Posted in Local events and pictures on 26 June 2009| 1 Comment »
St Stephen’s CE School will be holding our Carnival on Friday the 3rd July. This year the theme is Circus – children will be parading along South Lambeth Road (around 2.15pm), into Albert Square (around 2.30pm) and through Dorset Road Estate. It would be great if as many residents as possible could cheer and wave as the children walk by. St Stephens will be having music and entertainment in the playground from 4.15pm
Posted in Local events and pictures on 24 June 2009| Leave a Comment »
Lots of photos of the Summer Fair here. Scroll down to the bottom right of the site and click on ‘more photos’ in the Neighbourhood Photos section. If you have local photos to add you can include them here by uploading your photos to Flickr and tagging them ‘assasw8’ or if that all to much but you’d like to put some photos up contact Chris at assacan@assa.org.uk
Posted in Community involvement on 23 June 2009| Leave a Comment »
You may have seen the discussion board we had at the Summer Fair for you to post your comments on local issues. We had categories for The Royal Albert, Community Activities (what do you want to see more of?) and General. We’ve recreated them here.
The Royal Albert
Keep it as a pub. Cheaper and more diverse than the Fentiman
Use ASSA funds (esp from filming) to BUY Albert pub for community use [unfortunately we don’t have quite this much in the bank!]
Community restaurant/cafe
A community restaurant (like Bonnington Square)
Cafe
Yes lets have other community functions or uses in it
Community Activities
More fairs maybe every month or two with a different theme
A barter market for items or skills [Watch this space…]
Why not have a Christmas market?
General
Karaoke nights at the 3 Lions drive me crazy. It is too loud every Friday and Saturday. If they want to do it they should have proper sound proofing. This is a residential area!
We should have more walking or cycling tours in Lambeth
School crossing patrol on South Lambeth Road
Posted in ASSA business, Traffic and transport on 16 June 2009| Leave a Comment »
Latest dialogue with Lambeth Council – suggestions and questions sent to them in March, responses received today.
ASSA proposal: That the top of Lansdowne Way (between the Clapham Road and the South Lambeth Road) be returned to being a two-way road.
Lambeth response: Unfortunately we are unable to progress this request due to what would be a negative impact on the wider road network.
ASSA proposal: Defensive entry treatment at the junction of South Lambeth Road and Aldebert Terrace, and the junction of the Clapham Road and Albert Square.
Lambeth response: We would support your proposal, however these roads are the responsibility of TfL and as such any such requests should be directed to them.
ASSA proposal: Measurement of the impact of the sinusoidal humps
Lambeth response: This is a good idea. We will arrange to have speed and vehicle volume surveys carried out.
ASSA proposal: A 20mph sign to replace the current 30mph sign at the start of Bolney Street (as you leave Dorset Road)
Lambeth response: Thank you. I will arrange to have this sign replaced.
ASSA proposal: Sinusoidal humps to replace all the speed cushions
Lambeth response: Unfortunately we are unable to replace the speed cushions with sinusoidal humps at this time, however those cushions that are in need of repair will be attended to.
ASSA question: Has any assessment been made of the impact of the priority traffic flow treatment in Fentiman Road?
Lambeth response: An assessment of the effect of the Fentiman Road scheme is yet to be carried out.
ASSA question: Are there any plans for traffic calming in streets that feed our area e.g. Vassall Road, Caldwell Street?
Lambeth response: There are no plans for additional traffic calming on these streets, or any of the others feeding your area at this stage. Any need for traffic calming or additional works is prioritised and considered as funding becomes available.
Posted in Traffic and transport on 12 June 2009| 2 Comments »
The latest proposals for the development of Battersea Power Station include the idea of extending the Northern Line from Kennington through Nine Elms to a new station at the power station itself. Given the track record of Battersea Power Station proposals – a special shuttle service to Victoria was proposed twenty years ago and never got off the drawing board – it’s anybody’s guess whether this will ever come to anything, but it does have some local implications.
The proposal takes advantage of TfL’s intention (discussed here last year) of splitting the Northern Line so that Charing Cross branch trains always turn round at Kennington, but extending the terminus out two stops.
If it were to happen, one effect would be to put us within ten to fifteen minutes’ walk of four different tube stations, as there is a proposal for an intermediate station at Nine Elms, which looks as though it is intended to go roughly in Sainsbury’s car park. The other effect would be that of the tunnels: they would run south west of Oval station coming under Fentiman Road and grazing the end of Richborne Terrace, turning to run due west as they cross under South Lambeth Road somewhere around Wilcox Close. That’s almost certainly far enough away to avoid the problems we have with the Victoria Line – but the margin is not huge.
That’s all a bit of an approximation because the map on the power station website is tiny, but there are larger samizdat versions on the London Reconnections blog, which also has more of the background.
None of this will happen soon under any circumstances, and as things stand at the moment if feels pretty unlikely that it will ever happen at all. But it’s certainly one to keep an eye on.
Posted in ASSA business on 11 June 2009| Leave a Comment »
The annual meeting of the Albert Square and St Stephen’s Association takes place this coming Tuesday at St Stephen’s Church. Tea, coffee and conversation from 7.30 – the meeting proper will start at 8pm. Do come and share your thoughts, ideas and questions for the future of our area and the work of ASSA. If you can’t make it, feel free to put them into comments to this post (click on the comments link underneath the agenda) and we will make sure that they are fed into the discussion.
The agenda for the meeting will be:
1. Minutes of the Annual General Meeting, 24 June 2008
2. Review of the year from Chair
3. Policing report
4. Big Green Challenge
5. Summer fair
6. Planning
7. Treasurer’s Report and presentation of Accounts
8. Election of Officers and Executive Committee for following year
9. Election of Honorary Auditor
10. Any other business.
Posted in ASSA business, Community involvement, Local events and pictures on 10 June 2009| 1 Comment »
There was much checking of the weather forecast before and on the Saturday morning, but in the event, in a week that had swung from much sun and high temperatures to heavy rain and cold, everyone was grateful for the window of no rain that occurred from 3pm on Saturday.
The Fair was wonderful. Everyone will have had their favourite stall. The most beautiful was certainly the plant stall. So much effort went into the sowing and growing on of fantastic plants, which were then beautifully presented by Aldebert Residents. This nurturing was then complemented by the most incredibly generous donation of stunning bouquets and wonderful plants from Alexander Collier Flowers of 127 St Georges Drive SW1V 4DA. The donation, beauty and generosity of a director who lives in the Square lifted all of our spirits.
The cake stall was well staffed but poorly supported in the provision of donated cakes by the neighbourhood. Many thanks to those who did provide merchandise. The bottle stall was a great success as always. The book stall was staffed wonderfully and with an abundance of great books. The tea area neglected by the organizers caught up belatedly with stalwarts being drafted into help and provide the teas – heating up cold and neglected urns that were sitting under the Garden’s planes. Sorry !
There was a rock shop selling dinosaur teeth and gem stones that some children were entranced by: the most fantastic toy stall and a hook a duck and panning for gold area; the children spent ages looking for “gold” to take home in velvet pouches and getting wet and sandy. The police were truly brilliant at their police stocks. Smiling and chatting away to locals while willing to be soaked by sponges in aid of charity. It just shows you what a wonderful community policing team we have in our locale.
Vauxhall City Farm brought a number of wonderful characters – including Lunch the Duck. Children adore the interaction with the pets and Vauxhall City Farm is a very precious commodity in our urban jungle.
Once again there was a fiendishly problematic local history/ photo competition which attracted a huge buzz and participants determined to win. Queues were developing.
The art competition themed “Happiness” sadly did not attract as many competitors as it did last year. Jennifer Miles a brilliantly creative and award winning children’s book illustrator very kindly judged the event.
ASSACAN had a store and British Gas with their environmental campaign generously supported them and the Fair itself. Further details can be found on this site but for those not yet aware AASACAN are doing a tremendous jobin making people aware of environmental issues and advising on improvements to people’s homes.
BBQ The BBQ was again heroically staffed by one family with their three children. To run a smokey stall from 3pm to 10pm without any break at all is truly amazing. A fantastic effort thank you.
Crepes Another family after so many years of community effort should know better. Instead they kindly offered their machine abilities cheerfulness and services and did a terrific job.
A wonderful resident ran the kiddies games- all of which were free of charge. The idea was predominatly for parents to relax while their children used up energy. The kids really loved it and after the last game of tug of war they spent a great deal of time running around the Garden Square.
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FixMyStreet – Stockwell ward reports
