Be aware – possible opportunistic burglar in area

A number of people are reporting that someone tried their door in our area. I would suggest that all residents in Newton Hall, Framwellgate Moor, Pity and Brasside make sure their doors are on a catch or better still locked when they are in.

We have notified the police and they are looking at carrying out patrols where this has been reported. We have also asked the press to do something on this and asked some residents to spread this around Facebook and other sites as well as notifying Durham City Homes.

If this happens to you or any neighbour make sure it is reported immediately to the police. If you have any elderly neighbours who perhaps are not on the internet, a friendly remainder to them to be careful would be appreciated.

Oxley Terrace and Dryburn Road BT repair work

For many many months I have been trying to get the council to get BT Openreach to repair the damage to the grass verge on Dryburn Road where their vans regularly park. I even provided contact details to the council of senior management but still no reinstatement. This doesn’t appear to be a problem with the council, but perhaps mentioning it on his blog will stir BT into action. The council continue to chase it.

Also, the trench dug across the road in Pity Me by BT is still keeping residents awake and causing vibrations through their houses on Oxley Terrace. It will have been at least 2 months since this poor quality repair was carried out, so by my reckoning that’ hundreds of thousands of bangs they have had to put up with now. Why these companies can’t just do a proper job first time is beyond me. I’m sure it would save them money and bad publicity. Again I have chased up the Council to intervene.

Update on Broadband issues at Finchale Abbey and Rosemount

Last week I had a meeting with the Director of Openreach operations for the North East, and the Head of ICT on Durham County Council to try and sort out the continuing problems at these two sites.I have been working regularly on these for a ling time now and it has been a really hard slog. Across the Country thousands of communities are still missing out. Thankfully an end is in sight at least in our patch after all this chasing and pressure.

ROSEMOUNT

Early last year BT promised a new broadband box would be put in and be active for the summer. It didn’t happen. BT have apologised to me and said this promise should never had been made.

Issues of land access have now been sorted out. Issues of cost to provide electricity have been sorted out. Although BT confirmed that the Council’s contract is one of the reasons for the delay – i.e. they have put all resources into the Digital Durham contract which is separate to the Rosemount work, I have now been promised that this will not hold up the work. Our pressure in really pushing this has taken it up the agenda.

BT have confirmed that the final work required is now guaranteed to be funded in the coming financial year (April), and that their aim is to get this work done as a matter of urgency. I will be updating residents in the coming months on timescales when BT let me know but they are fully aware now that this is a PR problem for them and I am certain they will work hard to get a quick result. Certain because we will be chasing them if it doesn’t happen!

Clearly our public and private pressure has finally paid off.

FINCHALE ABBEY VILLAGE

This is part of the Digital Durham contract, but is not an easy one to fix. The location means that getting access is more difficult as potentially BT will need to provide a cross-river supply. However, I have been given a guarantee that this will be part of this year’s work program which is due to commence in June/July and run for unto 18 months. The Council, with BT will be working hard to get the program up and running and are aware of the importance that is placed on action by Finchale Abbey residents and us as local Lib Dem councillors. I have been given assurances that updates will be passed to me in the coming months so that residents can get a better indication of timescales. In the meantime we are checking to see if anything can done to improve speeds in the meantime. What is guaranteed is that at every opportunity we will be chasing this one as much as Rosemount!

Article 4 – Student and HMO housing – Lib Dem success for our area

The council has completed its consultation on introducing new rules in the City on student/HMO housing. The aim of this is to protect areas from having too many houses of multiple occupation, to avoid the negative consequences. When we found out about this last year, we immediately asked for our area to be included as it had been ignored. An initial consultation was arranged by your Lib Dem councillors.

The council has now accepted that  the area should be considered for inclusion, and a final round of consultation will start soon, along with a couple of drop in events in our area which we have requested.

Our previous post on this can be found here:

http://markwilkes.mycouncillor.org.uk/2015/09/29/article-4-direction-framwellgate-moor-area/

Please do join in the consultation and help us ensure that our area retains a mixed community without any further increase in the problems which HMOs can cause in the wrong places. as soon as it is active we will post a link here and give details of the event dates.

 

Regular reporting of littering

It might not get noticed but barely a week goes by without one of us reporting areas which need litter clearance. Some gets done by local residents or ourselves, but more often than not, it is the Council’s clean and green team we have to call upon. BY being proactive we are making sure the area stays as clean and tidy as possible.

This week we have asked for action on Dryburn Way, Along the A167 from Pity Me to Sniperley, and around the Arnison Centre, where I have also contacted the site owners and Sainsbury’s about the inside of the site which is looking pretty rough around the edges with rubbish.

That’s the easy bit – checking and chasing up when it isn’t done is the time consuming part. So we rely on residents to let us know where there are hot spots which need sorting. Please do let us know of any parts of our area which are littered. The quicker we get on top of it the less litter materialises.

BT Broadband box still empty after 8 months

After finally running out of patience with BT Openreach and the Council we are now trying the press route to try and get some action to bring proper broadband to the area. Parts of Rosemount in Pity Me and Finchale Abbey Village have less than 1mb broadband.

A box I managed to get BT Openreach to install for Rosemount remains empty after 8 months of being installed and BT have failed in their promise that residents would have broadband by last summer. The story is on the front of today’s Durham Times, as well as in the Northern Echo.

A very senior BT Openreach manager told me last week that the reason the broadband was not installed was because they had to use all their resources to complete the Digital Durham program for the Council and that as a result their commercial program was further delayed.

A less senior employee told the Council and press that it was because of the cost of getting an electricity supply to the site, despite it being on the main road where there must be some supply available. I strongly believe that the Council could do more and also think that the government should intervene to make sure that all areas which have poor broadband should be treated equally.

We are trying to arrange a meeting with the Council head of service and the BT regional manager to try and get this concluded.

In addition we continue to fight to get improvements for Finchael Abbey Village where broadband speeds are even slower and residents ahve been told they should get Satellite broadband – which costs an arm and a leg.

Hopefully we can get both of these issues sooner rather than later for residents, despite the fact that actually it is not an issue for which councillors are responsible.

Northern Echo Story:

http://www.thenorthernecho.co.uk/news/14272227.Super_fast__Eight_months_after_broadband_unit_is_installed__all_Durham_residents_have_is_an_empty_box/

 

 

Reporting wind blown rubbish

Following requests from residents we have asked for various sites to be cleaned up including Kira Drive and Rylands Way. I am also speaking with Sainsburys about items blowing off their petrol station forecourt and repeating calls for action on Porterhouse Lane. We have also asked for Framwellgate School Durham to the action to tidy up their boundary fencing where a lot of litter has blown. If there is an area with a build up of litter please let us know so we can arrange either a community or a council litter pick

State of Potterhouse Lane littering reported

I have reported the state of Potterhouse Lane from the roundabout past the Tip and beyond. The whole area is a complete littered mess and has been for weeks. Some of this is blown litter from the Tip but most is takeaway rubbish.

It is time the Council took this area seriously and installed some anti-litter signs and did some enforcement. I have asked before for a sign and it was removed as quickly as it went up.

Every few months I seem to have to ask for this area to be litter picked. I have asked Directors to take action when the evenings become light enough. Nearly all of the litter is car thrown.