Olympic Torch Touches Westbury

Remarkable scenes have greeted the arrival of the London 2012 Olympic Torch as it passed close to Westbury on Trym during this morning's rush hour, cheered by vast crowds of would-be commuters and enthusiastic school children.

"The gods have come to us in petrochemical form," shouted Daisy Cutter, as she gazed across Westbury Road at the angelic-looking torch bearer, skateboarder Tony Cruiser, one of twenty locals chosen to carry the torch on its morning journey across the city. Tony, a former ASBO holder and son of a chiropodist, was turned off tagging and onto tailsliding by a McDonalds outreach programme that targets disaffected middle-class youths and works with them to re-engage with the professional aspirations of their peers. "I was really fed up with education, but after I read about the programme on a cheeseburger wrapper, I got myself sorted, and now I can't believe I've been chosen at random to carry the torch through my own hood."

Henleaze businessman Ivor Profit of TV Now was equally enthusiastic about the torch's journey through BS9. "It's great to see so many people out on the High Street so early, not only to greet the torch but to make the subliminal connection between sporting success and Panasonic televisions. It's amazing!"

As the torch made its way northward across the downs, reports began to filter through of the wider social effects that the Olympic spirit was starting to have on the Bristol region. A spokesman for Bristol City Council confirmed that a solution had been found to the Bristol City stadium re-building saga which has dragged on for several years. "I can confirm," announced spokesman Arthur Truth, "that all parties have agreed to abandon the judicial and democratic process and have agreed to the new stadium being built at Ashton Vale. We are grateful to our Olympic sponsors for lending their support to the process and can announce that the new stadium will be named the Cola Bowl."

Thousands of local residents rose early to catch a glimpse of the sacred flame, lit on the actual site of the ancient Olympics in Visa-soaked Greece by a solar ignition system specially designed for the event by General Electric. GE will be hoping to improve its public perception following its long association with Japan's Fukishima Nuclear Plant, whose six reactors were built by GE.

Southmead housewife Eva Ho noted that, despite a global profit of $14.2 billion, and GE having paid no US Federal taxes in 2010, she was pleased that the manufacturing giant was behind the torch relay. "If the flame goes out, you want to know that a big company can get it lit again."  The back-up to the sacred flame is carried throughout its journey in a support vehicle, guarded by 20 members of the Metropolitan Police's elite Sport Sponsorship Squad. Emergency legislation brought in by the last Labour government allow the squad to shove members of the public out of the way of the flame in the event that they err too close to the holy fire. "Good thing too," declared Ms Ho, whose eleven children were wildly waving union flags supplied by Visa as they awaited the flame's arrival

The flame was enthusiastically welcomed to the City of Bristol on Tuesday night and will start the next stage of its nationwide journey in Cheltenham. The flame's journey can be followed on its way to London here.

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Council Recommends New Housing for Stoke Bishop and Westbury

Bristol City Council has announced its preference for the former waste depot site on Sea Mills Lane to be turned over for housing development.

The 1.1 hectare site on the corner of Sea Mills Lane and Avon Way (see Google street map image below) is owned by the Council and its use has been reassessed as part of the Council's site development document which is currently the subject of a public consultation until May 18th. An initial Council report suggests that up to 25 houses could be built on the site.

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The City is required under the terms of its nationally-coordinated Core Strategy, to provide 26,400 new homes in the city by 2026. As a brown field site, The Sea Mills Lane location is a preferred site, with the new housing needing no use of green spaces or green belt land.

Avon Wildlife Trust, meanwhile, has called for the site to include a mix of housing and open space, in order to maintain the site's role as a wildlife corridor between between Sea Mills Wood and the Trym Valley, both of which are designated as Sites of Nature Conservation Interest.

The site is currently unused and was formerly a depot for waste management SITA.

The Council is also proposing redeveloping the Coombe House old people's home on Canford Lane, which it describes as a building "not fit for pupose" and also subject to the Council's recently floated proposal to outsource its entire stock of care home provision to the private/charitable sector. The Council estimates that 15 new omes could be built on the Coombe House site.

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A Hard Day at the Cafe for Westbury Costa Owner

Westbury on Trym resident Stuart Montgomery has had a challenging start to the working week.  The former soldier was due to open a new Costa Coffee franchise on Gloucester Road today but his efforts were greeted by protesters claiming that the new store does not have planning permission, having had its application refused by Bristol City Council. The Council decision follows the submission of a 3,000-name petition in September by residents and users of Gloucester Road who claimed that the store would damage local independent businesses. Franchise holder Stuart Montgomery, who also runs Costas in Henleaze and Portishead, is appealing against the Council's decision.   

Meanwhile, the Council has served an enforcement notice on Mr Montgomery for another of his Costa outlets on Whiteladies Road. As previously reported on Trym Tales, the Clifton branch has opened without planning permission for a change of use for the building on Cotham Hill. 

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Westbury Businessman Opens Whiteladies Costa Coffee Without Planning Permission

The recently-opened Costa Coffee shop on Whiteladies Road, which has opened without planning permission for a change of use, is owned by Westbury businessman Stuart Montgomery.

Mr Montgomery is a former soldier and also owns the Costa franchises in Portishead and Henleaze.

Earlier this year, Mr Montgomery was invited to become a member of the Leadership Group of the Prince's Trust charity.

The new shop is at the junction with Cotham Hill and was previously Derbyshire's Newsagents before it was converted into cafe.

 

Mr and Mrs Montgomery have "retail use" planning permission, allowing them to use the ground floor as a coffee shop with four chairs and one table. According to the City Council, the couple are breaking the terms of the planning rules by trading as a full-size coffee shop.

Earlier in the summer, Stuart Montgomery was voted Franchisee of the Year by Costa Coffee UK. He was quoted by Franchise News at the time saying that he wanted to open up to sixty additional coffee shops in the future. There are currently around 1200 Costa outlets across the UK.






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Oasis Academy Becomes St Ursula's (Again)

The former St Ursula's School on Brecon Road is to re-open - sort of. 

Just when it seemed that north-west Bristol's complicated state school provision had been finalised, further complexity has been added by the planned opening of a new state-funded primary academy on the site of the former St Ursula's/Oasis School in Westbury on Trym next week. 

The background to the proposed opening of the St Ursula's E-ACT Academy is as follows:

1. The original St Ursula's Roman Catholic all-age fee-paying school went into administration in August of 2010 as a result of declining student numbers.
2. The school site - formerly owned by the Catholic order The Sisters of Mercy - was bought by Bristol City Council for £2 million as part of a rescue package worked out between administrators Grant Thornton and the Council.
3. As part of this rescue package, external education provider Oasis Community Learning, based in London, agreed to submit a bid to open a state-funded academy on the St Ursula's site. Oasis currently runs two other state academies in Bristol - in Shirehampton and Hengrove. Because of the time constraints, and in order to avoid disrupting the education of the remaining St Ursula's pupils, Oasis agreed to run the school as a fee-paying independent school for one year while the academy application was submitted and processed by the Department of Education.
4. In March of 2011, the academy application involving Oasis was turned down by the Department of Education.
5. A new application was submitted, this time for a primary-only academy. In May,  education provider E-ACT was chosen as the proposed sponsor to open the new academy, on the site of the existing Oasis School.
6. The new primary academy is due to open in September, receiving the former primary school students from Oasis and, according to the E-ACT website, 60 additional reception-age pupils.
7. Despite the new school being a non faith-based academy, the name of the new academy will be St Ursula's E-ACT Academy.
   
   
   
   
   

Meanwhile, the Bristol Free School will be opening its doors from September for secondary age students,at the former government offices on Burghill Road in Brentry. In April of this year, the Council agreed in principle to allow the Bristol Free School to relocate to the St Ursula's/Oasis site, while the new St Ursula's Academy remained on site as well. The proposal is for two separate schools to be based on the Brecon Road site from Sept 2012. 

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Elmlea Academy to Dig up its Field?

In the week that Elmlea Junior School officially became an independent academy, it has emerged that, despite an original agreement to preserve its playing field, the new school has agreed to allow the neighbouing Infants' School to be redeveloped on the Junior School field.

Last year, when Elmlea Infants' School was seeking permission from Bristol City Council to rebuild on the popular Junior School field, parents and neighbours opposed to the digging up of the field succeeded in halting the plan. A local action group, Acies, was formed and gathered around 1,000 signatures on a petition opposing the development of of the field. Local MP Charlotte Leslie was also a vocal opponent of the move. 

Trym Tales understands that, following the transition to an academy - an independent state funded school -  Elmlea Junior has gained greater control over the use of the land on which the school sits. Consequently, academy head teacher Claire Galliers has reached an agreement with Infant School head Inge Fey which would allow the Infants School (which remains under LEA control) to use the Junior School playing field as part of its modified development programme. A full rebuild (estimated at £4.5 m) was ruled out last July due to public spending cuts nationally. It is unclear precisely what the nature of the building work on the field may be in light of these cuts. .  

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Council Plans to Reduce Carbon Footprint by 20%

Image via Wikipedia

This from Councillor Neil Harrison on the City Council's plans to move forward with energy reduction and the increased use of renewables.

Highlights of the project include:

• 10 new biomass boilers in schools and leisure centres
• 80 solar photo-voltaic installations at schools
• replacing 34,000 street lights with low energy units
• two new wind turbines at Avonmouth
  
• a major investment in new parking spaces for use by the city's two car clubs

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