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Councillors Refuse Permission for More Floodlights at Tennis Club
This evening I watched councillors refuse a planning application from Cambridge Tennis Club on Wilberforce Road. The club had applied for permission to put up floodlights on three currently unlit courts. The Vote Cambridge City Council don’t record which why councillors vote, even on matters of substantial public interest such as this application. I have […]
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Cambridge City Council Harassing Students for Council Tax
Given the importance of research students to the City of Cambridge it is astonishing that the City Council has recently increased the level of harassment to which they subject those working towards a PhD. The council is sending council tax bills to research students. This has been a problem for many years, but in the […]
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Cambridge City Council Decide to Make a Huge Leap Forward In Terms of Openness and Transparency
A buffet was provided for councillors and officers during a break in the meeting. I was hungry so I took up an offer of a sandwich. There were no professional press present. I guess I got the sandwich which would have otherwise been offered to them. (Photos of the meeting itsself were not permitted) I […]
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Stagecoach Managing Director Outraged at City Council Proposals to Confiscate His Business
At Cambridge City Council’s Strategy and Resources Scrutiny Committee on the 29th of June 2009 a paper was made available to the public containing an email from Andy Campbell, the Managing Director of Stagecoach Cambridgeshire. The Sustainable Communities Act 2007 has prompted the City Council to consider, and make central government aware of, what powers […]
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Cambridge City Council Adopts New Protocol for Making Decisions on Tree Works
People find it easier to deface notices of tree works and put their own notices on trees than to object formally to the city council’s proposals. Cambridge City Council’s new policy for consulting on tree works was taken to the Council’s Strategy and Resources Scrutiny Committee on the 29th of June 2009. I had commented […]
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Rare Outbreak of Common Sense as Cambridge City Council Shelves “Tree-Chess” Plans
Substantial plans for felling, transplanting and planting trees on Midsummer Common, Jesus Green and New Square were taken to Cambridge City Council’s West/Central Area Committee on the 30th of April 2009. The plans involved: Playing chess with the trees on Jesus Green, moving them into straight lines. The felling of healthy trees on New Square […]
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Love Cambridge Partnership Fails to Fulfill Promises
As of the 1st of April 2009 the Love Cambridge Partnership took over running City Centre management from the City Council. The primary argument for establishing a new organisation was that private companies would be more willing to contribute funds to an organisation independent from local government and not subject to local government bureaucracy. Love […]
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Looking into the Folk Festival Mistakes
On the evening of Monday the 30th of March 2009 Cambridge City Council’s Civic Affairs Committee considered a report into how the council came to lose £644,951 which was not paid to the council by the company it appointed to sell Folk Festival tickets online in 2008. I have written a previous article on the […]
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New City Centre Signage for Cambridge
Cambridge City Council’s Strategy and Resources Scrutiny Committee on the 16th of March 2009 discussed the new signage proposed for the city centre. My responses to the consultation on the proposals which was held in May 2008 are available via this link; we are yet to see how many, if any of the suggestions for […]
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Residents’ and Retailers’ Advocates on the Cambridge City Council City Centre Management Partnership
I am writing from Cambridge City Council’s Strategy and Resources Scrutiny Committee. Using the opportunity for members of the public to ask questions at council meetings I asked who had been appointed to the residents’ representative and independent retailer representative on the new city centre management partnership – “Love Cambridge”. I noted the published timetable […]