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• Archive Index 2010

News Archive - Week Beginning 10th January 2010

The editors say: As the recent news shows yet again, from well-above-inflation car park price rises to the plans for redeveloping the Reading Station area, as usual nothing 'New' Labour comes up with does anything positive for Caversham. Protest or suffer the consequences.

Crime

Four customised bikes worth nearly £12,000 have been stolen from a home in Cawsam Gardens between mid December and the start of January, whilst the owners were on holiday abroad. The bikes are a grey Flow Drift, a grey Gary Fisher Genesis, a black Norco A Line and a blue Tomack 205 Magnum. Anyone with information can call PC Liddicott on 08458 505 505 or Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111. (Reading Post 13/01/10 p17)

Environment

Following the latest heavy downfall of snow on Tuesday, 5 th January (the Royal Berkshire Hospital has said that nearly a quarter of people attending A&E in the following week had been suffering from snow-related injuries), there have a few Caversham-related items linked to the wintery weather:

Thames Valley Probation used convicted offenders under the Community Payback scheme to help shovel snow from various local sites as part of their sentencing conditions, including from the Albert Road Day Centre in Caversham. (Reading Post 13/01/10 p1)

As in central Reading, Caversham faced shortages of essential items – owing to panic buying rather than the volume of the snow. Andy Macaulay, branch manager at Waitrose in Caversham said: “our customers have not been panic buying but they have been stocking up on bread, milk, fruit and vegetables”. (Reading Post 13/01/10 p3)

In Galsworthy Drive, resident Glen Southern used his brother’s digger to clear the street of snow – winning the praise of neighbours. But an RBC employee then knocked at his door (according to the ‘Chronicle’) and ‘told him off’, ordering him to stop because he might damage the road surface. Council spokesman Oscar Mortali later said: “we would ask anyone who has access to this sort of equipment and is willing to help to contact the council first…” (Reading Chronicle 14/01/10 p1)

Schools

‘Get Reading’ publishes a set of overview tables detailing GCSE and A level results across Reading and south Oxfordshire on a school-by-school basis, as well as a separate table: ‘How Does Your School Fare?’ – listing all the local secondary schools in Caversham and Emmer Green. (Get Reading 15/01/10 p4)

Traffic

Paul Bardos and Colin Lee follow up a letter from Peppard Ward Conservative Cllr Richard Willis concerning the proposals for redevelopment of Reading Station. The writers draw attention to envisaged changes to the Vastern Road, detailed here. They comment specifically about a proposed new bus interchange to the north of the station, remarking on its large size in relation to the relatively limited number of bus services from Caversham / Emmer Green, and say: ‘it seems that this interchange will put a diversion of 0.5 to one mile on the journey into town for bus passengers, say an extra five minutes to get to Friar Street from Caversham by bus out of the rush hour’. They sign off by demanding reassurances from the RBC concerning the scheme, and call for an integrated transport and environmental impact assessment for the proposed transport changes ‘from an independent and reputable organisation’. (Reading Post 13/01/10 p13)

RBC Conservatives have ‘called in’ a decision by the Labour administration of Reading Council to raise car park charges across the town, with the matter now being discussed again at the Council’s Cabinet meeting on Monday, January 18 th. The decision on the increases had been made by RBC officers in consultation with the lead councillor for strategic planning and transport, Labour’s Cllr Tony Page. The current charges have been in place since 2006, and Cllr Page said that the increases are being driven by NCP which now runs the car parks, ‘but that they had been drawn up in consultation with the Council’. Charges at King’s Meadow stay at £1.50 for two hours and £3 up to four hours, but rise to £5 up to six hours and double from £6 to £12 for six to 24 hours. At Chester Street, charges will rise from 20p for two hours to 30p for the first hour, 60p for up to two hours, 90p up to three hours and £2 for three to four hours. N.B. - it wasn’t that long ago that the Chester Street car park was entirely without charge for Caversham people. Times change – watch out. (Reading Chronicle, 14/01/10 p3, Get Reading 15/01/10 p3)