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.

Installation of new vicar at St Paul

On the 23rd February we were invited to the licensing and installation of the new vicar of St
Paul, Hamstead, the Revd Smitha Prasadam. The service was carried out by The Bishop of Birmingham The Right Revd David Urquhart and The Venerable Hayward Osborne The Archdeacon of Birmingham.

It was a wonderful service where there was standing room only. It was very nice to see so many people from our community coming together to take part in the service.

We spoke to Smitha briefly (see picture) and she is enthusiastic about coming to work in Great Barr. We all welcomed Smitha and her family to the ward and would like to take this opportunity to wish her every success in her new role. We look forward to working with her in the future.

Checking the recycling programme

Jon and Ray joined Cllr Len Gregory, cabinet member for highways, at the Holdford Drive waste depot, Perry Barr, yesterday to look at progress on the recycling programme.

Our picture shows the party with a sample of the bottles and cans that are now being collected daily from throughout the city.

The aim is to extend the collection to most of the city within months - making it the largest recycling programme in Britain.

There is a pressing need to get good recycling plants in Birmingham. At the moment waste from throughout England is shipped to Blackburn for sorting. New technology means that cans can be lifted out easily - and as aluminium fetches a good price on the market, please make a special effort to recycle your cans. Plastic and glass can also be sorted and the latest technology can even enable glass to be sorted by colour whilst paper can be sifted according to its grade.

There is a prospect of getting such a plant at Holdford Drive, replacing the ugly old incinerator that dominates the sky-line in this area of Perry Barr.

We are keen to link these developments with other "green" developments, such as generating electricity through wind turbines and solar panels. A recycling plant would need quite a lot of power.

As an example, our swimming pools have taken a big hit this year with soaring energy costs pushing bills (and ticket prices) up. It is time to unhook these facilities from fossil fuels, which will only continue to get more expensive.

A 200th celebration and a Brummie link

In a few weeks time, the nation will be remembering the 200th anniversary of parliament voting to abolish the slave trade.

Karen Hamilton and myself tabled a resolution to last week's city council meeting - noting some little known links to north Birmingham.

The MP at the centre of the campaign - who tabled persistent resolutions to parliament over a 20 year period - was William Wilberforce. Wilberforce married a Brummie, Barbara Spooner, and her family home can still be viewed. It is Rookery House, Erdington, which still bears the cast-iron decor installed by her iron merchant father Isaac Spooner.

Wilberforce was a devout Christian and a film about his remarkable life Amazing Grace is set to hit the cinemas next month to coincide with the commemorations. And yes, there is a direct link to the well-loved hymn of the same name.

Our resolution to the council described the slave trade as a "stain" on our nation's history. The vote 200 years ago did not end it - but it enabled the British navy, strengthened after Trafalgar in 1805, to move against the slavers and end the kidnapping and trafficking that blighted millions of lives. It was indeed one of the most significant moments of British history.

We also noted that slavery in different forms still persists and that actions such as supporting Fair Trade - as Birmingham does now as a city - can help combat this.

Jon Hunt

Breaking the Chains is the organisation that is coordinating many of the local commemoration events. The website is still under development.

Anti-speeding campaign

At the city council meeting last week we submitted the first of a series of petitions being collected by local people for reducing speed limits. This was in Glendower Road.

I've been talking about getting 20 mph speed limits for some time. Tonight the local councillors were out on the doors again talking to people around Calshot School. The school has a good road safety scheme put in when I was chair of governors. But it needs to be backed by a reduced speed limit.

The police have organised a number of speed checks throughout Perry Barr and each one shows average speeds of about 30mph - legal but unsafe. There are conflicting statistics about the risk of fatality and injury at different speeds - but undoubtedly it is tiny when a driver is going at 20mph.

Highways department have also recently recognised this and asked us to make submissions for 20 mph limits.

So quite a few local residents are now also collecting signatures in different neighbourhoods. If you want one for your area, please let us know.

Dispersal and young people

The dispersal zone on the Beeches and Booths Farm estates is now in place, I understand.

The youth service report a complete absence of young people on the streets. It's good to see the police doing their job and some respite for people in these areas who have put up with growing problems over the last year.

It seems the gangs who walk around with dangerous dogs may have melted away.

However the youth workers are now concerned about the difficulty in tracking down young people who would normally be hanging out on the streets. Have they found back alleys to hide in?

So we are pressing for a young people's meeting to be organised on the estate.

At ward advisory board on Monday further funding for youth activities was supported. Some £15,000 will go to the youth service for holiday activities while further support goes to the Monday youth club at the Trehurst community centre, Beeches Road.

Metro challenge

A series of meetings this week began for me at a closed meeting at West Midlands Passenger Transport Authority.

Because it was private, I can't give details apart from saying that proposals for development of the Metro system will be tabled publicly in the next few weeks - and that I spoke at some length in criticism of the initial paper that was tabled.

So far as I am concerned I want transport planners to acknowledge the city council's view that the A34 "Varsity North" route is not a priority. There is some £140 million worth of capital that could be released for other routes and projects if they scrap this unnecessary "track to nowhere".

Some of this could even go on the A34 route to enhance the existing bus showcase schemes. Imagine putting serious money into the Birchfield roundabout and the Scott Arms to enable traffic to get through these bottlenecks.

I will post more information as the debate becomes public.

Jon

Snow!

This is beginning to look like the worst weather we have had for several years. By all accounts all the extra grit bins that have gone in over the last few years are being put to good use. If your neighbourhood still needs a bin, please let us know.

Several people have reported running out of grit, eg Rockford Road, Wensleydale Road, and I understand the council crews should have been round today topping up bins.

There was a water leak on Cliveden Avenue and, again, it seems Severn Trent were very prompt at stopping it.

It has been pleasing to get positive responses to problems today from officers at the highways department, especially as they must be very busy indeed.

Please let us know the area(s) where there were traffic problems so that these can he highlighted as areas that need to priortised in the future.

Cycle speedway

Following discussions with local councillors and officers a solution has been found to enable the track to be repaired. Over the last few weeks there have been numerous discussions to find a way forward for the club. Funding for the repairs has been identified and we will be continuing to work with the club to prevent them from having to struggle again.

Here's a picture of Perry Hall Park at sunset today. Jez the warden is now painting the gates in traditional Victorian colours. The transformation continues!

Questions were being asked at the ward committee on Monday about getting changing facilities in the park.

The following points emerged:
Perry Barr district has made bidding for capital funds for the project a priority;
the cricket teams currently pay a lower rate for using a facility without changing facilities;
during the summer portaloos are installed, paid for by community chest and neighbourhood renewal fund from the surrounding wards, Perry Barr, Handsworth Wood and Lozells.

Hospital alarm

Alarming changes to our local hospitals will also be under discussion at the ward committee next Monday (that's 7pm at Rocky Lane Methodist Church, Monday 29th).
The project team are coming to explain their proposals. I'm not expecting to feel comforted.

The first wave of changes would strip children's wards and emergency surgery from City Hospital.

Then there's 2010 - or probably much later than 2010 - when they plan to replace all major services at City and Sandwell Hospitals on a new site in Grove Lane, Smethwick.

I spoke on this subject at the city council meeting two weeks ago and was interested to discover that the Grove Lane they mean is the one at Cape Hill, not the one that runs down from Soho Road. There are no maps in the consultation documents to explain.

Local people use both hospitals. My children were all born at Sandwell Hospital. Grove Lane, Smethwick, is approached via the Rabone Lane industrial estate from north west Birmingham. I've used that route a few times, it's a useful cut-hrough but we've also had some nasty bumps along there. I guess the ambulances might use the motorway.

Also alarming when Good Hope, our third local hospital, is going under the wing of Heartlands. I was on the community health council when City and Sandwell were sandwiched together under the same management. We were assured repeatedly that it was purely a management reorganisation to save on the costs of bureaucracy. Some of us were pretty certain it was not - and how right we were. If City had gone under the same management as Good Hope the new hospital would be going up in Witton, by Spaghetti Junction, and THAT'S WHERE IT SHOULD BE! A few years ago in fact there was a report in the papers warning that the region could end up with one super-hospital at just this site. No chance!

Our constituents in Witton are even more worried as many do not have cars. I talked to one whose child regularly uses the children's ward at City Hospital. Now she will have to travel to West Bromwich. How many bus changes is that?

The problem, if you follow my argument, is not that NHS managers keep trying to change things. It is the utterly pointless and endless reorganisations that take place. So we end up with short-termism dressed up as long-term strategy. All that is taking place at the moment is being driven by the inadequate funding of health services for west Birmingham and for Sandwell.

The plan also involves proposals for a chain of community hospitals, including one placed somewhere like Witton. I like it in theory but get alarmed when they try to suggest that casualties could be diverted to these hospitals.

When I spoke at the council I reminded the council of some history. That when the General Hospital was closed in the early 90s, people were told city centre emergency services would be provided by Dudley Road Hospital, which was then renamed City Hospital. In addition a minor injuries unit was open on the site of the General Hospital. The minor injuries unit was hardly used and closed within a year or two.

There is already concern about the staffing of the five community hospitals. And once the public realise they are not open 24 hours they lose confidence in them and cease using them. Exactly the same fate as has befallen our local police station and neighbourhood office (which however continues to provide a good service to many people, I hasten to add). In addition, how is somebody with, say, a sprained ankle supposed to know which kind of hospital to use? How do they know whether it's just a muscle sprain or a broken bone?

Jon