The Bradley Stoke Journal

Councillors on Bradley Stoke Town Council say they will consider supporting a scheme to reduce CO2 emissions and cut electricity bills by turning off some of the town’s streetlights overnight, but only if the financial savings are passed on to local residents.

South Gloucestershire Council (SGC) has been trialing overnight  switch-offs in the village of Charfield since June 2009 and is now looking to extend the scheme to other towns and parishes.

A similar scheme has recently been introduced on stretches of the Avon Ring Road, where switching off 35% of the streetlights is expected to yield savings of £12,000 per year.

SGC says the scheme will only be extended to areas where full consultation has been carried out in advance with the local town or parish council, police, the fire brigade and other partners:

“Only when there is agreement between organisations would that area be considered to take part in the trial.”

Town Clerk Sharon Petela’s suggestion that Councillors might like to consider introducing the switch-offs in Bradley Stoke received a frosty reception from Cllr Robert Jones (Conservative), who expressed concern about the costs of a consultation exercise and how the money saved might be apportioned:

“I don’t think we should be expending [Town Council] officer time if we get no benefit. If SGC saves money, it should be Bradley Stoke that benefits – not the whole of South Gloucestershire.”

The discussion gave Cllr Julian Barge (Conservative) another opportunity to engage in one of his regular rants against the “one way” flow of money from Bradley Stoke into the coffers of SGC, citing police staffing, youth provision and litter collection as areas where the Town Council had felt it necessary to supplement inadequate funding from SGC.

A greener note was sounded by Cllr Jon Williams (Liberal Democrat), who suggested that Councillors needed to be thinking of the “bigger picture”, namely the environment.

The Three Brooks Pub in Bradley Stoke is to host a series of sport-themed events to raise cash for Sport Relief.

Wii Sports fans can enter a Round Robin Tournament on Wednesday 24th March, featuring bowling, tennis singles and tennis doubles. The tournament starts at 7pm and will run until approximately 10:30pm.

The pub’s  Wii console will be available for half hour practice sessions from the morning of Monday 22nd March. Tournament entry costs £3; half hour practice sessions £2. The prizes for the tournament will be ‘bar tabs’ valid at the Three Brooks.

A charity bikeathon will be held from Friday 26th to Sunday 28th March. There will be a stationary bike (sponsored by Bradley Stoke Leisure Centre) in the pub from 11am – 11pm on each of the three days.

The pub will be looking for people to participate in the bikeathon in half hour sessions. A raffle will be held for everyone who takes part, with prizes ranging from memberships of Bradley Stoke Leisure Centre to ‘bar tabs’ valid at the Three Brooks.

Non-cyclists will have the opportunity to enter a ‘Guess the Distance’ competition, where people can try and guess the total distance that will be cycled over the week.

Saturday 27th March sees a sport-themed Fancy Dress Night (£1 advance; £2 on the door), with special sport-themed cocktails available at the bar.

The final charity event will be held on Saturday 3rd April -  a live band night featuring Rockmungus. All ticket monies (£1.50 advance, £3 on the door) will go to Sport Relief.

The British National Party (BNP) has announced that it is to contest the Filton and Bradley Stoke (FABS) parliamentary seat at the upcoming General Election.

The news, which the BNP claims will “shock the party’s opponents”, was revealed in a posting on the far-right party’s website on Saturday (13th March).

The article names “lifelong Bristol resident” David Scott as the party’s prospective candidate for FABS.

Mr Scott is said to have seen active service with the local County Infantry Regiment and his children “have all attended South Gloucestershire Schools”.

Other minority parties to have recently announced prospective candidates for FABS are The Green Party with Lon Lucas, and the United Kingdom Independence Party (UKIP) with Neil Dowdney.

The campaigns of the main party candidates have so far had little visibility in Bradley Stoke, with as yet no party leaflets arriving at Journal HQ and no presence at events held in the town. If we have missed something, please leave a comment to let us know!

Ian Boulton (Labour) has been the most active candidate in the online media, with regular updates on Twitter and, since yesterday, a video entitled “Local Roots, Local Knowledge” on YouTube.

The Liberal Democrats have renamed their local party website the “Peter Tyzack” site, where the latest article promises smaller class sizes for South Gloucestershire schools. Elsewhere, Mr Tyzack has been critical of South Gloucestershire Council, which he says hasn’t cleared rubbish from the Gloucester Road (A38) in Patchway since the Conservatives took control in 2007.

The Conservative’s Jack Lopresti, hot favorite for the FABS seat, prefers to boast about the achievements of South Gloucestershire Council on his personal website – with articles about cuts in bus funding imposed by the Labour government and the district’s recently announced “lowest ever” Council Tax rise.

More info: 2010 General Election in Filton and Badley Stoke

Thursday night’s International Women’s Day celebratory event  organised by Southern Brooks Community Partnership (SBCP), once again attracted a large and enthusiastic crowd to Bradley Stoke Community School (BSCS).

The evening kicked off with performances from the BSCS salsa band and a musical performance from local girl group ‘Raise Your Voice”.

This was followed by an international fashion show, choreographed by Furo Sefia of African Elegance, and featuring some stunningly colourful African and Asian costumes.

The awards ceremony for the Poetry and Photography competition (a new feature this year) began with a moving recital of four of the poems entered, before Cllr Heather Goddard, Executive Member for Communities at South Gloucestershire Council, announced the winners and presented the prizes.

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Panoramic photographs of virtually every street in Bradley Stoke have today been made available on the Google Street View website.

The search engine and mapping giant has extended its controversial street scene recording service to cover 95% of the homes in the UK.

Launched in the UK in March 2009, the service previously covered the central Bristol conurbation, but didn’t extend beyond Filton to the north.

Images of the area around the new Tesco Extra store in Bradley Stoke show the new town centre still under construction, meaning that the pictures were taken sometime before October 2008.

Google has come under fire from critics who claim that the detailed pictures represent an invasion of privacy but the company counters this by pointing out that Street View only shows imagery visible from public roads. The service also uses technology that automatically blurs both faces and licence plates.

To use Street View, go to Google Maps, type in an address or post code and drag the yellow ‘peg man’ symbol onto a street shown in the main map display.

Spotted something interesting or bizarre in the Street View images of Bradley Stoke? Leave a comment on this post to share your discovery.