There's something in the air at Sandwell

There has been some speculation about the purpose of, what looks like, a short section of roadway, which has appeared in Sandwell Valley during the last week.

Although this roadway doesn’t actually lead anywhere yet, I can reveal, exclusively, that it will.

Sources close to Sandwell have informed me that this is the first stage of the main runway for Sandwell’s first airport.

To be known as Sandwell International, the airport will be the hub of a network of airports which are to be built during the next few years and which are to be located at Tipton; Smethwick; Wednesbury and Oldbury.

Asked about the rationale for the airport network, the new, £450,000 a year, Sandwell Airports Commissioner said that it was mainly because the car sharing scheme had not worked as well as the Council would have liked. Accordingly, the Council, after lengthy investigation and consultation, with themselves, have sanctioned the in-Borough air transport scheme which, it is claimed, will reduce road traffic by as much as 1% by 2028.

The Commissioner went on to say that it would provide much needed additional capacity to cater for things like the influx of visitors to the fantastic new Tesco store in West Bromwich, and to the hugely successful art gallery, The Public, although, unfortunately, not before it closes in November.

‘This is another first for Sandwell,’ he said, ’and will provide a massive boost to the local economy. We estimate that Sandwell International will create 2,000 new full-time jobs, 50 of which will be at the airport itself and the rest in Sandwell Council House.’

But can this be cost-justified?

‘Yes.’ the Commissioner said,’ It has been fully costed, and, using a new kind of cost sharing scheme, pioneered by the Private Initiative ‘Sandwell Style’ Office, we are confident that the costs of the project will be met.’

Pressed on this point, the Commissioner elaborated.’ The Private Initiative ‘Sandwell Style’ Office will be calling on Sandwell residents, who will benefit most from the initiative, to shoulder a fair share of the costs. So, there will be a Council Tax Airport supplement of £1 per house per annum, which will, over the next 250 years, raise £31.5 million. And’ he said’ the Office has applied to the Arts Council for the other £43.5 billion.’

Has there been any reaction yet from the Arts Council?

‘Oh Yes,’ said the Commissioner,’We were greatly encouraged by an almost immediate response.’

Which was?

‘Well, we are in the process of clarifying that at the moment. The text of the response seems to have been largely lost, due to some technical matter, leaving only an abridged form of the Office’s address, but we expect to have the full text soon.’

No one from the Council was available for comment as they are still all on holiday in case it starts raining here.

However, we were able to speak to someone from the new, bijou, Sandwell College, who said he had no idea what we were talking about, but could see some synergy of an airport, with the notion that it was going to cost far less than £20 million for the College to convert The Public into something useful, because every time they said that, there were reports of pigs flying over West Bromwich town centre.

In the interests of fairness and balance we sought an interview with someone from The Public. She strenuously rejected the charges that The Public had been a complete and utter waste of time; space and money, and that it was as infantile and vacuous in concept as it is artistically vacant in reality. She also completely refuted the notion that the bulk of visitors are merely in transit, via The Public’s lavatories, to the bus station.

She went on to claim that, in an age where it is generally accepted that less is more, the complete nothingness which The Public has to offer is positively orgasmic.

With that, she ran off squealing.

So, exciting times ahead.

Check back here for regular updates on the new airports.

By the way, I saw the Sandwell Official Jag recently, and noted the registration number as 1 HA.

Is there, I wondered, something subliminal here?

Is some wag at Sandwell trying to tell us that, at one HA short of a HA HA, Sandwell isn’t even a joke any more?

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Sandwell Fantastic Mountain Bike Trail New Notice

 Well; Well; Well.

Look what's appeared.

A new, legible notice telling everyone other than mountain bike riders to sod off and go somewhere else.

I hadn't seen it, but a couple drew it to my attention this morning saying that they had been banned from walking in the Jubilee Woods.

I said 'What!' 

They explained that they had been walking through those woods for years until the construction of the Fantastic Mountain Bike Trail started. It has, so they say, (I haven't seen all of it myself) taken over practically the whole of the woods, and the previous pathways, worn by generations of feet, are either, now, part of it, or are inaccessible because of it.

The notice from Sandwell confirms what they thought, from their own observations, that they, like most everyone else, are personae non grata in Jubilee Woods!!

This is a classic example of Sandwell 'looking after the countryside' (I quote from one of its own notices) - a civic attribute to which Sandwell has awarded itself on more than one occasion. Unfortunately, not many people will be seeing how well Sandwell will be looking after this particular bit of countryside from this point onwards.

But what are we to make of the new; shiny; jumbo-sized notice?

Why is it that, barely 2 weeks after the Fantastic Mountain Bike Trail seemed to be finished, complete with little signs on stumps,  Sandwell has now put up a much bigger, albeit temporary, laminated version, which reads exactly as the original?

Has something rattled Sandwell's cage?

Has a non-mountain bike rider already been injured, and I missed it?

Has Sandwell become alert to the possibility, nay, likelihood, of something nasty happening in the Jubilee Woods?

Does Sandwell think that by putting up a legible version of the smaller 'everyone keep out' version, it will save itself a few bob when the claims start coming in?

Watch this space .................



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Sandwell Valley Fantastic Mountain Bike Trail

Well you’ve got to hand it to Sandwell, haven’t you?

Buoyed up, no doubt, by its recent stunning achievement of opening a new college, and, within a year declaring its capacity to be the wrong size (ie 6 times too small !!!!!!!!) Sandwell, ever mindful of the needs of others, has, only last week, completed its latest flagship disaster.

Well, I say ‘completed,’ but with Sandwell, you can’t be quite sure whether it’s finished something or not. In fact, a good proportion of the time, I’ve no doubt that Sandwell itself doesn’t know whether it has finished something. Things just seem to shudder to a halt, and sometimes start again after a few weeks, and sometimes don’t.

But, on the face of it, a new ‘fantastic’ (Sandwell’s word, not mine) mountain bike trail was finished last week.

Of course, disciples of Sandwell will be asking themselves, ‘Can this new; unnecessary; expensive; environmentally damaging folly, even remotely vie for the much contested Sandwell Outstanding Stupidity Award’ which is presently held by Sandwell’s The Public art gallery.

Well, maybe – maybe not.

On the plus side for The Public art gallery, (famous for having almost no art and almost no public) it can boast having doubled its 2001 approved construction budget of £38.3 million, by coming in at a reported £72 million.

That, itself, would be insufficient to hold down the Sandwell Outstanding Stupidity Award for any length of time, but the saving grace for The Public is, that after only 5 years, Sandwell is looking to throw in the towel, draw a veil over the whole sorry project; give the thing away to the brand new undersized college, and try to forget it ever happened.

So I think the Councillors behind The Public are probably feeling fairly confident of hanging on to their SOS Award for a good while yet.

But hang on a minute.

This fantastic mountain bike trail may yet pull a rabbit out of somewhere.

Now, OK, it didn’t cost £72 million, and it hasn’t been shut down yet.

But  potential for killing, or, at least, maiming people is just tremendous.

Have you ever seen anything so crazy in your life? Now I’m the first to admit I know nothing whatever about mountain bike riding. But I do have a degree of common sense!

With cycle paths in some places less than 2 feet wide; hair pin bends; steep cambers; massive rocks along the route and especially on corners, this has to be a recipe for terrible disaster. 

And, yes, Sandwell has put up pygmy sized signs saying that pedestrians and ‘leisure’ cyclists should not go on the new trail. But how many weekenders, or teenagers, are going to take any notice of those, even if they see them?

I take no pleasure in saying that I was dumbfounded and aghast when I saw (part only of) the trail and realised the awful, and inevitable, consequences of its use by the unaware.

Of course, it’s difficult to equate squandered money with human lives or suffering. But in insurance terms, a reasonably young, employed person who is severely disabled through accident, must be easily worth in excess of £6 million – a straightforward death, very much less. But you only need a couple of each of these a year and the fantastic mountain bike trail could top The Public in less than 5 years. And, unlike The Public, which cost an arm and a leg to keep going, the fantastic mountain bike trail will cost almost nothing to maintain. It could go on killing and maiming people for donkey’s years - at no extra cost. 

Well done Sandwell.

This fantastic mountain bike trail isn’t just stupid, it’s absolutely wicked, and if any of Sandwell’s Councillors actually know where the trail is, and what it looks like (which I doubt) they should call for it to be either destroyed, or completely fenced in, allowing only experienced mountain bike riders access, before someone is seriously/terminally injured.

                         *************************

Just as a matter of interest, and as evidence of the quality of thought of whoever it is at Sandwell, compare the notice above, telling 'leisure' cyclists to go and cycle somewhere else, with the one put up by Sandwell in March, 2013, saying that the fantastic mountain bike trail '... will be designed to offer something for all abilities.'

I wonder why Sandwell changed its mind. Could it be that someone, somewhere, deep in the bowels of Sandwell, spotted that it might just have created a Black Country Dignitas?

                                    ******************

And as a matter of further interest, harking back to the new £77 million undersized Sandwell College, where has all the demand for places come from - and why? One web site which I was looking at reported that there were 6 applicants for each place. 

If there had have been enough places available, would that have resulted in other Sandwell 6th form colleges being left half empty?

And what was so attractive about the new college? Was it the great thirst for knowledge and personal development which Sandwell, by its own actions, had inspired in its youth? 

Or was it something to do with the free Samsung Notebooks which were advertised on the Metro for anyone signing up?

                                 *********************

http://www.expressandstar.com/education/2013/06/08/college-plan-for-the-public-to-cost-millions/ makes for interesting reading, especially some of the readers comments!

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A New Notice at Sandwell Valley

Well, the Sandwell Special Sign Secretariat seems to have gone into overdrive. 

Barely have we had time to admire and digest the last 3 notices, than another has appeared!

Is it, one asks oneself, that the Springtide sap is rising at SSSS, or is it that they are celebrating the start of a new Local Authority year - with a new Local Authority budget to go with it?

(Sighs of relief all round as they congratulate themselves on surviving yet another year).

Whatever the reason, we, the multitudes of avid readers, count ourselves indeed fortunate that Sandwell MBC, through its SSSS organ of communication, keeps us so well informed of all of the new things happening at Sandwell Valley.

So what's new then?

Oh! They're going to chop down a few more trees.

So, er, not so new then. Just a bit more of the same.

I think it must have been the SSSS B team that produced this notice as it doesn't have the usual flair. A dead give-away is the use of 2 'possible's in the same sentence, but as they said they were going to possibly save as many trees as possible, maybe we should overlook the appalling grammar. Instead, we can pretend that we are unaware of the vast resources available to Sandwell which are patently unused for things like the correct use of grammar in public notices. 

But the import is clear. 

Trees are to be chopped, and as there are only 259 chopping days to Christmas, Sandwell better get a move on.

(Don't worry on that score. If there is one thing that Sandwell and its collection of specialist arborealists are good at, it's chopping down trees. They have several Green Flags to prove it.)

It's sad that a survey of trees has shown some to be in 'very poor health' and really wonderful that Sandwell are going to either chop them down or 'pollard' them if they possibly can, as they are possibly a danger to 'public safety'. That's always a great banker isn't it - 'public safety'. That's the one Sandwell used when it chopped down the 50 or so 100 year old poplars which used to flank the boathouse at Swan Pool. 

But there have been other equally good reasons for chopping down the trees at Sandwell Valley (apart from keeping Sandwell employees and its sub-contractors in full employment).

For example, 'necessary thinning' to allow wild flowers to grow, or 'necessary thinning' just because they need, necessarily, to be thinned.

Then there was the necessary removal of willow and other assorted trees round Swan Pool so that a new CCTV camera on the Swan Pool boathouse had a clear line of sight to the, then, newly installed lifebelt stations, and the, then, newly beefed-up car park next door to the boathouse.

Of course, necessary thinning had to take place round the Swan Pool car park to discourage gays; dogging; drug dealers, murderers and other anti-social types.

Thinning took place on the approaches to the 2 motorway bridges for no obvious reasons apart from the ones given to me by a Ranger - being, 'nothing has been done here for years', and, ''they' want a Green Flag'.

More recently loads of trees (and mature hedgerows) have 'needed' to be removed so that many hundreds of yards of plaited fences can be made - this, of course, to the detriment of any birds which might have wanted to nest in any of them. 

Then there are the few dozen trees that had to go when Sandwell installed street lighting in the Valley. (SSSS let us down badly here by not informing us of the reasons Sandwell had for their installation. Someone did suggest that if there was a problem round there at night, then the presence of these luminescent erections might facilitate orderly comings, and goings, rather than premature evacuations - but that didn't sound quite right to me).

Lots of trees went, and continue to go, in and around the area  where an adult climbing frame, otherwise known as 'Closer to the Edge' of something, was constructed. I haven't seen many people getting closer to the edge, but I have seen one or two coach loads of hapless 6th formers being bussed in, presumably to bump up the attendance numbers.

Famously, lots of really fantastically old and beautiful trees were given the chop in Dartmouth Park, as part of its National Lottery financed 'restoration' because they were 'in the wrong place'. I ask you, trees that had probably been there longer than the park itself, sentenced to death by Sandwell because it thought that they were in the 'wrong place'. Sandwell - the personification of arrogance.

Let's not forget the necessary 100% removal of trees and everything else last year from an island in Forge Mill Lake (the Balancing Lake to those of us who know a thing or two), to encourage ground nesting birds to do whatever ground nesting birds do on a flat piece of dried mud. 

And let's not forget the other trees that were removed from the banks either side of that island, to stop other birds from sitting on them and, thereby, spotting whatever the ground nesting birds were getting up to!! You may think this is too ridiculous even for Sandwell, but I have a photograph of the notice which spells it all out.

You don't believe me do you?

OK ......................

Quite recently, almost everything, trees, of course, included, was cleared from one end of Swan Pool on the pretext that a 10 year inspection of the bank, under a 1975 Act, needed to be carried out. Well, I'm not sure what happened in 1985, or 1995, or even 2005, because no similar clearance was made, as a number of well aged oaks would readily testify, were they still able to do so. 

And soon there is to be a necessary clearance of trees in Jubilee Woods to facilitate the construction of a 'fantastic' cycle path. Hooray!

And there has been a fairly massive clearance in the woods adjacent to Ice House Pool, or Heron Pool as some of us know it. A pathway is being cut through what's left of those woods as well but I have no information as to its purpose. 

Still, it doesn't matter really does it? As long as Sandwell managers; staff and sub-contractors can keep themselves in a job, who cares a jot if Sandwell Valley disappears in the process. Sandwell Councillors obviously aren't bothered, otherwise they would have done something to stop it   .........  always assuming that they actually know what is going on.

And that begs a couple of quite interesting questions.

How many of Sandwell's Councillors have visited Sandwell Valley in the last 12 months, on even one occasion, on Council business? And how many Councillors have visited Sandwell Valley in the last 12 months, on even one occasion, for purely leisure purposes?

I don't think I would be at all surprised at the answers.

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A few more Sandwell trees saved !!

Sandwell, has published notices relating to its policies of looking after its countryside and retaining as many mature trees as possible.

I've shown this notice before, but it's worth another read. There are others of equally crass nature.

Whilst it is undeniable that Sandwell is retaining mature trees, it is also undeniable that an increasing number are now horizontal rather than vertical.

Here are a few which have bitten the dust in the last few days :-

Let's all wave a green flag for those honest souls buried deep in the bowels of Sandwell who are looking after the countryside so well and who are, in the process, retaining as many mature trees as possible.

Ably assisting Sandwell,  in its careful custody of the Sandwell Valley Country Park, are a number of increasingly present sub-contract arboreal specialists. 

There is no doubt that tree chopping is a growth industry in Sandwell - as well as being an oxymoron. 

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Sandwell Notices

Within 3 days of the appearance of the ‘farming’ notice to which I referred in my last post, Sandwell had put up not 1 or 2, but 3 notices of its own.

I don’t know, but I’m guessing, that the farming notice hit a nerve somewhere, causing the great Sandwell machine to grind into action, and in particular, to put the Sandwell Special Sign Secretariat (SSSS) on alert.

So serious were the allegations in the farming notice (that Sandwell is self-serving and environmentally indifferent) my further guess is that SSSS would have sought guidance from the secret and rarely accessed Sandwell High Intensity Thinktank. (Sandwell are currently working on an acronym for this unit – any suggestions should be sent directly to Sandwell but will probably be deemed as most unhelpful)

One of Sandwell’s notices was about the, now routine, removal of trees; shrubs and mature hedgerows, this time down a goodly length of Park Lane to facilitate the creation of another few hundred yards of plaited fences.

Another notice was about the further routine removal of trees and shrubs in Jubilee Woods. This follows a ‘necessary thinning out’ of the woodland which took place last year, and will enable the construction of a ‘fantastic’ mountain cycle trail.

But the notice which I found most interesting was about the huge cull of  trees and mature shrubs which has recently taken place at one end of Swan Pool and which has left the site virtually barren.

The notice says ‘  …. you may have noticed that some vegetation works have take place ….’       ‘….this has involved the removal of a number of young trees and areas of bramble ……’

‘ ….. we have retained as many mature trees as possible.’

Like here ................

.........  and here .......

......... and here .......

..........  and here ......

etc etc etc I've loads more photos of felled mature trees, in just the last 2 or 3 months, all round the Valley.

So, Sandwell, you carry on telling yourself about how you are retaining as many mature trees as possible, while the rest of us ponder the old adage – ‘You can fool some of the people some of the time, but Sandwell fools itself all of the time’ - if it thinks that anyone other than the Green Flag people, believes this kind of tosh.

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Farming at Sandwell Valley

On Saturday, 2nd March, 2013, a notice appeared attached to a tree by Swan Pool. It was a nicely done thing - properly laminated and so on - and seemed, at first sight to be from Sandwell. However, a brief scan of the first few lines left the reader in no doubt that it was a spoof.

Here is a photo of it. 

The bright sunshine behind me and the gloss finish makes it somewhat indistinct. For those who aren't able to discern its import, the gist of it is this.

The author objects to the massive amount of tree and hedge clearance which Sandwell have undertaken. He (I'm assuming for ease that the author is a 'he') says that the bird population has decreased significantly during the last 5 years which he attributes directly to Sandwell's actions, whilst at the same time farming activities, and the costs thereof, have increased with, he says, little or no return.

Well, I can't vouch for any of his facts and figures, but I do go along with his underlying point which is that Sandwell has without doubt caused colossal and irreparable damage to a once piece of unspoilt countryside. And I go further than him, because he makes no reference to the urbanisation of the Valley. My view is that the installation of CCTV; street lights; automated car park barriers; warning notices; barbed wire topped fences; litter bins; dog discharge bins and the like, all take away the 'natural' aspect of the Valley. There is nothing 'natural' there any more. Everything is either man made or man interfered with. 

And why?

My opinion, as often stated, is not that Sandwell has done this because it likes farmers. My view is that Sandwell has done this as part of a job creation and preservation scheme for some of its staff, coupled with the hope, and probably expectation, that one or more of its Councillors will at some stage get recognition for 'services to ..' something or other.

Call me cynical if you like but it's the only explanation I can come up with. 

No concerned organisation would ravage the Valley, at any time, in the way that Sandwell has done, unless it had a driving case for doing so. And no Local Authority would spend the money that Sandwell has done on work carried out during years when every penny spent should have been scrutinised and justified as absolutely necessary, unless it had a driving case for doing so.

Don't tell me that the driving case was Sandwell's all consuming desire to foster farming - especially as it sold off its dairy herd only last year.

And don't tell me that the driving case was Sandwell's response to a great upsurge of requirement from Council Tax payers. How many people live in Sandwell? 300,000? (... and there's close on a million next door in Birmingham!) And on a sunny summer's day, how many do you see there? And for most of the rest of the year how many do you see there? No, the evidence is clear that less than 1% of Council Tax payers have any interest in either visiting Sandwell Valley or what their elected representatives have done to it.

So if the people (who are the ultimate paymasters of Sandwell) aren't interested in the Valley - why has Sandwell spent so much time and money doing so many things which have completely changed the nature of the place?

There's only one answer.

Sandwell is doing it for itself; its Councillors and its staff. 

There can be no other reason.

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(You're) Welcome to Sandwell Valley Country Park

The last 3 months have seen an unprecedented assault on the trees and bushes at Sandwell Valley.

Sandwell have felled thousands of trees in Sandwell Valley during the last 6 or 7 years, but the last 3 months has seen the most concentrated and most widespread devastation yet.

The above photos show the former solid block of trees and shrubs at one end of Swan Pool having  been razed to the ground. For the entire length of the Pool, almost all of the vegetation is gone. A tractor with attachments has been grinding away at the last vestiges of  plant life and the area is reduced to soil level.

The internal pathway which runs parallel to Park Lane, most of which was 'surfaced' last year, now has nothing between it and Park Lane (above) for most of its length, most trees and all low level vegetation having been removed. It was always possible to hear passing traffic - now you can see it as well -- and a barbed wire topped fence on the other side of the path.

And the above refers to only 2 locations at the Valley, There are many more where chunks of woodland have become flat ground in the last 2 or 3 months and where mature trees and underlying vegetation have been wiped out.

Horrific is the word.

Most of the recent clearance work has been carried out by contractors, and they certainly went at it with enthusiasm. But there are 3 other groups of people (that I know of - there may well be more) who devote their time to cutting down trees and shrubs. There are the Community Pay-Back people (as long as the weather is OK); a band of local volunteers who hack around under the supervision of the Sandwell Rangers, and there is another small outfit who's minibus claims to be en route to a brighter environment - or something like that.

With so many organisations engaged in cutting things down at Sandwell Valley, it is hardly surprising that the place is melting away like the snow in sunshine.

And why do I care?

Well quite apart from the fact that it was the only place remotely like unspoilt countryside anywhere near Birmingham, it pretty much reflected my life.

As a boy, I was brought to Sandwell Valley with my brother and we played there and looked at the animals. Later, I took my girl friend there, and after she became my wife, our children went to play and look at the animals. Even when she was quite ill, we used to go for walks every Sunday morning from the Sandwell Park Farm car park. And now her ashes are laid there beneath a tree which Sandwell planted for me.

So when I see a landscape, familiar to me for decades, being ripped apart and destroyed in just a few short years, I see not only the end of a lovely thing, because it can now never be replaced, but I see much of  my life has disappeared as well.

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Nice Job Sandwell

Does anyone remember my post in January 2012 about the path round Swan Pool?

No?

I'm not surprised.  Wasn't that interesting I suppose.

Well, there's an update.

To save you looking back, there is a path, trodden by a couple of generations of feet, which runs round Swan Pool. In a couple of places this path had become impassable in very wet conditions, but, instead of just fixing those places, Sandwell decided to dig up the whole thing and put on a new surface of grit and stuff.(I hope I am not being too technical)

Of course, the Sandwell Special Path Secretariat caused this work to be started during the (predictable) awful weather of November, 2011, rather than the less predictable rains of Summer months. The result was a much longer job than otherwise might have been the case and a huge amount of muddy mess in the process.

No matter. The job was done, and, at a time, when few people would have seen what a lash up it was.

But.........

Problem.

Someone noticed, early in 2012, on, I think, their first circumnavigation of the Pool, that there was a 10 foot or so stretch of the pristine path which was under water !!!!!

And it was reported that there were other similar soggy places.

What was to be done?

No problem.

The great machine of the Sandwell Special Path Secretariat moved into high gear and by December, 2012, the solution had not only been found, but was being implemented.

Yes, a couple of  vehicles; a trailer; a digger and some other machine (unknown) with  a number of workmen appeared and by the end of January, 2013, the job was done. 

At least I think so, as to-day, Thursday, 31st January, 2013, none of them were there.

Quite what the job was, that was done, I cannot tell you. I haven't been to look. It was all too muddy for me.

But I am told that the nice new (and presumably expensive) path of barely 1 year old has been dug up in 2 or 3 places and 'drainage' pipes laid. One assumes that this is to solve the surface water on the newly laid path. 

Quite why no one didn't just put another foot or so of shale on top of the waterlogged parts is something known only to the Sandwell intelligentsia. But, anyway, it's done - apparently - and the contractors, so carefully selected by Sandwell, have left the area exactly as a visitor to the Sandwell Valley Country Park would expect to find.

Not for nothing did Sandwell post notices with the headline  ' Looking after your countryside.'

Nice job Sandwell.