Ely Safer Routes to Schools

£15m boost for children's cycling

2006-06-26T06:39:03+02:00

"Parents should abandon the school run and encourage children to cycle to school, the government will say later."
Monday 26 June 2006

See BBC News article £15m boost for children's cycling

Also see the Cycling England website

This is great news and a good platform for launching our "Ely Safer Routes to Schools" Campaign.

Peter

Comments

School Travel Plans

2006-06-24T16:53:00+02:00

I understand that all schools in England need to prepare and submit a School Travel Plan to their County Council by 2010. Once approved schools are given a sum of money to make various improvements on the school premises.

Details are found here.

The Lantern Community Primary School has had their Travel Plan approved and have received around £3750 that they have spent on various measures within the school premises.

The City of Ely Community College has not submitted a travel plan yet - but when submitted and approved it could mean that they receive a grant worth more than £10,000 for carrying out various approved measures on the school premises.

Details of what the grant can be spent on can be found here in a PDF file.

Details of the criteria that the County Council uses for approving the Travel Plan can be found here in a word document.

I don't think the Highfield School have submitted a travel plan yet.

Peter Bates

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Involvement of the City of Ely Community College

2006-06-24T16:33:48+02:00

I have a meeting with Ian Gartshore & Bursar, Charlie Crisp - who also has property responsibility City of Ely Community College on Tuesday 27 June 2006.

Peter Bates

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Contact with Harlequin Childcare Day Nursery

2006-06-13T17:24:33+02:00

updated version 2

Contact made with Harlequin Childcare Day Nursery. Thor Thomassen the Managing Director and co-owner of Harlequin Childcare, has contacted me and he will be the main contact on this issue. I have a meeting with him at 15:00 hrs outside the Harlequin tomorrow (Wed 13 June.)

Peter Bates

Comments

Problems with getting hold of draft plans for Downham Road traffic management

2006-06-13T16:59:27+02:00

Rowan has spoken to John Richards, County Engineer, but Rowan has just reported that he is having difficulty getting hold of the draft plans related to the Downham Road traffic management - to at least get an early sight of them. They are not available for "Public consultation".(If they look good we would not have to spend extra effort on this issue and could spend more time helping with the school fete!)

However, the Town Clerk of Ely Town Council says they can be viewed at her office (when open)- but not copied!!

Given the shortage to person-power in the Enginneers dept, I would have thought additional brains to look at the various options available would have been very useful.

Peter Bates

Comments

City of Ely Town Council Involvement

2006-06-13T11:17:25+02:00

Just had a telephone discussion with City of Ely Town Council - Town Clerk - Tracy Coulson. They had a meeting with John Richards or Andrew Corrie County Engineers in January 2006 to discuss initial plans drawn-up for school road safety - engineering measures - along the full length of Downham Road - these include various road markings raised platforms (humps) in the road (one near the Harlequin Childcare Nursery and another near the Sixth Form Centre). 30mph flashing lights, widening footpaths and other road markings.

Some representatives were not happy with some aspects of the measures and asked county engineers to modify the plans. Currently plans are availale from the Town Council offices.

I understand that the Town Council successfully submitted a "Jointly funded minor highway bid" so funds are available I believe within this financial year.

There is an urgent need to have access to these or revised plans so that we can comment on them.

I'm inviting Tracy Coulson to clarify or make any additional comments relating to this specific point.

As well as the Town Clerk a useful link with the Town Council would be Jenny Chaplin who is a Lantern School governor as well as a Town Councillor.

Peter Bates

Comments

Safer Routes to School Project

2006-06-13T08:43:59+02:00

Yesterday, (12 June) I have made contact with Kirsty Gilliland, the County School Travel Advisor, who covers the Ely area. We discussed School Travel Plans and The Safer Routes to School (SRTS) Project.

The Safer Routes to School (SRTS) Project works with individual schools to promote sustainable forms of transport. Nearly a hundred Cambridgeshire schools have been involved with SRTS since 1997.

The Safer Routes to School team work with schools to implement school travel plans. The writing and implementing of a school travel plan (STP) is now a key requirement of completing the SRTS project.

The School Travel Advisors work with the SRTS Project Officers to ensure that their schools’ travel plans meet with Government criteria.

More details of this project found here.

Schools can next submit applications to County in May/June 2007 and if accepted the project would start from September 2007 for at least two years. This might be something for schools/governors/parents to consider next year (2007), but many activities could be done without initially being officially part of the project.

I do have details of the Project application pack and the Project Manual and will try to make them available via this web-blog.

I will also invite Kirsty to monitor this site and make comments.

Peter Bates

update 14 June - You can now download the Project Application Pack and the Project Manual. Both are in a PDF format.

Comments

School Governor involement - with specific actions

2006-06-13T08:13:07+02:00

Following a meeting with Mrs Jan Cobley (Headteacher) last Wednesday, she mentioned that the Governors premises committee we were talking about this issue and one of the governors had contacted the council to try to ensure that they have a say in what is done. There are plans for traffic calming and cycle ways etc. Rowan Haysom and Will Barfield, both parent governors and are dealing with this issue on the school's behalf.

Peter Bates met Rowan Haysom and Will Barfield last night (12 June) for an informal meeting to share information and ideas. (Thoughts and ideas with details as to who has been contacted will be given in further entries to this blog.)

It was agreed the main objective was to initially focus on the Downham Road area for traffic calming and other related improvements, but this should be in the context of a broader strategy for safer routes to local schools.

Specific actions to be taken:

Peter – to set up this web-blog as a communication tool for sharing ideas and what actions are being taken for all interested people.

Rowan – to contact John Richards, East Division Engineer, County Council to identify whether any initial plans have been produced or at least obtain any large scale plans covering Downham Road.

Will – to identify and contact elected local representatives of both District and County level.

Peter – to contact the Principal of the City of Ely Community College – Mr Ian Gartshore

Peter & Will to speak to Mrs Cobley about using The Lantern School for a meeting of key stakeholders including council officials, in early July. Community College might be an alternative location.
Peter – to contact the clerk of the City of Ely Town Council – to identify their interest and activities.

Peter – (afterthought) to contact the Harlequin Day Care Nursery, Downham Road.

Peter Bates

Comments

Introduction

2006-06-13T07:21:08+02:00

This campaign has started as result of growing concern from parents and governors at The Lantern Community Primary School that travel to school, with their children, across the Downham Road, particularly near the City of Ely Community College, was becoming more difficult and something is needed to be done about it.

Although the initial focus is on the Downham Road area – it is planned to broaden the campaign to include all routes to the schools in the area.

The purpose of this web-blog is to facilitate communications between all interested people (stakeholders) so as to share ideas and report upon what actions have been taken.

The moderator of this web-blog is Peter Bates (father of Daniel) who can be contacted at Ely 667973 or via email pjb(at)pjb.co.uk

Everyone (parents, local householders and local government officials) is invited to comment on specific items and present their own ideas. If you wish to make a contribution, but don’t wish to put your name to it, please contact me and I will add it on your behalf.

Peter Bates

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