In which one playground shuts and another is sealed off from the public before it even opens, in a chilling warning for the future of local government.
That legally the council have to choose between opening the playground and being able to contest that the developer failed to deliver what was promised it a truly awful indictment of the system.
Not all Parish Councils are the same. I saw the way the wind was blowing nearly a decade ago and have worked with Willand Parish Council (Devon) to take away control from housing developers and the district council. This post is 5 years' old. https://excelsiorgroup.co.uk/choosing-the-right-equipment-for-your-local-park/
We've recently renovated another park in the village with similar equipment.
One parent moaned to me today, 'I took Arthur down there but there were too many children playing and we couldn't get on.'
Too many children playing on the new equipment in the park....
How many villages have that problem in the UK?
Work with the PC, put the right equipment in there and the children can play... for free!
It should also be noted how much we have, for want of a better word, "privatised" these services. And I don't mean that we sold off the parks and created Municipal Parks PLC, but that private competition came along and many people prefer it, and don't mind paying for it.
Go to a town park, and the cafe is run by amateurs, so the coffee isn't very good or maybe they just don't bother opening. The toilets are broken. The swings are broken. There is broken glass on the floor. We've run this experiment of not having park keepers, of not locking up parks at night, of not prosecuting firmly for decades without anyone saying that it isn't working. We have plenty of park management at every council. My local park has its own website, with directions to get there by car or train as if it's Kew.
Every provincial town in England has an old warehouse or two that was turned into indoor play areas. With soft foam everywhere, with trampolines, slides, with names like Jungle King and Jolly Roger Adventures. You pay a bit of money and your kids get to run around. Apart from being great fun, it's properly managed. Oh and it's warm. The coffee is good, the toilets work, none of it is vandalised as its protected, and even though you have to pay extra to get it, you'd rather do it. BTW there used to be one in a listed, award-winning Richard Rodgers designed building.
If that park that is closed was a business, with paying customers, they'd be getting the situation resolved, wouldn't they? But the people in local authorities don't see it quite like that. They make sure the websites about the parks are updated (even though everyone knows where the local park is) but not fixing the swings.
And I think what happens is that once people stop using the park, they don't want to spend much on it.
With reference to footnote five, I once saw an episode of Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares where the only menu item he liked at a failing restaurant was a baked potato, so he forced them to reopen as a baked potato restaurant. It did not go well. Restrict your MBA course to the first couple of series, maybe.
That’s actually a better MBA lesson than most. If you’re in 3 markets and only good/competitive in one of them it’s often wiser to figure out how to do more there, and abandon the others. Trying to recover failure is much hard per than people think.
Just potatoes is a bit extreme, but the line of thinking is interesting.
Central Bedfordshire is made up of villages and small towns, and the populations of these places are skewing disproportionately older compared to larger, more urban areas ... If residents are pouring a growing portion their pay into a black hole and seeing only decay and decline and shittier services in return, how on Earth can you expect them to be happy with that? How do you justify it to voters? And where is the plan to change it?...The development was highly controversial because it involved building something in Southern England that people could live...
This is very much not the point of this excellent post, but I think The Avengers was done for by the terrible nineties Thurman/Fienes movie. I would LOVE for someone to bring it back, but the property was mauled so badly I doubt anyone sees it as viable (though a revived James Bond might send producers looking for more sixties IP to revamp I suppose, so maybe there's still hope).
With all these things, I think you have to find someone who loves the old property, who gets why it works and can also update it.
One of the differences between Star Wars and the Marvel Cinematic Universe is that the former hasn't adapted to threats being about terror groups rather than national governments. Star Wars is about Nazis and Soviets. Large countries invading us, using weapons of mass destruction (death star=nukes). China isn't going to attack everyone that buys goods from them, and Russia is no longer a superpower, more a bunch of scumbags with arms.
(I have a take that James Bond doesn't work any more because going to Istanbul costs £60 from Gatwick with Wizz Air)
That legally the council have to choose between opening the playground and being able to contest that the developer failed to deliver what was promised it a truly awful indictment of the system.
Not all Parish Councils are the same. I saw the way the wind was blowing nearly a decade ago and have worked with Willand Parish Council (Devon) to take away control from housing developers and the district council. This post is 5 years' old. https://excelsiorgroup.co.uk/choosing-the-right-equipment-for-your-local-park/
We've recently renovated another park in the village with similar equipment.
One parent moaned to me today, 'I took Arthur down there but there were too many children playing and we couldn't get on.'
Too many children playing on the new equipment in the park....
How many villages have that problem in the UK?
Work with the PC, put the right equipment in there and the children can play... for free!
It should also be noted how much we have, for want of a better word, "privatised" these services. And I don't mean that we sold off the parks and created Municipal Parks PLC, but that private competition came along and many people prefer it, and don't mind paying for it.
Go to a town park, and the cafe is run by amateurs, so the coffee isn't very good or maybe they just don't bother opening. The toilets are broken. The swings are broken. There is broken glass on the floor. We've run this experiment of not having park keepers, of not locking up parks at night, of not prosecuting firmly for decades without anyone saying that it isn't working. We have plenty of park management at every council. My local park has its own website, with directions to get there by car or train as if it's Kew.
Every provincial town in England has an old warehouse or two that was turned into indoor play areas. With soft foam everywhere, with trampolines, slides, with names like Jungle King and Jolly Roger Adventures. You pay a bit of money and your kids get to run around. Apart from being great fun, it's properly managed. Oh and it's warm. The coffee is good, the toilets work, none of it is vandalised as its protected, and even though you have to pay extra to get it, you'd rather do it. BTW there used to be one in a listed, award-winning Richard Rodgers designed building.
If that park that is closed was a business, with paying customers, they'd be getting the situation resolved, wouldn't they? But the people in local authorities don't see it quite like that. They make sure the websites about the parks are updated (even though everyone knows where the local park is) but not fixing the swings.
And I think what happens is that once people stop using the park, they don't want to spend much on it.
With reference to footnote five, I once saw an episode of Ramsey's Kitchen Nightmares where the only menu item he liked at a failing restaurant was a baked potato, so he forced them to reopen as a baked potato restaurant. It did not go well. Restrict your MBA course to the first couple of series, maybe.
That’s actually a better MBA lesson than most. If you’re in 3 markets and only good/competitive in one of them it’s often wiser to figure out how to do more there, and abandon the others. Trying to recover failure is much hard per than people think.
Just potatoes is a bit extreme, but the line of thinking is interesting.
Even Henry Ford had an off day :D
Central Bedfordshire is made up of villages and small towns, and the populations of these places are skewing disproportionately older compared to larger, more urban areas ... If residents are pouring a growing portion their pay into a black hole and seeing only decay and decline and shittier services in return, how on Earth can you expect them to be happy with that? How do you justify it to voters? And where is the plan to change it?...The development was highly controversial because it involved building something in Southern England that people could live...
Hmmm... if only these facts were linked somehow
This is very much not the point of this excellent post, but I think The Avengers was done for by the terrible nineties Thurman/Fienes movie. I would LOVE for someone to bring it back, but the property was mauled so badly I doubt anyone sees it as viable (though a revived James Bond might send producers looking for more sixties IP to revamp I suppose, so maybe there's still hope).
With all these things, I think you have to find someone who loves the old property, who gets why it works and can also update it.
One of the differences between Star Wars and the Marvel Cinematic Universe is that the former hasn't adapted to threats being about terror groups rather than national governments. Star Wars is about Nazis and Soviets. Large countries invading us, using weapons of mass destruction (death star=nukes). China isn't going to attack everyone that buys goods from them, and Russia is no longer a superpower, more a bunch of scumbags with arms.
(I have a take that James Bond doesn't work any more because going to Istanbul costs £60 from Gatwick with Wizz Air)
Tbh the whole post was an excuse to ask for an Avengers reboot, the rest is incidental. But yeah, that film was a disaster 😢.