The Third Runway Debate - Finally...

My thoughts...

There appear to be three completely separate arguments fused within the popular 'hot topic' of what tends to be loosely labelled as the 'Heathrow Third Runway Debate'.

The first is simply whether Heathrow needs a third runway or not, and what the implications are for - or not - going ahead with one.

The second is whether there can be an alternative new runway - or airport - built somewhere else in order to increase capacity in general (and possible destinations) for the nation's airlines as a whole.

The third is the wider (and looser) argument of whether we need to be building new runways or not full stop, and whether we can come up with other, alternative solutions.. or indeed, if we can just sit back and ignore the whole thing altogether.

This blog entry is not necessarily going to have the space (or energy!) to provide definitive pros and cons for each side of each debate - and then draw a straight-forward and rounded conclusion based on them - but I will try and give my general (and most pressing) thoughts on the matter none-the-less!

1. I do not want a new runway for Heathrow!

This is not just because it is an easy side to take for a 'greeny' who doesn't appreciate the economic reasons/pressure behind having it, or someone who understands the extra noise and pollution that the planes (and all the associated transport infrastructure that serves them) creates. Indeed, it is easy to fall into the pit-trap of NIMBY-ism in such debates... but, fortunately, I do not live near Heathrow, or any other London airport.

No, in many ways, my two reasons for this not going ahead are more simple...

i) the third runway that has been proposed is too short in comparison to the other two exisiting runways and thus not a genuine solution to the primary argument behind why people are asking for an extension in the first place... namely a third runway that is able to handle the landings of the latest jet planes!

ii) the time and planning it will take to prepare the land to build it (including the inevitable compulsory purchase orders (CPOs)) will be a very long, complicated and drawn-out process, that will no doubt get tied-up by various lengths of bureaucratic red tape - some completely justified, others not-so-much.

2. The 'Boris Island' Estuary Airport is from the realm of science fiction... and should stay there!

As a dreamy teenager, I would have loved the various proposals for a new Thames Estuary Airport (whether it be Norman Foster's 'Thames Hub' design or the more recent Gensler designed 'London Britannia Airport' concept). I would have poured over the various maps and plans, 3D cut-views and mock-ups - even the stats and figures that pin it all together - for hours!

But then, I wasn't a very mature teenager...

On (e-)paper, it all sounds so good:-

i) 4-6 runways that will do all that is asked of the shortcomings of the current infrastructiure and will fully support the local and national economy (now and in the future) and more...

ii) Solid and integrated public transport links (including high-speed trains) that will no doubt connect the City of London in quicker times that it currently takes the Heathrow Express and tube lines...

iii) The creation of tens of 1000s of jobs in both the construction project itself and then the day-to-day running of the place...

iv) A much quicker and simpler planning AND construction process...

v) A site that is away than immediate areas of population... but still close to London.

 - and so on...

BUT.... I am against this too.

The truth is that such a project will take years - and years - to properly think-through and then build.

Side note:

One of the primary reasons the current London Mayor, Boris Johnson, is against the Heathrow Third Runway is the tedious process of sorting out all the complicated but necessary legislation that is needed first. He is right about the process being tedious... but his agenda is only thus because he knows it will take just as long a time to sort out the preparatory elements to his favoured alternative of the Thames Estuary Airport... and so he wants the project under way NOW(!) in order to get to the point where his ridiculously large-scale project (and all its required and related infrastructure) is actually being built instead.

But starting to build and finishing a build are two different things!

Most (voting) Londoners that are against the Third Runway will be doing so from an environmental perspective... and Boris is gorging himself off that city-wide NIMBY-ism. His dream for the Estuary Airport is then a way of placating the businessmen (and women - but to a lesser extent, let's be honest!) that still want (profitable) growth.

We are currently in the economic doldrums it's true... and one of the consistent calls (both before and during the recession) for improving the British Economy has been to increase our 'global business network' and the associated transport and communication connectivity that implies - so that it is on a par with rival European countries.

This is mainly, apparently, to be done via the implementation of new and improved airline services to 'customers' around the world...

BUT how do we know what the future will truly bring? And who is to say that being able to fly direct from London to places which aren't currently available (mainly the rich BRIC cities) is really a good thing for business? It is short term and speculative.

And... isn't the fact that places like Frankfurt or (Amsterdam) Schiphol that already have such places on offer to fly to NOW have simply beaten us to it?

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I digress...  

For me, the Environmnetal impact of the Thames Estuary Airport is unacceptable. This link deals with that side of things better than me:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/blog/2012/jan/18/boris-island-airport-impact-wildlife 

AND... for the pilots that would then fly into such a place (aside of the fact that this area would then be the most busy airspace on the planet making it so congested that the chances of mid-air plane collisions are high too), there would then be a very high chance of regular bird strikes (i.e. waders)... creating a very dangerous and potentially disastrous situation, every time a plane lands... on each and every day!

3. A new runway for any other 'London' Airport is equally just as disastrous.

There are alternatives to building anew at Heathrow.

All the other "London" airports (Gatwick, Luton, Stansted...) only have single runways at present and would all benefit from having a second runway that would relieve pressure on their own infrastructure as well as that of the significantly 'hemmed-in' Heathrow...

Well, sort of. The problem is that ALL of the surrounding land around ALL the London airports is either an area of high population or a complicated fabric of attractive countryside or existing roads and railways that would take a lot of work to 'tidy up' ... Just like Heathrow!

It would, again, take years to sort out - regardless of where one stood stand on the matter.

Looking at the last time a second runway was proposed - and debated - for Stansted, you can see where the problems are with that proposal being dragged out of the gutter again!

http://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/en/campaigning/our-campaigns/aviation/stansted/Pages/expansion-proposals.aspx?gclid=COe16ISpurMCFczHtAodYQMA-g

4. Building 'oop north' instead as an alternative will be ignored!

I am more far more passive to the idea of buidling new runways to airports in our northern cities, aside of the general debate about CO² emmisions and the fact our skies are full of planes already.

After all, new planes such as the Boeing 787 Dreamliner are allegedly far more fuel efficicient and environmentally friendly in their contsruction than older planes... so we may be able to make the call for 'having more'... if the 'inefficient old' are retired.

Whether it's Birmingham (not so far north admittedly), Manchester, Leeds-Bradford... Glasgow... Aberdeen... it doesn't matter. As long as the land is brownfield or not so obviously 'precious' in terms of either wildlife habitats, prime agricultural land, historical sites or areas of population... there is an argument.

However... the 'business people' won't want to hear of it.

Whether we like it or not, LONDON is what is behind the call to extend, Not the United Kingdom as a whole. The financial clout of the City of London, as the current Financial Capital of the World is what (certain) people want to protect, and not any general business or tourism concept (e.g. the now defunct Cool Britannia), however good and beneficial that is to all (/more).

What with our current transport infrastructure being old, slow and/or over-crowded in the main, building anywhere further out than, say, an hour or two outside of London will not be efficient for those business people flying in to get to their important meetings on time in the city.

5. Building anything will be too late... so let's do something else! 

Aside of the argument that London retains the image and atmosphere that people want to witness in the flesh, we may be able to argue that, in the future, most business will be done 'in the cloud' online, and not need to employ so many planes and business class seats for trivial face-to-face meetings and events.

The human animal (and business 'player') will always need to interact face-to-face from time to time it's true... and being in a hi-tech future won't change that... but there should be (and is) the capacity for the occasional business trip by plane to the UK for that now.

What we need to do is reduce the number of current journeys! We need to agree that things will only get worse in terms of traffic, pollution, population... and that any potential 'solutions' for the short to mid-term future have so many hang-ups and will take so long to sort out and implement that they are not worth investing in AT ALL.

If we lived in a totalitarian society, where the masses could be grouped and forced to produce such large-scale 'objects' at whatever cost then may be... but we don't. And how can we afford large-scale projects full-stop if we are supposed to be in the middle of a recession? If we can, then perhaps the truth is that
the money we do have is enough... and it is simply being badly organised and/or mis-managed... as opposed to not being there!

SO: If we can sort out things like Super-Fast Broadband for everywhere in London and the South-East, and 4G networks across all our major towns and cities and so on... we open up the rest of the country to potential investors... and start to relieve pressure - tomorrow.

True, the people that want to go to London, and London alone, will not want to go to a wet and grey Manchester to do business... but many people confuse London with everywhere else in the country anyway, and the main fact is that the UK is not a big place. Many businesses already 'trick' customers by playing on that fact that, on different scales, places like Bristol are close to London.

It's all subjective and down to clever marketing.

In addition, we are supposed to be getting a new High Speed Rail project to help the South-East. Aside of the fact that it won't really encourage businesses to go north and will, in truth, just extend the clogging-up of London further by helping people commute in to the capital from further afield, there seems to be no thinking from the present government that High Speed 2 and the Third Runway Debate our intrinsically linked... and that both projects could do with being handled as one big (MASSIVE!) overall project.

But the High Speed 2 Project is for another blog entry for another day...

In conclusion...

I think we have missed the boat (or, rather, plane!) on the need for a third runway.

Any 'solution' calling for new 4 kilometre-long pieces of tarmac, with all the associated clutter that comes alongside them, will come too late to really help... and will do ADDITIONAL damage on top too.

Even though the dreamy young teenager from late 1980s would disagree with me, I don't want ANY new runways in the UK...

And that young boy wouldn't have known about the Internet at that time anyway.

Who's to say what new technology the future will bring? Technology that provides us with a different approach... and solution... to all of this mess?

Zeeox

Austerity versus Conservation

The differences between words such as 'conserve' and 'preserve', 'frugal' and 'abstain' are merely down to semantics.

They exist in a rich seam of the wonderful English language that, despite such close relationships of meaning, helps provide subtle nuances of interpretation that result in them being categorised separately... and prevents them from ever being aggregated together into a singular dictonary entry.

But... in more simple languages, and indeed, if we employed more plain talking in our own everyday speech and correspondance, they do effectively mean the same thing. And no doubt such words would have been easily targetted in the first edition of the Newspeak Dictionary from Orwell's '1984'.

N.B. I am not proposing that we start thinning down the dictionary for this blog entry by the way!

Anyway, so: to be careful with the way one uses money or careful with the way how one looks after the 'environment' is surely connected?

To continue the dictionary angle for one final paragraph, the word 'environment' is simply defined in some books as 'surroundings' or 'atmosphere' (and in others, as 'the surroundings or conditions in which a person, animal, or plant lives or operates')... so surely, if you don't help look after your own surroundings, you put yourself in big trouble, regardless of how solvent you are?

There are certain situations, regardless of happiness, that money cannot not buy you out of.

----

Nowadays, in terms of politics and the media, we tend to capitalise the word and only use it in conjunction with all things 'Green'... and especially alongside the other common word and term: 'conservation'.

As a result, and as these times that we find ourselves in are, without a doubt, 'hard', we can then find it easier to dismiss them in terms of their importance... as we have to consider the more pressing financial matters at hand.

Many people think that the ideology of Green politics at this moment in time, is a luxury we can simply not afford to apply to our everyday concerns.

However, it makes sense to be careful with natural resources if we wish to also be careful with what finances we have left. And if our future governments, regardless of their political leanings, were aware of this (or worked harder to achieve it), then surely it would be the closest one could be to being conservative... with a small 'c'? The clue is in the title!

Why, in this time when all the world's economies are suffering, do the leaders of the richer western powers, such as in my home country, not take a lead and be genuinely more frugal and forward thinking at the same time? Anticipating the inevitable problems we will face in the future is a good thing as we can then help prepare to deal with them more effectively now rather than later!

Making cuts to various budgets is fine... but money is just an abstract concept. It literally doesn't grow on trees!
 
When people are finding it hard to make ends meet, all they are interested in, quite rightly, is in ensuring financial security for themselves, their family and their business.

But... that is why we have governments. They can think of the bigger picture and be less selfish in order to help with the greater good. What could be better than if we had a government that openly admitted that times are always going to get tougher in the future, not better, and that pressure on our resources (financial and physical) is going to increase as we continue to overpopulate this world and use up those physical materials that have a finite lifepsan and can never be replaced?

Regarding energy, not only can we/must we heavily invest what spare cash we have left into
alternative/renewable energies such as anaerobic digestion, biomass, geothermal, hydroelectric, solar, tidal and wind power, but we must also avoid thinking we have cheap and easy short term get-out clauses in things like 'fraccing' (aka: hydraulic fracturing) or imported natural shale gas.

In addition, we must also support the subsidary industries and businesses that spin-off such concepts as: cogeneration, energy efficiency, green building, microgeneration, passive solar and the 'Organic Rankine cycle'.

If you asked the average person on the street if they would be happy if their future energy bills were to be reduced by, say, 75%, or, indeed, that they might even get money back from selling on the excess energy that they create, then surely they would be saying: 'of course!' and then: 'who do I vote for that offers that?'

If all our new houses were carbon neutral, and older houses re-fitted as to be more energy efficient, not only would we have less overheads, but we would have more jobs.

It has been proved many a time that large-scale house building is the best method of re-igniting a slumped national economy... so why don't we do it with these environmental'/'conservation'/'sustainable' (WHATEVER!!!) concepts in mind from the off? It's a 'no-brainer' as far as I'm concerned.

If we were ever to do this, then not only are we more genuinely 'austere' by definition, but we would also safeguard our economy, build the hundreds of thousands of houses we desperately need... and create many new jobs in new, innovative industries.

We then lead the world by example, and show everyone how it can be done... and thus, eventually, the whole planet benefits.

Looking after our 'cash under the mattress' AND our natural resources CAN be done at the same time... and by being a bit more sensible and temperant for the good of all will not only help our economy right now... but will also reduce the hardships faced by our progeny in the future.

Overdue Rants

Just a quick entry to say sorry for not having created a proper entry recently!

This is not for having run out of ideas. I have sketches for at least three or four rants but just haven't found the time to sit and type them out at snail speed. I must get Dragon Voice or something!

Please watch this space (eventually) for some thoughts on...

• City versus Country living
• Heathrow and the third runway... and using Broadband more effectively
• New, inland nature reserves that 'relieve' coastal nature reserves
• The High Speed 2 Project...

All views are guaranteed to be biased, poorly researched, badly thought out... but sound in practice... and thus defendable to the hilt!

Best,
John

Cambridge... a Progressive City?

So, 'Cambridge' has finally released plans for its second railway station.

(http://www.cambridge-news.co.uk/Home/First-plans-for-Chesterton-rail-station-unveiled-12062012.htm) Long overdue you might say, and a 'win-win' bit of PR for 'green' public transport.

Or is it?....

Here's the thing: Cambridge's continued - and now trend-bucking (is that a term?) - economic success lies firmly at the feet at having one of the world's best Universities... and an associated hi-tech industry that has grown up as a consequence of it.

If it weren't for that, it would simply be a relatively quiet market town, with narrow, busy roads, an under-supported professional football team and highly canalised river that occasionally floods its banks because it sits on the edge of the flattest land in the country... 

The Science Park, tucked away just south of the bypass in the the north of the city, was the very first in a now numerous collection of local business parks that are collectively known as 'The Silicon Fen'. It allowed University Research Centres and private businesses specialising in technology to come together in one place and provide mutual benefit for all. 

The pleasently landscaped, but now full, park supports many jobs and, until the opening of the nearby Busway, relied upon the A14 as its main point of access.     

And so... we come back to the question at the top of this blog entry.

For a city with the Number Six University in the World*, and a proven track record of creating the most innovative and successful IT companies on the cutting edge of technology in the UK, we finally see a City Council responding to basic infrastructural needs. 

There has been talk of a new railway station in the suburb of Chesterton for many years... and its only now, once the Science Park has 'settled in' and there are no new significant developments on either side of the neighbouring Milton Road, that the plans have been put down and cash found.

'Better late than never' I hear you say!

Perhaps... but what Cambridge needs RIGHT NOW is a new station in the SOUTH of the city!

In the area around Addenbrookes Hospital (itself a large hospital of International repute and recently both enlarged and provided with new access roads) even more building work is taking place.

In the next few years, over 3000 homes and associated businesses, schools, etc are going to be built on fields surrounding the hospital, and the nearby suburb of Trumpington. These developments (Great Kneighton  and Trumpington Meadows) will put an enormous amount of pressure on the roads leading into the City from the south.

This pressure will arguably be far greater than what the Science Park ever brought on its completion.

Once we have a new station in the south, serving a new community 'under construction', we can then worry about the one for Chesterton.

A new Development Plan for taking the Science Park and surrounding Chesterton Sidings/Cowley Road area into the next phase of its history can then be produced - with thought, care and less haste.

This can, and should, include a new railway station of course - but perhaps also some form of solution (finally!) for the entire Brownfield site of the Chesterton Sidings. Otherwise, they will remain, at least for a while yet, completely overgrown and dormant - until someone conjures up a solution for the legacy of the Lafarge Aggregates site and the nearby Sewage Works.

If new housing can be built, I would propose that there are NO new car park spaces - at either the station or the houses themselves. People can use the railway and busway to commute/travel about - and things like extra investment in hi-speed optical fibre broadband, or carbon-neutral housing materials and energy efficient heating and electricity can be employed in the housing itself, to entice people to live there instead. If people have no choice - they will still come... because this is Cambridge! And this will then be a Showpiece for Urban Living, not a piecemeal compromise that, literally, fills a gap.

I hate looking at cheap and cheerful development plans, even - or especially - if they are for public transport solutions.

This is 2012 not 1985. And Cambridge not Corby. And I mean no disrespect to Corby there.

Cheers.

*source:Times Higher Education

"Planet Earth Pre-Recorded"... sorry, "Live"

This week's rant is about the (current) popular BBC TV programme, Planet Earth Live.

After initially getting upset simply with the news that it was to be presented by Richard Hammond, the least 'harmful' (and thus biggest hypocrite) of BBC TV's Top Gear "motoring" programme, I then made the mistake of watching an episode at my family's house at the weekend...

My faults with this programme are numerous. Here are just a handful that spring to mind long after having watched it (and calmed down):

1. It is dumbed down.

In general, it is an understandable and arguably positive 'tactic' to make complicated subjects more understandable and accessible to the general public. By reducing the science and raising the entertainment 'bar', it allows more people to become aware of an important topic and can even sometimes encourage them to contribute. And thus for TV, it is surely only good for more people to become interested in the world and its animals. An academically produced programme about a specialist subject would normally result in limited viewing figues. But this programme is based on the original (David Attenborough presented) Planet Earth series, which was incredibly popular anyway... and critically well-received! So why do it? We need to raise the bar to the next level and continue the education... not go back to Square One!

2. It is too like Springwatch.

There are live links connecting pre-recorded films - which to all intents and purposes might as well have been filmed a year ago, rather than earlier in the week. Let's be honest, the reason why Natural History programmes can be great is because they are the HIGHLIGHTS (and a culmination) of HOURS of hard work by camera operators and researchers. This kind of programme undermines their efforts by hinting that something might easily happen live on camera.

3. It is all about the same old cliché animals!

Lions, elephants, bears, meerkats... these animals have almost been done to death already on programmes like 'Big Cat Diary', 'Meerkats Utd' and 'The Man who walks with Bears'. Don't get me wrong, they are wonderful, iconic animals, and have the 'ah!' factor... but this programme was surely a bigger opportunity to show us how other, less well known, animals do day-to-day. Why did they have to sell-out? The audience could have been 'sold' some new species, from the lowly insect or the not so well known mammal species... and we could have thus started to understand how the whole food chain works and how fragile ecosystems are all inter-connected. Basically, the programme made me think I was watching ITV, not the BBC.

4. There is no real point behind the programme.

Live Satellite TV broadcasts are hardly a new concept (after all, the first was way back in 1967...) and linking to just two live presenters in two countries for their regular summary reports and loosely scripted linkages every episode hardly sounds like a serious technological challenge for this day and age. Now, if there was a need for a spread-out network weaving through to numerous presenters live from all around the globe, that would be another matter. I reckon I could do something more complicated using Skype!

5. The other main presenter is insipid.

Not as bad as Richard Hammond perhaps but I still can't stand her. I can't be bothered to really argue why frankly (but I know it's not just me and I didn't like her on Countryfile either!). Even if I am just wrong here, why can't the Beeb finally risk a few chips and bet on the whole thing being fronted by well-known natural historians or professional wildlife cameramen (and women) like Gordon Buchanan? They do just as good a job in the live links and also know their stuff! Is it simply because the prog. producers want it watched by millions of indifferent Top Gear viewers who would otherwise most likely avoid it?

6. There is too much of an obsession with anthropomorphising the animal 'stars'.

True: it's important to give some form of inividuality to the animals that are regularly shown on the prgramme, but they take it too far! Animals are not humans and we should not treat them as such. By doing so, we not only get over emotional like we would a pet dog or cat... but we also miss the bigger messages by getting cheated by clever cinematic production techniques and so on. For example, atmospheric soundtracks over-egging false emotion to scenes and clever editing and fast cutting conveying 'Hollywood action style' moments where it might not have been in truth do start to annoy after a while. If I wanted that kind of thing I would go and watch 'Avengers Assemble' again! (A very good film btw.) Prince Phillip (a man I pretty much loathe as a rule) has a point (to an extent) when he says that some animal lovers are simply 'bunny huggers'  and not aware of the hard truths of wildlife conservation and management... and this kind of television does not help alleviate the clear gap between our nation's millions of (self-titled) 'animal lovers' and the (much fewer) 'wildlife conservation enthusiasts'.

And so, on the face of it, it is good telly! :-) I am happy to sit and watch it in truth and am not sure it has seriously harmed the long established reputation of quality BBC Natural History television.

BUT... I find myself grimacing every few minutes watching it and, more pathetically, then can't help but wander at the end about how good it could have been...

ZeeOx

And I think to myself, what a Wonderful World...

I have just caught an episode of Simon Reeve's new Indian Ocean TV series. This episode was the Madagascar to the Seychelles leg - and boy was it good television!

As usual, his kind of jovial, Louis Theroux-like approach manages to expose the bare naked truths behind the places and people he visits. But, perhaps unlike Louis, the impact of these facts are clearer to see on Simon's face - and in his presentation. He is not interviewing bad people and letting them hang themselves on their own words, more, he is exposing the world, and its bones, and letting us diagnose the diseases found therein for ourselves.

There's no denying, for example, that Madagascar is in trouble. A poor nation, with an exhausted landscape and tired economy, we might all know (or think we know) about the plight of lemurs, etc and the pressures of farming and deforestation... but Simon's up close, and sometimes personal, perspective in some ways gets the messages through even more clearly than any grandiose natural history programme, or cold, hard-facts political documentary.

Anyway, for those of you in the UK, it is available (for a while) on iPlayer from this link: http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p00pqbfg

Saying that, I guess it doesn't make for good viewing really. Who'd've thought a TV programme that includes showing its presenter snorkelling in pleasent clear blue waters of Mauritius and The Seychelles would make for such a depressing and sour 'after-feeling'?

I felt bad for myself as a consumer watching this programme. And then I felt bad for my country as a western, so called 'First World' state. And then I felt bad for Humankind full stop.

I struggle on most days to be a glass half-full person, and I know that is a bad way to go about living your life. The world is full of people trying hard to think of 'The Answers' and many others go about their daily lives doing good things for their fellow species.

But we can't avoid the plain fact here... we are over working this Island Earth of ours - and it is struggling to cope. And that makes me sad.

This world really is doomed unless some kind of wonderful miracle happens soon so that everyone is brought together to work for mutual benefit - for ourselves, our families... and our planet.

I want this miracle to happen before there is nothing left worth saving.

Basically, I wish I lived on the amazing  Moyenne Island shown in the programme... but then again, that would be only hiding from the truth. And there is nothing to say that place isn't going to avoid the bad times coming in the future.

Jeez, Am I still suffering from Seasonally Affected Disorder?

Sorry,
Zeeox

Hosepipes Utd Nil, Buckets Town Nil.

So... after a nice, wet April day - sorry, week, my thoughts turn to the upcoming UK summer of low reservoirs, dry streams, hosepipe usage debates, miserable farmers and overall drought conditions...

Which inevitably leads me to predict we're going to have a horrible cold and wet summer! Hurray!

But, regardless, I recall hearing an interesting 'fact' on the radio the other day where someone pointed out that by banning hosepipes for the use of washing cars, far more water will actually be used by resorting to buckets instead. Something silly like twice as much water is used this way.

But I guess it must be a bit like showering instead of bathing. If you use power showers (or shower for longer than 15/20 minutes), it's obviously going to cancel out the savings.

But not the time.

Will people find the time to bother with using loads of water-filled buckets to wash their cars if it takes ages to actually do?

Perhaps we'll find people using carwash machines at garages again? (A habit that has surely declined these past 10 or so years?) Apart from the pure vanity and silliness in most cases of wanting to regularly wash your automobile in the first place, perhaps some clever bod will be able to work out a way of recycling the water from garage carwash machines more efficiently and offer a great alternative to doing it at home? (or in Sainsbury's car parks!) It would then probably reduce the cost of the service too.

Which brings up my concern about water retention in water and sewage services in general....

The UK's decrepid and leaking water pipes account for far more lost water than the water we need - and can't afford - or aren't allowed to use - in times of drought.

We should be concentrating on a nationwide upgrade project so that these holes are plugged!

Which of course, won't happen in these austerity-hit times. Even if we'd probably all agree in a referendum that would be a good idea.

Instead, things like this are starting to happen:

http://www.stwater.co.uk/conWebDoc/3010

And so, whilst our resevoir levels go down... our water bills will continue to go up.

God help us.

I was travelling along a road in my home town of Cambridge, England, on a sunny day last week and saw the wonderful Springtime pink cherry blossom on its newly planted trees... and it got me wondering about that specific road, and the use of trees in enhancing urban landscape in general.

It's a well known 'trick' that planting trees along roadsides enhances landscape values, both spiritually, physically and economically... but this road in particular has an interesting story.

It is called Milton Road, and has bus lanes along its wider stretches. In early 2002, it was proposed that trees be removed so that Cambridge's newly planned Busway could get buses in and out of the city centre to connect to it without seriously affecting existing traffic. After a solid debate and changes of plans and budgets, the road where the trees was not dualled and most of the trees survived.

However, it is not to say they will stay safe forever... councils are always changing their minds... and, at least as it appeared to me, the trees in blossom that I saw were new trees anyway (complete with original nursery planting bags at their root bases). I take this to mean there must be a short term plan at least to keep the road at its current width.

But what annoyed me a touch later was the fact I passed by happy - and forgot that cherry trees are not native plants, and are ornamental trees with a short lifespan and, apart from their role in providing pollen to bees in Spring and berry-eating birds in Winter, not particularly beneficial to urban wildlife.

What other urban trees should we planting?

I like Oaks. Pedunculate or Sessile, no bother. They are the tree we all know first from childhood (barring the Christmas Tree), and the one where we learn about the lifecycle of a germinating seed and acorn that then matures into a tree with a beautiful shape and crown, with gnarly limbs, millions of leaves and the provision of house and home for numerous other animals beyond count.

Fact: Oaks support the highest levels of biodiversity of any native tree in the UK.

Near my flat there is a simple terraced area of housing where there are three wonderful large, and old, Oaks that the road (Oak Tree Avenue) is presumably named after. And in immediate vicinity, there are other roads named after various tree species, although it is not so easy to see the specific trees that were presumably planted/incorporated along them in comparison.

....

It is true that 'woodland' trees such as Oaks and Ash do not provide much in the way of Spring colour and the major point is that they can take a long time to grow and get established. They are also much more expensive and can get so massive that their roots and height can become a danger to house foundations in later life.

Alternatively, blossoming trees such as Hawthorn, are more hedge-like in appearence and do not always look so good as a stand-alone 'standard' tree. They also have rather nasty thorns that are hard to tolerate by some people living in urban areas.

When I start thinking about decent large trees that suit urban areas, I always start with the (London) Plane tree. Not only does it look good when established, but it also has attractive, continuously peeling bark that is well known to tolerate pollution - and absorb it. I guess its main faults are the same though: it is also slow-growing, does not bloom in Spring and looks a touch fragile when small.

So... is there a native tree out there that can provide that Spring blossom, grow quickly but also live for a reasonably long time and not bankrupt a council with high planting or maintenance costs?

Suggestions please!

If there is: then I'd say that that is the tree that should be planted down roads like Milton Road, Cambridge... and not Ornamental Cherry Trees, however pretty they may be at this time of the year.

Cheers.

Which side of the fence to choose...

So then... first up:
The UK Government has just released news of new planning guidelines for England that they think will reform an overly-bureaucratic existing system and accommodate the urgent need for new homes, whilst protecting the countryside.
Check http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-17514730  for the BBC news release and http://www.communities.gov.uk/corporate/ for the official info.
Where do I stand on this?
As someone who fell in love with the (alleged) original concept of the (modern) UK Green Belt system, my thoughts on the matter have changed over the years. Like the Government, I can no longer support it in its current form. The simple facts are that: (1) the UK is a small island with over 60 million people on it, and has a large capital city that over overly dominates the economy, transport, politics... and geography of the country it rules; (2) we have no real wild countryside* left and that all land and its inhabitants, be them human or otherwise, must be continuously managed in some way for a balance to be attempted/achieved; (3) The population is growing. Not, fortunately, as bad as the developing world, but enough to warrant an upcoming programme of new housing construction that will put pressure on the entire country's infrastructure.
*bar a few, dying, 'alpine' mountain tops in the Cairngorms.
And so... what to do?
The true nature of much of the UK's 14 green belt areas is that they are not green. They are dominated by monocultural crop fields, where fertilizer and insecticide is heavily used and supplemented by significant water irrigation sytems, and sustain little in the way of 'breathing space' for the cities they surround - either in the way of wildlife reserves of sports and recreation facilities.
We could build on much of these sites and not feel that we have 'hurt' the countryside, and so the Government is right to say that the middle of many of our towns and cities - where most of us live and work - are being picked to death by new developments that take over the little greenspace that remains in our urban areas.
However, as much as urban densification can be a bad thing, there are still many brownfield sites in the UK that are untouched. They are purely and simply being bought and sold for the profit game. It is better for some so-called developers to play the buy/sell game rather than actually start building. Also: by building outside our cities in green belts, even if it means creating more true green space in the form of parkland and pocket nature reserves as a result, it also puts pressure on transport.
If we are still commuting into these cities, our road and rail systems continue to suffer.
I am going to stop here for now - this is not supposed to be a mini-essay... but I will close by saying that I think the key to future UK development is providing more smaller, affordable homes in central city locations, not providing underground car parking or 'one parking space per unit' schemes in middle income urban housing developments and concentaring on high-speed Internet connections for out-of-town projects (whatever they may be) so that people are encouraged to work from home more. Then... we won't have such a need to overspill into our South-Eastern green belts specifically and continue the status quo of one half of the country dominating the other. If we can do this, we won't need to build on green belt land at all - leaving it to be properly converted back intro true green space, providing 'wildife corridors', where are threatened flora and fauna can be given a chance to re-colonise.
What would be so bad about living in the north if your house was carbon neutral in construction, a 'Passivhaus' in usage, had a view of true green Dales and Hills... and had BroadBand so good that you didn't need to commute to the City of London to join in on that all-important Video Conference to that client in Dubai?        
TTFN, Zeeox

First post

This aim of this Blog is to be an online home for my thoughts on Town and Country Planning, Landscape Management, Ecology, Wildlife Conservation, Urban biodiversity and conservation and BioGeography - today, in the past... and in the future.

This is mainly going to cover my home country, the UK, and my home region, East Anglia. However, it will not be limited to that - and there should be plenty of capacity for opinions (and occasional rants) about the world at large and global politics in general. After all, this is a small world we live in, and everything is explicably connected.

It is formally linked to my YouTube channel, http://www.youtube.com/zeeox, where I post videos of the wild things I see out and about on my travels. There is no thematic connection between the two, but I believe it will potentially compliment some of the things I intend to blog about.

I hope I find the time and effort to create something interesting here. I am willing to debate things here and take on board opinion. As I get older, I get more uncompromising and fundamental... but I do change my mind on occasion... and, like the Sith, I never deal in absolutes.

It's highly unlikely that it will get a big following or inspire a 'movement' or anything... but if it does get a few people thinking, and inspire them to then act upon those thoughts, I will be pleased. You have the power!