Kingsway Villagers

The other day without warning, workers turned up to cancel (black-out) one of the double yellow lines along Valley Gardens. At the same time, as far as I’ve been given to understand, they put double yellow lines along Thatcham Avenue.

Usually, when there’s a single yellow line, parking restrictions apply, e.g. you can park after 6pm or can park for up to one or two hours with no return within the hour, etc, however there is one yellow line (presumably something to do with the new bus route) along Valley Gardens, but no indication of what the parking restrictions are.

Parking is already a nightmare in Kingsway and nobody seems to know what’s permissible and what isn’t, given that the roads haven’t been adopted by the Council and the “No Parking” signs carry no weight whatsoever.

Why can’t whoever makes changes to the parking situation, be it QUVL or the Council (and I doubt it was the latter who changed the situation in Valley Gardens) have the courtesy to let residents affected by any changes know in advance? Say, by means of a leaflet through the door, or in the usual way, by putting signage on the lampposts.

A lot of people will have seen the “electric fencing” around the horse paddock at Manor Farm next to the Barn Owl. Part of the wooden fence seems to be broken and the “electric” ribbon is only loosely attached in places.
It may be that the eventual aim is to put fence panels all the way around, but in the meantime, I was wondering just what the voltage in such an “electric fence” might be?

It seems fairly open and despite there being notices that it’s an electric fence, any toddlers walking by, or kids playing around it unsupervised (remember that kids have been seen playing in the balancing pond nearby), or even inquisitive dogs, could easily come into contact with the ribbon.

I was wondering therefore, whether - if it were live - such a fence could cause problems for people or dogs touching it?

It’s clearly meant as a deterrent for the 2 horses that live on the farm, but would it be dangerous for - say, kids playing a game of “dare”?

Last night (Monday 6th Feb) at 9.45pm, as I was walking down Valley Gardens, I passed a middle-aged, fair haired woman, accompanied by what I took to be her 2 daughters, pushing two Tesco’s trolleys up the road. The trolleys were filled with Tesco bags, so I assume she’d just done a weekly shop.

So much for the signs that say, “These trolleys will stop if pushed beyond Tesco’s car park” - or words to that effect. That’s probably another two trolleys discarded somewhere on Kingsway (experience suggests she, along with a like-minded minority on Kingsway who lack a social conscience, probably won’t have returned them to the store); Tesco’s will have lost another 2 trolleys - unless it recovers them at some cost to itself, which will be reflected in the prices the rest of us pay.

What worries me, as has been pointed out in a comment on the Asda post, is that if we get another local supermarket, we could be looking at even more trolleys littering the estate. Another argument in favour of pressing Asda for coin-deposit trolleys which, if it won’t exactly eradicate the possibility of further trolleys in Kingsway, may go some way to keeping the problem to a minimum.

Friday, another refuse collection day. Green bin and recycling bin duly left out on the pavement for The Council to collect.

I got home at lunchtime to find that some inconsiderate (expletive deleted) had decided to dump 4 carrier bags of rubbish - not all recyclable by the looks of it - in the emptied green box. (This was obviously after it had been emptied as the dustbin men leave the lid under the box once they’ve taken away the contents).

I’ve had similar things happen in the past and on the first occasion just decided to add the waste to my own collection, but enough is enough; this time I phoned The Council.

They’re not only sending someone to collect the rubbish but, as this is considered fly-tipping, they’ll go through it to see whether they can track down the perpetrator - it must be someone local.

Let’s hope the selfish person who decided to leave their problem rubbish for someone else to deal with has left a receipt or envelope inside the carrier bags, so that The Council can track them down and prosecute them.

Obviously it’s impossible to watch over your rubbish until it’s collected, especially when most of us have to go to work, but this really is anti-social behaviour of the “I’m alright, Jack” variety. (Good job I’m a firm believer of “what goes around, comes around”).

Postscript (Saturday): The Council failed to act yesterday, which meant that overnight someone - probably kids - threw one of the bags of rubbish against the front door!

I’ve reported the incident to The Police, who will now be alert to people walking round Kingsway with bags of rubbish on collection days, and will get back to The Council with a further complaint.

Remember how nice the roundabout used to be at the A38 entrance to Kingsway?
(Editors Note: See website header picture)
Then one day, for reasons that have already been explained here, the trees and stones were taken away!

With the prospect of the road being opened (effectively an extension of Woodvale) in the near future (fingers crossed - didn’t I read it should be open “soon”?), wouldn’t it be nice to have the roundabout put back to its former glory as a sign that people were entering the Kingsway Development?

Of course things like that cost money, but as I drive round Gloucester, I see roundabouts “sponsored” by various companies. Now that we’ve got a new Tesco’s store on Kingsway, might they be able to sponsor the re-design or reinstatement of the roundabout? Or perhaps Marston’s, who are soon to open the new Barn Owl pub, might like to sponsor it? Or perhaps it could be sponsored by the new SevernFM Radio Station (with a sign there giving details of how to listen to the new station)?

The possibilities seem to be quite a few.

We could always have a whip-round amongst the residents - but then there’s the matter of maintaining the roundabout, which is why I think a local company might like to sponsor it. I can’t imagine it would cost that much to send someone round to mow the grass on a small roundabout once in a while, or even clip the trees now and again.

Dare I even suggest Asda as sponsor? I just think it would be nice to have something more pleasant to the eye than the bare space we’ve got now.

Yes…

Parking and The Underpass.

A few days ago, while walking under the underpass, I witnessed a car coming down Valley Gardens towards Matalan. As it approached the underpass, it sped up considerably, as if travelling at speed might allow it to avoid the CCTV. I hope it didn’t. Reckless and dangerous are two words I can think of to describe the driver’s attitude. But a £60 fine at most? If there really is a good reason why this road isn’t open as a general thoroughfare, which I take it there must be, then why aren’t the fines much higher? Are any figures available to show how many people have been caught driving through the underpass? Are they published / made public anywhere to act as a deterrent? A driver thinking they could get away with speeding through the underpass could put a child’s life at risk.

Meanwhile… I’ve also seen a few people parking on the double yellow lines next to the children’s play area on Valley Gardens recently, while they take their children into the play area. It’s good that they take the time to supervise their children; not so good that they effectively block one half of the road, turning it into an obstacle course. Another sign of the “I’m alright Jack” culture that seems to be spreading throughout the area?