The Feasts of the Sea Fest was was on down the seafront when I went pars and ought to be worth a visit if you are wondering what to do today.
The Manston issue does seem to be moving forward, with the
cpo by TDC I am reminded of the person with the hammer and the screw, where
having banged in the screw with a hammer they are now looking at the slot in
the screw where the screwdriver goes and the hammer and trying to make some
sort of connection.
What about our Labour PPC then? Well frankly he still seems pretty convincing to me and I guess UKIP must be only too aware of how he beat them in the county council elections. In with a chance do you think? Personally having voted for both Labour and Conservative PPCs in previous elections, the deciding factor for me is will they make a good constituency MP? I don’t consider my own solitary vote makes any difference to the national political result but do what I can to help select an MP who is at least going to answer my emails personally and perhaps have some sort of input on local issues.
On to the latest Manston auction, how much did the stuff fetch? Well as you can see from the link the fire engine made £7,450 and if you click on the green arrow buttons you can see what the rest of it made http://www.ppauctions.com/lot_closed.php?l_id=52251&id=126&search=chocks&cat=all&perPage=20&sort=2&thisPage=1&account=no one way to spend your evening I suppose.
On the bookshop front we are still fairly busy at the moment
and have seen a definite improvement in book sales so far this year.
I was sitting sketching the ceiling and drinking a coffee in
Waterstones the big chain bookshop at Westwood Cross yesterday trying to ponder
where UK bookselling is going.
The physical book as opposed to the download, E-book and so
in has definitely not had its day, but a lot of what the big chain booksellers and
publishers are doing at the moment suggests a bit of a misunderstanding about
what is actually going on.
On the one hand in my bookshop, the non-fiction books that
are selling are the ones least like websites, where either the information
contained in them just isn’t on the internet or the formatting of the book is
not like the formatting of websites. On the other hand a great many on the new
non-fiction books coming out, when you open them up and look inside seem to
look more and more like websites.
I guess the key issue here is the manufacturers, publishers
in this instance, but I guess it would apply to a lot of products, need a way
of getting their products on to the high street so people can handle them and
compare them with similar products made by different manufacturers.
The rub here is that it has become cheaper for the retailer
to have products on a warehouse and sell them via a website.
One of the up and coming shop businesses at the moment are
art galleries and what they do is to charge artists a fee to display their work
for a period of time and take a percentage of the selling price of what
actually sells.
There may be lessons here to be learnt by the retail world,
as far as I know the only general independent bookshop that is much larger than
mine, Baggins in Rochester, does this.
Though honestly when it comes to new books selling at what
in the rather crazy modern retail world I can only describe as the full price, I
would say with the very large W. H. Smith and Waterstones at Westwood Cross
Thanet has more retail space devoted to sales than is warranted.
Looking at the two relatively small Albion Bookshops and
Geerings that closed when they opened and considering that my own sales, where
the average book price is probably around an eight of theirs, I haven’t seen a
very noticeable change in the demand for books in Thanet since they opened.
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Anne Cloag made a mint from that fire engine! "the fire engine made £7,450,000".
ReplyDeleteIts becoming more and more attractive to build on brown field sites with yesterdays announcement by the government to give 20% discount on 100,000 houses for first time buyers under 40. Paid for by giving house builder tax incentives. Now that might distort the local housing market.
Funny, but your calculation of how much the fire engine made looks as though it is as wide of the marks as a lot of the comments on here. It didn't make £7.4 million. Great creative accounting though.
ReplyDeleteWhoops Anon 5.39 busy day I have corrected the error, thanks for pointing it out.
DeleteYoung Scobie rolling away from an airport and CPO. Dithering over pleasurama. Sounds like a feather in the wind.
ReplyDelete£7M for a fire engine? Did it include the other manston junk?
Reality has dawned within the Labour Group. They have now realised that they've made a complete mess of things. They started looking for an indemnity partner before ascertaining that a CPO was either legal or feasible. Now, they are lining up to ditch Iris and to vote against the CPO. The interesting thing will be the Tories. We know that several Tories are concerned about the financial implications of a CPO which could drag on for years. But Bob Bayford is trying to butter up the SMA supporters by telling them that Labour has dragged his feet and that, on his watch, things would have moved along a lot more smartly. I can see him whipping his councillors to vote in favour of CPO. We know that the Labour old guard (Johnston, Harrison and Nicholson) will vote for it because they can't stomach the idea of anything other than an airport. Looks like the vote will go in favour even if every councillors in Ramsgate votes against.
ReplyDelete............................................................................The Real Truth About Pleasurama.........................................................................................
ReplyDeleteFriends Of Ramsgate Seafront (FORS) fb group, today posted a video of Cllr Ian Driver and 2 high profile members of FORS purposely delaying, with an aim to preventing the building of the development known as the Royal Sands development on Ramsgate seafront by getting the council to vote on a delay, what I assume they thought was, important information. The reality was a stalling tactic dreamed up by Cllr Driver. You can hear him proudly say at the end of the video "how it may take 2-3 years for Thanet council to get the site back then we can get something we want there" The problem being Cllr Driver is using 2400+ members in the same way as SMA group do. Misleading Thanet council into thinking this is the view of the majority of concerned residents when in reality it only represents very few people (70) at the most. This would not be so bad if the aim of the group was clearly defined on their page but nowhere on FORS fb page does it say that their aim is to delay or prevent the development being built. The really sad thing is, that they have no hope of getting what they want, even if Thanet council do take legal action against the developer and, in the unlikely event win and regain the site, Thanet council will be bound by their code to get the best value from the site and sell to another developer who will argue that their are to many shops in Ramsgate already and no demand for a hotel from hoteliers. Setting the stage for a huge block of flats with a higher price tag to the development allowing Thanet council to pass this huge eyesore past planning in the knowledge that it will boost the tax coffers more than the original development would have, as the developer wont have to build less profitable retail units or hotel. This will leave Ramsgate a poorer place having nothing on its beach front apart from flats completely backfiring on its instigators who wanted leisure activity's on the site.
Actually the council are not bound by any code to get the best financial value for the site, both best value and best consideration give options to address value in terms of social and environmental impact as well.
DeleteWell done Chris thanks for pointing that out, The problem with our fine council is they are a little shy of doing environmental impact assessments (EIA) Just ask the good people of Ramsgate who had to endure Manston for so many years without one...
DeleteOh I don't know Andy H, the good people of Ramsgate had not objection to Manston in 1940.
DeleteA little shy of flood risk assessments and cliff foundation surveys too perhaps. I think saving Manston did have an answer which was to petition KCC to acquire the airport and look for funding and partners for a mix of aviation heritage, regional airport and aviation related light industry. I think this could perhaps have stood a chance of succeeding and wouldn’t necessarily have even gone to a cpo. Now with the discovery park on one table and stuff like airfreight hub and aircraft dismantling on the other, you just have two proposals that may or may not succeed and the cpo legislation bound to come down on the side of the existing owners. What worries me is the council don’t seem to have done the proper things, getting a public consultation going to support spending money based on public opinion, and carrying on spending what looks to a hundred grand of council tax on pursuing a solution that just wont work and has unknown public support. A huge rub being sign the petition to save the airport is one thing and sign the petit on for a freight hub and scrap yard theta you can’t fly off on holiday from is something else entirely.
DeleteMichael you know that the cliff face has a inspection ever 2 years and has had a number of reports in recent years. Manston has never had a EIA in all the time its been an airport.
DeleteOm, bit of a tangled web you are weaving here, the cliff façade has had two TDC inspections, one in 2005 when I made a fuss about the state of it, this resulted in about £1m being spent on it, and one about three years ago when I made another fuss, this resulted in a schedule of work which wasn’t done and the promise to inspect it every three years. What Manston failed to do at the request of the EA was to get an environmental permit EP, this would have been the first stage, next would have been a planning application for the airport (the airport has never been granted planning consent as an airport which is why it operated on S106), part of the planning application would be an EIA.
DeleteSomeone has a very fevered imagination at 2:38 in the morning. 2 high profile members of the Conservative party maybe especially in view of the fact that members of the public cannot speak at a council committee!!
ReplyDeleteBarry, You are one of the people in the video, Playing Ian Driver like a ventriloquist dummy, I'm surprised Ian manages to buy a paper without you behind him telling him what to say. Its a shocking show of how our democratic system can be manipulated to favour a very few. I do hope other Cllr's are reading this and watch the video for themselves before its removed.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
DeleteAndy you will remove that comment at 12:51 as Ian Driver is his own man and as far as I am aware only 2 people were filming and both from the public gallery. therefore I could not have been in any video. If you believe others were videoing the proceeding they failed to ask permission from anyone in the Public Gallery. If you listened to Jo Gideon she expressly states filming people in the gallery is not allowed.
DeleteBTW who s the very few and why when you post as Purple OM do you need to resort to anon as well?
Barry do you think that the people who came down to the hands around the pleasurama protest knew that FORS intention was to stop any development there, and continuing the blight for at least 5 more years (3 to get it back and 2 to get anything else though planning and built) Or do you think that they were there to protest to get rid of the building site and get something built? The 6 people that I bought down who have nothing to do with FORS just thought they were there to help put pressure on TDC so TDC could put pressure on SFP and they did. Now we have a chance to get rid of SFP and get a long stop date put into a new contract with a good company whose track record is fantastic. With one of the best modem plans I have ever seen that benefits Ramsgate as well as the developer. TDC are going to get the land revalued but this will be hard to pinpoint because of whats going to be built there. The more Ramsgate gets, the less the value of the site ie retail units and hotels are worth less that luxury flats but worth more to Ramsgate's economy.
DeleteTwo major issues.
ReplyDeleteI think the key to the Manston issue is that the council is engaging in expensive and time consuming activities related to a cpo based on perceived public opinion without first having a public consultation.
The discovery park proposal by the new owners is a total game changer and there doesn’t seem to be anything in the rules relating to cpos that would make one viable in the face of this new development.
With the Pleasurama issue the politics and the past recriminations don’t really take any one anywhere, the real issue relates to practical considerations over the cliff and se defence. I don’t see how any development on the site can proceed without a proper and independent evaluation about what can practicably be done on the site. A very cursory glance at the current condition of the cliff façade combined with the consideration that had the development been built on schedule, it would either be in this condition with people living under it or the development would have had to be evacuated because of cliff condition or someone would have had to fork out a huge sum of money on repairing it in a thirteen foot canyon. This then brings up the further consideration as to whether the development or part of the development would have had to have been evacuated while repairs occurred and what compensation costs would have been involved.
Yes the cpo and airport is finished. Pleasurama is finished. Both sites need cleaning up and new plans. Tdc seems incapable of doing this so far so we need a change.
ReplyDeleteAnon I think it’s called an election unless you are considering a coup d'etat, in practice this means voting for the people the local political parties have selected from what looks like a fairly limited number of people who first would be prepared to stand and secondly get selected.
DeleteMichael I have always considered your view to be a fair impartial and for you to have a reasonable amount of intelligence. So you can imagine my disappointment to see you talk about the cliff façade as if its just about to collapse. How many buildings are only 13ft apart with a road between them that manage to be repaired? or that the sea defences at that site would be the first to flood when you clearly know, as do other locals, that the first place would be in the harbour at the end of harbour parade. So I cant understand why your not campaigning for that to be sorted before the pleasurerama site, Not unless you are using this to further your campaign against this development.
ReplyDeleteOm the real issue with the cliff is that the façade isn’t a building and behind it is an unsupported chalk cliff. This means that the cliff partially collapses behind the façade, so you get tons of chalk pressing on the back of the façade, the first external sign of this is the panels between the pillars of the façade bulge and crack as one did just after the main repair contract and another one has now. So when you come to replace part of the façade the first thing you have to do is to remove the faulty part and as you do so tons of chalk fall out. You aren’t stupid so I doubt I would have to draw you a diagram, when they removed the last panel they did so with a long reach JCB with a spike on the end and the lumps of chalk and concrete landed up to about 6 metres away as you would expect. Now I guess you could build some sort of shielding structure that supported the lower part of the façade and remove the chalk and concrete manually, reducing the height of the support structure as you went, but this would be very expensive. As the reinforced concrete façade pillars become defective you could use soil anchors to hold them and the chalk behind them in place while you removed them manually with a pneumatic drill and acetylene cutter once again prohibitively expensive. I have discussed this with two civil engineers neither of them would wish to get involved themselves as the do public sector work but neither of them could come up with a reasonable solution other than leaving enough space to maintain the cliff for the life of the development or starting with a new façade designed to last for about as long as the development.
DeleteOm on to the sea defence issue, the development isn’t on Harbour Parade which lies behind Ramsgate Harbour, it is on Marina Esplanade and all of the other part of the Marina Esplanade frontage has recent EA maintained sea defences of a very high standard, it is only the sea defence in front of the Pleasurama site which is the responsibility of TDC and their engineer says it dates from 1860 and the council hold no plans or maintenance record for it. Now my take is that the development should have a proper flood risk assessment before any more work is done, how you can see this stance as being in some way against the development design is something I can’t understand, are you saying that you think there should be no risk assessment?
DeleteMichael I have also done some research on this matter (because of yours and Barry's public comments are worrying the novice public ) also the Labour Cllr's were handing out leaflets reassuring the public on the street because of the public comments you and Barry have been making, I wonder if you got one? Anyway I'm sure that when or if they need to remove the non-structural concrete blocks they wont just pull on the top so it falls like a tree. They will put scaffolding up and remove it top down by using one of those big long tubes with a skip at the bottom. the pillars would be a little harder but not much, again a scaffold would be erected round the pillar with netting and floors would be placed at intervals preventing any large lumps falling and a angle grinder would be used to remove the reed bars. The distance required to achieve this would be the width of a scaffold and about 1.5 ft more into the road leaving loads of room for vehicles. I do hope this clears things up and I hope this is the end of what can only be described as scaremongering the public to help your cause.
DeleteWould it be facetious of me to say, that the proximity of the building would exclude the use of wrecking ball and explosives.
Michael water finds its own level. What I'm saying is the lowest point on the whole sea defences is the harbour wall on Harbour street. The sea defences at the site are above that point so making the harbour your biggest point of concern. When taking sea level rise its not done like a inland lake its done on a average over many years so that you can have a bad day with a high tide and low pressure making the sea breach the defences but in the last 100 years last year was the worst its been and it did not cause that much damage. There are lots of things built pre-1860 and they are fine if maintenance needs to be done then I hope there is enough room between the sea and the new building if not you may have another thing to worry the public about lol.
DeleteYou know Andy I'm beginning to believe you are a well known Troll that once upon a time used to haunt this blog until he had a phone call from the police. Neither Michael or me are doomsayers however you seem to forget simple things like £900K spent in 2008 which by the end of 2009 had failed in one panel costing TDC £20K. Was that scaremongering? I do have the structural report from that incident and it doesn't make pleasant reading for TDC.
DeleteMichael just pointed out another panel is showing signs of distress, is that scaremongering?
The issue is inspections are of the facade NOT the cliff face behind, how is that scaremongering to point that out?
What is your level of expertise, a leaflet handed out by Labour, have they examined the cliff behind the facade? The same Labour group that accepts petitions from anonymous signers?
Barry your problem is you don't like anybody challenging what you say but your happy to attack people even when they are not talking to you.
DeleteAs for being the Troll you speak of why not send the police round to his/her house if you think its a police matter and see if I answer the door.
You keep trying to point out my identity even though I post on here as Purple Om. Its funny how that reminds me of resent events with a well known blogger and two SMA supporters when they found their arguments lacking. Oh well, The thing with me is I am not afraid to speak my mind even though some people try attacking someone to win their view.
Om the problem is wave action and what happens when an old stone structure like the sea defence in front of Pleasurama comes into contact with significant wave action, I have tacked a picture of what happened to the harbour wall, which is higher than the Pleasurama sea defence, last time we had a fairly large storm in 1977. The problem is that the sand in front of the sea defence nearly all went last winter, this is what I would expect to happen to the sea defence that holds the sand in place that Royal Sands foundations sit on, when we get a fairly large storm without sand in front of the sea defence. My take is that a flood risk assessment would see a new concrete sea defence put there financed by the national costal defence budget.
DeleteSorry should have read"Ihave tacked a picture of what happened... to the bottom of the post above"
DeleteI see what your saying Michael and if EA deem the sea defences lacking then they will have to reinforce them or change them completely but I very much doubt this will have any effect on the pleasurama site only as the pavilion will be first hit. I must say that with higher sea defences the beach will be less attractive. I wonder if EA could have a different approach to defending our coast by getting that huge sand shifting ship
Deletehttp://www.dredgingtoday.com/2013/05/03/new-sand-dredger-stellamaris-at-work-spain/
to replace what sand we have lost?
Andy read what I said not what you think I said. especially as I have no idea where you live and would I waste the police time necessary however when you insult me here when this discussion should have taken place in FORS I wonder at your motives.
DeleteHave you answered any question either me or Michael have asked. What research? what is the state of the cliff behind the Facade? two simple questions. It does seem you do not like being asked questions.
Barry James - you can't simply demand that people remove a post because you don't like it! Purple Om makes some valid points about your style of discussion, which can be lacking at times
DeleteThe rub here Om is that the EA have strongly recommended a site specific flood risk assessment here, but they don’t have the power to enforce it. My guess would be that both the council and the previous developer didn’t have one done as a result of the letter the EA wrote to them because they were concerned that the height of the top of the sea defence would have to go up. Of course if this happened then it wouldn’t be possible to build to the approved plans and there would have to be a new planning application. I think when Cardy’s had the foundations designed they assumed that like most of the UK coastline the sea defence was managed by the EA and therefore very unlikely to fail. Perhaps they think that if the development is built first then there is a flood risk assessment then some compromise could be reached possibly building a new sea defence further towards the sea would work, the equation is basically the further the building line is behind the sea defence the greater the wave dissipation. The sand beach worked well as wave height is soon limited to the depth of water, so a 3 metre high wave travelling across 1 metre deep water is soon dissipated to a 1 metre high wave. If you look at the planning application for Turner Contemporary where the fra and resultant wave dissipation plans were done by Wallingford’s who are the best in the UK you can see what to expect.
DeleteMeant to say The Pav is iron framed on a concrete base and has been washed through by the sea on numerous occasions.
DeleteOm thinking of your humorous comment about the scaffolding I have tacked one of the pictures of the 1958 collapse of the cliff façade at the Paragon in Ramsgate, the banana shaped objects are the RSJs that formed the framework of the building in front of the cliff façade before it collapsed without warning and demolished it.
DeleteMichael all chalk cliffs will collapse at some stage, as they say nothing stronger than gravity. If it were sufficient enough to bring the brick structure down with it then whatever was there would be flattened. Just the same as behind the amusement arcade or anywhere else
DeleteA collapse of that magnitude would take something of equal magnitude before the collapse had started, to stop it. If it started moving then it depends how much momentum it was allowed to gather before it was stopped to judge the amount of ballast you would need . As I say its just needlessly worry people. I would worry when you see a dip in the pavement or a crack big enough for you to get your fingers in.
So if you had your way Purple Om, work on construction could begin immediately, if not sooner? Just build a brick wall of sufficient strength first to retain any cliff fall?
DeleteFunny really this was one of the smallest of the Ramsgate collapses and as you can see from the debris and remaining façade was a concrete and not brick. My guess is that it was caused by water, probably a leaking surface water drain, just like all of the telltale signs are showing up the harbour end of the Pleasurama façade. If you don’t know what I mean here, large damp areas, the paint being forced of the front of the façade by the water behind, cracked areas, bulges and a large amount of vegetation growing on it. Compare this to the bit of the façade the hasn’t got the problem, the bit where the faced has rounded arches, further away from the harbour. Anyway I have added a picture of the 1947 collapse at Pegwell so you can see what I mean by a larger cliff fall, this façade was a mixture of concrete and brick.
Deletethe funny thing about you Purple Om is you don't like anyone challenging you. You are sounding quite boring now, as SEMBOB says all you want is build. Do not worry about how safe it is because you cannot afford to live there so it isn't your problem, is it!!
DeletePerhaps there are more inane statements you can share with us....and your definition of an election excludes independents and nonlocal candidates. The key point we need a change from the failed councillors probably resignation rather than election
ReplyDeleteMichael has been consistent in his concerns about the Pleasurama site. Sea Defence and TDC commitment to cliff face maintenance throughout the life of the site. Michael has never suggested that a cliff face collapse is imminent. But with chalk cliffs it is not IF but WHEN they collapse. The likelihood being there will be a collapse within the life of the site. The access for preventative action is ill thought through.
ReplyDeleteWhich would you prefer Purple Om, the cliff to be repaired after the new project, whatever that might be, goes ahead, or repair it now, while there is plenty of room? I know which I would prefer. 13ft is room for two cars to pass, but can you swing the jib of a crane of the height required to reach the cliff top? And what happens if the cliff falls while construction work goes ahead?
ReplyDeleteI challenge anybody, to show me a better building than what's proposed on the pleasurama site thats been built since the 1940s in the whole of Thanet. Just put a link to google Earth
ReplyDeletehttps://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Council+offices+Margate&rlz=1C2GGGE_en-gbGB468GB469&biw=1680&bih=925&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=B1EoVP6gMNLksATx5ICgDg&ved=0CAgQ_AUoAw#facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=LXaNrVCt2BwpaM%253A%3B4q5Es9D_cUkGqM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.thanetgazette.co.uk%252Fimages%252Flocalworld%252Fugc-images%252F276433%252FArticle%252Fimages%252F21204734%252F6188658-large.jpg%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.thanetgazette.co.uk%252FPolitical-banner-Margate-seafront-questions%252Fstory-21204734-detail%252Fstory.html%3B618%3B416
Deletehttps://www.google.co.uk/search?q=Methodist+church+Cliftonville&rlz=1C2GGGE_en-gbGB468GB469&biw=1680&bih=925&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=hVEoVNXZOZWTsQTE1IGwCA&ved=0CAcQ_AUoAg#tbm=isch&q=QEQM+Margate&facrc=_&imgdii=_&imgrc=pqJr-nCIUonuWM%253A%3ByemWiLaikqN6YM%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Flegacymedia.localworld.co.uk%252F275787%252FArticle%252Fimages%252F16021513%252F3760826.png%3Bhttp%253A%252F%252Fwww.courier.co.uk%252FPraise-East-Kent-University-Hospitals-Trust%252Fstory-16021513-detail%252Fstory.html%3B448%3B300
LOL
SEMBOB
DeleteLOL I rest my case.
SEMBOB a thing of beauty is a joy for ever
DeleteForgot The Turner Contemporary, Margate Police Station, The Marina Resort Ramsgate. And remember that they wanted to build the Turner Contemporary along side the stone jetty, till a scale model was destroyed the first time the wind got above a moderate breeze.
DeleteI am still waiting for someone/anyone to prove me wrong, a better piece of architecture since the 1940 in the whole of Thanet than what's planned for our seafront, surely there must be a cue of people out there who would like to prove me wrong. Nothing at the moment
DeletePurple Om, I think that in terms of environment and technology you will be hard pushed to beat Thanet Earth. But of course we will have to agree to differ because you will never admit that you might be wrong. As for a cue (sic) of people, I don't remember a snooker hall opening recently.
DeleteThe design may look good, but it is in the wrong place. Why not build it on the now defunct Manston runway, where it will be seen and admired from miles around, as were the Richborough cooling towers before their demolition.
Lots of views from people that have never been near a building site in their lives.
ReplyDeleteHow long do you think a crane boom is? You lot do have to stop reading other peoples views and look these things up for your selves.
A crane boom is as long as a piece of string Purple Om. Do you even know what a crane boom is? And as far as I can see Purple Om it is you who fail to look things up for yourself. You are trying to make a silk purse out of a sow's ear.
DeleteRemember sic?
http://www.kobelco-cranes.com/en/wp-content/themes/kobelco/pdf/hydraulic/SL4500-std.pdf
I am sure that the likes of Bayford and Gale will be looking to throw mud at the Labour Group, who may not have acted particularly effectively over Manston. They will be looking to find a scapegoat.
ReplyDeleteBut…
If Manston had been such a viable commercial proposition as an airport, as its supporters claim, then surely profit-motivated private investors would have made a success of it in the past, and would certainly have been queing up to try their luck in the past. You can't criticise the public sector when the commercial world has (obviously) decided the airport is a non-runner.
Gale has consistently claimed the airport is of national importance in aviation terms. Why then has not one central Government Minister - from Gale's own Party - ever shown any support for this claim? Why has there been no reference whatsoever to Manston in the current debate about the future of airport capacity in the South East. Gale, and Sandys, have kept hinting at Government support. Where is it?
Apart from the (relatively powerless) District Council, the other tiers of government are all controlled by Gale's own (Tory) Party, yet there has been no unification behind support for Manston. Indeed, as soon as the sale was announced this week, Tory KCC Leader Carter was on radio and television welcoming and praising the outcome and looking forward to a bright future for the area. Gale and Sandys have not even been able to bring their local political associates on side.
With Gale and Sandys so obviously isolated within their own Party has there ever been a realistic chance of Manston staying an airport?
The cliff faced will never fall down until it does.
ReplyDeleteHas anyone seen the new build at the end of Marina esplanade? I think this is architecture that Ramsgate deserves.
ReplyDeleteIf RS looks this good then surely we have a gem!
8:58 I think its better than that have you seen the CGI of it. Its fantastic just what Ramsgate deserves a true piece of stunning architecture. Unlike every other maxed out box planning have passed. I do think it will do wonders for the whole of Ramsgate.
DeleteOn the subject of the all too common accusation of scaremongering
ReplyDeleteThe Thor Facts from Environment Agency
The response also clarifies that there are TWO direct abstraction sites at Northwood close to the massive Sericol sourced aquifer contamination. IE Sites that have drawn up contaminated water since 1963. And, just as with Pleasurama issues, is there a compelling case for expert inquiry ? In the case of water abstraction inquiry by the Health Protection Agency. In the case of Pleasurama by Environment Agency supervised sea defence survey and cliff face survey.
I also think that as yet no one has gained the facts for the failure of the structure of the Marina Pool. Certainly council electricians working on the Marina pool were told it had a structural problem caused by water flow in the chalk below the pool. But just like Sericol. Thor and Pleasurama what is required are the facts. Because Marina Pool may be a useful precedent to take contingency against.
LTP, the FOI simply proves that regular monitoring is being done at the site, that THOR is paying for clean up and that there is no direct threat to anyone from the contamination. What basis is there for an enquiry? In what possible sense is this a threat to anyone and how is the responsible regulator failing in its responsibilities?
DeleteI am giving LTP another chance here, hopefully his comments won’t descend in a mixture of vendettas against various Conservative councillors and dubious spam like comments where links say one thing and lead to another.
DeleteIf there is a real point to the EA response it is to make me even more wary about a variety of mixed use industrial companies on the aquifer Manston, a mixture of relaxed planning restrictions in enterprise zones and the same old what looks like a drain tends to be treated like a drain is what worries me the most here.
My guess is that some of the mercury that got into the ground on the Thor site was due to workers not understanding that rainwater roof drains are not in fact drains at all but soakaways.
Anon 11.19. The FOI gives the facts of the Thor situation. And it reveals that the remediation has decades to run. The water abstraction sites are a separate issue relating to Sericol where EA say the problem (Cyclohexanone) will be for the "Foreseeable future". It was Michael who first raised the question of whether K Laundry operates on a direct abstraction licence. Now we have the facts. K Laundry and Newlands Farm have direct abstraction licences. The anecdotal information of some years ago suggested that Northwood has had a cluster of early stroke and aneurism fatalities. Thanet, as a whole, has the highest cancer mortality rates. Specialists previously employed at QEQM have spoken about Thanet's aberrant high level of ectopic pregnancy and I think polycystic ovary.
ReplyDeleteThe Kent Health Protection Agency some years ago replied that they were taking the Sericol contamination FOI facts seriously. But there was no political support to put pressure on them for an epidemiological inquiry.
Michael it is true that Iris Johnson took legal advice about two weeks ago re the Statutory Reporting Duties of Terrorism Act 2000. This is not about pursuing "Vendettas" but it is about pursuing compliance with law. I think you fully realise that this advice relates to TDC duties at Ramsgate Harbour and, in the broadest strategic context, to Manston. The situation appears to be that three former Labour cllrs and one former Chief Executive have complied with statutory reporting duties as individuals but not on behalf of TDC. And, as you seem to correctly infer, two current tory cllrs and two current Labour cllrs would appear to be in direct breach of the act.
One compliance report from a former Labour cllr does concern Thor. Anon 11.19 is attributing questions to me that I never made. A Strawman fallacy. If anon had read the FOI fully they would have seen that EA were thanked for their detailed answer.
LTP I guess the real answer here is an industrial society both increases life expectancy by its very existence, while at the same time reduces that increased life expectancy with its pollution. The key here is to get the balance right, i.e. no industrial society your life expectancy would have been around 25, with an industrial society this goes up to say 90 and then is knocked back to around 75 because of the associated pollution. My take is that the main problem pollution wise in Thanet is background particulate air pollution caused by the prevailing wind across the uk being westerly, so I guess the best solution would be to stop all those people in southern England driving, cooking and heating their homes, shops and factories. The net of this would of course be to bring life expectancy down to about 30. Of course there are different ways of looking at this problem, your error in misinterpreting the results of your foi seem to relate to your thinking that liquids flow uphill, could I ask you to read it a again and then come to a conclusion that isn’t damaging to your credibility.
DeleteLTP you'd have a better case if there was any actual evidence of harm rather than anacodes. That Thanet has high cancer rates is of no relevance to a pollution event. Correlation does not imply causation.
DeleteUnless you have specific knowledge about the geology, which all you have said here suggests you have not, then there is no case to answer - no clear epidemiological evidence, no geological way that a pollution event could get to an extraction point some miles away and so on and so forth.
What you suggest here is a massive conspiracy and I'm afraid other than you I don't see anyone buying it.
Anon 4.03. The reason there is no epidemiological evidence is that there has been no expert inquiry. The fact is that Rumfields water abstraction was switched off in 1993 immediately upon discovery of the Sericol contamination. That is a guideline for the distance at which the experts did recognise a threat. Now look at the distance from Sericol to the two direct abstraction sites Newlands and K Laundry. QED
ReplyDeleteIn fact the Kent Health Protection Agency were given a number of names, Northwood area, who had suffered premature stroke or congenital aneurism death. Plus it was suggested there is merit in examining the health histories of workforce at the laundry. With high levels of ectopic pregnancy and polycystic ovary syndrome in Thanet it is not difficult for a layman to suspect a causal effect. Because cyclohexanone is a soluble solvent that acts upon female oestregen biochemistry and can cause foetal damage.
The rational thing to do is to promote expert inquiry. To simply state that pollution is never a causation of cancer is pretty stupid anon. Asbestos for example??
Beachcombers, as it happens, have reported finding mercury at Margate beaches. The information about the waste drain in the FOI was because it was being posed as a possible route to outfall. And the EA response was that contact should be made with Southern Water. What TDC Building Inspectors required along the Ramsgate Road, for extensions, was that the drain be protected by piers and lintels and reinforcing in the oversite. After the 1987 hurricane TDC realised that many of the extensions along that length of road were on standard footings over the top of the drain. No one says that the drain lacks integrity. Because to draw a conclusion requires first an inquiry. (A point that appears to have evaded you thus far)
LTP -
DeleteAs regards your first point, even if what you say are facts it is irrelevant, given that you'd need detailed knowledge of geology to know where there was likely to be a problem with any pollution. The EA have this expertise, so you are suggesting that there is a conspiracy.
As regard your second, I suspect the HPA will only take action when alerted by qualified people, which one assumes are the relevant specialists at QEQM and the public health people. So you are implicating the medical staff and the local authority public health people into your conspiracy.
As to your third, I of course have not said that pollution is never related to cancer, but clearly cancer is not always related to pollution. There is a pollution event and there is a cancer cluster, you have added 2 and 2 to make 5 - namely that the latter is caused by the former.
As to your last, I doubt that anyone can identify mercury on a beach, least of all unqualified beachcomers. I don't understand what your point about roads has to do with anything.
You have therefore implicated a huge number of local authorities in this conspiracy of silence about a pollution event which has caused an enormous cluster of cancer. If there is anything in this claim, you'd need to have a water-tight amount of evidence to back it up - including evidence from geologists, evidence from qualified contaminated land specialists, evidence from public health people and so on. They at very least would have to say that what you say is feasible before there could be any kind of public investigation.
3:33 you re assuming the hospital etc know about the problem. They may not if the EA are being secretive about the pollution
DeleteWhy would the Kent Health Observatory not know - when their role is to monitor health outcomes in Kent? Why would the EA not know about the risk of pollution when it is their statutory responsibility to monitor it?
DeleteWhy should we believe that a random anonymous commentator on a blog knows more about this than the people whose job it is to monitor?
Clearly conspiracies do happen but in order to have any credibility you have to have a lot of facts which are currently missing about geology, pollution monitoring and epidemiology. If you really believe there is a cover up, get proper advice from professionals rather than posting conspiracy theories in blog comments.
Michael I regret that you have indulged Strawman fallacy to the point of absurdity. I have a minds eye picture of you in WW2.
ReplyDelete"Oh we can afford to ignore doodlebugs because there is something more serious out there".
You accuse me of misunderstanding that water flow down hill. Ignoring U tube effects and the effects of pumping then apply your gravity argument. There are two ground water contamination sites. One is downhill from the other. Which way does the contamination flow between the two sites.
Given that authority demonstrated that it recognised risk at the site of a Water Authority abstraction station were direct abstraction sites at the same or less distance also at risk ? Looking at the safety data on the chemical is there risk from skin absorption ? Does that risk exist for solvent coming out from solution in laundry and argricultural use ? I dunno. Nor would anyone until there is epidemiological inquiry.
I am reluctant to say "Blighted" but how long (say compared to Pleasurama) will Thor site be frozen in time ? When will mercury remediation begin ? Will Thor comply with EA recommendations re surface concrete integrity and best remediation technology ?
Should Thanet rely on what you "Guess" or on what experts find ? And if experts find there is no health adverse consequence then so be it. But answering people on blogs who assume they already know the answers is condoning fools Michael.
The fact is you raised the question on blog whether K Laundry was on direct abstraction. Then YOU left it. Now here is your answer. And somehow you "Guess" that your own original question was without merit ? Laughable
Look at it like this LTP if you really feel that you have a valid Thanet issue which makes proper sense outside of normal historical pollution issues across the whole of the UK then start your own blog about it.
DeleteThe reason for this is very simple and boils down to you either stand by what you say and are prepared to put your name to what you say, or you are just making wild conjectures with nothing to back them up and the posting them here as psedondomouse comments which I just don’t have time to validate so I just delete them like I have just done with your last comment.
Frankly anyone can comment under any old pseudonym that the moon is made of cheese and then add masses of unsubstantiated reasons why this may be the case, but I have a life to lead and don’t have time to research what may be nonsense or may be the truth or may even be a tangled mixture of both.
Personally I have very little interest in digging around for old recriminations and am much more concerned about plans for future industry here being better controlled over the next 20 years.
On the U tube front, consider the chalk as most similar to a large bathroom sponge that is wet at the bottom and dry at the top, so I suggest you wander of to your bathroom, wet the bottom of the sponge and apply some oil and some solvent to the top and see what happens.