Public Meeting regarding the Aida/Bliss Factory Plans – Saturday, 17th January.

Aida engineering have submitted a planning application for the site of the Bliss factory on City Road to build 27 houses and 129 apartments up to 6 storeys high on the flood plain close to the edge of the river derwent.

Please could you spare 5 minutes to drop in to the –

Chester Green Community Centre
Old Chester Road
On Saturday 17th january 2009 Between 11.00am and 3.00pm

The Little Chester Residents Association need to hear from you so that we can represent your views to the city council.

Aida Bliss Plans are in!

Aida gave their plans to demolish the foundry building (apart from the front facade) and build 166(!) dwellings on the land on Christmas eve…..I can only imagine that they chose this date to hopefully get it through without anyone having time to question it.

The residents association are having a meeting on 5th Jan to discuss the proposals, but please post any comments here on the website.

I’ll not comment on them until after the LCRA meeting!

The plans can be viewed here and here.

Christmas Fair, Saturday 29th Nov, 10.30 – 1.00

Christmas Fair @ Mansfield Street Methodist Church (off City Road), Chester Green on Saturday, 29th November from 10.30 – 1.00.

Come along to pick up a bargain and have fun for all the family!

Santa’s Grotto, Nearly new baby/children’s clothes, toys & equipment stall*, Usborne book stall, Children’s activities including Christmas Bauble making, Home made cake stall, Traidcraft fairtrade stall, Phoenix cards stall, Craft stall, Gold rush tombola, Toy stall, Raffle, Refreshments and more!

* Donations of baby/children’s clothes, toys and equipment welcome with 50% of sale price back to you if requested. Contact Abigail on 01332 722488 for more information.

To see the poster, click ——HERE——-

New Plans Afoot for Aida Bliss Factory!!!

Today, some residents of Chester Green received the following letter from Hopwood regarding a public consultation about new plans for the Aida Bliss factory on City Road (which used to be known as the Union Foundry).

Dear Resident,

Public Consultation: Union Mills, Chester Green.

We are holding a public event to present the plans for restoration and redevelopment of the Union Mills, Chester Green.

The views of local people are very important to us, and we would like to invite you to attend the event, to see for yourselves the plans for the area and give your views on them.

The plans propose the restoration of the frontage of the foundry building and a new lease of life for the site with sympathetically designed, high quality town houses and apartments.

The event will be held at St. Paul’s Church Hall, Seale Street, Chester Green.

Thursday 6th November: 12 – 8 pm
Friday 7th November: 12 – 5 pm
Saturday 8th November: 9am – 1 pm

We look forward to showing you the proposals and hearing your views.

Karen Bateman
Event Organiser

Hopefully their claims of ‘sympathetically designed’ plans are true, although it seems dissappointing that even more apartments are planned for this conservation area!

The more people that turn up to these events the better, so please try and be there to give your views!

Hopwood can be contacted at enquiries@hopwood.co.uk and their website address is www.hopwood.co.uk although it must be noted that this is a PR agency and NOT the developers involved in the project (note that the developer is not named in the letter….)

St. Pauls Newsletter November 2008

Attached to this post is the latest newsletter for St. Pauls Church here in Chester Green. Have a look to see all the things that go on in our local church! (The newsletter will open in a new window) – St. Pauls Newsletter November 2008

Forum is back up!!!!

I’m pleased to announce that I’ve managed to put the forum back up, and port all the old posts across….. I’m starting to get to the bottom of how it was hacked, so hopefully, I’ve managed to fix that….fingers crossed!

Lower Derwent Flood Risk Management Strategy

The public meeting at St. Paul’s Church Hall on the 21st October to discuss the Environment Agency’s strategy to manage future flood risk was well attended by local residents.

Tim Ive and his three colleagues from the Environment Agency gave presentations covering a wide range of issues, including existing defences, climate change forecasts, local archaeology, flood warning awareness, upstream land management, development and planning issues and a “Blue Corridor Vision”.

The “Blue Corridor Vision” would involve aligning defences to a new line through Chester Green and Derby City Centre, to provide increased protection and a wider area for water to move through during a flood.
This would reduce the height to which defences need to be built, would have no adverse impact on water levels upstream and a smaller impact on water levels downstream. This option would have environmental benefits including improved access to the river and opportunities for a more natural riverside. However, close consultation and co-operation with Derby City Council and other agencies would be required to implement it.

It was evident from some of the questions raised that there was some confusion over the “Blue Corridor Vision” and some frustration that specific details of the location of new flood defences were not available.

Tim Ive responded by explaining that this first stage of the consultation process is about agreeing the general principles of the strategy and they would be consulting on more detailed proposals at a later stage. Tim also confirmed that the Environment Agency would hold a surgery at
St. Paul’s Church Hall on December the 4th, so residents can discuss concerns on a one to one basis.

Tim has responded since the meeting to say “On the timetable issue, once the consultation has closed down on the 10th December, 2008, unless we get major objections, we will submit a formal business case next Spring, but this will take time to get approval, hopefully next summer. If that is approved, then we would be looking to develop specific projects. So it is possible, but not certain, that towards the end of next year we would be consulting on more detailed proposals”.

If you would like more information from the Environment Agency on this subject – Call them on: 08708 506 506 (Mon-Fri 8-6)
e-mail: enquiries@evironment-agency.gov.uk
website: www.environment-agency.gov.uk

Flood Management Meeting

The flood management consultation meeting last night was extremely well attended. The environment agency presented there material well and there were some moments of heated debate. We’ll try and produce a little report documenting the gist of the meeting for those that couldn’t make it…watch this space!

Playgroup Coming Soon to Chester Green!

Chester Green will soon be getting a playgroup. It is planning to start Easter, 2009, and will be run from St. Pauls Church Hall. So far the (rough and subject to change!) details are:
– It will run three days a week…
– …from 8am to 4pm
– it will be run by qualified and experienced staff
– staff will be able to deliver the Early Years Foundation Stage

A Christmas Fair fund-raising event will be held in St. Pauls Church Hall on Saturday, 6th December, at 2pm where there will stalls, tombola’s, refreshments and all manner of fun, games and last minute pressie ideas!

Donations (in any form – toys, labour, fences, equipment etc.) are very welcome! Email info@littlechester.org.uk with offers!

For more details, watch this space!

Flood Risk Strategy Meeting – Tuesday, 21st October

The Little Chester Residents Association are calling a public meeting to discuss the recently acquired information from the environment agency. If you’ve tried to get buildings insurance through Zuric, then you’ll know just how relevant this is to residents in our area!

The meeting will be held in St. Pauls’s Church Hall on Seale Street on tuesday, 21st October, 2008 at 7.30pm

These proposals will have a big impact on Chester Green and we invite all residents who are interested in the area in which they live to come along to this meeting. Representatives from the Environment Agency will be present and are very interested in YOUR VIEWS!!!