Pill Community Forum

Environmental Improvement Group

 

The group has now met twice, although we would be delighted if more people were to join us with their ideas and energy.  This note is intended to do two things:

Ø      Give an update to people we think might be interested – including members of the Forum and Parish Councillors, but many others as well

Ø      Encourage people to put themselves forward to get involved in key activities

 

We have three main ideas for action:

 

1. Creating An Archive Of Photographs On The Community Forum Website

Charles Exley, who is going to be setting up and managing the Community forum section of the developing Parish Website is being consulted about this and has indicated that there should be no technical problems.

The idea is that the archive (which might include documents as well as photos) would provide a developing historical record of the Parish to be sued for all sorts of purposes, including support over planning issues.

 

2. Encouraging Pride in Our Village Environment

Our Parish is a wonderful place to live: anyone who doubts this just needs to talk about all that goes on here to friends from other places to realise how lucky we are.  Small things, though affect on our perception of this and, for some people, make their lives much more difficult.  We are thinking of things like:

Ø      litter	Ø      overfull litter bins
Ø      pavements blocked by parked cars	Ø      overhanging branches
Ø      fast traffic	Ø      dog mess

 

We hope to encourage the formation of small groups of people who will take some responsibility for an area of the village – perhaps their own street or little area, or perhaps a more public area.  Obviously, we’d want to co-ordinate this with the Village Orderly and – as far as possible – the North Somerset services.

 

3. Supporting Energy Conservation And Small Energy Schemes

An increasing number of towns and villages in the UK are signing up as ‘Transition Towns’ – Bristol has declared its intention of becoming a Transition City!   These are places that are committing themselves as communities to preparing themselves for the time – not far ahead – when energy supplies are much scarcer and more expensive than currently.  They do things like:

Ø      Promote ideas about energy conservation	Ø      Help people with conservation steps
Ø      Encourage local shopping and local food	Ø      E.g. provision of low energy light bulbs
Ø      Reduce plastic bag use	Ø      Help people understand the environmental costs of flying
Ø      Encourage fuel efficient driving	Ø      Encourage public transport use

 

There are lots of other ideas – see for example www.transitiontowns.org

 

We hope people will be enthusiastic about these ideas:  will you join us?

 

 

 

Madeleine Bickle, Bob Langton, Peter Milner

May 2007