buses

Headington Headlines #49

TonyOX3

Here’s my weekly round-up of local news for 6 – 12 February —

New timetables for bus routes 8 and 9 were announced, with a start date of 19 February. It’s claimed they allow more time for buses to get onto the Green Road roundabout in the mornings, and that they will schedule more buses on the Barton (8) route.

Two local schools are on the list of 10 Oxfordshire primaries to be converted to academy status under a government schools improvement policy. They are St Nicholas Primary School, Raymund Road, Old Marston and Bayards Hill Primary School, Waynflete Road, Barton. I blogged about an astonishing interview about the proposals with the County’s Cabinet Member for Scools Improvement, Melinda Tilley, and there’s a comment on the blog in support of St Nicholas’ School.

Consultation on two big Council planning documents opened this week: the Sites and Housing Development Plan Document (SHDPD) and the Barton Area Action Plan (BAAP). The documents can be downloaded here (SHDPD) and here (BAAP). You are constrained to comment in the format required by the Council. I have extracted the OX3 sites in the SHDPD into a handy annotated map to make it easy to see what the document has to say about them(*). I hope to write more on the Barton plans over the next few weeks.

Local Councillor @RuthWilk and Highfield Residents’ Associations’ Patrick Coulter met County officers at a site meeting to discuss the Lime Walk/All Saints’ Road junction and other road works in the area. Ruth’s report is here.

A 15-year old girl was sexually assaulted in Quarry Road on Monday. The police are appealing for witnesses and information.

The Masons Arms (@The MasonsArmsHQ) is looking for evening and weekend bar staff. No experience required.

Lazy Gamer, @LazyGamerUK, a new computer games and comics shop is due to open on London Road (opposite Domino’s Pizza) on Friday 17th. Their website is still under construction.

This map shows the location of some of the places mentioned in this report.

My favorite Headington-related tweet this week:

(*)The extracts from the SHDPD in my annotated map are taken from the version that went to the full Council in December. I haven’t checked to see if there are any material changes.

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

  • New Lime Walk and All Saints junction “improvements”
  • London Road – closure of cycle lane
  • Leak/blocked drain at St Andrews Road/ Dunstan Road junction

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.

Headington Headlines #23

TonyOX3

Here is my weekly round-up of news for the week 25 – 31 July.

To my deep dismay the new combined ticketing and revised bus schedules meant the end of the 7C bus route. Both operators now use 8 for Headington/Barton and 9 for Headington/Risinghurst. The Oxford Mail (reported via This Is Oxfordshire) said the new ticketing system is “a great success” but this was based on a couple of vox pops and spokespeople for the Council and the bus companies. I haven’t seen any real information yet about how the scheme’s operating. My highly unrepresenative personal experience backed up by comment on the e-democracy forum seems to show that the timetables aren’t working yet and buses are still travelling up and down the London Road in convoys. The joint ticketing seems to be working, though, and has been well received even though the night buses and the 700 route are not part of it.

An ‘eco’ car rally set off for Pall Mall from Broad Street on Sunday morning, passing through Headington en route. Headington car park has an electric vehicle charging point.

The route of the Oxford half-marathon on 25 September will take the runners through Headington Quarry: Beaumont Road, Quarry Hollow, Quarry Road, Old Road and Morrell Avenue.

Dinner lady and cleaner Beryl Chidlington retired from New Marston Primary School this week after working there for 47 years.

Both Bury Knowle Park and Brookes’ Headington campus were given Green Flag Awards by Keep Britain Tidy. Bury Knowle Park hosted an open-air screening of “How To Train Your Dragon” on Sunday evening.

Planning consent for @UniofOxford‘s Old Road campus development was recommended for approval to the East Area Planning Committee.

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

  • Joint Bus Ticketing Starts 24 July
  • Sikh temple in Cherwell Drive
  • Londis corner shop in receivership
  • Rosemarys Restaurant
  • 700 Not In Smart Zone
  • I’d rather have a Tesco than a KFC
  • Temporary car park proposed at Harcourt Hill …
  • Can anyone recommend a good electrician?

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.

On The Buses with EF Language School

TonyOX3
The Oxford News and Times have been carrying stories and letters about the anti-social behaviour of language school students in Headington parks. I’ve certainly seen the litter – there was a collection of about 18 lager cans at the Pullens Lane end of Cuckoo Lane the other week. But my gripe has been about the buses.


About a week before the end of July I was on a bus going into the City which stopped at the top of Headington Hill for a crowd of young people sporting EF bags. There was a young man with them whose sweatshirt announced him as “Staff”, though he too was clearly not English. The bus driver had obviously had the experience before – he turned off his engine. He then very patiently spent ten minutes explaining how and where they could buy bus passes, then issuing individual tickets to more than a dozen students in turn. Finally the bus set off. And then they all got off at St Clements!


I wasn’t looking forward to having the same experiences over the rest of the summer so I phoned EF Language School to ask if they could do anything about it. Why, for instance, couldn’t the “Staff” be briefed on the bus ticket system before they took charge of a party? Why not buy the passes in advance? The School Director was not available to talk to me but I was put through to someone else. He listened courteously but took the line that these weren’t EF Language School students, they were students brought to Oxford by EF Language Travel (EFLT). EFLT, he said, was a different company although part of the same organisation and with an office on the EF site. While not speaking for EFLT he suggested that the problem may lie with the fact that EFLT groups sometimes bring their own Leaders (“Staff”) who themselves weren’t familiar with Oxford and with socially acceptable behaviour.


The spokesman said he would pass my enquiry to a colleague in the EFLT office and ask them to call me back, but that was the last I heard.


But maybe my call didn’t fall on deaf ears, because over the past few weeks none of my occasional bus journeys into the City have been held up by groups of EF students. Instead, I’ve seen several groups walking down Headington Hill towards the town centre. Has there been a change? Or have I just been lucky?