Thursday 2 February 2012

Free running?


Readers may well already be aware by Public Notice published in The Bath Chronicle newspaper, that B&NES Council invited residents to comment on the above.

We have now been advised that the Consultation has been CANCELLED for the time being.

However, as the Consultation may be resurrected, readers may wish to see what was proposed and prepare any comments for submission at a later date.  Full details of the Orders were published on page 87 of The Chronicle newspaper dated 26th January 2012.

Details of the Consultation Documents were obtained from the Council's website, but, they have now been removed, due no doubt to the cancellation of the Consultation.  Other information is still available on this site, to link to this please click here.

We have already spent some time investigating how the Orders would have affected users of the Newbridge Village Green and, we give below a brief resume of same.

Order 1
The Fouling of Land by Dogs [Bath and North East Somerset] Order 2012.

This Order would have applied to the Newbridge Meadows Village Green.
All dog faeces to be removed by person in charge of a dog.

Order 2
The Dogs on Leads [Bath and North East Somerset] Order 2012.
Would not have applied to the Newbridge Meadows Village Green -  Area not shown in the Schedule.

Order 3
The Dogs on Leads by Direction [Bath and North East Somerset] Order 2012.

This Order would have applied to the Newbridge Meadows Village Green.

It will be an Offence for any person in charge of a Dog to fail to put and keep the Dog on a Lead of not more than 4 metres in length, when directed to do so by an authorised officer of the Council……….

The Registration of the Newbridge Meadows Village Green was obtained partly on the fact that for many generations people have been able to exercise their Dogs by letting them have free run of the area without the use of a Lead.

Having just won the right to continue exercising Dogs in this manner by way of the Registration of the area as a Village Green, any restriction by way of Leads would not satisfy the Registration of the area.

This Order should not apply to the Village Green but, by the original proposed Order, it would do so.

Order 4
The Dogs Exclusion [Bath and North East Somerset] Order 2012.

This Order would not have applied to the Newbridge Meadows Village Green  -  not shown in the schedule.

Order 5
The Dogs Specified Maximum [Bath and North East Somerset] Order 2012.

This Order would have applied to the Newbridge Meadows Village Green.
It will be an Offence for any person in charge of more than six dogs.

This information was obtained from the Council’s website (please see link above) and, has been confirmed as correct by the Council’s Senior Environmental Health Officer.

The closing time and date for making representations to the Dog Control Orders department, would have been midnight on the 23rd February 2012 but, as stated above, the consultation has been CANCELLED, due we understand to the vast number of objections to the Orders, already received by the Council.

We will of course advise you further should the Consultation be reinstated. 

Monday 9 January 2012

Air quality management changes...

Readers may well already be aware that B&NES Council has invited residents to comment on the above.


Full details of the Consultation Documents may be obtained through this link.


A member of the Newbridge Matters team has sent the following letter to the B&NES Council and, we urge readers to consider the consultation documents and submit their comments.

You will see from the letter that only one of the many aspects of the consultation has been covered, that of providing air pollution monitoring equipment on sites not already covered.  This applies to the present Park and Ride Car Park here in Newbridge.
Any comments must be submitted by 31st January 2012 to:
Bath and North East Somerset Council
Environmental Monitoring
Environmental Services
FREEPOST (BA1458)
Bath
BA1 1ZZ

Letter sent by a member of our team referred to above:
Consultation on Changes to the Bath Air Quality Management Area
7th    January 2012
The vast amount of information you have provided in your Consultation Documents takes a considerable amount of time to read and comprehend and, so far I have been unable to complete the task.
However at this stage, may I make just one point which is that from the information at present available, further air monitoring action must be taken.
It would seem that the present levels of air pollution at sites not at present monitored, are either not known at all or, values have been obtained from ‘modelling’, these being considered insignificant compared with present day knowledge of the levels of air pollution causing problems with the health of various sections of the population.

I am sure you would agree, that had we known more about air pollution at the time the Royal Victoria Park Children’s Play Area was constructed immediately adjoining the A4 Upper Bristol Road here in Bath, it would not have been sited in this position.  I appreciate the large cost that would be involved in moving the play equipment to a much more suitable site, possibly within the park but, surely human life cannot be measured in terms of money.  I request that very serious thought be given to re-siting this play area, which is used by many thousands of young children every year, not only from Bath but from outlying areas, without delay.

May I suggest that monitoring stations be set up at all schools and their playing fields, hospitals, park and ride car parks and other commercial locations where large numbers of vehicles congregate within the B&NES area, so that definite information may be made available on air pollution levels.
It may well be possible to encourage those responsible for these sites to receive detailed information from the Council on the method of collecting this pollution information and, for them to forward the samples obtained to you.

As far as schools are concerned, this method of collecting the required information could well be included within the normal school curriculum, making children aware of the dangers of air pollution.  This could be done in a similar way to that which many of them already provide weather information to the National Weather Bureau but, in this case the samples would be returned to you for analysis.

Such a system would then provide real data on many of these additional sites at no additional cost to the Council, other than the initial cost of providing the sampling equipment and instruction on the retrieval of the samples.
I hope that these initial comments will be taken into consideration when you assess the results of your consultation period, which ends on 31st January 2012.

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We hope readers will respond to the Consultation Documents with their own views on this very important issue.