Sandwell -- I am Sorry

Mea Culpa :: Mea Culpa :: Mea Culpa

 How could I have doubted Sandwell's wisdom? How could I have doubted the combined wisdom of Sandwell and the Environment Agency?

 Foolish. That's the only word to describe me.

 When, 3 years ago, I questioned the sense of Sandwell creating another run-off from Swan Pool at Sandwell Valley, just a few hundred yards from one which had been there since time immemorial, I knew in my heart of hearts that Sandwell and the Environment Agency would one day be proved right.

 And so it was.

 Just last week.

 The run-off, which had lain arid for so long, sprang into life with a virtual torrent of water gushing through it.

Actually, now I think about it, 'virtual' is perhaps the right word, as the flow was less of a spate and more of a trickle.

 But that's not the point. Sandwell and the Environment Agency were proved absolutely right in spending the 30 or 40 thousand pounds on creating the new run-off because the old one was clearly struggling - although, on second thoughts, it didn't seem to be.

Water was going through it at a fair old lick, but it looked as though it had oodles of capacity left.

 But it might not have. And that is exactly where the combined expertise and intelligence of Sandwell and the Environment agency really pays off and leaves us rank amateurs, who know nothing, standing.

 Because, if the old one had not been able to cope with unusual rainfall, and if the new one had not been constructed, where would the excess water from Swan Pool have gone?

 Would it have deluged into the nearby car park, and from there, out into Park Lane thereby interrupting the Sandwell/Birmingham traffic.

 Nope. It wouldn't.

 Why?

 Because the distance from the pool surface to the pathway at the car park end of Swan Pool was about a foot, and the distance from the pool surface to the pathway at the opposite, run-off, end looked, at the path's lowest point, to be 9 or 10 inches.

 So, instead of flooding one of the main arterial routes from Sandwell to Birmingham (I jest, of course) the water would have simply passed over the internal pathway; down the slight bank, and into the little stream that both the old and new run-offs flow into!

 No problem.

 So, although the new run-off does work, one is still bound to ask whether there was any real need for it, and the attendant expense, or whether it really was just something else, thought up to ensure the continued employment of managers, et al, at the two sponsoring organisations.

 I know what I think.

 . .

Another First for Sandwell

Sandwell MBC has for some years now been carrying out a dual policy at the Sandwell Valley (so called) Country Park. One is to destroy as much of it as possible (just read my earlier posts) and the other is to urbanise the remainder.

The latest piece of urbanisation (dreadful word, I know, but so is what Sandwell's doing to the Valley, so it seems somehow quite appropriate) is to convert what was once a field into a car park.

The Sandwell Special Car Park Secretariat had planned for the conversion to occupy the three busiest months of the year, ie June to August, but it is isn't finished yet. It looked as though it was, but then it looked as though it wasn't - a bit like the concrete steps which aren't far away from the new concrete car park. Those steps appeared complete, after well over a year's hard toil and graft, but for weeks they remained off limits to would-be users, and then someone started drilling big holes in them and inserting handrails. 

So it is with the new concrete car park. After months of scraping off the grass surface and replacing with a shale and sand base and concrete blocks, all work shuddered to a halt; the chaps and their equipment disappeared, and the thing looked as though it had been finished. 

But, no !! Or, at least, maybe not.

After a couple more weeks, a new fence started to appear down the side of the the internal road about 5 yards away from the old one. 

Then, the old one was removed, thereby making the new car park about 5 yards wider than it was before. 'Laudable' you may say, 'They can get lots more cars in the new car park now.'

Well, no!! At least, not yet.

The problem is that the extra 5 yard strip doesn't have any of the concrete blocks in it - nor the shale and sand base installed. It hasn't even got the grass off it yet.

What it does have is a line of cones where the old fence was, to stop people trying to park on it.

So one is left wondering what, exactly, the Sandwell Special Car Park Secretariat has in mind for this added strip.

Obviously it is not going to become more car park. I was only joking about that. No one, not even Sandwell, would be daft enough (would they? Let's not take a vote on it...) to make a new car park and then start a secondary operation extending it even before the first bit was opened. I mean they would have to get all of the chaps back again with all of their equipment and close the place down again for, maybe, another 3 months, while the extra bit was concreted. No that would be just plain silly.

My thinking, and I don't think it can be too far off the mark, is that the Sandwell Special Car Park Secretariat, and the Sandwell Special Strategic and Forward Planning Secretariat have been liaising on this, and plan for the extra strip to become the Sandwell Valley Country Park Cricketing Centre of Excellence - or cricket pitch, to you and me. 

Now, OK, I'll grant you that some of the boundaries would be a tad short, but, on the plus side, the length would be simply wonderful. 

So, we could be on the brink of yet another first for Sandwell, and a glorious one at that. Remember it wasn't all that long ago that, despite the fact that WBA FC is only just up the road, Sandwell put up a huge coloured sign which proclaimed 'The Home of Football - Here in Sandwell.' And that was only on the back of a part-time 5-a-side football pitch and the adjacent playing fields.

Just think what the Sandwell Special Sign Secretariat could do with this. 

'''Forget Headingley. The Oval?  Nah  ::  The Home of Cricket - Here in Sandwell'''

Hoorah !!!!

That's got to be worth another Green Flag and an OBE for some tired old Councillor who's a friend of someone.

.

Signs of the Times

Well. It's been a long time since my last thoughts were committed to something like paper, and the main reason is technology, or rather my inability to cope with it. I had a great problem transferring myself from Google to Google Chrome, and after overcoming that, I got a new phone, and got into a real knot in transferring the photos to my computer, and then finding them again!!. I could get them in without much trouble, but I couldn't find them again!!!! Anyway, having now mastered the art of photo retrieval, I am able, once more, to report on things which have been happening. Sandwell has, as usual, occupied much of my thinking time. An intriguing phenomenon has appeared in the last couple of months at Sandwell Valley. The Sandwell Special Sign Secretariat has caused to be erected a number of low level, in fact, near ground level, signs. Some of these take the form of little stumps with tiny signs attached to them. Others look like picture frames with what appears to be a map in them. It's not immediately apparent why these signs have been installed but, of course, being Sandwell there doesn't have to be any particularly good reason. I came across a cyclist one Sunday morning, sitting on his bike, staring down at one of the map signs. It was too far away from him to be able to discern the detail for which he was looking and he asked me if I could tell him something about it. I had to disappoint him. I told him that as it had been so wet for so many weeks the ground was soaked, but that as soon as it dried out sufficiently for me to lie down on it, I would be able to see what the map was all about. Until then, like him, I had no idea. I agreed with him that it was a little odd to put up maps with fine print so close to the ground. But I explained that Sandwell has many experts on its staff and amongst its subcontractors so there was probably a very good reason for these signs being unreadable unless you lie on the ground first. I told him about the rash of nice oak signposts which appeared all over the place a few years ago, and that progressively, Sandwell removed most of them. I also told him about the one just a few yards away which was pointing in completely the wrong direction. He seemed like a nice chap - said this was his first visit to Sandwell Valley - but I got the distinct impression that this wasn't an experience which he was going to repeat in a hurry. Anyway, all that aside, whilst there is no obvious reason for these low level signs, I think I may have reasoned out their raison d'etre. It all hinges on the location of the stumps around Swan Pool. Most of them have been positioned within a few yards of big red lifebelt stations which themselves have signs on them, some of which are identical to the tiny ones on the stumps. The difference though is that the signs on the lifebelt stations are at normal head height and of a size which enables them to be read. And therein, I think, lies the clue to the reason for the low level stumpy signs, and, by a process of extrapolation, the low level maps. It is clear that the low level signs are not intended to be read by normal sized adults. It's also pretty obvious, because of the content, that neither are they intended to be read by children. So who are they for? Why -- it's obvious. Pygmies! Now, OK, I agree that you don't see too many pygmies walking around Sandwell Valley - largely because we don't have too many in the UK. But they have lots in central Africa, and I would be prepared to bet that the Sandwell Special Strategy and Forward Planning Secretariat has spotted this, and are putting in place the infrastructure necessary to accommodate the inhabitants of Cameroon; Botswana and Namibia et al in case they are ever granted full membership of the European Union. I know that sounds a bit crazy, but this is Sandwell we are talking about, and why else have signs so close to the ground that ordinary sized people can't read? . . .

Every Day's April Fools Day at Sandwell

I don't know. I only have to turn my back for 5 minutes and away Sandwell goes again!

 Do you remember me saying that Sandwell had put up lamp posts round one of the car parks at Sandwell Valley and round the tennis courts? And do you also remember me marvelling at this - not just because Sandwell, like everywhere else, should be saving every penny it can in these straitened times, but also because the access gates to these areas are locked at dusk thereby limiting the apparent use to which these lights can be put.

 Well, if you, like me, thought that Sandwell had gone off at half cock again, you would have been quite wrong. Of course the Sandwell Intelligentsia had not gone off at half cock. The Special Lighting Secretariat had clearly thought this apparent wasteful action through thoroughly, and gone off at full cock. 

Why?

 Because, dear people, those few lights were only one part of the master plan, more of which is being unfolded as I write. Lamp posts have since sprouted all the way down from the Salters Lane entrance, past the lamp post encircled car park and tennis courts, to the Sandwell Farm car park, and there are tell-tale yellow rings here and there which suggest that more are yet to be sited round it.

 Apart from the fact that this enlarged venture has enabled Sandwell to squander even more money needlessly, it has provided the added bonus of allowing Sandwell to hire yet more arboreal specialists to chop down yet more trees. But, you may ask, why, if the access gates to these areas are locked at dusk, have Sandwell installed lights? And here's the clever bit which ordinary folk like me would never have thought of.

 The lights have been installed because there are going to be at least some parts of the year when the access gates will not be locked at dusk. Why? Well I am told that it is so that people can play tennis, or football, or visit the farm in the dark!!! Apparently Sandwell are planning to keep the farm open until 8.00pm in the Autumn. That's just what I have been told and it could be wrong, of course. But, that the lamp posts are there, is undeniable.

 Eureka!!!! Another great step forward for Sandwell. I await the next few weeks with great expectation. Could it be that the Special Lighting Secretariat has planned that the lamp posts will continue on beyond the farm, over the motorway bridge, to Swan Pool, so that people can go and see the ducks in the dark as well?

You've got to hand it to them haven't you. What vision. Well, night vision anyway. This should guarantee Sandwell's 2014 Green Flag.

 PS. I actually started writing this on 1st April - hence the title - but I am having so much trouble understanding this site since it had to move from Google to Google Chrome that I have almost given up the will to live. And where have all the paragraph breaks gone? This wasn't written as a solid block. There's something wrong somewhere and I don't think it's me this time!!

PPS I think I've found out how to do paragraphs !! (Dec 2012)

A New Sandwell Road

Look!

Sandwell is building a new road.

Unlike the A something-or-other, which I know as the West Bromwich bypass, which has been being re-jigged, literally for years, and shows no signs whatever of being anywhere near completion, this new road is almost finished - at least I think so.

The road is round part of the perimeter of the Forge Mill Lake and its stated purpose is to provide access by the disabled from the Forge Mill car park to the RSPB reserve. It has only taken 2 or 3 weeks so far, but judging from the amount of equipment; manpower and full time security, it must have cost a small fortune.

However, such considerations as cost don't seem to weigh heavily on the Sandwell intelligentia where Green Flags are concerned, because you can bet your sweet life that this is what this is all about.

Next March (2013) when Sandwell will be fully expecting to get another Green Flag, they will be able to point to their new 'disabled access' road and trumpet this as another great step forward in access at Sandwell Valley for the disabled.

But what the Green Flag people probably won't know, and probably wouldn't care less about either, is that all of the legions of disabled people, who are, apparently, queuing up to roll round the lake on this new road, have, for the last 25 years, been able to drive to another car park, the RSPB car park, which is within a few yards of the RSPB reserve!!

Sandwell may think that the Green Flag people are stupid, but do they really think that the rest of us are as well?

.


.

Community Payback III

Week 3

Almost all gone now.

Where the lime/yellow stemmed shrubs were is now just a space.

Mindless destruction.

Sandwell Valley -- a wasteland in a land of waste.

.

Sandwell Valley Signs

You know, despite the awful and wasteful things that Sandwell perpetrates, it does have its redeeming features. Not many, admittedly, but they are there.

I've commented before on the wonderfully responsive traffic signals in Sandwell, and the ladies who sell the eggs at Forge Mill Farm shop are just so consistently pleasant it's worth going in to buy a few dozen even if you don't want any.

And I'm coming to admire more and more the Sandwell Special Sign Secretariat.

It has given such pleasure over the years, and has just produced another wonderful example of the art of sign making.

But let's first look at a couple of the SSSS earlier achievements.

Back in February, 2008, the SSSS caused to have erected a number of signposts around Sandwell Valley. Most of them have since been taken down, but one still proudly stands close to the boathouse at Swan Pool.

This was erected about a yard from a then existing old signpost, which old signpost seemed, to us non-expert sign makers, to be perfectly good. Sadly, but logically, after but a few weeks of co-existence, the old signpost was removed. Now, with the benefit of hindsight, this may have been something of a mistake, because the old signpost used to correctly indicate locations by pointing towards the locations concerned.

The new signpost has 2 'arms' and they point, roughly, in the opposite directions to the locations indicated.

4 years on, the signpost still stands for all to see and wonder at - still pointing in the wrong directions.

More recently (last year to be exact) the SSSS erected a sort of Welcome sign at an entrance to the Valley off Park Lane. Motorists can't drive in there and there is nowhere to park, inside or outside. Entrance is limited to persons on foot or horseback, in practically all cases, by crossing the road from the Hill Top area of the City of Birmingham.

Passing motorists cannot see the sign as it is too far back from the road, and even if they could, they couldn't get in for the reasons already given.

Pedestrians and equestrians traversing the road from Birmingham, unless hopelessly lost, would have no need for a sign telling them that they were entering Sandwell Valley, as only locals would be there on foot or horseback, and they would, hopefully, know where they were.

Therefore, having reasoned that neither motorists nor non-motorists, or put another way, nobody, can find this sign of any use, one is bound to ask why it was put there. Perhaps SSSS had bought a job lot of signs and this was one left over. Or maybe it filled in a Friday afternoon (or more likely, a couple of weeks) for one of the SSSS researchers to find somewhere that hadn't got a sign.

Whatever the reason, the opportunity was not lost, by the Sandwell Health and Safety Secretariat, to warn us that there is a road there.

Would you believe, (yes, of course you would - this is Sandwell we are talking about) that after decades and decades and decades of local people making their ways to and from the City of Birmingham, across that road, at that point, Sandwell sought, in 2011, to tell them that there was a road there!!!!!

Grief!

And so to the most recent piece of lovable sign nonsense

Why nonsense?

Because this sign, about keeping dogs under 'close control', actually makes no sense.

The sign, the only one of its kind - so far - is on the run-up to Swan Pool just by the boat house.

Swan Pool has been there for over 100 years (I have a photo of it, dated 1907, from, perhaps, the most noted historian in the Midlands so there can't be much doubt about that.)

It follows that there are likely to have been birds there for over 100 years, and also that people have probably been taking dogs for walks there for over 100 years.

Further, I can confirm that there are still lots of birds there. Admittedly I speak as an amateur in this matter and do not possess the kind of expertise for which the Sandwell inteligentia are so carefully selected, but there certainly seemed to be plenty of birds around there last time I looked.

So, one must conjecture that, whatever sort of control (close or otherwise) dog walkers have exercised over their charges during the last 100 years, it must have been adequate to ensure that the bird population was not wiped out!

Why then the need now for a sign telling people to keep their dogs under close control, and what is the significance of the added words 'Wildfowl are present in this area'?

Are these words intended simply to inform unobservant dog walkers that there are birds around, in case they fail to notice, or is there a deeper meaning to them?

Is it that these words have been used to indicate that close control of dogs is required within (unspecified) distances from the sign, because of the presence of birds - and, by implication, that beyond the (unspecified) distances, no close control of dogs is required, because there aren't any birds?

I think not.

Were that to be the case, then at the (unspecified) distances from this sign, there would be other signs saying 'It's OK to let your dogs off the lead now - there aren't any birds here.'

But there aren't any such signs.

So how can dog walkers, entering Sandwell Valley from Swan Pool car park, know where Sandwell consider it appropriate for them to cease close control of their dogs and let them off their leads?

It's a nonsense.

Now look at this from a different direction, or lots of different directions, - the Salters Lane entrance to Sandwell Valley - or any of the 4 Park Lane ones - or that from the housing estate, or Dartmouth Park; or the golf course ........

There aren't any similar signs at these locations or on any of the closer approaches to Swan Pool.

And what about Heron Pool - one of the largest heronries for miles around? There aren't any similar signs at the innumerable entrances to Heron Pool either. There are signs saying you can't swim or have inflatables (!!) or light fires etc etc, but nothing about dogs.

So, logically, Sandwell do not consider it necessary to require dog walkers to start exercising close control over their animals anywhere in Sandwell Valley except at the point where they pass the only sign making such a requirement which is on the run up to Swan Pool. And it is then only necessary if the dog walkers are walking towards the front of the sign rather than towards the back of it!

If they are walking towards the front of the sign, close control of their dogs is required everywhere in Sandwell Valley. If they are walking towards the back of it, they didn't need to exercise close control anywhere!!!!!

It's a nonsense.

You couldn't write a comedy about this, could you?

Isn't Sandwell and its Special Sign Secretariat just wonderful!

Either that, or just plain stupid for continuing to waste time and money needlessly and thoughtlessly.

.

Community Payback II

Oh Yes.

Another weekend of Community payback - Sandwell style - another few yards of shrubs rased to the ground.

It's lucky it was raining on Saturday, otherwise the whole lot may have gone by now.

Still, there's always next week -- and the week after that -- and the week after that ...........

Watch this space.

.

Community Payback

Sandwell Valley has, in the last few years, become a wonderful place for Sandwell to send its minor miscreants and forget all about them.

They can while away their community payback hours endlessly cutting grass which doesn't need to be cut and chopping down trees which don't need to be chopped down.

I suppose that community payback is like custodial sentences, in that the withdrawal of liberty is the punishment. Doubtless the community payback chaps could think of a thousand things they would rather do on a Saturday or Sunday than strim grass or hack away trees.

But that's how it is.

In Sandwell at any rate.

But to what extent, if any, are the non-miscreant residents of Sandwell benefitting from this 'free' labour being so generously and routinely expended at Sandwell Valley?

The answer is, not at all.

Far from receiving any sort of 'pay back' the Sandwell residents are continuing to 'pay out' in one way or another.

Why?

Well, for a start, the 'free' labour doesn't come free. Someone has to pay for the bus that carts the miscreants around; the employment costs of the minder that oversees them, and the overheads that oversee the minder. So it's far from free.

Secondly, the work which these people carry out is at best pointless and at worst, positively destructive.

Take last weekend's work for example.

A good part of the 'free' payment made back to the community was expended in clearing some briers and the like from deep down alongside the run up to a motorway bridge. Such a clearance is completeley unnecessary. Nobody walks there as there is nowhere to go. Nobody looks there as there is nothing to look at. The partial clearance was just a futile and utter waste of time; effort and money.

But worse still, just around the corner from this useless exercise was (note the tense) a row of lime/yellow stemmed shrubs which are grown, (where people know about these things), primarily for their colour during the winter period. There is another similar shrub, grown for the same purpose, which has red stems.

You are probably ahead of me.

Last weekend, having done such fine work in clearing some of the undergrowth alongside the approach to the motorway bridge, the community payback people were, apparently, redirected towards the lime/yellow stemmed shrubs, and proceeded to chop the first few yards of them down to the ground.

The photos here show the space where some of the shrubs were, and some of the remaining ones. I fully expect to publish photos in due course showing that all of them have been 'grounded.'

This is only the latest instance of the community payback people being used to further Sandwell's systematic urbanisation of Sandwell Valley. Practically everything they do is destructive in one way or another, and, on the other hand, it is rare that you see them being used to do anything useful like picking up litter.

On one occasion in May a couple of years ago, just as the wild flowers were getting into their full swing alongside the path that runs parallel to the M5/M6 link road, the Community payback people were being used by Sandwell, (trumpeters of the Sandwell Valley Country Park, Green Flags et al) to cut these wild flowers down. When asked why, the minder said that he had been told to cut the borders back to keep the 6ft wide tarmac path clear!!

Grief!

(Ihave have not published the photos of this in case any of the chaps are recognised.)

Sandwell Valley - Another plaited fence

Here's another one, and the remains of another fire.

That's 5 new plaited fences that I know of this year, (there could be more) and it's only February!!

Question :: Who's paying for all of these fences?

Question :: Why are they spreading like wildfire? And don't say 'To encourage the birds to nest.' Sandwell have already gone into print with that one. The only slight shortcoming with Sandwell's reasoning there, is that the birds, which were nesting in the trees and mature hedgerows that Sandwell have cut down to make room for the fences, will have to find somewhere else to nest while they are waiting the 10 or 15 years for the new ones to grow.

Question :: Why has Sandwell started burning all of the trees and hedges which it is cutting down instead of chipping them? I know that the volume of material to be disposed of has increased enormously but that's not quite the point. Have Sandwell not heard of the debate concerning climate change and that open-air fires are considered by some to be a contributory factor? Have Sandwell not heard of carbon footprints, because they sure as hell seem to have heard of carbon! It's appearing with alarming frequency.

Maybe Sandwell doesn't care.

It's got a Green Flag.

.

...and Sandwell said 'Let there be light', and there was light.

So what's going on here then?

Lamp posts have appeared at the car park adjacent to the new concrete steps and also along the sides of the tennis courts.

Obviously Sandwell have decided to cheer us all up and shake us out of the economic gloom by wasting a bit more of someone's money on lights.

Quite why, when local authorities are supposed to be vetting every penny spent for value for money, beats me.

And quite why, when the gate to the access to these areas is locked at dusk, also beats me.

Who is going to benefit from these lights if they can't get in?

But this is Sandwell, so there doesn't have to be a sensible reason.

From little acorns big trees grow - Part 2 -- P.S.

I said I couldn't understand why so many shrubs had been ripped out when a yard wide path was 'surfaced' on the old walkway which runs parallel to Park Lane.

I do now.

Yet another of the man-made plaited fences, of which Sandwell seem to have some sort of fetish, is being installed in the 'Country Park'.

So the one-time country-like lane now has the Park Lane traffic and a plaited fence on one side and a barbed wire topped fence on the other!!

I wonder which country Sandwell has as its model for the Sandwell Valley Country Park.

Afghanistan?

The last 2 photos are of a gate from Park Lane into the Valley.

It used to be a wooden gate, in harmony with its surroundings, until Sandwell decided to replace it with a brashly painted yellow and green metal one, and for some reason, known only to the Sandwell Gate Installation Secretariat, a height restiriction beam was installed at the same time. The mind boggles at what the rationale could possibly be for installing a height restriction beam at the entrance to a few hundred acres of fields, but that's Sandwell for you. They don't do things by halves.

Anyway, to facilitate the smooth entrance to and egress from the site of plant concerned with the path creation/surfacing, it was deemed necessary to remove the height restriction beam which was placed on the ground, in tacta, to one side of the gateway, presumably awaiting re-erection when the works were finished.

Oh no!

The works have been finished, apparently, but the height restriction beam has not been re-erected.

It still lies on the ground.

But Lo! A new height restriction beam has been installed in it's stead.

This one has a removable top.

Maybe some forward-thinking member of the Sandwell Gate Installation Secretariat is allowing for the possibility that at some stage in the future it may be desirable that another vehicle of some size be admitted to the site at that point. The forward thinker may have gone on to reason that, in such a circumstance, it would be less costly and more convenient to have a removable top rather than to have to dig the whole thing up and replace it for a third time.

As an alternative to all of this Sandwell rumination, I would have proposed, if asked, that, as the height restriction beam served no useful purpose, the cost of a second installation could have been avoided completely.

But this is Sandwell and they don't do things by halves.

Having wasted somebody's money on the first erection, Sandwell seem perfectly at ease with themselves in wasting some more money the second time round.

But 'Ah!' the forward thinker may have said. 'You have not understood why the beam was erected in the first place. And, to be fair, there's no reason why you should. We in the Sandwell Gate Installation Secretariat have been specially selected for our wide experience in all things defensive.'

Suddenly I feel humbled.

'But,' the forward thinker may have continued,'we are always happy to share our expertise with ordinary people and I can tell you that the primary reason for the height restriction beam was to prevent unauthorised access by, shall we say, caravans or tarmac trucks or such like. You get my drift??'.

Indeed I would have got his drift.

But I still wouldn't have understood the logic, because there are no height restriction beams at the Salter's Lane entrance to the site (as evidenced by the Pat Collins fair which rolls in each year) and from there, there is access, via the 2 motorway bridges to almost everywhere on the site.

QED

.

From little acorns big trees grow - Part 2

I can't believe it's been 11 weeks since my last contribution here.

But there has been Christmas in between so that must have accounted for at least 6 of them.

I thought an update was due on the Acorns matter and the seemingly unnecessary destruction of trees, and the attendant expense, by Swan Pool.

Of course, I had hopelessly misjudged the Sandwell experts and should have realised that they would have had at least one compelling and expert reason why these trees should be hacked away or completely removed.

For this I apologise, and seek to put the record straight immediately.

Round Swan Pool runs a pathway, made by feet over many generations.

A few years ago, in fact, quite a few years ago, there were some 24 hour cycle races, part of the route of which was this path.

It always had had it's ups and downs but the cycle races exacerbated them significantly and rendered a couple of places virtually impassable after periods of wet weather.

And so it has been for, well, quite a few years - must be at least 10.

That is until now - or rather last November.

It was then that Sandwell put in hand the 'fixing' of this path.

Quite why Sandwell's experts waited until mid-November to start such works is, perhaps, something that should not be enquired into by ordinary people, as there is doubtless at least one compelling and expert reason why it should have been so. But November is usually part of the wet UK winter season - last year it was snowy and icy as well for 3 weeks.

Anyway, that aside, if the Sandwell experts want to dig up earthen paths in the middle of Winter, when one can more or less count on them turning into quagmires, rather than in the Summer, when there is at least a chance that they won't, then that is up to the expert Sandwell mind to determine.

The result of these soggy Sandwell labours is a rather messy strip of gravelly-type stuff about a yard wide where the foot-trodden path used to be.

Sandwell have, of course, taken the opportunity to chop out a few more trees and dig up ground yards wide either side of this strip in places.

They have also done something similar to part of a somewhat wider path which runs parallel to Park Lane. This has been partly treated to a covering of 'gravel' but largely dug up and had the gorse bushes; blackberries etc removed.

Without the benefit of an expert mind I haven't been able to reason out why only part of the path has been 'processed' but I suppose we should all be grateful that there a still a few blackberry bushes where the Sandwell works have not been carried out.

I also fail to understand why so many of the shrubs have been taken out. I mean, this path being so close to Park Lane has meant that you could always hear the traffic going past. Now you can see it as well, just a few yards away - and Sandwell call this place a 'Country Park'.

Believe me readers, Sandwell Valley has, over the last 10 years or so, become less rural and more urban as each year has passesd.

It bristles man-made intrusions such as warning signs; notice boards; dog waste bins; alarmed lifebelt posts; CCTV cameras; 4 x 4's etc etc. And while the man-made content has been increasing year by year, the number of trees, young and old, have been reducing as also have the hedgerows all of which have been either reduced in height to 4 or 5 feet, or cut down completely. In fact, Sandwell have, since last Autumn, cut down so many trees and so much mature hawthorn hedge that they have resorted to burning it. Even Sandwell's proud fleet of wood chippers apparently couldn't cope with the volume - there were 6 separate sites where the fires were made.

Yes, Sandwell is producing a wonderful 'Country Park' - and it has a Green Flag to prove it!!!!.

However, and this is no more than a thought, not in any way intended to subvert the Sandwell intelligentia, but would not the interests of the Sandwell Council Tax payer be better served by doing away with the chippers and chain saws; the bonfires and sub-contractors, and instead replacing them with a few gallons of napalm.

This would, I guess, be a far cheaper alternative, and one which is no less destructive.

Great idea.

Everyone's a winner.

Oh! Except the layers of management and health and safety people and buyers and councillors and experts and .......

No. This idea's no good after all as it would start nibbling away at the Great Sandwell Job Creation Scheme.

.