The South East Plan
September 27th, 2006 at 03:43pm
Under The South East Plan
It’s not like me to rave about a tip, but if it didn’t smell as bad as the old one, Crawley’s new tip would be a breath of fresh air!
A high tech, state of the art rubbish dump is what Crawley is. No, wait; did I finish that sentence too soon? A high tech, state of the art rubbish dump is what Crawley is setting itself apart from other Sussex towns with (with lesser tips).
Fastway Bus Service? I would rather have a dump!
The new rubbish disposal point in Crawley is everything that that Fastway Bus is not; Namely useful. I would say that the Fastway bus is also full of shit but how can I? It is always empty when it rolls past me, with the driver looking slightly embarrassed that he can’t be trusted to drive a normal bus, that he needs one with stabilisers that Noddy would be ashamed of. But I have drifted off the point. Which is that at least someone in authority knows how to make a decent decision regarding public amenities. The new tip, whilst looking like the Millennium Dome’s little brother’s tip, has a drive up ramp to ensure easy off loading of the car load of rubbish, a low wall to drop stuff over, lots of parking and friendly attendants. It has the very best in recycling opportunities that I have ever seen. All in all, worth the trip! Even if you have no rubbish to dispose of.
By Jez
February 24th, 2006 at 05:50pm
Under Horley Master Plan+ The South East Plan+ Buy A House in Horley
Water Shortage in South East
Sounds like it’s going to be a nice summer, queuing up at the local standpipe with my bucket. It’s looking likely that we in the south east will be facing our worst ever water shortage - in a long run of water shortages.
I hate to harp on about it, but how can anyone plan to build thousands upon thousands of new houses in the southeast when there is not enough water to go around for the existing houses?
Why can’t some of the land be put aside for some new reservoirs? It’s getting beyond the pail (geddit?)
Who in their right mind would want to move into a house in an area that has constant water shortages and a hosepipe ban every summer? Considering we aren’t even close to summer yet?
You also have to question the folly of building on known flood plains after the driest winter sways someone’s decision. 
By Jez
December 21st, 2005 at 09:40am
Under The South East Plan
Watching ITV News last night, they showed frightening pictures of the Weirwood Reservoir at a shockingly low level. Over twelve feet lower than it should be, in fact.
The upshot of the news story Millions of homes face higher water rates and meters is that water meters are to be forced to have water meters.
Below is a picture taken in May 2005 - is’s easy to see how low the water is - it’s worse now but I can’t find a more current photo.
With all the planned housing boom (can you have a planned boom? I thought the whole idea of a boom was that it was unexpected!) in the South, if they can’t already sustain the levels of water needed how are they going to cope with all the thousands of new houses planned? It’s easy to imply the South’s existing householders are wasteful with their water usage, but the truth seems to me to lie with over expansion being the culprit. So why are there so many more houses planned? Why are there no new reservoirs planned? The planned boom is going to be on arid land, it seems.
I pertso9nally have no qualms whatsoever about having a water meter installed - BUT will it solve the problem? Of course not. Only an idiot with their head stuck up their reservoir would think so.
The planned boom needs a serious rethink and some proper planning - not stopgap management with no real resources integrated.
By Jez
August 30th, 2005 at 12:05pm
Under The South East Plan
I didn’t realise that FASTWAY is an acronym!
Here’s what it stands for:
F = Folly
A = Adding
S = Surplus
T - Traffic
W = Without
A = Achieving
Y = Yield
So, it IS living up to expectations!
By Jez
August 9th, 2005 at 09:25pm
Under General+ The South East Plan
Here’s another example of the SOUTH EAST PLAN being taken advantage of by builders making money out of government policy - BARRATT HOMES in this case.
The owners of large houses along the A25 west of Reigate town centre have been tempted to sell their large garden to BARRATT’s so that they can build a whole housing estate even though there are trees situated in these gardens with preservation orders on them.
If it wasn’t for the the SOUTH EAST PLAN planning permission would not have been granted but so long as they include a minimum of relatively low cost starter homes in the plan, approval will be granted.
The residents of Reigate who use the cricket ground or the tennis club or the rugby club or the bowls club or the croquet club will lose the wonderful views of the north downs for which Reigate is famouse The view will be replaced by a roofsacpe which is actually acknowledged in the planning application submitted by Rippon Development Service of Reading on behalf of Barratt’s.
No doubt planning will approved in spite of all the objections about local congestion, lost views etc.
Yours sincerely
M sheppard
By mick
August 8th, 2005 at 12:20pm
Under The South East Plan
Dr Lucas, Green Euro-MP for the South-East England region, said: “This level of housing development is simply too high for the region, which is already over-crowded and economically ‘overheating’.
I meant to mention this here a while ago as it’s a major concern of mine regarding the South East Plan - water. Where is the supply going to come from? We already have a water shortage in the South East - and nothing is being done about it as far as I know.
The proposed new houses will actually “save” water according to the plans. Therefore not making an impact on the current water supply. How can this be? This is fuzzy logic at its worst! Installing water saving devices in toilet cisterns in the proposed 578,000 new homes is not going to lessen the impact on the already dangerously low water supplies.
Why aren’t there plans to build reservoirs on the land instead of the new housing?
By Jez
July 30th, 2005 at 02:48pm
Under Horley Master Plan+ The South East Plan
Local people (especially my friends) are really starting to moan about the Fastway Bus Route (now something like £5,000,000 over budget, I hear though I will check to make sure that’s correct ). Now that some of the new bus stops are starting to go in on the roads, we are noticing that they are not indented as all good bus stops should be - no, they are out dented. Further crippling the flow of traffic. Because buses struggle to pull out into traffic. THIS IS HORLEY NOT PARIS!! There just isn’t that much traffic in our ghost town! At least not until they put in out dented bus stops and the traffic gets grid locked every time the bus stops to pick up the SINGLE passenger that wants to use it for that week.
The fastway bus is going to be a massive white elephant. I just cannot see people being winkled out of their cars to get on a bus that doesn’t cover most of the surrounding area. Most people will have to drive to their nearest bust stop.
And this in the name of global warming?? We are made to feel guilty about using our cars when air travel is on the increase, every airport in the country wants to expand and allow more flights and pollute god only knows how many more times than cars do.
This is not the answer in my eyes.
By Jez
July 4th, 2005 at 02:43pm
Under Horley Master Plan+ The South East Plan
…Or Gatwick Airport’s staff bus???
Call me bitter but this seems an awful lot of money and disruption for Gatwick to shuttle their staff about! I expect that no one has noticed that a lot of Gatwick workers work shifts? Will there be a Fastway Bus available to take someone home at 4 am?
No.
I love Wikipedia. Just found this on Fastway if you are unfamiliar with what it’s all about.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crawley_Fastway
By Jez
July 2nd, 2005 at 12:29pm
Under Horley Master Plan+ The South East Plan
It will be interesting to see if the Fastway bus route has any impact on traffic, good or bad - it’s certainly bad at the moment with all the disruption of building it.
Locally to me, the Fastway model is causing bad feelings as everyone that I have spoken to is sceptical about whether people will actually use it or not. I doubt it will make one iota of difference. In Horley, the bus is always empty - I can’t see it suddenly getting full!
If people DO start to use the bus more - are the Government going to impose a bus congestion charge as they are talking about with trains? I haven’t heard anything so ridiculous in ages! It shows how out of touch the powers that be are. They must think that we don’t notice the irony of this latest proposed congestion charge.
By Jez
June 6th, 2005 at 11:34am
Under The South East Plan
4.Climate Change
Issue
We welcome the inclusion of climate change as a cross cutting issue, however there is no adequate policy to follow this through. References to climate change are weak and do not adequately reflect the IRF commitments for mitigation. Climate change should be recognised as the single biggest threat to people and wildlife in the SE; there must be a clear policy commitment to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Found this on the http://www.sefs.org.uk/ site.
They raise some very interesting points and have some good recommendations for the future. Especially this part!
2.Economic Growth
Issue
We support the stated commitment that economic development will be sustainable and the recognition that ‘more of the same’ is not acceptable. However it is clear that the goal of sustainable development is constantly being undermined by the pursuit of economic growth, regardless of social and environmental consequences. We therefore question the sustainability of the SE Plan adopting an annual growth rate of 3% GVA. The SE currently has a higher economic growth rate than any other region in the UK and it is widely recognised that this level of growth is pushing against – and in some instances exceeding – environmental capacity regionally and globally.
By Jez
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