Headington Headlines #40

TonyOX3

Headington’s Christmas lights have been funded entirely by local businesses and voluntary organistations. The Council turned down an application for support, but local Councillors have chipped in from their discretionary ward budget.

In an event organised by Churches Together in Headington on Friday children and a donkey walked from St Andrew’s Primary School through Headington to All Saints Church knocking on inn doors. The donkey was later spotted being led down the main road.

Pickets were out at @Oxford_Brookes on Wednesday morning as part of the public sector workers’ strike over pensions, and protestors later joined the parade through the city centre.

Road works and diversion signs obstructing cycle paths and causing cyclists to ‘swerve’ into the road or onto pavements got surprisingly wide coverage and attention. Well, I was surprised anyway.

A taxi driver was robbed in Osler Road early on Monday morning, having been threatened by a group of men who got into the taxi at the Shell garage on the London Road. @TVP_Oxford appealed for witnesses and on Friday announced that six men had been arrested and bailed.

Bad feeling between Lord Mayor Elise Benjamin (@EliseDB)and John Kelly (ex Oxfordshire CC emergency planner) broke out again over the Mayor’s attendances at the repatration tributes near the entrance to the JR Hospital. Mr Kelly’s complaint has been rejected.

There was a complaint about deliveries in the middle of the night to the Keraleeyam Stores (London Road).

A planning application 11/02584/FUL to convert two retail units at 293 London Road (near Northfield Road) to hot-food takeaways was refused.

News broke that another pub is to close – The Crown & Thistle in Old Road.

Active topics on the Headington & Marston e-democracy forum this week:

  • Thornhill Park and Ride….again

  • Northway Pharmacy

  • Headington Car Park

  • Renaming places

  • Keraleeyam Stores

  • Crown and Thistle

  • Church Bells in Ferry Rd, Marston

I try to cover news from the OX3 postcode in Headington and out as far as Barton, Sandhills and Risinghurst (see map). To feed into next week’s summary you can comment on this article, or tweet either with the hashtag #ox3 or @mentioning @TonyOX3.

Oxford Twitter Choir

TonyOX3

I’ve been on twitter for about a year now. I think I’ve avoided becoming a twitter obsessive but I enjoy using it – it’s fun, amusing, and informative. But if for me it’s just an indulgence it’s particularly nice when it can be the means of doing something real and positive.

The Oxford Twitter Choir @OxTwitChoir was created out of nothing a year ago by @Ox_Bex. A group of people who had either only ‘met’ on twitter, or had met in the real world through twitter, got together to sing Christmas carols at the Oxford Castle Christmas market in aid of charity. I’d only just started tweeting so didn’t feel right about going.

But a year later I’ve (real world) met quite a few of the Oxford twitterati and ‘met’ and chatted with many more. So when @Ox_Bex announced a repeat performance in aid of Sobell House Hospice I agreed to go along.

Which is how yesterday I joined up with around two dozen others at the castle clutching our song-sheets and determined to sing as loudly as possible in the hope that something tuneful would emerge and people would give lots of money. Gareth Malone would be proud of us – this was genuine grass-roots community singing in action. With a few notable exceptions none of us had any discernable singing training, but does that matter? Gareth would surely say ‘No’.

An hour from 12.00 to 1.00, a pub lunch break, and a repeat performance from 2.30 to 3.30 may not have had the Castle crowds rocking around the Christmas tree, but it did tap their generosity to the extent of raising £200.45 for Sobell House.


Photo: @OxfordCityGuide

So well done to everyone who turned out, but especially to @Ox_Bex who organised it all, and a special ‘thank-you’ to the students from Stanford University who have been here this term and who came along to sing as part of our choir.

Headington Headlines #39

TonyOX3

Here is my round-up of local news for the week 21 – 27 November —

News broke that the City Council will not designate Headington car park as land for housing in the forthcoming Policy and Preferred Options Document. While local residents and businesses celebrated, accusatory squabbles broke out between Labour and LibDem councillors and supporters over who should take credit: the LibDems for opposing it all along, or Labour for listening to people’s concerns.

It looks like another contest may be brewing between Northway residents who want to get land between the Ring Road and Northway designated a Town Green to prevent it being used to build access roads, and the City Council who apparently are threatening to ‘appropriate’ it.

Six student community wardens have been appointed by @Oxford_Brookes to patrol the Gipsy Lane, Cheney Lane and Divinity Road areas. The wardens will patrol in pairs, with each area having at least two two-hour patrols a week.

Thames Valley Police has charged a 27-year-old man with seven counts of theft from motor vehicles in Cheney Lane, Headington in October, and a Headington man was arrested on suspicion of a sexual assault in Marsh Road, Cowley

My favorite Headington-related tweet this week:

Active topics on the Headington & Marston e-democracy forum this week:

  • Road signs in cycle lanes

  • Headington Car Park

  • Road signs in cycle lanes and Gritting

  • The Brookes bus

I try to cover news from the OX3 postcode in Headington and out as far as Barton, Sandhills and Risinghurst (see map). To feed into next week’s summary you can comment on this article, or tweet either with the hashtag #ox3 or @mentioning @TonyOX3.