New Mosque: Public Exhibition

I have just received details of a public exhibition for the planned new mosque on Mill Road:

There will be a public exhibition of pre-planning application proposals for the new Mosque building. Please join us to view the detailed plans, learn more about the project and ask project leaders any questions you may have.

The exhibition will take place on Wednesday 7th September, 2011 from 2pm to 8pm at Ross Street Community Centre.

Click Here for more information and to download the exhibition leaflet.

Mill Road Winter Fair

Mill Road Winter Fair is back on Saturday!

Mill Road will be closed to traffic from Tenison Road to Coleridge Road during the hours of the fair, 10.30am to 4.30pm, 4 December.

Personally I'm looking forward to my old favourite of one (or two) of Andrew Northrop's hot dogs. Let's hope it's a nice crisp day like today - blue skies and no wind!

If anyone would like to help the organisers, such as by stewarding, get in touch with them through their website.

The future of Mill Road

Three organisations, The Mill Road Society, No Mill Road Tesco Campaign Committee and Milly Card Scheme have come together to hold a public meeting about the future of Mill Road on Thursday, 14 October at 7.30pm at Ross Street Community Centre.

Unfortunately, as the meeting clashes with the city council's East Area Committee there are unlikely to be many local councillors present.

This is the message from the organisations:

Dear Mill Road Supporter,

As you’ve probably seen, Cambridge recently topped the list of Britain’s clone towns. There are still areas of the city where independent shops survive, but they are under pressure. We’d like to get together to discuss ideas about how the Mill Road area can be promoted and improved for local residents, and to support and encourage independent traders.

At present the Grand Arcade and the Grafton Centre get most of the attention/money/support from the City Council and there is a real need to get the council to focus attention on the Mill Road area as well. There are things that the council could do which would make a great improvement.

We’ve been talking to some of the local traders to get their views but we want to get as many ideas and as much support as possible. We will be meeting with local councillors to talk about what the council can do to help the area, and we’d like to know what you think. We care about our area and together we can improve it.

A meeting has been arranged at Ross Street Community Centre [map] at 7.30pm on the 14th October. If you want to protect independent trading in Mill Road and the unique area and community that we have, please come along and give us your views and ideas. We’ll also be giving an update on what the Milly Card Scheme and the No Mill Road Tesco campaign have been up to over the past year.

We hope to see you on the 14th.

The Mill Road Society
No Mill Road Tesco Campaign Committee
Milly Card Scheme

More misery for Mill Road

There is more misery for traders on Mill Road, as inspection of the sewer during the current works has revealed a further collapse.

While Anglia Water were carrying out the repair works to the collapsed sewer in Mill Road they discovered another blockage 20 metres further along the Mill Road line.

They put a camera down the sewer and confirmed at a site meeting yesterday that the sewer has collapsed at that point and that there is a void under the road. The sewer is deeper than the one they are working on now at about 8.5 metres.

The estimated repair time for this is 9 weeks. A second team will deal with this repair whilst the first are dealing with the original collapse.

As traffic is already used to using the diversion that is in place Anglian Water has been instructed to continue immediately with the second repair rather than wait for the first to be finished in two weeks time. CCC highways team has told Anglian Water that even when Hobart Road is opened again it should not form part of a diversion route as it is a residential area. Instead it should be for access only.

Cyclists and pedestrians will still be able to pass the works at all times.

Lights on but no one in, Comrades

Pictured is the Green Party's 'shop' on Mill Road, taken at 11.20pm tonight, with the lights blazing. There didn't appear to be anyone in at the time.

The Greens are always trying to tell everyone what to do - perhaps as socialists they think it's one rule for the party elite and another for the rest...

More seriously, we do all need to do our bit and cutting out obvious wasting of energy like this is the right place to start, not mosquito farming, wacky protectionist economics and ideological opposition to nuclear energy etc.

Mill Road Winter Fair AGM

The Mill Road Winter Fair will be on Tuesday 16th March at 7.00 in the Baptist Church on
Mill Road in Romsey. Everyone is welcome to attend. The success of the fair relies on volunteers, so if you are interested in helping, it might be a good opportunity to meet the organisers.

They also have a Facebook page if you would like to get regular bulletins about what is happening. You can do this here.

Tesco lose Mill Road Alcohol Appeal

I understand Tesco have lost their appeal yesterday against the Council's refusal to give them a licence to sell alcohol from their new store on Mill Road.

Despite offering to implement a variety of new conditions to restrict the types and times they would sell alcohol, the magistrates listened to objectors and upheld the Council's original decision.

Looks like those promotional posters will have to carry on gathering dust in the store room.

Mill Road shut on Saturday

The Mill Road winter festival is taking place on Saturday 5th December, with the opening at Ditchburn place at 10.30am and will be going on until around 16.30 hours.

Just a quick word of warning however, the road from Tenison Road over to Sedgewick Street will be closed to all traffic from the times as above.

Access to Tenison Road and Sedgewick Street will remain available and the roads off Mill road will remain open but there will be no access by vehicles from the part of Mill road that is closed.

One development being launched during the Fair is a new scheme called Millycard, that will be available from outside Hilarys the Greengrocers. The website isn't up and running yet, but for a fee of £2, I'm told the card will entitle holders to all sorts of discounts and offers from participating local traders.

Your Conservative team will be watching with interest how this scheme develops, and hope it can provide support for the diverse range of independent traders on Mill Road.

Police respond to unlit cyclists on Mill Road

It was good to see a police officer checking for cyclists without lights on Mill Road tonight. An earlier survey by Coleridge Conservatives, that hit the front page of Cambridge News, showed that 50% of lights that should have been present and on were either absent, dim or obscured. We don't know exactly how many people were therefore not properly lit (as we were checking light positions independently, not cycles as a whole) but it would obviously have had to have been at least half.

The officer I spoke to tonight reckoned 80% of people he'd seen weren't lit properly. That's a damning statistic, but I'm glad that they haven't just done a symbolic annual check on Sidney Street but seem to be taking the problem seriously.

Mill Road Winter Fair

I'm happy to pass on the following message from the organisers of Mill Road Winter Fair:

"With a month to go to Mill Road Winter Fair we thought you might like access to the on-line programme, with details of what will be happening, when and where, from Donkey Green by the swimming pool through to Romsey Mill and the Labour Club near Coleridge Road. You can find this at http://www.mill-road.com/winterfair_timetable.aspx

More details can be found at http://millroad09.wordpress.com/

It would be great if you could download the poster from http://www.mill-road.com/millroad_community.aspx and put it in your window. We don't want people to miss the opportunity of coming to the Fair.

If you could give up a couple of hours on the day of the Fair to be a steward, please let us know. Or if you could help us to put up and take down signs and banners in the neighbourhood in the days before and after the Fair, act as a runner on Friday 4th, or give us any other help, again, just reply to this e-mail and I will forward it to the appropriate person.

Finally, don't miss the first ever Mill Road Christmas Switch On! From 4:00 pm on 14th November at Cutlacks and the Deaf Centre there will be free children's activities, hot food from Urban Larder, a brass band and a raffle, The winner switches on the lights. ALL WELCOME!

www.millroadfestivelights.co.uk"

Bicycle lights on Mill Road

Coleridge Conservatives surveyed cycles going over Mill Road bridge after pub closing time on a Sunday and Monday evening and found that only 50% of the front and back positions where there should have been lights had lights on either full or flashing. (We noticed that far more people had front lights than rear lights.)

This is one of the problems that we feel should be tackled before almost half a million pounds are spent annoying all vehicular users of the road and cyclists with 'vertical displacement' features.

The Mill Road safety scheme will be up for consideration at the next Cambridge Traffic Management Area Joint Committee at Shire Hall and the initial report on Mill Road is included in the agenda. I argue that the proposal should score badly on all three of the scoring categories mentioned in section 2.1 but I am not holding my breath that officers will agree.


Our survey was unscientific and small scale, but I suspect the result will surprise no-one...

UPDATE: Martin in the comments asked for the actual numbers corresponding to the above figures so here are the results from observing 89 cycles. You may notice a slight error.

		full	flashing	low bat	none	obscured
Out of town	Front	29	8	3	30	1
	Rear	14	19	4	33	3
Into town	Front	8	2	0	6	1
	Rear	6	3	0	8	0
		57	32	7	74	5

Mill Road safety scheme consultation closed

The consultation period for a proposed £400,000 safety scheme for Mill Road is now over. Coleridge Conservatives participated in the consultation and now await the report that will be drawn up for the Area Joint Committee (joint transport committee of city and county councils) to consider in January.

As we noted previously, systematic speed analysis on this road suggests that speeds are already kept low. Accident records obtained by Coleridge Conservatives also seem to confirm anecdotal evidence that the real dangers on the road are at junctions.

It is not clear how any of the measures in the proposed scheme would reduce incidents of cars pulling into Mill Road without noticing cyclists already on the road. Yet the costs of the plan are high at £400,000 and humps in the road are really going to annoy not just car drivers, but also cyclists; they will no doubt also encourage cyclists to hug the kerb instead of cycling in a safer defensive position into the carriageway, while car drivers may be tempted to drive in the middle of the road between the humps. (And it would be a terrible shame for the lovely new road surface to be ruined in this way - it is now a pleasure to cycle along!)

We really need a more thorough analysis of what the actual problems are if we are to come up with an economical solution that we can have confidence will actually make a positive difference, and preferrably without annoying all classes of road user simultaneously.

When I attended the exhibition at St Barnabas Church in September I noticed that the sign-in form had columns to tick for Romsey, Petersfield and 'other' residents. This suggests that the consultation, including official flyers to notify people of the consultation, was aimed predominantly at Romsey and Petersfield residents and not other city residents, such as in Coleridge, who have a big interest in this important road. (Although we of course publicised the consultation in our August newsletter.) I think we should therefore expect conclusions to be skewed heavily towards the views of the residents around the road itself, who are less likely to own or need a car themselves. We shall be making this point to the relevant people.

Here are some of the ideas that Coleridge Conservatives think should be considered:

1. Do a proper analysis of why accidents are happening and work out what could be done to fix the situation. (Rather than dogmatically assuming that speed is the cause and annoying drivers the answer.)

2. Proper police enforcement of cyclists being unlit at night (currently no effective enforcement at all undertaken and huge numbers of cyclists are unlit),

3. Driver education relating to junctions, along with analysis of why cyclists are so hard to spot.

4. Look at delivery arrangements e.g. whether side streets can be used to cut down on the amount of delivery from the road.

5. Ban overtaking anywhere on the railway bridge.

6. Consider marking advisory cycle lanes in the middle of the two lanes so that cyclists are encouraged to ride in a position that makes them prominent and discourages unsafe overtaking, such as in the tunnel at Heathrow airport.

Tesco set to open tomorrow as court bid fails

No to Mill Road Tesco has failed in its bid to secure an injunction stopping Mill Road Tesco opening tomorrow, clearing the last legal hurdle before Tesco's planned opening tomorrow morning. The action saw an individual campaigner as claimant, the City Council as defendant and Tesco as an interested party.

Whilst there remains an option for campaigners of pursuing a judicial review, some of the observations of the judge could prove problematic for the anti-Tescos campaigners, including:

"In so far as there is alleged to be a breach of planning consent granted or of planning control generally, there is an absence of evidence that the Defendant has acted irrationally of unlawfully. "

"The defendant Council has a wide discretion ... whether to take action in respect of any such breaches or not."

"There appears to be no legal basis for the claim that the installation of air-conditioning plant is development within the meaning of that term in planning law"

and perhaps most damning:
"This application is in reality an attempt to revive the No Mill Road Tesco Campaign under the guise of a Judicial Review claim. It is a misuse of Judicial Review"

I haven't blogged on the East Area committee last week yet - it took some time to calm down, after finding out that the Council's failure to provide a briefing for opposition Councillors resulted in me being excluded from actually making the decision. Under planning rules, Councillors cannot make decisions that they have predetermined, and it appears that this also applies to planning enforcement decisions.

It is unclear what would constitute predetermining the decision - I had certainly made it known that I didn't think large companies should be able to just ignore planning conditions, but without an adequate briefing beforehand I just didn't know if it would be legally safe for me to take part in the decision, so I did't.

I did however speak as a ward member to make it clear that on the main planning condition that Tesco had threatened to breach - delivering from Mill Road, the Council need to take a very robust view.

There are still questions to answer about quite why the Council was so slow in acting on this matter (which ultimately resulted in the last minute Tesco U-turn) - and why repeated requests for a briefing to be held for Councillors were refused. The chair of the committee Cllr Blencowe certainly didn't come out of the situation well - he had a briefing on 6th August, that other members of the committee were effectively excluded from, tried to cancel the meeting with a couple of days to go, and then proceeded to use the meeting to attack the No to Mill Road Tesco campaign members at one point.

Ultimately however, I think the press reports of the meeting were very harsh on the committee - who had at late notice received assurances from Tesco (and agreement to put these into a more legally binding form) that they wouldn't deliver from Mill Road. The committee did all they could reasonably do in the case of the deliveries from Mill Road - authorising officers to take immediate enforcement action if the condition was breached despite the undertakings from Tesco.

There remains the question of whether the changes made to the building to fit air conditioning require planning permission - the Council is looking in to this. Tescos will now be delivering to the rear of the store via Catharine St and Sedgewick Street - which is far from ideal, although doesn't appear to directly contradict any planning conditions or traffic laws, so it will be interesting to see how any problems that arise from this delivery method can be tackled.

No to Mill Road Tesco have secured significant concessions from Tesco on deliveries and blocking the sale of alcohol, as well as keeping them out for nearly two years, but it finally looks like Tesco has conceded enough to enable them to open.

Mill Road Safety Scheme

There are a couple of dates coming up for the consultation exercise being carried out for the County Council's proposed safety scheme for Mill Road, that could see a 20mph limit introduced - exhibitions will be held as follows:

• 20 August 2009 11am – 7pm, The Jordan Room, Romsey Mill

• 8 September 2009, 11am – 7pm, The Old School Hall, St Barnabas Church

If you have strong views about the plans, please turn up to the exhibitions to ask questions, or fill in the consultation - it is important that the views of people that use Mill Road but live slightly further away are taken into account. Further details and a download of the consultation form and online version of the survey are available at http://www.cambridgeshire.gov.uk/transport/projects/cambridge/millroad/

A detailed speed survey was undertaken at several points on Mill Road over the course of a week in August 2007, and indicated average speeds along the road of between 13 and 26mph, almost all drivers were travelling under 30mph, with very few drivers going significantly over the (30mph) limit. I remain to be convinced by the case for a 20mph limit when so few cars speed at the moment - we need to understand the causes of the accidents that are occuring and tackle them. I would suggest dangerous overtaking of cyclists on the railway bridge and car drivers failure to spot cyclists when emerging from junctions (perhaps because it is dark and they don't have any lights on...) might be good places to start.

Tesco wont deliver from Mill Road

The Mill Road Tesco saga seems to be moving rapidly - they have just given a reassurance in writing to confirm that they don't intend to deliver to the store from Mill Road.

In a letter dated 17th August to the Council planners, they confirmed that contrary to previous statements, it is now 'Tesco's intention to deliver from the curtilage of the site'.

They have indicated that there will be 3 deliveries a day in 8m long lorries, along with a daily newspapers delivery in a transit type van.

Somebody is going to have a busy day looking at shop layouts - the floorplan presented to yestedays licensing committee had a section for alcohol and assumed deliveries from the front of the store...

Exclusive: Tesco refused Mill Road alcohol licence

After a marathon 4 hours meeting of the City Council's Licensing Committee today, Tesco has been refused a premises licence to sell alcohol from its proposed store on Mill Road.

After hearing evidence from Tesco's, the Police and their legal team, and some impassioned pleas from local residents and No to Mill Road Tesco's supporters, the committee concluded that Tesco simply hadn't addressed the problems outlined by the police, and refused the application.

It was yet another bizarrely inept performance from Tesco. As I indicated in my response to the application, the store is in a Cumulative Impact Zone for alcohol related anti-social behaviour, so the presumption is that new applicants would be turned down unless they could demonstrate how they addressed the problems of the Cumulative Impact Zone.

Tesco rolled out a boilerplate defence of their application, then tried to claim that the main problem with Mill Road being addressed by the introduction of the cumulative impact zone was the sale of alcohol for consumption on licenced premises e.g. pubs, not the sale from premises like supermarkets for off-licence consumption. If you start by demonstrating such a complete lack of comprehension of what the actual situation on the ground is in Mill Road, you really are going to struggle to convince anyone that you have properly addressed the problems with your application.

A deserved round one victory in this battle to the No to Mill Road Tesco protestors - Tescos are expected to appeal.

Tescos East Area Committee date set

It has been confirmed that a special East Area meeting to discuss the potential options for dealing with Tesco's announcement that they intend to ignore the planning condition on deliveries when they open their new store will take place on:

Thursday 20 August 10.00 (presumably 10am - its not 100% clear...)

St Phillips Church

185 Mill Road

Cambridge

CB1 3AN

A formal agenda will be published on Monday.

Still no date set yet for a briefing for Councillors on the issue - I am yet to have the benefit of knowing what advice the Council has taken to date about this issue, what it thinks are the options, along with what it thinks are the relative merits of each option, or even why the Council thinks East Area Committee is the right place to take any decisions. In fact, the Council is still deciding whether or not it can give us a briefing at all before the meeting - possible legal issues apparently - (How did that episode of Yes Minister finish up in the end...)

As a random aside - if you are a large organisation thinking of pulling a fast one on the local planning department, I can highly recommend August as the month to try it on...

Exclusive: Conservatives call for Special Meeting of East Area Committee

Cambridge Conservatives are calling for a special meeting of East Area committee to consider the options open to the Council to enforce planning conditions relating to the proposed new Tesco store on Mill Road.

I have written to the Council's Chief Executive:

"In accordance with Section 4a paragraph 43.1 of the Council's Constitution I would like to formally request that a special meeting of East Area Committee is held as soon as possible to consider the options for dealing with Tesco's announcement that they intend to ignore the planning condition on deliveries when they open their new store on Mill Road.

I would also like to request that a briefing is arranged prior to the meeting for members of East Area committee to cover the Council's understanding and advice received about this situation."

I understand other members of East Area committee also intend to call for this meeting, that could result in a course of action being agreed prior to Tesco's planned opening of the new store.

Mill Road Tesco Heading for the Courts

The saga over the proposed Tesco store on Mill Road could be heading for the courts imminently.

Tesco has made it clear it intends to open its store on 26th of August, and has told the press that it intends to deliver to the store from Mill Road itself, in apparent contradiction of a planning condition relating to the site.

Campaigners including No to Mill Road Tesco and Cambridge Cycling Campaign are particularly concerned about the safety aspects of deliveries from Mill Road, and are calling on the Council to take pre-emptive action, for example, by taking out an injunction.

I am not against a Tesco on Mill Road in principle, but many of the details, including their requirements for very frequent deliveries that will be hard to satisfy safely are clearly very problematic, and Tescos should not be able to get away with bending the rules for its own convenience at the expense of public safety. I have been asking for weeks now for the Council to clarify its position, and agree a course of action. The Council however is still reviewing the legal position, and has suggested that any pre-emptive actions on its part will have to go through the normal committee procedure. The best it has come up with is a statement:

"There is a lawful planning consent for the use of 163-167 Mill Road for retail use which requires deliveries to be made only from a rear service yard. We are urgently contacting Tesco to establish the company's intention for the premises given the lawful consent. If it becomes clear that enforcement action may be necessary then the officers will report to members as soon as possible on options for further action"

This is a hopelessly inadequate response in view of the imminence of the store opening - I am calling on the Council to come up with some recommendations urgently, brief all relevant local Councillors and then immediately put recommendations for approval by the appropriate Councillors as part of the Council's procedures for urgent decisions.

It sounds like the patience of No to Mill Road Tesco has now been tested beyond the limit. They have engaged lawyers, and given the Council a deadline of today to confirm they will be seeking an injunction preventing Tesco deliveries from Mill Road (or for Tesco to confirm they will not breach the planning condition) - if no reassurances are forthcoming they will be in court without further notice to seek a judicial review of the Council's decision not to seek an injunction.

Tesco Pressing Ahead

I am urgently trying to establish the planning department's view on how the planning condition relating to no deliveries from Mill Road can be enforced most effectively, Tesco meanwhile seem to be pressing on with opening plans regardless of any obstacles...

(Photo from Tesco's on the Leisure Park)