message from Jon Hunt:

Can I thank everyone who gave me their support in yesterday's election? I intend to continue to work hard for Perry Barr and Birmingham and justify the trust that local people place in me. There's been a lot of good things happening locally recently but also many continuing problems to tackle, such as the many neighbourhoods where litter continues to be a problem.

My majority was 1,119 - the largest majority I've ever had! I have now fought six elections in seven years and been elected three times during that period as a councillor for Perry Barr. This election means I will serve for four years as a councillor for Perry Barr.

On a personal note I will be unavailable to take phone calls next week as my father is undergoing major heart surgery and I will be supporting him and my mother. So if you need a councillor please call Ray or Karen.

Best St George's event ever?

More than 4,000 scouts paraded down Broad Street yesterday and gathered in Centenary Square to celebrate St George's Day and the Centenary of their own movement.

They were met by St George and attendants, parading on a white horse. The scouts, cubs, beavers, guides and brownies arrived with a sea of flags and their own marching bands, backed up by pipers from the fire service.

It was an amazing event, highlighting the continuing strength and contribution of the scouting movement to our young people. It seems it is some time since anything like this took place in Birmingham. As so often, the scout leaders showed astonishing organisational ability, moving the parade down Broad Street bang on time.

Around the world there are some 28 million scouts and the movement is growing in strength in countries such as Indonesia, we were told.

Ray Hassall and Jon Hunt were there - both with a special interest in the event. Ray as cabinet member for leisure services made the event possible after he and Jon were approached by scout leaders in Perry Barr. Jon is chair of the city's education scrutiny committee and also had a son in the parade.

Our pictures show some of the local scouts and cubs arriving in the square and the performance laid on by the Handsworth Gang Show for the assembled crowd. Both are shown at low resolution to prevent identification of individual children.

Reduce the yellows!

We've been reporting back to residents today on possible solutions to some of the area's parking problems.

Earlier this year we circulated surveys on the Booths Farm estate and the Wensleydale/Sandringham area. Both areas have narrow roads, grass verges and yellow lines.

Already hundreds of residents have invested in drop kerbs and we believe this gives an opportunity.

The council has been already been running a pilot scheme in the south of the city to reduce the number of yellow lines. In Great Barr they were installed about 20 years ago because of the amount of on-street parking which made roads impassable for emergency vehicles.

Now households have many more cars but they also have front drives. What is irksome is that yellow lines mean many residents or their visitors are fined for parking on the drop kerb part of their front drive.

On Booths Farm residents voted overwhelmingly for reduction of yellow lines. In the Wensleydale/Sandringham area the response has been the opposite - these roads are that much narrower and more congested. So we're asking the people on Booths Farm to sign petitions in favour of reducing the yellow lines which a view to getting the city's pilot scheme here next.

Another idea being put forward by the local MP is to install plastic meshing on the grass verges to enable parking on them. There's a few problems with this including:

• it would save some grass but hardly improve the appearance of the area. We succeeded last year in getting the council to agree to reinstall "no parking" staves on grass verges - and many residents have requested these in front of their homes. These are people who do NOT want cars parking on the grass in front of their homes;
• it would remain illegal to park on the verges where the yellow lines remained;
• the drop kerbs that are installed allow people to drive over the kerb and the pavement without causing damage. It seems unlikely that plastic meshing would prevent the stone kerbs from damage - and too many people who park on the verges seem to use the pavement to get there;
• the pictures that have been printed along with other people's reports of this technology and common sense suggest the grass would still get damaged;
• you don't want to clear the road of all cars. If you open up wide avenues, you create race tracks. Some on-street parking helps to slow traffic and prevent dangerous driving - and already hundreds have signed our petitions for 20mph zones. Quite a few of these have been submitted to the council, road by road.

That's not to say there may not be one or two locations where this might be worthwhile. But maybe we should wait after the election for a sensible discussion about the costs and who's going to pay!

Tower Hill mast refused

Many residents by now will be aware that the proposals for a second telephone mast at Tower Hill have been refused.

Planning officers refused it under delegated powers, agreeing with my argument that the proposed mast would create "clutter" on the pavement. Many residents wrote in - most also stressing that the proposed mast would spoil the Tower Hill centre.

This is good news - but serves also to highlight the monstrosity that is the existing mast outside the Clifton Bingo Hall.

The proposed new mast would have been right by a bus shelter and its cabinet could have provided shelter for muggers.

Jon

Victory!

We were pleased to hear this week we've been successful in blocking the ludicrous idea that tolls could be levied on many of the roads leading out of Perry Barr ward.

That would have been the impact of the congestion zone charging proposal in the £2 million Gridlock or Growth document, sponsored by the government and the West Midlands local councils.

The original draft, which I saw, put this forward as the best idea. This was altered in the published document - but the reality is that scrapping zone charging leaves Gridlock or Growth without any feasible road pricing option.

I distributed a number of petition forms in the autumn and these cascaded across north Birmingham - meaning that ultimately I presented well over a thousand signatures to the city council and to West Midlands Passenger Transport Authority.

You can read the letter confirming the ditching of zone charging by clicking on the image.

The zone charging proposals would have seen the region divided along the lines of the motorways. Drivers would have paid £2.50 a day to cross under the M6 on very local roads such as Thornbridge Avenue, Hassop Road, Beeches Road and Brookvale Road. Somebody had forgotten that the motorway was built on pillars in a pretence that it would not divide the communities.

People such as Thornbridge Avenue allotments were particularly alarmed as they sit on the line of the motorway and their members come from both sides. It was an idea that needed to be firmly nipped in the bud and that is what we have done.

This has been a good example of where councillors can take part in local action whilst raising matters in "higher forums". So I've been able to speak on these issues repeatedly in the city council and at West Midlands Passenger Transport Authority.

Road pricing is controversial so there is a great deal of buck passing going on. London politicians want the West Midlands or Greater Manchester to run pilot schemes. We think parliament should make up its mind - local schemes could merely disadvantage the local economy.

Undoubtedly one of the main sources of congestion in north Birmingham is the M6 and the M6/M5 interchange. Transport planners think rush hour congestion could also be reduced by persuading more people to use public transport.

The problem is we are sitting on three decades of muddle thinking about the A34 corridor through north Birmingham.

Bus users are already noting that bus times are quicker than cars in rush hour thanks to bus lanes and traffic light priority. But many people won't switch because buses are also smelly and crowded in rush hour. I spoke on this in the city council on Tuesday but, according to the Evening Mail, TWM is still setting its face against putting conductors/wardens on buses. Local people have complained to me there is precious little evidence of the Safe Travel Team doing much work on the 51/16/33 routes. However following the Mail report, they were out in force in Newtown yesterday!

The proposed solution for the last 20 years has been the Metro. But there's a problem there - at Birchfield commuter traffic disperses in at least three directions. The Metro would go in just one direction, up the Walsall Road. I've now seen the latest figures suggesting something like 10 million passengers a year on the so-called Varsity North metro. That means something like 40,000 a day on the A34. There are barely that number of people living along the route. It's totally unrealistic and would simply mean another white elephant of a scheme.

These are points I've made repeatedly at Passenger Transport Authority meetings over the last few weeks following the publication of the latest Metro development plan. I don't think it's too late to develop a major public transport interchange in the Birchfield area - but time is running out. When the Varsity North plans were belatedly made public in 2003, I and others of all parties argued it could stop at Perry Barr/ Birchfield. I think it could be an effective city centre shuttle service - but it needs to pick up commuters from the Kingstanding Road, College Road and Brookvale Road routes. That means fast interlinking bus rapid transit services alongside good park and ride facilities. Surely a better use of the tens of millions they want to spend.

I hope to continue to be involved in further discussions over the summer as a further report on congestion is to be prepared with a view to making a bid to the government for so-called Transport Innovation Fund cash.

Jon

Telephone mast is obtrusive

There's a planning proposal for a new telephone mast at Tower Hill and we've circulated some 600 local homes with leaflets asking for their comments. We will forward these comments to the planning department when we receive them.

The proposal is for a 10m mast with a "shroud and equipment cabinet".

I believe it can be stopped on planning grounds and have already expressed some views to the planning department. Tower Hill is simply too cluttered already - it has one mast with a large grey box that is the base station along with a recycling centre.

The council has just spent a fortune improving the area for pedestrians with new crossings, bus lanes and bus stops. Having revived the shopping centre here, it now needs to concentrate on making it a pleasant environment. A forest of masts does not achieve that.

I'm assuming there will be little support for this proposal. There was a great deal of opposition to the first one. And when it comes to issues of appearance, local people are more than entitled to their views. So let's hear some good arguments from local people!

Jon

Hospital changes

I've just been to a meeting at City Hospital to be briefed on the latest thinking over the changes to our local health services.

City and Sandwell Hospitals have been consulting on a series of immediate changes - and also on their long term plans to create a single "super hospital" in Smethwick, on the Birmingham border.

The immediate changes would involve moving children's wards from City to Sandwell along with emergency surgery - although City would retain its 24-hour accident department.

This has caused me concern because some of the families from the Aston end of our ward rely on public transport to get to City Hospital and get treatment for their children.

So managers are making some concessions here - and a paediatrician was present to confirm they wanted these changes. They are hoping that City Hospital will continue to provide a 24-hour assessment unit for children - originally 12 hours was proposed - and this could keep a child in overnight for up to 24 hours. They are also looking at providing free transport from City to Sandwell for parents if a child is admitted to the wards.

Second concern is about emergency surgery. What happens for example if a gun or knife victim is deposited at City Hospital's front door? The answer seems to be that they will call surgeons into City to perform the emergency surgery. The patient would of course be made stable by accident staff.

Looking ahead to the superhospital planned for 2014, it seems inevitable the plan will be approved. Many people from Perry Barr and Great Barr will lose out by having to travel further and there was a lot of concern about this when it was discussed at the ward committee a month ago.

They are promising a mini-hospital with urgent care facilities in Aston. The concern is that these urgent care facilities may only be open 12-14 hours a day. Also that the record of these mini-centres is that they can be cut back when the financial times get hard in the NHS. So we need to keep a close eye on the development of these facilities.

Jon

Carnival coming

We've been involved in a number of meetings about the Birmingham Carnival coming to Perry Barr Park this year, on Sunday August 5th.

The aim, as always, is to minimise the traffic chaos that sadly accompanies this event.

Ray Hassall has been able to put the block on other major community events being held in the park in the first part of the summer holidays - ensuring that the Carnival will be the only weekend that disrupts the neighbourhood.

Two key tasks: to get the procession to start on time. Being late by up to two hours is unfair on many of the dancers who have to dance all the way - and also contributed to most of last time's traffic problems.

It will be forming up in Handsworth Park this year and lorries and generators will be parked overnight. The organisers will be told that the road closures will be lifted if they fail to start - lorries would then have to make their way through ordinary traffic.

Second task is to get more tow trucks in. It is now apparent that only one or two vehicles were towed last time despite massive illegal parking. We're looking at the barriers erected along Thornbridge Avenue to see if they are necessary - as they only block off some roads and this was the one neighbourhood last time where there did not seem to be parking problems. We'll be consulting residents about this.

The third objective is to get cars into car parks. There are always plenty of unused spaces very close to the event. We need better stewarding and the procession to arrive on time!

The Carnival's a great event but every time something goes wrong with the traffic. The "exclusion" zones, which prevent visitors parking on side roads, are proving their worth but can come under big pressure - especially when other arrangements break down.