Buckets of money to be poured into the Harbour

Our Council put a lot of time and effort into this bid to get a heap of European funding that will boost Whitstable’s tourism by enhancing its museum offering and information centre.

Excellent. Well done.

Now it’s Herne Bay’s turn.


Harbour funding bid gets green light

A city council bid for European funding for Whitstable Harbour has been successful.

The money is coming from the European Union Interreg IVa programme,
for the partnerships bid Fostering Long Term Initiatives in Ports. The
project sees the council working with a number of other small and medium
sized ports including Dieppe, Le Havre, Newhaven and Torbay on
initiatives that will improve performance, trade, efficiency and the
local economy.

At Whitstable, the funding will go towards studies and models for the
redevelopment of redundant buildings, a feasibility study for the
development of a maritime heritage and information centre, studies into
improved water and energy efficiency and cross border training and
capacity building into innovative port financing.

Half of the money for the €600,000 project comes from the
European Interreg fund, with the city council providing match funding
for the other half.

The council’s Deputy Head of Culture and Enterprise, Dawn Hudd, said:

“Naturally we are very pleased that the bid was successful and are
looking forward to working with our partners on both sides of the
channel. We can all learn much from each other as we build up close
links over the next few years. There is great potential for revamping some areas of the harbour,
such as through the redevelopment of the south quay shed. But we want to
make it clear that we will be working with local people throughout the
process and making sure there is full public consultation on any
development plans. We know how passionate the town’s residents are about
their harbour.”

CCC 19th Apr 2013

Royal Mail meeting in Whitstable

Hello Herne Bay!

The people of Whitstable want to invite you to a Public Meeting here in Whitstable this Fri (1st Feb 2013) to hear your side of the story since you lost your delivery office to Canterbury.

Royal Mail say the move is successful? I think there are some porky pies being told there.

Come and tell us YOUR side of the story. We will take all your comments directly to Royal Mail as we are fighting hard here to save our own delivery office.

Here’s a short film of last Saturday’s protest here and some information beneath the clip of film. Please pass on this message! There will be a story in your local press this week.

Julie Wassmer

The point is: CCC already maintains village greens…

As you may know, one of our councillors recently resurrected the claim that village green status would somehow complicate, impede or prevent maintenance work being carried out on The Downs. I had already sent a letter to the Council’s Legal department (in January 2010) that explained why this was not the case, but this message seems not to have filtered through to all the councillors. So I sent them all a copy of the letter that I had sent to Legal, just to make sure that they’re up to date.

Cllr Vickery-Jones then sent all the councillors a message saying: “We are awaiting advice from our own legal department, it would be prudent not to form a view based on hearsay evidence before that advice is forthcoming.” Here I share with you, dear reader, my next salvo:

I have no wish to weary you with this email exchange, and hope that the following simple fact will finally resolve the question of maintenance of village greens:

Canterbury City Council already carries out maintenance work on village greens.

For example, at Whitstable:

  • Within the last couple of years, CCC completely took over the western half of the village green between Island Wall and West Beach (VG 115) for a period of months, using it for timber storage and erecting a row of portacabins as offices for the workers.
  • Similarly on the village green at Seasalter/West Beach (VG 126), the Council erected sea defences and brought in large quantities of shingle. CCC received no objections from the “inhabitants of the locality” to this work, because it was clearly in their interest, as would be any maintenance works on The Downs at Herne Bay.

The legal position requires no clarification. This is not hearsay, it is fact: village green status is no obstacle to the Council carrying out maintenance work.

Is that conclusive? Will it suffice? Stay tuned…

In a nutshell: Manston

Manston a.k.a. Kent International Airport is an ex-RAF base in north-east Kent, just west of Ramsgate. It passed from the RAF to Wiggins, then PlaneStation, owners of EUJet (a budget passenger airline). EUJet went bust, and in August 2005 the administrators sold Manston to Infratil, a New Zealand-based multi-national infrastructure investor.

The airport is mainly used for flying clubs, testing and training, and private planes. In 2008, less than 3% of the planes were freight or passenger flights. Infratil’s growth plans for Manston are ambitious: 6 million passengers, ½ million tonnes of freight and 103,800 flights annually.

There is a “Section 106 Agreement” (S106) between Infratil and Thanet District Council (TDC) which describes what Infratil can, and can’t, do at Manston. The scale of Infratil’s planned growth is enough to require the S106 to be renegotiated. The existing S106 was drawn up in 2005, and needs to be renegotiated anyway as its 3 year lifespan has expired. There would be a statutory period of public consultation lasting 6 months. This consultation period has not started (as at: 20th June 2009).

Due to the nature of airports and air travel, many more people have a stake in this than just Infratil and TDC. East Kent residents under the flightpaths, particularly in Ramsgate, but also in the Wantsum villages, Herne Bay, Whitstable and Canterbury will all be affected to some degree. Environmental groups, transport lobbies, government bodies, wildlife groups and others all have an interest. The non-partisan KIA Consultative Committee provides a valuable forum for all the interested parties to meet and discuss.

A key issue for local residents is noise. Obviously, the nearer a plane is (in both distance and height) the louder the noise; and if everything else is particularly quiet (at night) it will sound louder anyway. Which is why flightpaths, plane heights, flight times and monitoring matter so much to so many, and keep appearing on this site.

TDC have a duty to do their best to regenerate and energise Thanet, which includes some of the most deprived areas of Kent. Infratil have spent £30m on Manston so far, and have yet to make their shareholders a profit. All the East Kent residents would welcome something that benefits them. We need to find a win-win-win solution.

This is not a small decision, and the consequences will affect tens of thousands of people for years, if not decades. It’s worth taking the trouble to get this one right. And everyone needs to think in the short, medium and long term.

The bid for BAWC night flights

Before I die of rage…

I should have known better. I should have been ready, but I was taken aback by the torrent of special pleading, contradictory arguments, anti-logic and selective perception of reality. Infratil’s presentation to TDC (mentioned in thanetonline, and thoroughly bewailed by Brother Stephen at St. Opmanston‘s) is a leading contender for the crappiest piece of work this year.

Bear in mind, dear reader, that this is a presentation from a multi-million dollar enterprise to a strategic partner on whom it is pinning its future hopes. I’ll take you on a guided tour of the particularly crappy bits later, but for the moment, try this: here are all the reasons that KIA spelled out to TDC as to why night flights are a bad thing…

No mention of the 40,000 people in Ramsgate, or the 35,000 in Herne Bay, or the 30,000 in Whitstable, or the 45,000 in Canterbury. The poor sods who will be living under the night-flying aircraft.

Thanks a million, Matt. Sleep tight.

The Background Story

Manston a.k.a. Kent International Airport is an ex-RAF base in north-east Kent, just west of Ramsgate. It passed from the RAF to Wiggins, then PlaneStation, owners of EUJet (a budget passenger airline). EUJet went bust, and in August 2005 the administrators sold Manston to Infratil, a New Zealand-based multi-national infrastructure investor.

There is a “Section 106 Agreement” (S106) between Infratil and Thanet District Council (TDC) which regulates how Infratil can use Manston – they can’t suddenly decide to turn it into a spaceport and launch satellites, for example. The scale of Infratil’s planned growth is enough to require the S106 to be renegotiated, which would require a period of public consultation lasting 6 months.

The S106 states that Infratil isn’t allowed to schedule any night flights, although a scheduled flight that arrives late can actually land. A night flight is any take-off or landing between 11pm and 7am. Infratil have said they want more night flights.

Many more people have a stake in this than just Infratil and TDC – East Kent residents under the flightpaths, particularly in Ramsgate, but also in the Wantsum villages, Herne Bay, Whitstable and Canterbury will all be affected to some degree. Environmental groups, transport lobbies, government bodies, wildlife groups and others also have an interest. The non-partisan KIA Consultative Committee provides a valuable forum for all the interested parties to meet and discuss.

A key issue for local residents is noise. Obviously, the nearer a plane is (in both distance and height) the louder the noise; and if everything else is particularly quiet (at night) it will sound louder anyway. Which is why flightpaths, plane heights, flight times and monitoring are so important.

TDC have a duty to do their best to regenerate and energise Thanet, which includes some of the most deprived areas of Kent. Infratil have spent £30m on Manston so far, and have yet to make their shareholders a profit. All the East Kent residents would welcome something that benefits them. We need a win-win-win solution.