Maida Vale Police Meeting

There was a great turnout on Monday evening for the police meeting that we asked the Council to organise. Representatives from the Maida Vale Safer Neighbourhoods Team, Civicwatch and the Maida Vale Estate Office were all present, along with around 50 local residents. We're really grateful that local residents gave up their Monday evenings to come and discuss their concerns regarding crime and anti-social behaviour, and there was some real progress made.

The Police/Civicwatch teams, led by Ian Russell and Aleks Pogroszewski, began by highlighting some welcome successes in Maida Vale in recent months:

• Dibdin House: anti-social behaviour has been severely cut in Dibdin House, after local residents and councillors brought the problems to the attention of the police in the middle of last year. The planning proposals about to be laid before Westminster's planning committee may, in our opinion, also contribute to further 'designing out' the potential for misbehaviour.
• Glasgow House: anti-social behaviour in Glasgow House appears to have been successfully disrupted in recent weeks, and the police are keeping a close eye on the situation. A review of security arrangements has taken place, including changes to the concierge service. Areas of the property where misbehaviour was occurring have now been padlocked.

We then went straight into questions and comments from the floor, last for over an hour. Local residents and police officers discussed, among other things, Oak Tree House, the rest of the Scottish Towers, graffiti, lighting around Carlton Vale, Paddington Rec and begging in Elgin Avenue. We also discussed wider issues of provision for activities for younger people and the perception of crime in our local area. Police and Civicwatch officers have agreed to go away and look at each individual case to feed into their long-term problem solving.

Residents were urged to make sure that they report patterns of non-emergency anti-social behaviour to the Westminster hotline - 7 641 3000. Community intelligence helps the police build up a picture of any emerging problems - and the police rely on residents to provide that intelligence.

If you'd like to get in touch with your local police team, details can be found here.

Thanks again to all who came.

Alastair, Jan and Lee

Police Meeting - This Evening

Don't forget - the Maida Vale Police Meeting is happening tonight (6.30pm) at the Maida Centre. Please do come along to discuss the work of our local police and Civicwatch teams and to have your say about where the police should be concentrating going forward.

Jan

Paddington Rec: Nets Opening

On Thursday, Mike Gatting led the opening of Paddington Rec's new cricket nets, the latest improvement to come out of the £3 million programme led by Westminster Council. Four state-of-the-art batting strips - including the first 'Premier System' synthetic surface in Central London - bring first-class facilities to local residents.

Mr. Gatting and a number of first team players from Middlesex CC also took part in some coaching sessions to mark the opening.

For more information click here.

Lee

Gotcha x 10

They say that once is an accident. Twice, apparently, is foolish. And three times is a habit. If that's the case, then ten times speaks volumes. Because that's what we've found over the last couple of weeks when we went out to check that Thames was working properly in the streets around Maida Vale. Ten separate trangressions in the space of just a few streets:

• Randolph Avenue: three random holes (accompanied by a random skip) without approved parking suspensions, one suspension overrunning and one suspension helpfully obscured by a load of Thames equipment
• Shirland Road: Thames still overrunning and helpfully allowing works to jut out into the road
• Morshead Road: one random hole close to Elgin Avenue
• Grantully Road: two random holes (along with a random skip and digger) blocking all the parking spaces outside Ashworth Mansions without suspension notices
• Lanark Road: one suspension taking up much more space than it's allowed

Absolutely, utterly, completely unacceptable. Our meeting with Thames is next Tuesday (27 February). We'll certainly be letting them know that. In the meantime, there are a series of bills winging their way to Thames headquarters. And in the last few days they do seem to have filled in some of the above holes, thankfully bringing some parking spaces back online.

If you have any comments you'd like us to pass on to Thames Water, please do let us know before next Tuesday. E-mail maidavale@maidavaleconservatives.com.

Lee

Happy Chinese New Year!

Last Sunday was Chinese New Year - gung hay fat choy! Earlier this week, Jan was one of the Westminster representatives at a past Lord Mayor's function to celebrate the Chinese New Year.

Jan

More Graffiti Cleared

In the last week or so, we've noticed a few other areas where graffiti has appeared around Maida Vale. We've reported everything to the anti-graffiti unit at Westminster Council and they have removed scribbling from:

• the garage near Dundee House adjacent to Lanark Road and Hamilton Court
• the entrance to Elgin Mews South in Lanark Road
• on the Pay & Display machine on Delaware Road

If you spot any graffiti and would like it dealt with, please don't hesitate to get in touch with us.

Lee

Congestion Charge Part II: Day II

Yesterday morning, Ken Livingstone doubled the size of his congestion charging zone, despite the strong opposition of local residents and the Department for Transport labelling the project as demonstrating "poor" value.

As we all know, Maida Vale residents live outside the congestion charge boundary and Livingstone has absolutely refused to give you and your neighbours a 90% discount to the charge (unlike our friends in Kensington & Chelsea).

On Saturday, our parliamentary candidate, Joanne Cash, led a protest against the extension of the congestion charge. We were joined by a group of all political persuasions, old and young, businesses and residents, cars drivers and pedestrians, those supporting the principle of congestion charging and those not, all of whom were united in the belief that this particular scheme would cause more harm than good.

We want to hear from you. E-mail us at maidavale@maidavaleconservatives.com and tell us about your experiences now that the extension has started.

Alastair, Jan and Lee

Zapped

And the Maida Vale white goods award for this week goes to the residents of Lanark Road, who were provided with a microwave and various bits of white plastic/wood by an unidentified benefactor yesterday.

We've arranged for the Council to remove and dispose of the items.

Dumping - in all forms - is very anti-social, particularly when Westminster Council will pick up two bulky items for free! For further details, click here or phone the Environment Action Line (7 641 2000).

Lee

Two Apologies. One Water Company. Zero sense.

You'd think, having badly run over on finishing its works in Shirland Road, that Thames Water might have done the decent thing and apologise properly. But that really would be too easy.

As Councillors, we demanded that Thames send a letter to residents apologising (i) for a delay in finishing and (ii) for ignoring the end of parking suspensions (and hoping no-one would notice).

Thames first attempt (click on the picture above) was a masterpiece of bland, corporate evasion which sought to blame the weather (sounds familiar). Utter rubbish. A few hours of melting snow does not extend works for a week. Despite this, Thames refused Westminster's request to reword the letter and delivered it to residents earlier this week without our consent.

This clearly wasn't acceptable, and we haven't been backwards in letting Thames know this. In the end we extracted a further apology from a member of Thames's communications unit (apparently one does exist).

So, residents of Shirland Road: Thames Water apologises for their apology letter. It's just too bad that they can't do it right first time round. Or - here's creative thinking - not need to say sorry in the first place.

Next time, we are assured, this won't happen. We won't hold our breath.

Lee

PS Please do get in touch if Thames are causing you hassle. We'll be very glad to help.

Maida Vale Police Meeting

Just a short post today to say that, at our request, we'll be holding a community meeting to discuss our local police team, crime and anti-social behaviour on Monday 26 February. The meeting will be at the Maida Centre, Lanark Road from 6.30pm onwards.

Please do come along to listen to our local police team, our local Civicwatch and to have your say. All welcome!

Looking forward to seeing you there.

Jan

Paddington Rec: Listening to Residents

Back in January, a local resident came to us wanting to discuss Paddington Rec. We arranged a meeting with the resident, ourselves and the Cabinet Member for Parks (Daniel Astaire) one Saturday morning (see here for more information).

During the meeting, the resident highlighted a number of concerns about paving, closing times and suggested a number of improvements that users might welcome. Having listened, Daniel has now confirmed the following:

• that Park Security have been told to not begin to close the gates until 5 minutes before closing time
• that works will be done to some of the paving areas in the next couple of weeks
• that a dog rail will be installed close to the cafe area shortly

We're very grateful to Daniel for listening to local residents and sponsoring improvements.

If you have any issues or concerns about Paddington Rec - or anything in Maida Vale - please do let us know. We can't promise anything, but where we can help, we will!

Alastair, Jan and Lee

Lee's Surgery This Tuesday

Lee will be holding his surgery this Tuesday, 13 February, between 7pm and 8pm at the Maida Centre, Lanark Road.

If you have any problems or issues we can help you with, please do come along.

Lee

Graffiti Cleared

In the last couple of weeks, we've noticed that there are a few areas where graffiti has sprung up. We reported all of the problems and the graffiti team have cleared scribbling from:

• a wall opposite the City of Westminster College on Morshead Road, close to the junction with Elgin Avenue
• the telephone box on the junction of Randolph Gardens and Kilburn Park Road
• an electricity box next to the forecourt of Tesco on Lanark Road
• walls at both ends of Elgin Mews North
• the "Ashworth Road" sign on the junction of Ashworth Road and Grantully Road

There are still a few more areas which need attention. We've reported those and we'll let you know when they've been cleared.

If you know of any graffiti in Maida Vale, let us know and we'll get it sorted.

Lee

Shirland Road: Gotcha.

I don't think it's much of a secret that we are increasingly unhappy with the way Thames Water are carrying out their pipe improvement programme in Maida Vale (see here). Thames seem determined to highlight that all the things they have been accused of in the past - disinterested in billpayers and local residents, uncommunicative, haughty and overbearing - are, apparently, quite scarily accurate.

Last night was another opportunity for Thames to shine. Walking down Shirland Road to visit some local residents, I noticed (sad that I look, I know) that Thames were still occupying a fair number of parking spaces which they should have vacated earlier in the month. Not cricket. When the parking suspension is over, gentlemen, that generally means move the digger/skip/detritus and fill in the holes.

This is plainly unacceptable for local residents and Shirland Road. Westminster doesn't have enough parking spaces for everyone who needs them, and the situation is only exacerbated when disinterested utilities blatantly 'forget' to vacate them once their alloted time is up.

We await an answer from Thames.

Lee

Committee Report: Health & Community Services

Last night I attended Health & Community Services Overview & Scrutiny Committee, which looks at Westminster's policies in housing, health and adult services.

We looked at the following:

• received update reports on the activities of the Cabinet Members for Housing, Adult Services and Community Services
• examined changes to the Adult Services team and their priorities going forward
• looked at the budgets for Adult Services, Libraries, Leisure and Housing

During the discussion on leisure and parks, we also talked about the improvement works going on in Paddington Rec. There is some really great plans to improve the Rec for local residents and all three of us welcome the council's willing to spend money to improve our area.

Lee

Next Maida Vale Area Forum

The date for the next Maida Vale Area Forum has been set: Tuesday 27th March at the Amadeus Centre, 50 Shirland Road, W9, between 6.30 and 8.30pm.

Between 6.30 and 7pm an informal surgery will be held where Councillors and council officers will be available to speak to.

From 7pm onwards, residents can participate in two interactive workshops:

• The Council and Older People - Leonora House developments and older people's priorities
• Westminster's new housing strategy (and the findings of the Westminster Housing Commission)
• CivicWatch - priorities for Maida Vale
• St. Charles Hospital - shaping health services for the future

Further information is available from the Westminster Council website (click here)

Lee

Andover Place and Lanark Road Street Surgery

Earlier today, we held another one of our Down Your Street Surgeries in Andover Place and Lanark Road.

Not many people in (quite right too, being a lovely day!), but we were pleased to hear that most local residents are happy with Westminster Council.

We'll be taking back a couple of issues regarding street cleaning to check that the service levels are right for both streets. We'll also be looking into continuing low-level issues with graffiti (having reported earlier this year the new 'artwork' which has appeared - it should be cleaned shortly by the Council's anti-graffiti team).

If you live in Maida Vale and have any issues or comments regarding council services, please don't hesitate to get in touch.

Alastair and Lee

1.3 words a day

They say good things comes to he who waits. Well, we’ve waited. And waited. And waited a little more. And finally, 86 days after the event, Thames Water did manage to supply us with an explanation for the water bursts that occurred all over Maida Vale last November.

This is the information they have sent us:

"The first burst of these bursts in the Maida Vale area was on 1 November 2006. This took place on Malvern Road and was an 8" main. The burst led to higher pressures on Elgin Avenue, which caused the 12" main to burst. The 12" is the main feed into the area. The process of recharging these two burst mains in itself caused more bursts and problems in the Maida Vale area. This is due to the age of the mains, and is exactly the sort ofproblem which should be minimised in future by our current Victorian Mains Replacement programme, which is currently taking place in the Maida Vale area."

Wow. Just over 100 words in just under 100 days. That equals a production of about 1.3 words per day. Good going guys.

Insufficient explanation. Unacceptable delay. No apology. A rather lame attempt to justify the latest works being undertaken. No, no, no, no. This isn’t the way to treat local residents who pay your bills.

The one good thing to have come out of our request has been Thames Water’s offer of a meeting. We’ll certainly be taking that up, and we’ll let you know how it goes.

Lee