Kaleidoscopic projections, 800 candles and some of the world’s finest medieval glass will help create a series of unique evenings at York Minster as part of this year’s Illuminating York festival.

The evening openings take place from 31 October to 3 November, with a promise that visitors will see York Minster in a whole new light, from the candle-lit Chapter House to a constantly-changing kaleidoscopic image being projected onto the South wall of the Nave, enabling visitors to become part of the evolving artwork. The Orb, York Minster’s brand new domed gallery displaying some of its stained glass masterpieces, will also be open, with colourful images projected onto its metallic exterior.

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The Council are advertising a budget consultation event which is taking place next week. We think that they are right to try to engage residents in making what are always difficult decisions.

The Council in February decided a “2 year” budget; meaning that they have already committed to the general shape and priorities of the 2013/14 budget. This reduces the flexibility available.

…………..and for events like these to be successful, residents do need access to a lot of background information.

Not least amongst these would be information about government grant levels. For the second year in a row the Coalition government is offering to increase grants to help offset the costs of inflation – meaning that the Council does not have to increase Council Tax rates.

However, the Council leadership have already said that they don’t intend to take up the offer of extra funding.

So residents can’t influence what will be one of the most important decisions to be made in February.

The details of the consultation events are:

City of York Council budget consultation

Come along to either the morning or evening session

10am to 12noon or 6pm to 8pm

Monday 29 October

at the Priory Street Centre, 15 Priory Street, York YO1 6ET

As expected the Boundary Commission have confirmed that York will continue to have 47 Councillors.

The Commission is now asking residents and interested parties to tell them what ward boundaries should apply.

Details can be found here http://www.lgbce.org.uk/all-reviews/yorkshire-and-humberside/north-yorkshire/city-of-york-fer

Representations have to be made by 14th January 2013.

York Central constituency Liberal Democrats have indicated that they will be putting forward proposals which would see the introduction of:

• Single member wards:- This will improve accountability as one member will be closely identified with a ward which would contain about 3500 electors (2000 homes). Currently some wards have over 6000 homes and are represented by 3 Councillors who – in some cases – have little contract with the area that they are supposed to represent.

• Annual Elections with 25% of the Council retiring each year: Again it is argued that this will improve accountability and that electors will be able to giving a rolling verdict on the performance of their representatives. It is likely to counter the tendency for Councils to be insensitive to resident’s views in the early part of a 4 year “all out” term of office. Annual elections were used in York in the period up to 1995.

Young craft-cyclers are being tasked with designing and building either: a hotrod racing car, a plane or an out-of-this-world spaceship, with a twist, in an exciting competition to promote reuse of recycled materials amongst children.

Zero Waste York, in partnership with local publisher, Junkcraft Books, is running the competition for Key Stage 2 children where all entries must be made from recycled items found around the home.

Get building, as the best creations will be in with a chance of winning great construction set prizes by Meccano, plus a Super Construction Set prize for their school.

Children have until February 8th 2013 to submit their entries. To enter upload a digital photograph of the finished creation with a short description to the competition page at www.junkcraft.com.

Full competition details and entry requirements can be found on www.junkcraft.com/york-schools-competition/

During the Illuminating York Festival 2012, a short film capturing the stories of York-based or linked armed forces personnel, their families and local communities will be screened in St Helen’s Square.

The film has been produced as part of the York Stories 2012 project which celebrates York 800 by recording and sharing local people’ stories, and has been funded by the Community Covenant Grant and City of York Council with the aim of building bridges between the armed forces and local communities.

The film will be screened every night from October 31 – November 3 between 6:30pm and 9:30pm on a mobile screen.

North Yorkshire Police will be carrying out mobile safety camera enforcement on the following roads between Wednesday 24 October and Tuesday 30 October 2012.

•A64 west-bound Bowbridge Farm Tadcaster
•A64 east-bound Bowbridge Farm Tadcaster

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Foxwood Residents Association and Foxwood in Bloom have planted 5000 crocus bulbs throughout the area today.

Foxwood in bloom writes;

“Locations include Huntsman’s Walk, Otterwood Lane and Foxwood Lane at the junction with Gale Lane.

Our grateful thanks to the young men from the Community Payback scheme who helped us.

We are already looking at other areas for planting in 2013 and if there is an area near you which would benefit from planting, please let Shirley Gumley tel 793437 know.

Crocus planting in grass verges is preferred to daffodils as the crocus bulbs die down before the first grass cut”.

It appear that the “20’s plenty” campaigners may take the law into their own hands. They are reported to be seeking training in the use of hand held speed guns.

For several years the Council and police have supported what is called a “community speed watch” system which allows local residents to use equipment which measures the speed of traffic on a local road. In the main, these were used to remind drivers of a 30 mph limit. They had the advantage of “prompting” drivers that they might have drifted over the speed limit.

However while the universal 30 mph speed limit is well understood and respected by most drivers, the proposed city wide 20 mph limit has, on the other hand, attracted a lot of opposition.

It is difficult to imagine anything more likely to inflame the situation than self appointed vigilantes seeking to intimidate drivers by pointing speed guns at them.

The police have already said that they will not be able to allocate additional resources to enforce 20 mph limits and have required the Council to make them “self enforcing”. With speed humps ruled out, and the Council slow to install more Vehicle Activated Speed signs, only limited signage and build outs are being provided. Yet the Council expects to spend £600,000 implementing the new limits.

The potential flash points at the moment seem to be the new limits on main arterial routes like Bishopthorpe Road. These are wide roads where a 30 mph limit is appropriate for most of their length.

On the part of Bishopthorpe Road between Norfolk Street and the urban boundary, virtually every vehicle using it, earlier this week, was travelling in the speed range 25 -30 mph.

Because of road works, traffic signals and congestion the speeds on the rest of Bishopthorpe Road (nearer the City centre) were less than 15 mph – which is similar to the average speed recorded in the South Bank area generally; mainly because of the number of cars parked “on street”.

More controversial will be any attempt to introduce the new limit in the Dringhouses, Westfield and Acomb areas where modern road layouts predominate.

One way that residents could express their views would be in the Police and Crime Commissioner elections taking place on November 15th. The Labour candidate Ruth Potter is one of the main supporters of the citywide 20 mph speed limit.

Should she fail to be elected, then the police might be expected to take a more sceptical approach to the York Councils speed limit policies.

Meanwhile the only opportunity being offered to residents to voice their opinions on the extension of 20 mph limits will come at Ward Committee meetings. These meeting are now very poorly attended partly because the Labour Council no longer sends out agendas to each household giving people details of times and venues.

The only meeting that has been scheduled, where the 20 mph limit is on the agenda, is Dringhouses & Woodthorpe Ward Committee Thursday, 29th November, 2012 7.30 pm Proposed venue: Woodthorpe Primary School, Summerfield Road, York

No consultation meetings have been arranged in the Westfield or Acomb Wards.

The award-winning leisure centre “Energise” located on Cornlands Road has doubled the size of its gym.

The gym now accommodates 95 users – previously 56 – at any one time, and has extra space to improve access for disabled users.

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The government have allocated York £22,000 to conduct a contaminated land study on the former tip sites which lie between Foxwood Lane and Gale Lane.

The sites were used early in the last century for the dumping of waste and, although cleaned up prior to the developments in the Chesney Field area, it is now necessary to check that any remaining waste remains inert.

The whole of the Chesney Field playing fields were levelled and grassed in the early 90’s.

In other parts of the country some build up of methane and other gases have been found and it is this type of risk that any survey will seek to identify.

No issues have been reported on the land and the check is purely precautionary. A similar study was completed on similarly classified land near Westfield Place without any issues being revealed.

Residents are likely to witness some activity in the area over the next few months. It is possible that some bore holes will be drilled.