Kingsway Villagers

On Tuesday an accident involving a car going into the middle barriers at the traffic lights to Kingsway, meant that traffic coming from the south could not turn right into the village.

Today another accident with a motorcycle and car, again at the entrance traffic lights, caused problems.

Firstly I hope everybody was okay.

How many incidents does there have to be before a second access route is opened? How many houses, occupants and cars does there need to be before anyone takes responsibility?

Are the entrance traffic lights becoming an accident hotspot? At peak times there are queues of cars leaving and entering Kingsway. Sometimes the slip road coming from the North into the village becomes full, and the queue goes onto the main carriageway where cars are travelling at 70 miles per hour…

This will get worse as more houses are built and occupied.
I fear a major smash will happen one day.

Sandra

Year 6 pupils from Kingsway School are getting together with the year 10 pupils from Beaufort School in a joint project to produce a "News Program" about Kingsway School & Kingsway Village.

The program will feature children and staff from the school as well as local parents and residents, and Mrs Bennett has asked me to invite local residents to take part, saying:

"We’re looking for input and opinions from anybody interested in giving positive feedback about the village and local area, and how we can work together to improve the local community."

If you’re interested, please call Kingsway School on 01452-881800 and let them know that you’d like to be involved.

Hi all,

If you’re into contemporary photography, there is a new exhibition (free entry) on at Gloucester Guildhall.

Perspectives: Photographs and Artwork by Matt Haslam

Matt’s images communicate a sense of mystery and alternative reality, giving things a different slant and compelling us to see them in new ways. He is fascinated by contrasts, both within the images themselves and to the ‘norm’. An urban designer by training, he uses a way of viewing the environment as a theme which produces a large variety of often very different subjects, as well as very different techniques. For him the process becomes the subject as much as the object being captured.

Thursday 7th until Saturday 30th January 2010

Well worth a visit in my opinion, and its free

Thank you to everyone in Kingsway who joined in with Halloween this year.

My two girls had a fantastic time with so many people opening their doors and joining in the fun.

We felt very safe walking round our village last night, with lots of other families doing the same thing.

We also found it helpful that some people put up the “sorry no trick or treat” signs as it meant we didn’t stand waiting at doors that nobody answered and hopefully the people inside remained undisturbed.

First of all Jo, my apologies for delaying this post.

For the last 2 years I have added a Halloween post and I usually try to add a bunch of pictures of the local kids in their halloween costumes.
This year – due to illness (myself and Angelina) I wasn’t able to get out for the evening but I did try to get photographs of some of the trick-or-treaters who turned up at our door. Sadly it seems my camera was cursed, because none of the pictures were saved correctly (most likely I messed up… I’m definitely not “on form” at the moment)! So – to all those who agreed to have their pic’s taken and displayed – please accept my apologies.

Luckily Phoenix was able to get out and scrounge her (traditional) bucket of sweets and I did manage to (successfully) snap some pictures of her (and the cat) before she left:

Once again it was great to see so many children enjoying the atmosphere and the event and our sincere thanks go to all Kingsway Residents for being so kind to them

Waterwells Synthetic Pitch – Official Opening Saturday 21 November at 10:30

Please come to the official opening of the Synthetic all weather pitch at Waterwells Sports Centre on Saturday 21st November 2009 at 10:30 am.

The entry is off the link road between Naas Lane and Waterwells Drive.
There will be youth team football matches / demonstrations taking place.

The synthetic pitch is an artificial grass surface with full flood lighting and is available for local groups to hire at discounted rates. For details contact Quedgeley Parish Council on 721552.

Funding for the synthetic pitch was provided by Quedgeley Urban Village Ltd, the Kingsway developers, and the project has been completed by Quedgeley Parish Council, on time and within the £230,000 budget.

The land for the Waterwells Sports Centre was donated by Crest Nicholson, from the Waterwells Business Park, along with the funds to provide a high quality grass playing surface. The changing rooms at Waterwells were provided by the City Council, Parish Council and Quedgeley Wanderers Football Club with a substantial grant from the Football Foundation.

For the future, all we will need is an indoor or undercover training facility, and an outdoor hard-court informal sports facility and we will take Waterwells from a Sports Centre to be proud of, to just about the best Sports Centre in the area.

Has anyone else noticed whenever Kingsway is in the Citizen, its always referred to as “Kingsway estate” and not as Kingsway Village? Also any story a little bit negative they usually go along with “troubled estate” etc.

Is it any wonder why the area seems to have gained a reputation? As for this reputation, I personally haven’t really noticed anything out of the ordinary in the village. The way some people talk ill of the place now you would think its South Central or something.

Todays Citizen ’sfront page said “Drugs swoop on city estate”. Doesn’t exactly make the place sound very welcoming! I realise they have to print negative as well as positive stories but it was for minor drugs offences in two properties which I feel for other areas would not have been on the front page. The headline was very sensationalised.

The other day they also printed several extremely negative internet posts about Kingsway, such as “it’s a good thing all the dole scroungers are going there, keep them all in one area”. Most of the stuff printed was factually wrong but they put them in anyway. I am not a dole scrounger thanks and I bet the vast, vast majority of residents in the area aren’t either. Without wanting to sound like a snob, I doubt many “dole scroungers” could afford nice new Mercedes’, BMW’s, Range Rovers etc like many in Kingsway have.

Do people really think of Kingsway like this? I’ve lived here for 2 years, have not known of any burglarys in my road or attempted break-ins etc. All my neighbours are pleasant, resepectful and keep their gardens tidy. I know not every household will have the same sense of pride but this will be in the minority and you’ll get the same everywhere.

I go jogging round Kingsway somtimes late at night (9/10pm) and the only people I tend to see are other people doing the same or people walking their dogs. Occasionally I see a few teenagers wandering about but have never had any problems. To put it into context, I used to live in Abbeymead – a so called “nice area”. I would never go running alone round there as there were always large gangs of 16/17 year olds hanging around, always problems with them outside the Tesco and the pubs getting into bother fighting and drinking. I lived in Longlevens before that and my house was broken into twice, my next door neighbours 3 times (and their dogs attacked in one incident). Several cars were stolen in my road, and I lived in Greyhound Gardens. Again another so called nice area.

Sorry for the rant but I cannot believe how quickly the village’s reputation has been tarnished with little evidence. Every area will have problems, however to say Kingsway is a “troubled estate” when compared to many other areas in Gloucester is ridiculous.