Barrow Focus

PLANNING ISSUES

You may have heard recently about proposals for development of 285 dwellings at land adjacent to Breachfield/Melton Road, by Jelson. A meeting of the Parish Council with Jelson’s Agents, held recently, confirmed that it is intended to submit an application for outline permission. It is apparent this may well be considered by Charnwood Borough Council, in order that its obligation to Central Government, to provide a five year development plan is fulfilled. Councillors present expressed their concern very strongly and requested the Council is kept fully informed during the planning process. The Agents’ representative agreed to investigate and address all concerns raised. The Council intends to involve our Borough and County Councillors, our Local MP Andy Reed and our prospective parliamentary Candidate Nicky Morgan. It also intends to keep residents well informed and would appeal to you to keep your eyes peeled for notices relating to this issue.

Complaints or concerns

If you have any complaints or concerns relating to overgrown vegetation, street cleaning or highways matters please report them to the Parish Council who will forward them to the appropriate authority. If we can help we will.

The Parish Council is looking at ways in which entrances and traffic islands within the village can be visually enhanced and at a recent meeting considered suggestions put forward by Councillors. It is hoped some funding toward this can be allocated from ‘Public Art’ money from 106 Agreements attached to development in the village already approved, though confirmation of this is awaited.

The following Grants have been awarded so far during this financial year.

Lilly Harrison – International Guiding Trip - £100 Barrow Business Forum – Business Survey - £250 Barrow Youth Theatre Production “The Wizard of Oz” - £300 BOSCAPS 2009 - £250 LCC Streetwise Detached Project - £2,000

An Application Form and guidance is available to groups and or individuals for funding toward a project or Community Facility. All applications will be considered on their own merit.

Funding to groups/individuals is limited to £250 subject to the Council’s discretion whilst larger sums are available to Community Facility Projects.

Please contact The Clerk for further information or to request an application form.

The Parish Council was awarded ‘Commended’ for its application to Category 1 – Community

Early in October six Parish Councillors were given an exciting tour of the Lafarge granite quarry. It is only possible to see the bottom, 190 metres below sea level, by standing on one of the special viewing platforms. It has taken 30 years to make this hole and Lafarge expects to continue for another 30 years and go down a further 190 metres.

The vehicles that scoop up the granite after it has been blasted from the face are enormous. The caterpillar tracks are more than the height of the tallest of us and yet the men who operate them are able to manoeuvre them with fine precision. A large manganese ball was lifted up using the two buckets as pincers and dropped onto a particularly large piece of granite which crumbled into fragments. At the moment it takes a loaded truck 25 minutes to get from the bottom to the top of the quarry and they don’t hang around even though they carry about 75 tons!

After the granite is taken out of the quarry it is put in the crushers. The first crusher looks like some gigantic pestle and mortar. Smaller crushers reduce the pieces to sizes that have a particular market use much of which is for road and rail track building.

The best bit of our visit was kept to last: the blast itself. Earlier a team of three men had drilled between 30 and 40 holes into which were packed the explosives. Just before 12.30 the quarry was evacuated. Because the blasting is now so low down there wasn’t much of a bang; just an earthquake-like vibration of the ground followed by a cotton wool puff of smoke.

Cllr. J Rodgers

The following statement has been released by Network Rail.

‘Since the closure of the crossing in July 2008, a series of temporary closure notices have been granted and we are now in the third 6 month period for temporary closure with the support of Leicestershire County Council and the Secretary of State’s Office.

Whilst the crossing has been closed Network Rail has looked at various options which will allow for the full closure and removal of the crossing. Network Rail has consulted with a number of user groups, the Parish Council Groups, the Parish Council, Borough and County Councils and local residents in order to seek their opinions on our proposals at both public and private meetings.

A public event was held on 15th December 2008 where we received feedback from over 100 local residents. There was overwhelming support for option 2 which involves the closure and removal of the existing level crossing, construction and installation of a new 46 metre single span footbridge at new location, Pingle Nook, involving diversion and creation of public rights of way and extinguishment of bridle rights and Network Rail can confirm that this is the option that will be taken forward. Network Rail would like to thank everyone who attended this event and commented on our proposals.

Network Rail’s key objectives for this scheme have been to ensure the safety of the public at all times, propose a solution and gain the support of the majority of users and residents, and to implement the agreed solution with as little impact as possible on the local community and stakeholders. We believe our solution best meets these criteria and we look forward to taking the project forward. The local community will be kept fully updated on the next stages of this scheme’.