Skip to content or view mobile version

Home | Mobile | Editorial | Mission | Privacy | About | Contact | Help | Security | Support

A network of individuals, independent and alternative media activists and organisations, offering grassroots, non-corporate, non-commercial coverage of important social and political issues.

Town centre demolition hits more problems

Keith Parkins | 16.07.2007 15:39 | Health | Repression | Social Struggles

Following numerous dangerous incidents putting public and workers at risk, the demolition of Farnborough town centre appears to have ground to a halt.

'It is just wonderful to see the demolition work start.' -- Peter Moyle, leader, Rotten Borough of Rushmoor

'Our persistence and commitment to the development has finally paid off and in no time at all residents will start to see Farnborough Town Centre transformed into the shopping centre everyone wants.' -- Andrew Lloyd, chief executive, Rotten Borough of Rushmoor

'I am thrilled that the redevelopment of Farnborough town centre is now moving ahead.. With the demolition work under way, it won't be long before the town centre will be transformed.' -- Peter Moyle, leader, Rotten Borough of Rushmoor

Arena is a rubbish magazine which for most people on receipt goes straight into the bin.

In the latest edition (July 2007), leader of the Rotten Borough of Rushmoor Peter Moyle demonstrates his usual depth of ignorance and contempt for the local community.

After five years of false promises that the demolition of Farnborough town centre was about to begin and regurgitated by a subservient local press as news, the demolition of the town centre finally got underway May 2007.

The site was surrounded by a rickety 6-foot corrugated metal fence offering no protection to the public whatsoever from dust and flying debris. Heavy machinery was on site, grinding away at the buildings.

The inevitable happened, a piece of flying debris shot out from the site, missing the head of a woman by inches (had she been hit she would have been seriously injured or killed), and landed at the feet of two members of the public standing nearby and having a conversation.

The projectile (retained as evidence), appeared to be from one of the steel reinforcing rods, several inches long, an inch in diameter, razor sharp ends and weighing roughly one and a half pounds.

The Health and Safety Executive were notified re concerns site safety. Almost 6 weeks later, they have not reported back or provided requested documents, including a site risk assessment.

HSE were asked to produce a site risk assessment and to shut down the site until such time as a risk assessment was carried out and the site properly screened.

One week on from the first incident, the same member of the public had a piece of heavy masonry fall at his feet.

Following this incident, the road has been sealed off, diversion signs hammered into the street. The diversion signs are not legal as they obstruct the highway, have damaged public property.

Last week there was a further incident which appears for the time being to have shut the site down.

There was dust everywhere, which people were breathing in. Gregs the Baker, all surfaces were covered with a film of dust.

There is asbestos on site which no attempt has been made to remove before demolition began.

This is the site that Moyle is so happy to be associated with, but then he and the borough chief executive Andrew Lloyd have been having regular secret meetings with the developer for several years in order to promote the agenda of the developer.

The redevelopment with which Moyle and Lloyd are so proud to be associated with, involves the destruction of a viable town centre, many small businesses have been driven out of business and the town centre is now a ghost town, half the town centre is to be demolished for superstore, which will face out of the town centre, social housing of 28 maisonettes is to be destroyed to provide a car park for the outward facing superstore. The cream on the cake will be a bingo hall on top of the superstore!

Last week, Peter Sandy, until recently a councillor in the Rotten Borough of Rushmoor, had to appear before the Adjudication Panel for England facing nine charges of treating officials with disrespect, bringing his office and the council into disrepute. He was cleared of seven out of the nine charges.

It begs the question who is bringing their office and the council into disrepute?

Websites

 http://www.thetruthinrushmoor.gov.uk/
 http://www.heureka.clara.net/surrey-hants/

References

Bulldozers herald £80m town centre revamp, Arena, July 2007

Peter Moyle, Make the most of the summer, Arena, July 2007

Keith Parkins, Town centre demolition danger, Indymedia UK, 8 June 2007
 http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/06/373015.html?c=on

Keith Parkins, Peter Sandy cleared of nearly all allegations, Indymedia UK, 13 July 2007
 http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/07/375903.html

Keith Parkins, Who runs your local council?, Indymedia UK, 16 July 2007

Keith Parkins
- Homepage: http://www.heureka.clara.net/surrey-hants/

Additions

dust everywhere

17.07.2007 15:10

reduced to a pile of rubble
reduced to a pile of rubble

no protection for the public
no protection for the public

road sealed off
road sealed off

diversion signs obstructing highway
diversion signs obstructing highway

asbestos shed and chimney
asbestos shed and chimney

The work has recommenced with heavy equipment. There is dust everywhere. No attempt to damp down.

The Dry Cleaners in the Mead, Classic Cleaners, adjacent to the site has everything covered in dust. Clean dresses are covered in dust. The cleaners is a BookCrossing zone. The Books are covered with a film of grey-white dust.

 http://www.heureka.clara.net/books/bookcrossing.htm

Today is a very windy day, making a bad situation much worse.


Keith


Upcoming Coverage
View and post events
Upcoming Events UK
24th October, London: 2015 London Anarchist Bookfair
2nd - 8th November: Wrexham, Wales, UK & Everywhere: Week of Action Against the North Wales Prison & the Prison Industrial Complex. Cymraeg: Wythnos o Weithredu yn Erbyn Carchar Gogledd Cymru

Ongoing UK
Every Tuesday 6pm-8pm, Yorkshire: Demo/vigil at NSA/NRO Menwith Hill US Spy Base More info: CAAB.

Every Tuesday, UK & worldwide: Counter Terror Tuesdays. Call the US Embassy nearest to you to protest Obama's Terror Tuesdays. More info here

Every day, London: Vigil for Julian Assange outside Ecuadorian Embassy

Parliament Sq Protest: see topic page
Ongoing Global
Rossport, Ireland: see topic page
Israel-Palestine: Israel Indymedia | Palestine Indymedia
Oaxaca: Chiapas Indymedia
Regions
All Regions
Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World
Other Local IMCs
Bristol/South West
Nottingham
Scotland
Social Media
You can follow @ukindymedia on indy.im and Twitter. We are working on a Twitter policy. We do not use Facebook, and advise you not to either.
Support Us
We need help paying the bills for hosting this site, please consider supporting us financially.
Other Media Projects
Schnews
Dissident Island Radio
Corporate Watch
Media Lens
VisionOnTV
Earth First! Action Update
Earth First! Action Reports
Topics
All Topics
Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista
Major Reports
NATO 2014
G8 2013
Workfare
2011 Census Resistance
Occupy Everywhere
August Riots
Dale Farm
J30 Strike
Flotilla to Gaza
Mayday 2010
Tar Sands
G20 London Summit
University Occupations for Gaza
Guantanamo
Indymedia Server Seizure
COP15 Climate Summit 2009
Carmel Agrexco
G8 Japan 2008
SHAC
Stop Sequani
Stop RWB
Climate Camp 2008
Oaxaca Uprising
Rossport Solidarity
Smash EDO
SOCPA
Past Major Reports
Encrypted Page
You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.
If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

Global IMC Network


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech