Charlbury's lost assets

Mon 21 Oct 2013, 16:43

Mandy. as Chair of the CLP, I am not aware that we have ha contact or response from the Sports & Social Club to any consultation, but if you send me your e mail address I will forward a questionnaire the Community Led Plan has sent to organisations in the Town for you to complete. This will then be reflected in our report to the Town Council and form part of future debate. My e mail is jimholah50@yahoo.co.uk

Sun 13 Oct 2013, 15:06

They have tried and we can get no answers from anyone no one seems to want to talk to us.

Sun 13 Oct 2013, 11:24

Mandy If you have not already done so you should enter comments on the community led plan on this website www.charlbury.info/community/74
As far as I am aware there has been little input from the sports and Social Club but they will certainly be affected by whatever happens at the new community centre. However this is a complex issue particularly regarding providing new facilities and it is important that their views are represented. They should also be encouraged to get involved in discussion on how the available funding can best be used to provide facilities for ALL groups who want them. It is really up to the Sports and Social Club to make sure their views are heard and for them to join those now planning what can be done.

Thu 10 Oct 2013, 20:46

Mention was made on September 25th of the closure of a former cafe and restaurant in Sheep St, and other people were asking for a proper cafe in Charlbury .....but we already have one at the Charlbury Deli and Cafe, also in Sheep St. Unless people use this cafe it will also become a lost asset. Older residents will remember that it was originally saved from closure by the local community taking out shares, but it is still a struggle to keep going, despite providing a valuable resource of items that are not obtainable elsewhere in Charlbury. Why not visit it and have a cup of coffee, with a slice of one of Lynne's delicious cakes. Unless Charlbury uses it, yet another vital asset will be lost to the community. Helen Bessemer-Clark

Sat 5 Oct 2013, 23:40

so when this community center gets built will that make the sports and social club lost assets as they will have to knock it down to make the posh new flats that no local charlbuy person would be able to afford. And where does that leave the social club where will the footballers go after there game.

Fri 4 Oct 2013, 11:43

Completely agree with Tony and Chris. The only point on which I would differ is that the incompetence and infighting go back c.30 years not just 10. That is very sad because Charlbury is a great place with a great community so let's put that behind us and support the present trustees and their efforts.

Thu 3 Oct 2013, 22:26

Agreed Chris it was a mixture of incompetence and infighting that caused the failure 10 years ago. We now have an extremely competent set of trustees who are trying to fulfill the wishes of the majority and provide a much needed community centre They do not deserve attack from people who are not prepared to step up and take responsibility for sorting out the residual problem

Thu 3 Oct 2013, 21:13

Well said Tony.

This sniping about a community centre must stop, divided communities do not achieve their maximum potential.

Also not sure that we should obsess too much about car parking, I consider myself a bit of an old git, and I am quite capable of walking and cycling anywhere in Charlbury and catching a train or bus to other places in this country and further afield.

Thu 3 Oct 2013, 14:13

Perhaps all the residents of former public houses would like to reopen them.

Might be a way of getting rid of the Creme de Menthe from the drinks cabinet/cupboards.

It seems one area that we can agree on " A lot of people in Charlbury like a drink"

Thu 3 Oct 2013, 13:45

But if you make the Spendlove parking limited time, what will happen to the walkers Tim mentioned? (Although they're not a new phenomenon caused by the Walkers are Welcome scheme as he thinks; the Cotswold Wardens have been running walks starting from the Spendlove carpark for years, people come from Birmingham, Cheltenham and Bath to walk here. And this was a point I made earlier this year, not all the cars in the carpark are owned by commuters or locals.

Thu 3 Oct 2013, 10:35

Parking at the spendlove does need to be considered as a seperate item, possibly limited stay time to prevent people parking all day and getting the train to london.
However, the substantive point is that surveys over the last few years have shown that the majority of respondents want a new community centre, and this is the last chance to achieve that. The people sniping from the sidelines should put themselves up as Gifford trustees and suggest what they would do with the bomb site and debt left by the previous incumbents

Thu 3 Oct 2013, 00:02

While it's true that Tim might have conflated the Gifford Trust with the trusts which run Memorial Hall and Corner House, I think his point about parking at Spendlove is a very serious one. It often feels at capacity already.

Mon 30 Sep 2013, 13:39

I think Tim's post is misleading & in need of rebuttal
He appears to be linking the Thomas Gifford Trust's sterling efforts to provide Charlbury with a much needed & long overdue facility on the spendlove site with 'people scheming to sell the corner house & memorial hall'
The present Thomas Gifford trustees took over responsibility for the bomb site left by the mistakes of the previous trustees 10 years ago, and by a supreme effort have now got approval from the county council for the money from the sale of the old school to be transferred back to charlbury provided an appropriate facility is built on the spendlove site. I believe that if this does not happen then the viability of the whole site will come into question. The Thomas Gifford trustees have no responsibility for the corner house or memorial hall which are run by seperate trusts and provide different facilities from those envisaged for the new community centre, which maybe is too far away from certain shops to fit in with certain people's requirements!

Mon 30 Sep 2013, 09:28

Here Hair Here? (sorry)

I recently give up my addiction to Amazon (see "These days we all shop partly or largely by brand") I have spoken to a few people about doing this but not with a great success. I think we have to be realistic and find out if people really want to buy locally (not the people who come on here but the rest). 'We' will pay more, lose convenience, lose choice, but will others? should the focus be on Chippy and Witney for food and products and small towns/villages be on something else. Services for example. We need things which make businesses think - That's the perfect place' rather than, 'if everyone pitches in we could just about survive'. no answers from me about what those would be (perhaps Little Monkeys is one example) but business need to start on the right foot to be successful in the best of times. Another way to think is, if something was here before and failed why try that again, rather than something different?

Mon 30 Sep 2013, 07:52

Or should it be Hear Hear ?

Sun 29 Sep 2013, 13:17

Richard,
I think that you need to go a bit further back than John Brain. Martin Slatter had and has a bigger business than just the Charlbury or indeed the Chadlington shop, and there was a time when he had both.

Tim,

Here Here

Sun 29 Sep 2013, 12:47 (last edited on Sun 29 Sep 2013, 13:03)

Last time I looked Richard most of the shops open at 9am not 2pm and to be honest if I had to commute via train everyday the last thing I would want to do after a hard day's work in the city and then having to stand up on a…

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Sun 29 Sep 2013, 11:51

Oh, sure. Charlbury will never be able to supply absolutely everything, even 25% of everything. But that's not to say that it can't supply anything at all!

Take butchers. Chadlington (a third Charlbury's size) supports one; Chippy (only twice Charlbury's size) supports two. I don't think you can simply say that Brains closed because the people of Charlbury didn't want to use a butcher. Personally I'd have loved to have bought more from there, but like most people, I was at work, out of Charlbury, during most of its opening hours. I take your point about people trudging past the bookshop, but nonetheless it's notable that the Co-op is always busy immediately after the arrival of the main evening trains.

(For clarity, I'm not talking about the current shops here, who obviously know their own business much better than I do!)

Sun 29 Sep 2013, 10:06

'We want to buy things the same as anyone else.' You are right, Richard. I want my clothes from M&S or Fat Face. I may want a new Panasonic microwave. I get Lush shampoo. My outer clothing and footwear will be mostly Berghaus or Merrill. These days we all shop partly or largely by brand. However efficient a small local shop is, and whatever hours it opens, it cannot stock or supply any of the above items. So let's be realistic on that score.

Twelve years ago I kept my bookshop open until 7pm. Lots of passers by from the trains but no customers. I closed at 6. Same story of course. There is a train comes in about 5.20 but if I am open then, no one comes in. Not surprising: they all look dog tired and are struggling up the hill with bags and cases (those who are not met by car or catch the bus).

Sun 29 Sep 2013, 09:51

I would like to mention Quarry lane and the state its in.There are trees that have been pulled up and left. Recently there was a mattress left for a week. I had to ring WODC twice before it was removed. The rusted fencing to the quarry has dead shuddery propping it up. The old wall behind the houses is in rubble. This is not attractive to visitors walking in Charlbury and considering we now have the label "Walkers are Welcome". It doesn't give off a very good impression.

Regarding the quarry could it not be turned into a nature reserve? If there was a small charge for walking in there, the owners might agree to open it up. We could also get the woodland trust involved and have more trees planted as one of their community schemes.

Sat 28 Sep 2013, 21:49

Or, conversely, that the shops didn't adapt to the times.

More shopping is being done in Charlbury now than ever; we have the Co-op to thank for that. We have the busiest station on the Cotswold Line - one quarter-million passengers a year - yet only one shop, the Co-op, is open at the time all these commuters are returning from work.

When I was a kid growing up in Leicestershire 30 years ago, the shop from the next village realised that not everyone could get to the shop during their normal opening hours, so they sent a van round every week at a time more convenient for people. Could that work here? Currently our shops open at 2pm on Wednesday when nine people might be in the town centre; at 7pm down at the station, hundreds of people are passing through.

The people of Charlbury are no different from the people of Chadlington or Oxford or Birmingham or anywhere; we buy things to eat, we buy things to drink, and so on. If we can do it without going to Witney or Chippy or Oxford, so much the better. The challenge is for would-be business owners to sell things to us!

Sat 28 Sep 2013, 20:28

Charlbury has a great number of 'lost asset' shops - the reason being the people of Charlbury did not use them and they lost money.

Sat 28 Sep 2013, 15:33

Well said, Leah! How many of the houses in town used to be useful shops ... ALL of them?

Sat 28 Sep 2013, 09:02

It was a drapers,and clothes shop for years, so that was a lost asset, much more than a cafe

Sat 28 Sep 2013, 00:18

My memory was that the owner (Peter) wanted to open in the evenings as well as the day, because there are better margins for restaurants if they can serve evening meals. I believe neighbours didn't want it to open in the evenings, just like there was opposition to a chip shop down that way, too. Noise, traffic, smells ... etc. I used to l-o-v-e that coffee shop, and still have one of the paintings from it. A lifeline when I had my first child and could meet up with other mums in the back room for hours at a time, our little babies asleep while we tried to get our heads around the responsibility of new humans in our care. I wish I'd got his recipe for chickpea pancakes -- man, they were wonderful! As were the danishes on Saturdays.

Fri 27 Sep 2013, 16:31

Interesting to hear about the cafe and the issue with the cooking extractors - I live up Bayliss Yard and would love to see that shop in use - it's been empty the whole time since we moved in (3 years ago). The old extractor fans are still there at the end of the lane - why couldn't they be replaced? Was it a noise issue?

Thu 26 Sep 2013, 17:28

Two or three Jon, I went on it
Plus Jane no longer works for the Wychwood Project.

Thu 26 Sep 2013, 16:15

How many years ago was that?

Thu 26 Sep 2013, 14:24

www.charlbury.info/events/1829

Thu 26 Sep 2013, 08:58

Probably a maintenance work party to keep the face cleared (this is what makes it an SSSI, damage to the worked face will result in the site losing its status) and they may well also have been doing routine maintenance on the rest of the area (clearing scrub etc). I do remember being told there was going to be one, but can't remember when it was as this was a few months ago.

Thu 26 Sep 2013, 08:48

I also used to walk there daily and saw the 'large black cat' on several occasions there. I was told that they had found some interesting fossils in the quarry which is why it was closed off and the police notices put up but haven't heard anymore since.

Thu 26 Sep 2013, 00:54

Speaking of quarry, what was going on inside there the other day? Chopping trees or digging up rocks? I sure miss walking there, pushing my child in a buggy and being able to see wild strawberries, woodpeckers, and all sorts of interesting wildlife. I realise it's private and an insurance risk for the owners, but it would be such a beautiful nature reserve.

Wed 25 Sep 2013, 17:03

Jon, the quarry has been mentioned several times in the CLP feedback, along with public access to it, but as it's privately owned I'm not sure what the answer might be. Certainly it's also been suggested as a spot for development of housing as well. As for the cafe, I understood that the restrictions on fitting improved cooking extractors, relative to residential properties was the issue, but I stand to be corrected.

Wed 25 Sep 2013, 16:42 (last edited on Wed 25 Sep 2013, 16:47)

Walking up Quarry Lane the other day I realised how the town quarry has disappeared off the local radar. If you talk to people who have moved here in the last 3 or 4 years, you find they don't know of its existence. People don't realise what lies behind those iron gates. Yet a walk from one end to the other is similar in distance to the combined length of The Slade and Sturt Road, or a walk through the town centre from Fiveways to Nine Acres Thames Street! You can see it on the satellite view here: goo.gl/maps/ENlE7

Before it was fenced off with barbed wire and threatening signs, it offered a beautiful walk close to the town centre and completely on the level, so excellent for elderly walkers. The sides are lightly wooded and provide a wonderful haven for all kinds of flora and wildlife.

I then realised that the former cafe and restaurant in Sheep Street is also fading from local memory. Now screened with dirty blinds, the long shopfront on the left as you walk towards the Three Horseshoes hides what used to be a cafe/restaurant and reading/eating area, with a small gallery/exhibition space behind. People are asking for a 'proper' cafe in Charlbury, yet suitable premises are already in place, but left unused. You could fit a wifi cafe, information centre, bookshop and more in there.

Has anyone else got 'lost assets' to add to this list? Are these things we should be trying to recover for the community, as part of the Community-Led Plan?