Rainhill Village Life - Supported by your Labour Councillors

Monday, May 29, 2006

Planning Issues

APPLICATIONS RECENTLY REVIEWED
0269 Tower College, Mill Lane - Erection of sportshall, nursery, kindergarden and car park - withdrawn
0300 Brydon, Norlands Lane - Single storey rear extension - granted
0316 Norton & Co (The Old Bank) 499 Warrington Road - Consent to retain existing advertisements and to display a further three - refused
0255 14 Stonecross Drive - First floor extension and garage conversion extension - granted
0325 Fairchild Farm, Fox's Bank Lane - Loft conversion and window variations - granted
0413 1 Calder Drive - Conservatory - granted
0259 10 Trent Road - - Single storey rear extension - granted
0279 18 Fairclough Road - Two storey side and single storey rear extensions - granted
0357 Rock Bank, 27 Mill Lane - Two storey pitched roof rear extension - granted
0403 17 Horwood Avenue - Two storey side and single storey rear extensions - granted
0419 150 Stoney Lane - Single storey side extension - granted
0437 2 Newby Avenue - Single storey side extension - granted
0438 15 Tasker Terrace - Retain portable free standing advert - refused
0454 364 Warrington Road - Two storey side extension - granted

RECENT SUBMISSIONS
0521 23 Stonecross Drive - Single storey rear extension, extension to garage and change of use to habitable room
0527 Manor Farm, Mill Lane - (Retrospective) to retain satelite dish and security cameras
0548 Manor Farm, Mill Lane - External rear access ramp
0561 668 Warrington Road - Demolish conservatory / erect single storey extension
0576 Manor Farm, Mill Lane - External access ramp to rear
0615 19 Brancker Avenue - Conservatory


SCHEDULE OF APPEALS
00478 Land south of Fairchilds Farm, Fox's Bank Lane - Breach of Planning Control - Informal Hearing set for 23/05/06
00104 Fairchilds Farm, Fox's Bank Lane - Breach of Planning Control - The appeal is dismissed and the enforcement notice is upheld with corrections and variations.
0113 Land south of 34 / 36 Rainhill Road - Refused erection of detached single storey dwelling - Awaiting hearing date

Tuesday, May 23, 2006

Parish Council elects new Chairman

On Monday 15th May at the Annual General Meeting, the members of Rainhill Parish Council were thrilled to select Cllr Bill Wood as the new Chairman for 2006 / 07.

Bill, or Malcolm, (he responds to both names) has been a Parish Councillor for eleven years and been a resident of the village for nearly forty years. Bill was brought up in Sale, Cheshire and attended Manchester Grammar School and the Royal College of Advanced Technology in Salford, where he gained qualifications to enable him to earn his living as a computer engineer for AEI based in Manchester and later for ICL in Manchester and then in Liverpool.

Always active in the local community, Bill is a stalwart figure who many villagers will recognise from either walking with his dog or attending the many meetings around the area. Bill is always keen to put his name forward and currently he is a HomeWatch Leader, Governor for two local schools, member of the Crime Prevention Team, and a regular attendee at all the Local Heritage Societies Meetings.

Married to Elaine, father to David and Peter, and the late Judith, and Grandad to Emma and Abigail, Bill's family ties are the rockbed of his way of life.

We all wish him the very best in his year of office.

The photograph was taken at one of his first functions, the Mayor Making last Sunday held at St Mary's, Lowe House, and later at St Helens Town Hall.

LOCAL UPROAR OVER DANE COURT CAR PARKING CHARGES

We have been inundated with emails and phone calls regarding the new parking charges imposed last Friday for car parking on Dane Court in the Village Centre. We are as shocked and disgusted as our local residents are, and wish to correct some rumours that appear to be circulating.

Neither the Rainhill Parish Council nor the Rainhill Village Hall have any responsibility for this new charging scheme. The charges were imposed last Friday without the courtesy of informing the Parish Clerk or the Village Hall committee. The car park is in the ownership of Dane Court Shopping Centre and they are the ones who have imposed the charges. We, as Parish Councillors, have requested that the Parish Clerk issue notices to that effect and one can be clearly seen on the car park charges board. It was put there on Monday afternoon together with one inside the Village Hall entrance.

The knock on affects could have a severe effect on the use of the Village Hall. Parking generally is a real problem in the Village without this happening. I just wonder how they are going to police it effectively and what will happen if you don't pay the charges.

We can assure you that we are all working hard to see what legal challenge we can make to this action. We will keep you informed. It may be helpful if residents could complain direct to the company and we are putting leaflets on cars with the following addresses
.

AGENT
Mrs V Rodriguez
Irving Rice
St Nicholas House
Old Churchyard
Chapel St
Liverpool
L2 8TX
Tel No 0151 476 0001

OWNER
Lawrence Stanier Pinkney
Company Secretary
Lariche Investments Ltd
Ffoswen
Llandelo
Carmarthenshire
SA19 6SF

Friday, May 19, 2006

APRIL CRIME FIGURES

Here are the latest crime figures for Rainhill Village from Lynne Carberry of Merseyside Police:-

CRIME FIGURES APRIL 2006

Rainhill area

A Burglary was attempted in Owen Road.

Burglaries occurred in Ellaby Road, Longton Lane, Ratcliffe Place, Sandhurst Road and Mooreway.

Cars were broken into in Holt Lane, Ritherup Lane, Station Road, Stapleton Road, Warrington Road and Fox's Bank Lane.

Cars were stolen from Ansdell Villas Road, Victoria Place, Lincoln Way, Toftwood Gardens and Deepdale Drive.

Three Charged as Police Clampdown on Car Crime.

Merseyside police have charged three people in connection with an incident at Eccleston Park Golf Club on 4th April 2006. A 15-year-old from Liverpool has been charged with aggravated vehicle taking, a 17-year-old of no fixed abode was charged with aggravated vehicle taking and conspiracy to steal a motor vehicle and a 22-year-old male from Wavertree has been charged with seven offences [two counts of burglary, shoplifting, theft, conspiracy to steal from a motor vehicle (number plates), aggravated vehicle taking and burglary with intent to steal] that date back to March 2006

VILLAGE UPDATE

The contractors have finally finished, after what seems like an eternity, the refurbishment of the footbridge over the railway lines at the end of the Rainhill Station platform.

Some local residents in Tasker Terrace have been disturbed with noise from the upgrade, when the contractors were working over the line at night, but now the bridge is showing in its former glory, it's all been worthwhile.

VILLAGE UPDATE

At last the work has started on the promised alleygates close to the village centre. The posts have been put in place on the alleys on both sides of Rainhill Road and will hopefully be completed very soon.
We, your local councillors, would like to congratulate the local residents here for their hard work in upgrading the alleys. If you look closely, you will notice that the borders along the edges of the pathway have been planted with various bulbs, etc., and will look a picture later in the summer.

Saturday, May 06, 2006

Another Day - Another Hoax

Police are getting reports that Merseyside residents are having a card pushed through their doors informing them that a parcel company called “ PDS “ was unable to deliver a parcel and asks them to contact them on 0906 661 1911.

THIS IS A HOAX.

Calls to this number cost £1.50p per minute and can last several minutes and the company is currently under investigation by Trading Standards.

Further information can be obtained from; www.icstis.org.uk

MY THANK YOU TO RAINHILL RESIDENTS

The cameras were there in force in a packed Assembly Hall after the polls closed on Thursday evening. No, they weren't much interested in yours truly, but wanted to see if our Leader Marie Rimmer was able to hold onto her seat. Thankfully she did comfortably, much to the dismay of her opponents.

I watched Rainhill's votes being counted up and soon realised that the majority of our residents had given me the power to continue the team effort that Mike Doyle, Joe DeAsha and myself had started almost two years ago on behalf of the local residents.

A big THANK YOU to all who supported me this year.


Unusually, I suppose for the cameras, we were paraded onto the stage for the declarations and in due course it was my turn. I think I would have preferred to chair an angry residents' meeting as the atmosphere was electric and yours truly's heart rate started to soar.

Back to the real world and my monthly surgery next week.

Tuesday, May 02, 2006

Stoops Island - Latest Update following Complaints

I have received several anonymous complaints regarding the waiting times because of the work being carried out. Jonathan and Ben emailed me and have given some thought to the situation and I have held some positive dialogue with the Council. The following is a copy of the email to Ben outlining the position and a possible improvement to traffic flows over the next 4 to 6 week period.

"Work on the roundabout comprises the construction of a "free flow link" from A570 southbound to M62 East (towards Manchester) and the widening of the north side of the roundabout from three lanes to five.

To enable the widening works on the roundabout to proceed, it will be necessary to restrict the roundabout to 2 lanes in order to provide a safety zone between the works and the live traffic lanes. The approaches from the A570 and A557 will have to be coned down to 2 lanes to facilitate this.

As the traffic signals have to be moved back and the ducts require extending, the traffic signals have been switched off with the exception of the signals on the approaches from the motorway. The Highways Agency have concerns about traffic backing up along the slip roads and blocking the motorway, so the signals have been retained at these locations to ensure that traffic queues do not build up excessively and block the motorway.

The particular officer travels through this junction on his journeys to and from work and he is aware of the longer than normal queues on the non-signalised approaches. He has spoken to the Traffic Control Section and they will look to reduce the green times for the slip roads and increased the green times for traffic on the roundabout. They can monitor the junction through CCTV cameras and will review the changes to the signal timings to ascertain whether they can get an improvement to traffic flows through the junction.

We hope to get the traffic signals working on the south side of the junction by the end of May. Although the official completion date for the whole scheme is October, we expect the works to be completed before this ( perhaps September) and some of the capacity improvements should be operational prior to this. Traffic flows are lighter in the late Spring/Summer, so the delays at the junction are likely to be less than if the works were being constructed through the Winter"

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