The gritting of roads is one of the most important tasks that Wolverhampton City Council’s Highways department is responsible for during the winter months.

In this behind the scenes video we find out about the team behind the gritters that go out in all conditions to keep the city’s road safe.

Video: Wolverhampton Today @ YouTube

To celebrate the Queens 60th year on the throne Woodend Community Association in partnership with Wolverhampton City Council are organising the planting of thousands of daffodil bulbs in the shape of a 60 that should bloom in time for the celebration. If you would like to take part in this celebration and volunteer to help plant the bulbs please attend:

The Back Field (at the back of Orchard, Woodend and Bellamy Road) on Wednesday 9th November 2011, between 10am and 12 noon.

Please contact Woodend Community Association for further details: c/o 98 Orchard Road, Wednesfield or tel 07538 807 622 / email woodendca@aol.com.

Next community meeting

The next Woodend Community Association meeting takes place on Tuesday 15th November, 2011 at the Braybrook Centre from 6:30pm. (school next to Bellamy Lane Field—entrance off Bellamy Lane)

Download the agenda for the upcoming meeting here.

Image, creative commons: Freefotouk

Great news today as the war memorial in Wednesfield which was targeted by vandals / metal thieves has been restored to its former glory in time for next week’s Remembrance Sunday commemorations.

Two bronze plaques on the War Memorial commemorating the 174 names of people from Wednesfield who died in the First and Second World Wars were stolen by thieves in May.

The plates have now been replaced with new bronze plaques which were installed this week thanks to funding from West Midlands Police, the War Memorials Trust and Wolverhampton City Council.

The new plaques have been embedded in the granite memorial which stands in the Garden of Remembrance on Church Street, just behind the old Library building.

New names added after appeal

They record the names of 112 people who fell during the First World War and 62 people who laid down their lives in the Second World War. The latter includes the names of an additional five local people identified through an appeal led by former Wolverhampton Mayor Phil Bateman.

Councillor Elias Mattu, Wolverhampton City Council’s Cabinet Member for Leisure and Communities, said: “The restoration of the Wednesfield War Memorial is great news for the local community and it is very fitting that it has been completed in time for this year’s Remembrance Sunday commemorations.

“The people who vandalised the memorial earlier this year clearly have no conscience and no respect for the men and women who have given their lives to help make our world a better place.

“The thefts rightly caused great outrage among veterans and local residents and I would like to thank everyone who has been involved in the memorial’s restoration which will enable the people of Wednesfield to pay tribute, once again, to those who laid down their lives for their country.”

WV11 would like to say a personal thanks to West Midlands Police, the War Memorials Trust and Wolverhampton City Council for making sure this important piece of local history was restored.

Photo: Cabinet Member for Leisure and Communities Councillor Elias Mattu, Police Community Support Officer Steven Simpson and Wolverhampton City Council’s Parks District Manager Steve Male and Historic Environment Officer Jon Beesley inspect the restored memorial.

Update: 10th October

The Express & Star have reported that the contamination has now spread to Short Heath and over 10,000 fish have died.

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Thousands of fish have died in Wednesfield after contamination caused by a recent fire in Bilston has spread to the Wyrley and Essington canal.

It’s thought that around 5,000 fish have died as the result of water pollution caused by chemicals entering the canal system after the fire at an industrial site in Millfields Road, Bilston last month.

Both British Waterways and The Environment Agency are working to clean up the contamination which has affected the Birmingham Mainline canal and the Wyrley and Essington canal.

British Waterways spokeswoman Sarah Brudy said: “The chemicals aren’t like oil, they’re dissolved in the water so it’s case of waiting for them to dissolve.”

The leaked chemicals have caused the level of oxygen in the water to drop dramatically and as a result thousands of fish are suffocating.

A spokesperson for the Environment Agency said: “We are currently aerating the water at a number of sites to contain the incident and prevent further fish mortality.”

Ms Brudy added: “We are hoping it’s going to get better but with chemicals in the water it’s a case of monitoring and testing the water.”

Thanks to WV11 reader Ian Mundy who sent us the above photo which was taken on the canal near Bentley Bridge yesterday –  Ian counted over 170 dead fish.

As we mentioned during our live updates from Tuesday 16th August PACT meeting, Steve Male (who we incorrectly named as Steve Hale at the meeting) from Wolverhampton City Council Parks department was there to talk about the use of the parks in Wednesfield and asked if anyone would be willing to fill in an on-line survey.

We now have all the details and if you have 2 minutes to fill in this short (very short) 5 question survey I’m sure Wilf  the Park Ranger would be grateful.

The park survey can be found here.

You can read updates from Wilf and find out more about the work the park rangers do on the Wolves Parks blog “Wilf’s World”

Guest writer Dave Taylor writes about how the Express and Star are costing Wolverhampton tax payers money in order to write biased and negative stories about the city:

I’m not going to pretend that I am a fan of my local newspaper. The Express and Star on many occasions seem to revel in the negativity that blights my local area. With the recent riots still in the memory I do feel that people like the Express and Star don’t help matters by keeping the amount of positive stories about an area to a minimum. How can we expect kids to have respect for an area when the so-called local media will almost exclusively focus on the negatives.

A perfect example of this happened yesterday when the Express and Star front page was dominated with a “recycling story”. The Twitter feed reads:

Amount of food waste collected in slop buckets in Wolverhampton falls every month since introduction http://bit.ly/p2liwi

So let’s get a few facts out of the way. I am a resident of Wolverhampton and since the introduction of this scheme the Express and Star have maintained the biased stance of referring to this food recycling scheme as “slop buckets”. The negative connotations here are obvious. It is, therefore, no surprise that the Express and Star were also quick to pick up on the slow uptake of this scheme. Of course, it’s hard to say if there was slow uptake or if it was just the E&S bias coming into play. It’s also hard to say if the “slow uptake” was actually caused by the amount of negative press the E&S have given this story.

It is this cause and effect that is the reason for this rant. The E&S have filed a freedom of information request to get this information, which has cost the council money to process (reportedly £100 per request). Maybe the residents of Wolverhampton need to ask if this bastion of local journalism has done nothing more than waste public money and massage the facts to fight their own little battle.

The problem here is critical thinking. Even if less food waste is being produced why does this story imply that this is a bad thing? The issue is that the food recycling scheme deals with “food waste”. The key word here is “waste” and while the E&S would like to imply that a reduction is about the failure of the scheme and a waste of public money I would like to present a different hypothesis.

As a Wolverhampton resident I partake in this scheme and while I was initially sceptical I gave it a go and our household discovered an interesting thing. It makes you more aware of the food you are throwing away. Separating it almost makes you look at it and go, hang on, we bought that and never used it. Combine this with the belt tightening every household is going through and it’s no surprise that my household has seen a reduction in food waste. Is it beyond the realms of possibility that his is happening in other households in Wolverhampton? That others are wondering around supermarkets and thinking, “Don’t buy that, we threw the last lot away” and putting it back on the shelf. If this is the case then it’s a great thing. A wonderfully positive thing. A thing that should be celebrated. We are wasting less. Go Wolverhampton… you’re great. You waste less. Well done. Of course, that’s not something I’d expect the E&S to publish.

Now unlike the E&S I will present another hypothesis. It could be that people are now thinking, “I can’t be bothered recycling” and throwing the food waste into their main bin. It could be that this scheme has been a waste of public money but the problem here is that the information presented by the E&S doesn’t suggest that. It suggests that they’ve taken a “statistic” which could have a positive or negative angle and immediately jumped on the negative. Surely, residents of Wolverhampton, if this newspaper is forcing our council to spend money answering Freedom of Information requests we should at least expect them to write a balanced story as a result?

I’ll repeat that:

If this newspaper is forcing our council to spend money answering Freedom of Information requests we should at least expect them to write a balanced story as a result?

It seems obvious that the answer to that is, “yes”.

Of course, I’m not naive. The E&S is not the only media outlet to focus on the negative for sales. Most of them do it. And neither are they the only media outlet to be biased. Most of them do that as well. But if we can all think a little more critically about the information presented to us we wouldn’t fall for these tricks and maybe it would influence our decision on if we should buy their products.

I will also point the E&S to this page. It will be interesting to see if they are non-biased enough to retweet my message to them. I doubt it, but I do hope I can make one journalist there think before sending off for Freedom of Information requests and then writing a biased article. By all means file Freedom of Information requests but the subsequent article should be “fair” and “non-biased” otherwise they are wasting the money of the local council and therefore the local people. And if local journalists are not there to help local people then they really have to question if they are doing the job they should be.

Thanks to Dave for allowing us to re-publish his blog post. You can read the original on his blog.

Pupils at Oak Meadow Primary are getting the first glimpses of their new £7m school building.

Work on the Wednesfield school’s new accommodation began in September and is progressing well, with the building’s timber frame and roof now in place and the external doors and windows currently being installed.

The development of Oak Meadow’s state-of-the-art accommodation is being carried out by Midlands-based Thomas Vale Construction as part of Wolverhampton City Council’s £16.6m Primary Capital Programme, which is transforming education for primary age pupils by giving them learning environments fit for the 21st century.

Councillor Phil Page, Wolverhampton City Council’s Cabinet Member for Schools, Skills and Learning, said: “I am delighted that work is progressing well at Oak Meadow Primary School. The new school will transform the way that learning is delivered and will provide environments that engage and inspire young children, their teachers and the wider community.

“Thomas Vale Construction worked with our architects, Architype, on the award-winning St Luke’s Primary School in Blakenhall, and I hope that they will be able to create another award-winning school for the young people in Wednesfield.”

Oak Meadow Primary School headteacher Sara Morris added: “It is exciting to see all our work throughout the design process now becoming a reality. We are delighted with the progress already made on the school and are looking forward to seeing the internal areas taking shape over the coming months.”

“In order to commemorate our existing school building, we will be hosting a Celebration Day on Wednesday July 6, 2011. There will be singing, dancing, sport, refreshments, raffles and stalls. All former pupils, staff and governors are invited to come along and join in the celebrations and see Oak Meadow in all its glory.”

The new building will be able to accommodate 420 pupils and is one of the first schools in the country to be built to ‘Passivhaus’ standards, meaning it has been designed to use up to 90% less energy for heating and cooling than standard buildings.

The whole building will be wrapped in several layers of insulation and made extremely airtight, meaning any heat put into the building cannot escape easily. Large windows, made of highly insulating triple-glazed glass, allow the heat from the sun into the building, while heat from cooking, lighting and computers and the body heat of pupils and teachers is captured to replenish any minor heat loss.

Windows can be opened in the summer to allow excess heat to escape and fresh air to come into the building, while in the winter, warm stale air is extracted through a heat exchange unit bringing fresh air in from outside, heating it up as it passes.

The school will also benefit from state-of-the-art ICT facilities, with digital displays in the entrance and learning areas enabling pupils to share their recent school activities.

The new school hall has been designed so that it can be transformed into a performance area with state-of-the-art sound and lighting facilities, while the school is also planning to launch its own radio station to enable parents to tune in to hear about pupil activities.

The new building is being constructed alongside the existing school to minimise any disruption. Once the external doors and windows have been installed in the frame of the building, work will commence fitting out the internal areas of the school.

Oak Meadow’s new building is expected to open to pupils this autumn, at which point the old building, which was erected in the 1960s, will be demolished and the land re-developed as playing fields.

To find out more about Wolverhampton’s Primary Capital Programme, please visit www.wolverhamptonbsf.org.uk.

To see a picture of staff and pupils inspecting the work on their new school, please visit www.twitter.com/wolvescouncil or click here.

Source: Wolverhampton City Council

Every three months Wolverhampton Homes walks around estates and neighbourhoods with residents and other interested parties – e.g. local councillors, Wolverhampton City Council representatives, Neighbourhood Wardens and the Police – to identify any issues that affect the estate’s appearance.

These might include: Untidy gardens, Abandoned vehicles, Litter or Vandalism

The aim of an estate inspection (or evaluation) is for residents to work with Wolverhampton Homes to improve their neighbourhood. Suggestions (e.g. security lighting, car parking or gating) can be made by participants to help improve the appearance of their area.

Why should I get involved?

By taking part, you will have the opportunity to give your opinions and ideas on how to make your neighbourhood a better place to live. You will also be able to see the improvements taking place as a result of your involvement.

How do I get involved?

If you want to take part in an estate inspection, or find out more, please contact Homes Direct on 01902 556789, or visit your One Stop Shop.

You can find the dates for inspections in Wednesfield (which are split into groups of streets) here and more information on inspections here.

UPDATE: Have your say in our Facebook Poll.

Traders in Wednesfield are calling on residents to join them in voicing opinions over what they are calling “major issues” with people drinking in the High Street.

Wednesfield Business Association chairman Jason Gessey is calling for ‘no drinking zone’ around the High Street in order to combat the problem of people drinking and being drunk whilst loitering outside local shops and business frontages.

Residents and local tradespeople are being asked to post their views on the Wednesfield Business Association forum so that comments can be passed onto local Councillors.

You can register and post your comments on the Wednesfield Business Association’s forum here.

If you wish to send letters on this issue, please send them to: Andy Dixon, 31 Lichfield Road, Wednesfield, WV11 1TF or email info@wednesfieldbusinessassociation.co.uk.

If you are have any difficulties registering and using the forum, please contact Andy Dixon on 01902 858143, he will be more than happy to assist.

Demolition began this week at the former Danesmore Park Primary School site in  Ashmore Park, Wednesfield.

The school in Russell Close has been closed since December 2007 and was the victim of a major arson attack in October 2010, resulting in a large section of the roof being declared unsafe. Since then the perimeter has been secured and demolition experts moved in to begin clearing the site on Monday 21st February, 2011.

A Wolverhampton City Council spokesperson said:

“The demolition contract for Danesmore School commenced on Monday (Feb 21) and is due to completed by May 2011. The site will be left secure, clear and free of all buildings.

“The site of the school building and the adjoining site of the former Coppice Close Community Centre have been declared surplus to the requirements of the council and will be marketed for sale as a complete site in due course.”

This brings to a close the long-running controversy around the closure of the primary school (the only one in Ashmore Park with it’s own swimming pool and a dedicated Special Educational Needs unit) and hopefully the clearing of the derelict site will mean it no longer attracts anti-social behaviour.

Photo: Google Maps