New Car Club Launched in Maida Vale

As part of its commitment to offering the widest choice of transport methods to local residents, Westminster Council last year began exploring the possibility of creating a 'Car Club' throughout the borough.

Now, after months of planning, we are pleased to say that an experiment is about to begin to see whether local residents would use such a club. At selected sites across the City, 'Car Club' parking bays will be installed for Car Club vehicles to be made available to local residents.

Maida Vale is one of the areas chosen for this trial. In the next few weeks two car club bays will be installed in Randolph Avenue to assess usage over the next 12 - 18 months. They will be situated near Starbucks, close to the junction with Elgin Avenue.

Just to note (given that this is Randolph Avenue) - no existing resident parking bays have been removed as part of this scheme! Instead, two pay by phone bays are being converted.

Lee

Councillor Allowances

One thing none of us have been able to get away from is the news regarding MP expenses in the last few weeks. The whole system (and some of the claims within it) is clearly rotten and needs to be changed quickly.

As your local Councillors, we think it is important that you know exactly what we have received for being able to serve the community of Maida Vale and Westminster since you last elected us. This information has always been present on the Westminster Council website, but we wanted to highlight it directly, now, so that you can see it.

Remuneration for local Councillors is (thankfully) very different to that in the Houses of Parliament. In 2000, the government changed the law so that Councillors all received a basic allowance which was supposed to cover their outgoings and the time spent fulfilling their responsibilities. Councillors may also be given additional responsibilities at the Council (such as being in charge of a particular area of policy) – and an additional allowance is paid if this is the case.

We have not claimed for travel in the three years since we were elected.

2006/2007
For information on our allowances in 2006/2007, click here.

During this year, Alastair received an additional allowance being in charge of planning policy at the Council. Lee also received an additional allowance as being one of the Councillors in charge of waste collection and parks.

2007/2008
For information on our allowances in 2007/2008, click here.

During this year, Alastair remained in charge of planning policy at the Council. Lee received an allowance for waste collection and parks, and also for sitting on a planning committee.

2008/2009
For information on our allowances in 2008/2009, click here.

During this year, Alastair remained in charge of planning policy at the Council. Lee received an allowance as one of the Councillors in charge of economic development, and also for sitting on a planning committee.

2009/2010
We will place a link to this when it is published in mid-2010.

For full disclosure; Alastair continues to be in charge of planning policy at the Council. Lee is now in charge of Customer Services.

We have also placed links to each of these documents in the side bar of the blog so anyone can access them at any time.

Alastair, Jan and Lee

Open Age

We want to make a quick special mention to Open Age, a local charity which is doing excellent work in our local community with older people -

In particular, we are very grateful to Open Age for having organised a weekly afternoon bowls session on the Rec bowling green. All are welcome - it starts on 1 June, running every Tuesday between 2pm and 4pm. It's only £2 per session. If you need any further information, you can call Open Age directly on 8964 1900.

The charity also has a monthly W9 Social on the first Wednesday of every month at Rayne House on Delaware Road (2PM - 4PM). June's event will include a talk from a local environmental charity, Groundwork, who have been doing some great work in Paddington Rec (amongst other places).

You can also find out about the huge programme of events and support that Open Age offers the older community in Westminster and Kensington & Chelsea - visit www.openage.org.uk.

Lee

Rec: Dog Warden

Last week we held one of regular meetings with the manager of Paddington Rec, Angela Bailey. Angela is relatively new and we have quickly developed a good working relationship to ensure that the Rec works for the benefit of local residents.

Over the last few months, several local residents have reported to us their concerns about the conduct of some dogs in the park, who aren't really being watched and supervised as they should. This can cause some concern on the part of other park users.

We're very pleased that Angela has been supporting the dog warden within the Rec to take a much higher profile in recent weeks, to reassure users and to help owners. Feedback from local residents has been very positive and we understand that the warden has not been shy in issuing penalty notices to owner who are not watching their dogs. Penalty notices should, of course, always be a last resort - but it will be reassuring for residents to know that the Council isn't afraid to use them if they absolutely have to.

Our thanks to Angela for this.

Jan

Re-opening of the Bowling Green

A few days ago, we were very pleased to take part in the inaugural training session for the Maida Vale Bowls Club, the group of local residents who have come together and pledged to save the Bowling Green in Paddington Rec.

On a lovely Tuesday evening we managed a couple of hours of bowling as the sun went down and worked out just how much skill was involved with trying to hit a white ball only 20-odd feet away. my right-hand attempts at bowling were atrocious - the left-handed ones though weren't too bad!

It was great to see local residents come together for a chat over a relaxing game. The pitch was looking good and the Council, as agreed, had done some further works to the pavilion and installed some seating.

If you want to save the Bowling Green, then you have to get involved! Book a session for you and your friends through the Pad Rec booking office or get in touch with the Maida Vale Bowls Club. They are running weekly turn-up and play sessions at 7pm on a Tuesday. You can find out more here.

Lee and Jan

Elgin Avenue and Shirland Road streetworks removed

One of our biggest irritations as local Councillors is, when we walk round the ward, finding unfinished streetworks or random traffic cones/works barriers all over the place (usual culprits Thames Water and EdF Energy). So it has been over the last couple of weeks where random works barriers have appeared both on Elgin Parade and near the shops at the Shirland Road - Elgin Avenue junction. The Shirland Road one was particularly bad because it was stopping pedestrians using the bus shelter.

True to form, the culprits were well known. Thames had apparently forgot about the one on Elgin Parade (another triumph in Maida Vale!) and Edf were responsible for Shirland Road. Both have now been cleared.

Lee

Beachcroft House - Graffiti Removed

We are very pleased to report that – finally (!) – the graffiti to the under part of Beachcroft House on Shirland Road has been whitewashed over. This is brilliant news!

Although the ground floor level of Beachcroft was not easy to see from the road, you could still often get a glimpse of graffiti when using the pavement near Oak Tree House. As local Councillors, we have been pushing for a long time for the person responsible for Beachcroft to remove the graffiti. We are really glad that it has finally been done.

If you have any issues with graffiti, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. We will report it to our graffiti team and arrange to have it removed.

Lee

Maida Vale Police Team Update

Our local police team have provided us with the latest update on what they are up to –

Paddington Rec: The team continue to report good news on Paddington Rec, which remains quiet and relatively free of anti-social behaviour. Further success has been reported on the ‘youth diversion’ agenda, where the police are making efforts to persuade youngsters using the area to get involved with sport and other physical activity. The police also have confirmed that their new mobile police van (which we have had a long conversation about, particularly in regard to Maida Vale’s £100,000 community budget) will be situated in Paddington Rec at points going forward to deter any potential anti-social behaviour.
Burglaries: The police are also paying particular attention to any burglaries currently reported in the ward and continue to make their personal visits to anyone affected. The team report some success in that a male was recently caught in the act of committing a burglary and was arrested.

We also welcome PC Bishop who joined the team last month to replace Richard Berns who left to take up a new position elsewhere. Welcome!

Jan, Alastair and Lee

New Chief Executive of CityWest visit

Last Monday, we were pleased to welcome Mark Hoyland, the new Chief Executive of CityWest Homes, to Maida Vale.

We invited Mark because we wanted to show him all of the estates within Maida Vale and talk through all the current issues faced by local residents and the Estate Office. We spent a couple of hours showing Mark around Tollgate, Carlton Vale, Thurso, Torridon, the Scottish Towers, Oak Tree House and some of the street-based properties around the ward.

Mark was particularly complimentary about all of our estates - saying that they were some of the best looking and well run within Westminster - a testament to the TMOs and others who administer them so well. We spent a good deal of time talking through issues around customer service, maintenance, leaseholder charges and general responsiveness - all of which local residents have discussed with us and which we, as local Councillors, have noted over the last few months. Our primary message - serve residents first!

Mark has agreed to take our comments and issues back to CityWest HQ and to come back to us with responses on a number of issues.

Alastair, Jan and Lee