Local Green Space for Winnersh
Liberal Democrat Councillor for Winnersh ward Learn more
by Prue Bray on 23 June, 2011
If the Hatch Farm Dairies application goes ahead then Wokinghan Borough Council will have to fund and build part of the Winnersh relief road – from Reading Road by the M4 bridge at Winnersh Farm to King Street Lane, by the other M4 bridge.
Next week at the Borough Council Executive meeting the Conservatives are going to approve the spending of £300,000 from accumulated developer contributions (where accumulated from the report doesn’t say) on their part of the road. What will that buy? Modelling, apparently. Not actual road.
The full cost of the council’s part of the road is estimated in the report as £3 million. All of it is to come from developer contributions. That’s an awful lot of development!
Don’t get too excited about the £300,000 either. Because they are only planning to spend £50,000 of it this year. The rest of it will be spent “over a number of years”.
How long is “a number of years”? I can’t actually ask at the Executive, because, this being Wokingham, I am only allowed one question per meeting – and seeing as there was no mention in the Forward Programme of anything about the relief road coming to June’s meeting, I have already submitted a question about library privatisation. So I will have to ask outside the meeting and hope for an answer. And if I get one, I will let you know what it is.
2 Comments
At Bearwood Primary School ‘Wokingham Borough Council has insisted that the (standard admission) number remains at 41 and the school finds an appropriate working solution’ whilst not providing funding for additional resources. I get the impression that the Council is unwilling or unable to make necessary investments at Bearwood Primary School whilst the Hatch Farm Dairies Planning Application is being considered. (Why spend money on a facility that might not be there in a couple of years time?)
This has caused conflict between some of the parents and the school administration, at a time when no PTA exists to facilitate dialog between parents and teachers.
I think the reason for this is likely to be exactly what you have put in your comment – that the council don’t want to spend money on the current buildings while Hatch Farm Dairies is being considered. I am not sure there is a solution to that – except to get a decision on Hatch Farm Dairies, one way or the other. I did not know that there is no PTA. Perhaps the new school year in September will offer an opportunity to start one?