The Kent beaches that come with added sewage

The Kent coast has always been a draw for the Village News staff on their days off, in particular the coast around Broadstairs; plenty of beaches, loads of sand. Not necessarily the main beach - Viking Bay - though which, for the last five years at least, has received only a “Mandatory” for water quality which means that the water quality met only the minimum standard based on a European Bathing Water Directive. Botany Bay and Joss Bay, up the road, have, for the past five years always or usually respectively received a Marine Conservation Society Recommended which means excellent water quality.

However, even these beaches have fallen foul of a sewage discharge from two of Southern Water’s pumping stations on Monday.

Nine beaches are affected: Walpole Bay, Palm Bay, Botany Bay, Kingsgate Bay, Joss Bay, Stone Bay, Viking Bay, Louisa Bay and Dumpton Gap.

Thanet District Council have erected signs advising beach-goers not to enter the area of beach below the high water mark from the tide – which doesn’t leave much beach and, in some places, no beach.

In a statement Southern Water said, “A sewerage network cannot operate as a ‘closed system’, it must have in place a stormwater release mechanism to safely get rid of excess water during storms.”

This sewage issue is the more surprising given that  Botany Bay, Joss Bay and Stone Bay all received a “prestigious” European Blue Flag for 2014. Which doesn’t say much for Blue Flags.

So we know where not to go for our day trips this August don’t we readers?

In the meantime, if you want to make sure that your destination beach doesn’t contain floating motions in its waters, head to the Marine Conservation Society’s excellent Good Beach Guide at www.goodbeachguide.co.uk.  This is a free of charge guide which can help you find a clean beach in the UK.

© www.chislehurstpettswoodandbickleyvillagenews.co.uk

Chislehurst Rocks!

Friends of Chislehurst Recreation Ground (FOCRG) are holding their 4th annual Chislehurst Rocks! Music Festival and Family Fun Day on 6 September 2014 from 11am - 9 pm.
 
This FREE all-age family friendly music festival will be held in Walden Rec, the top field of the Chislehurst Recreation Ground, and will feature dancing and music from a variety of genres and will be complemented with food, drink and craft stalls.
 
This festival has been made possible via an Awards for All grant from the Big Lottery Fund as well as local community group, business and personal donations.
 
Get some friends and family together and come and see how Chislehurst Rocks!

HELP WANTED!
Many of you have helped with Chislehurst Rocks before, but this year we need even more volunteers to make the event even bigger and better.
 
For the organisers, the day starts at 7am and finishes at 10pm! We need a few extra early birds at 7 to help us direct stall holders on to site. The main work starts from 9am. Jobs vary from putting up gazebos to picking up litter, collecting donations, directing people, checking the loos and running the FOCRG and volunteers’ tents.
 
Can you help? It’s fun. You don’t have to work all day. Some refreshments are provided and there may even be other free stuff on offer. If we get enough help, we hope to have a volunteers’ tent where you can leave your belongings and relax after your exertions. 

Hopefully it won’t be needed for shelter from the rain.
 
We need to sort out a rota well in advance so we know for certain that everything we want to do can go ahead. Then everyone can have a really good day out.
 
Shifts will be in 2 hour blocks: 7 -9; 9-11; 11-1; 1-3; 3-5; 5-7; 7-9. Hopefully a few kind people will stay on for the shut down. We’ll also need help with a final litter pick on Sunday morning. We may also need help on days before and after with taking deliveries on site or returning kit.
 
Please join the team and let me know ASAP which time slot/s and types of jobs you can do, your email and VIP your mobile phone number. If you are under 18, please tell me your age.
 
RSVP to Barbara@FOCRG.org.uk or 0778 303 6295
 
Could you pledge £100 a year? That’s less than £2 a week to be part of the fun! Unless you want to remain anonymous, members will get acknowledgement in our Chis Rocks publicity material and website plus an invitation for VIP hospitality at the event.
 
If you have a business, maybe you would like to display your banner on the stage or barriers or take an advertisement in our programme?
 
Contact us at info@focrg.org.uk

Follow us on Facebook ChislehurstRocks! and Twitter @ChisRocks

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Help silence St Nicholas Church clock – and get a cockerel.

Up and down the country church bells are silent. Silent because there is not enough money to pay for their upkeep or because some city dweller moving out into the country complains that they’re keeping him or her awake at night.

“Try living next door to a cockerel,” is our response, but instead, even in the Village News area, there are church bells that are silent – at least during the hours of darkness, due to some out-of-towner’s complaints or worse...a visit from the dreaded Council’s Public Health Nuisance Team waving an Abatement Notice in the air.

We're not sure what would happen next if the bells kept toiling. The Council could apply to the Magistrate's Court for a Warrant to enter the property that is causing the nuisance and remove the offending noise maker. We're not sure how easy it would be to remove a mega-ton bell out of a church tower, although the scrap value may be an incentive.

Fortunately, the local residents around St Nicholas Church appear to live with the bells chiming out every quarter hour, day and night. They’re obviously in quite good nick, the bells that is – not (necessarily) the residents.

As for the clock, that is another matter. So many drivers and pedestrians glance up at the St Nicholas clock face to check on the time that its absence would be sorely missed. A few years ago the face was refurbished and it now shines blue and gold in the sunlight, but now it’s the turn of the mechanism. The clock is 157 years old, is the first of its kind in the world and still in its original condition. It is historically important being the forerunner of, probably the model for, Big Ben's clock.

To help raise the £3,500 needed, Theatre Productions present "If Music be the Food of Love!" - a charity musical evening to fund the clock’s overhaul. This production takes place at 7.30pm on Thursday 31st July. Tickets are £8 including wine & light refreshments. Tickets can be bought online from the Village News shop (http://www.chislehurstpettswoodandbickleyvillagenews.co.uk/#/shop/4578218722) or from local clock enthusiast, Peter Appleby, on 020 8467 9368.

If you are unable to attend the production you can also use the ticket purchasing “Shop” to make a donation, in £5 increments.

I hope that Mr Appleby raises his £3,500 – otherwise we may be sending the cockerels round.

© www.chislehurstpettswoodandbickleyvillagenews.co.uk

Lost locket: £100 reward. Any amateur sleuths out there?

A couple from Formby in Lancashire spent the last week of June in Chislehurst to attend their eldest son’s wedding to his now wife from Petts Wood. On 28th June, two days before the wedding the two families met for a meal at Zizzi on the High Street in Chislehurst at 8pm.

Somewhere between the Bull’s Head and Zizzi, the bride’s father lost his wife’s Links of London silver heart locket containing three small gold hearts which he had bought for her a number of years ago. It has enormous sentimental value as they chose the three small hearts to remind them of their three sons. Links of London no longer sells this locket so it’s irreplaceable. It’s particularly disappointing to the parents that on what was the proudest day of their lives, they should have lost something which was so important to their family.

The following day, the father did try to retrace his steps from the Bull’s Head to Zizzi via the nearby car park but without any luck. His only hope is that someone has found the locket, has kept it safe and, now on hearing how important it is to him and his wife, would be kind enough to return it.

He can’t actually remember how much they paid for it but to them it’s priceless so he would be delighted to offer a reward of £100 for its return.

If anyone has or finds the locket, please contact us at Village News and we will arrange to return it to its owner and pay the £100 reward either to yourself or donate it to a local charity.

So, if the kids are driving you mad already, send them down Centre Common Road with a metal detector.

© www.chislehurstpettswoodandbickleyvillagenews.co.uk

©

"Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery" is an expression that has been around for nearly two hundred years, and longer than that in sentiment. As Village News comes up to its fifteenth birthday, originally as "Chislehurst Village News" in print only, for the last year as an online News, What's On and Business Directory, and plenty more besides, and, more recently, extending to cover Petts Wood and Bickley, we are delighted to have had well over 60,000 hits with the number increasing weekly as we put more and more local information onto the website. The recently launched Village Card has been enthusiatically received, and over the summer we will be adding more shops and businesses to the thirty-five existing ones.

Several readers have said that they like the front cover from 2004 that's on our Home page, but have asked what we were writing about ten years ago. Well now you can find out. Click on the "Chislehurst Village News" cover that you will find on the Home page down the left hand side to see who and what we were reporting on.

Of course, such success breeds imatators and so we are now obliged to put a copyright symbol at the end of each article just to make sure that the imatators are in no doubt that they're being watched - by you! Not that we're too bothered with the imatators - just flattered, but when no fewer than six readers recently pointed out the similarities in a Village News report on 29th April and a News Shopper report dated 7th May, we felt it perfectly reasonable to give it greater publicity. What do you think?

From Chislehurst, Petts Wood & Bickley Village News, 29th April 2014

From News Shopper, 7th May 2014

The Conservatives currently hold 53 of the 60 seats on Bromley Council, up from 49 in 2006. They are fielding 60 candidates.

In the previous election in 2010, the Conservative party won 53 of the 60 seats on Bromley Council, up from 49 in 2006. This year they are fielding 60 candidates.

Labour currently hold 3 seats, down from 4 in 2006. They are fielding 60 candidates.

Labour currently hold three seats, down from four in 2006, and are also fielding 60 candidates.

Liberal Democrats currently hold 4 seats, down from 7 in 2006... for 2014 the Liberal Democrats are only contesting 47 seats, whereas in 2006 they contested all 60, and 59 in 2010.

Meanwhile the Liberal Democrats, who currently hold four seats (down from seven in 2006) are only contesting 47 seats - in 2010 they contested 59, in 2006 they contested 60.

In 2006 UKIP contested just 1 seat, in 2010 they contested 10. Next month they will be contesting 35 seats in all of the wards, presumably hoping to do well on the back of the European elections being held the same day.

The big story is the huge increase in the number of seats the UK Independence Party (UKIP) intend to run for. In 2006 the controversial party fielded just one candidate, in 2010 they fielded 10. On May 22 they will be contesting 35 seats, presumably hoping to do well on the back of the European elections being held the same day. 

The Greens are fielding 22 candidates. In 2010 they fielded 15 and in 2006 just 10.

The Greens are fielding 22 candidates (they fielded 15 in 2010 and 10 in 2006)...

We have emailed the News Shopper journalist for a response. When we get one, we'll let you know what he said. "Sorry," we hope.

 www.chislehurstpettswoodandbickleyvillagenews.co.uk