Yet another try for a skate board area

A third attempt to build a skate board park in North Oxford has apparently been all but beaten off. Two have already been repelled from Aristotle Lane Recreation Ground, between Kingston Road and Waterside. This one was actually planned for Waterside itself, at the end of Walton Well Road on a patch of rough ground known, with revolting tweeness, as The Spinney.

It was apparently promoted by Councillor Clark Brundin and Councillor Alan Armitage fuelled respectively (I would guess) by naivety and ambition. This time around, the council officers are not backing the idea – a whipped cur shuns the fire or whatever the expression is. Even council officers can get a message if you kick them hard enough – but not, apparently, some of the councillors.The first skate area was plotted between Councillor Jim Campbell and an official in the Parks department known locally as Dim Cow. It killed Jim Campbell’s reputation – someone told me, I hope correctly, that he was a “broken man” when the diggers destroyed his creation in March 2004 with £50,000 wasted.

Westgate War to continue

The Battle of Bonn Square has given way to the War of Westgate, as protesters promise to keep fighting the development to the end. As one who has long predicted a civil uprising in Oxford, I am on their side.

I am not, I have to say, a natural ally of fluffy-headed Greens or unwashed tree-campers, nor would I dream of arguing that the present Westgate and its hinterland are worth preserving. But they are as ghastly as they are because an earlier generation of city planners and city councillors made exactly the same mistakes as this lot are about to make, and with the same uncaring ignorance of aesthetics, unthinking servility towards big business, and unwarranted contempt for democracy.

Emptying some bins in Oxford

I was much impressed to see an Oxford City Council van full of bin bags on Sunday morning outside the Anchor in Hayfield Road, particularly as I had just walked past two overflowing bins in Aristotle Lane rec.

I watched it turn, backwards and forwards as one has to now at the end of Aristotle Lane, thanks to the mess of bollards and posts which Oxfordshire County Council has dumped there (I often wonder how much pollution that causes) and I wondered idly if it would take the easy route into Aristotle Lane up the wrong side of the bollards.

No. It did not go up Aristotle Lane at all, but just drove off. So, this council, which is always nagging us about vehicle pollution and fining us for litter offences, drives a bin van within 40 yards of two overflowing bins and drives off without collecting the rubbish. The bins remained full all through Sunday and were still overflowing on Monday morning.

It is probably not the fault of the drivers who, I imagine, have to follow a rota drawn up by some unthinking wally in the council offices. It seems nonsense to me. Can anyone offer a rational explanation?

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Aristotle Lane Rec saved from council officer

I gather that Oxford’s North Area Committee took little time to see off a council officer’s plan to dump a tarmac skate area on Aristotle Lane Recreation Ground. See the full thread of articles about it here.

The councillors were all deeply pissed off to find that a contentious and expensive proposal had been slipped into the budget for Rec improvements without any prior warning and, indeed, without any supporting argument in the officer’s report. Even those who still hanker for a hard surface in place of the grass voted against the proposal because of the manner in which it was presented.

Another go at wrecking the Rec

Following the fiasco of the skate area which was erected and as quickly closed down at Aristotle Lane Recreation Ground (see Wrecking the Rec), Oxford City Council conducted a further survey as to what local people wanted for the Rec. Most wanted the same as they had wanted originally – for the field to be drained, some benches and some kick-about goals. The drainage was estimated to cost abut £50,000 (i.e. the same as had been thrown away on the skate area). Benches cost about £300 each, as does a kickabout goal.

Wrecking the Rec

Aristotle Lane Recreation Ground is a pretty little rectangle of grass and trees by the Oxford Canal in North Oxford. More than 20 years ago, I pushed a pram round it. As my children grew up, we played football and cricket there and threw Frisbees. Now my children go there with guitars and girls.

Aristotle Lane Rec threatened again

There is a new proposal to build a hard street sports area on Aristotle Lane Recreation Ground. It is concealed within a report to the North Area Committee which is due to be considered on Thursday 5 July at Diamond Place Community Centre in Summertown at 6:30 pm.

Although the provision of a street sports area is the biggest single expense listed in the report (at £47,000) it is not specifically referred to in the body of the report, save for a vague reference to a “hard standing area”. Why does the report’s author conceal this part of the proposal?