Play out in Kings Heath

Swan Corner Community Group and Woodcraft Folk South Birmingham want children to be able to play freely outside their own front door.  That's why we're really excited about Playing out, and why we're playing out Wheelers Lane for a third year running, on 7th July 5:30 to 9pm.

Active Parks have helped organising with Birmingham City Council and will bring archery, tennis, badminton, basketball, skittles, giant snakes and ladders, skipping ropes and more.

Conversation in road improvement

Accidents on Swan Corner in past 10 yrs
crashmap.co.uk

Swan Corner roundabout is an accident blackspot, with about 20 reported accidents in the past ten years, causing many more 'serious' and 'slight' injuries - it's also right outside Swanshurst School, and next to my house.

Consultation on road changes can be challenging - Who should be involved? How important is their perspective?  Swan Corner Community Group grew from the first (failed) consultation for roundabout improvements in 2013-14.  How likely could the views of a school (parents and children), a pub (both the owner and customers), road users and local residents be properly taken into consideration to make our roads safer?

It appears Garry Dalton, Hall Green District Engineer, has succeeded in gaining approval for plans - improvements based on the previous plan from two years earlier - to make road improvements for 'Safer routes to school'.

So what's been different from last time?  Here's some of the differences

• 20mph campaign, raising awareness of our dangerous roads.  Swan Corner Community Group (SCCG) have also successfully campaigned for Brook Lane to be included in Kings Heath 20mph zone, being implemented as I write.
• SCCG initiated work with Swanshurst School to develop conversations between residents and  Swanshurst school on issues important to both, in particular Travel to Swanshurst.
• SCCG ran it's own transparent online survey to contribute to Garry's paper form, open for all to see online - Plan for Safer route to Swanshurst and results from responses,
• We also organised a public meeting to solely discuss the road improvements, and was a main agenda item on many more SCCG meetings

The road improvements haven't happened yet, and its only a hunch, but I can't help feeling open transparent conversations between residents, the Council, the school and other interested people could be making the difference between plans going forwards or backward.

Part of #29daysofwriting - http://staffrm.io/stories/discover

Plan for Safer routes to Swanshurst

 As part of 'Safer routes to school' there are significant plans to improve access to and from Swan Corner roundabout outside Swanshurst School.

Safer routes to school is part of a wider Birmingham City Council strategy.  Swan Corner roundabout is an accident blackspot, it's great that it is getting proposed for improvements, but the consultation and the changes need to be right.

Please take part in our survey before 8th December to raise concerns or show your support for changes being suggested.  We are also hosting a Swan Corner meeting 7pm on 8th December either at the Billesley Pub or in the Sixth Form room, Swanshurst School (TBC)

Swan Corner News update

SWCG Next MEETING Tues 10th November 7:30-8:30 pm The Billesley Pub - All welcome!

Roads resurfaced overnight

Roadwork signs joined our Swan on the roundabout as Amey completed maintenance work on the roundabout and along Brook Lane throughout October.

Follow the signs

Alright, so it's not the most exciting photo opportunity, so well done Cllr James McKay for smiling for the launch of Birmingham Road Safety Strategy consultation document, 'setting out Birmingham Council’s approach to making our roads safer for all'.  As photo opps go, I guess it beats scowling at grafitti, and there's no doubt speed kills.

20s plenty have over 250 campaigns running across the UK, and the list of towns and cities adopting a 20 mph limit for most of their streets is ever growing.  Merton Council have recently produced a comprehensive report documenting the impact 20mph has had in Camden, Islington, Kingston, Bristol, and more widely.  The evidence is pretty clear:

Know your neighbour

Best not to cut yourself off from neighbours

Last week it was time to put letters through the doors to invite everyone to our community group. It's a job I quite like doing, and one which our kids are always happy to volunteer for.  We were also delivering a first letter inviting residents to take part in 'Playing out' on two late summer afternoons.

Playing out is where we close the road for traffic for neighbours to meet up and play.  Wheelers lane is particularly lucky in that it has a stretch of green between the road and the houses which, when the service road is closed, is big enough for a game of football.  Local residents who have been there a while say kids used to play regularly on it, but since I've been living round the corner (15 years) it's mainly used as a car park, or sometimes a cut through for cars desperate to avoid traffic.

Last year we ran Playing out on national play day, 7th August  2014.  Having started our own community group earlier on that year, I thought I knew a lot of our neighbours, but I met many more, and a bit of luck with the weather gave me and my children a good chance to chat and play in the sun.

This year we're running it again, this time after school so we can invite Swanshurst school as well.  Birmingham City Council have once again waived the fee to close the road, Amey are willing to provide road blockades as and when required for free too, and Highways will give permission following assurance we will behave responsibly.

Both Swan Corner community group and 'playing out' work on different principles to gated communities, which assume keeping people away from where you live is safer:

A community group, and playing out, invites people in to where we live to make it a safer, better place.  By opening conversations and play, we hope to build trust between neighbours.  For example in our area litter, vandalism and agressive behaviour  are problems.  We've organised litter picking, planted trees and worked with residents, local groups and Swanshurst school on arts projects including making our fabulous Swan sculpture.

We're run by residents, not the council or a private business. Where there has been an opportunity to collaborate with others, like Swanshurst School, we've taken it - one of our 'playing out' sessions will also be with Moseley and Kings Heath woodcraft folk.

It's still all very new to us, and feels like an experiment.  From the start of Swan Corner Community Group many people have given good reasons to doubt it'll work. Who knows? Maybe they're right, but whatever happens, I know  we've done the right thing trying.

Useful links:

http://www.khcse.org/whos-coming-out-to-play/

http://www.khcse.org/playing-out-on-national-playday/

http://birminghamlives.blogspot.com/2014/09/looking-after-your-own.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/gated-communities-and-segregated-schools-6bn-cost-of-poor-social-integration-9805025.html

http://www.independent.co.uk/property/house-and-home/rise-in-gated-communities-could-pose-a-threat-to-public-services-581318.html

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/france/10206682/Fortress-Britain-No-weve-had-dozens-of-invasions.html

Spring on Swan Corner

Swan Corner's second AGM is this Tuesday (14th April).  It's been a busy year with plenty going on, and plenty planned for the coming year.  Here's a few photos from this weekend on the corner, showing some of our hard work springing back to life:

Japanese knotweed no more, but litter still to do

Three litter picking days so far this year

Litter gone!  Well, almost

Willow 'fedge' budding 

Three new damson trees join the apple and pear trees this year

Fruit bushes and trees springing back to life

New hazel leaves 

Hellebores flowering in the borders

Oz, our litter picking organiser, with apple blossom about to flower

Bulbs in with the strawberries

Quince, pear, blackcurrant, and gooseberry in front of the Billesley

Research your Street

crashmap.co.uk documenting Jago's accident

In 2012 my six year old son was seriously injured in a road accident outside my house - he fell into the road from the narrow pavement.  He's fine now, but following that accident I became more interested in road accidents locally, and then more interested in how communities can pull together to support each other and address local issues.

Swan Corner Community group was formed and 'road safety' has always been a major concern for the group,  We are campaigning at the moment to include the road in the new BCC 20mph initiative.

 

Length of Brook Lane where Jago fell into the road 

The road has a narrow pavement and is the main route for walking to Swanshurst School, apparently the largest girls school in Europe, at the end of our road.

We have been documenting probems ourself (see our journeys to school, 1 (Arthur's), 2 (Me, Jago and Freya), & 3(from 2013)) but data freely available online has really made the difference to prove the need for change.  Thanks to Podnosh and their Kings Heath and Moseley social media surgery, we've been able to access all the information we need for this, and pretty much anything else.

For more info on road accidents, and for a range of crimes, well documented, and some useful analysis see the following sites:

• Crashmap.co.uk
• Doorda.com
• Police.uk

Police.uk has a particularly useful feature - you can draw around the area you are interested in and it will give you a breakdown of useful stats for any time period, so for my small stretch of Brook Lane:

Litter picking on Swan Corner

It didn't take long, but the results speak for themselves - a good hour's work.  Thanks Oz and all the volunteers:

So why are we here?

I was making willow stars with girls from Swanshurst Girls School at their 'Winter Celebration' event when a friend saw me, and asked, 'So why are you here?'

A fair question, as I have no children at the school.  I was at the event representing Swan Corner Community group, and over the past month or so, we (Swan Corner community Group) have been working with girls from the school, planting apple trees, dancing, gardening generally, and creating a fabulous Swan sculpture sitting on our roundabout.

Swan Corner Community Group was started nearly a year ago to address local issues, in particular the risk to lives and the number of accidents caused by cars.




As you can see from this map, we've had nine accidents with casualties reported in the past five years all around the roundabout (to see accidents near you, check out  http://www.crashmap.co.uk/ for a very useful map of info).

We've not had any fatalities outside Swanshurst yet, as happens annually on Kings Heath High Street, but there is no doubt it could happen.  A much harder question for Swan Corner Community Group is how can we make our local area safer?

We have regular meetings.  We were involved in 'Playing Out' on 6th August, encouraging children to play outdoors, worked with Swanshurst for a number of events, all developing closer community.  Again with Swanshurst School, we have made improvements, including our rather fabulous Swan sculpture, noticeboard and Apple trees - many were sceptical saying it would be vandalised and destroyed, but a year on, there's been no real damage - willow and apple trees continue to grow.  It's tough though, coming back to that key issue of safety, knowing there will be at least a couple of serious injuries every year we fail to make things better on the road.

We haven't made the roundabout safer, but the reason I was at the school, and the reason we will continue acting and campaigning to improve the area, is because it is our home and all our neighbours mean a lot to us.

Thanks everyone who has helped - it's been a good first year!

See here for more about Swan Corner Community Group 

Swan Corner Community Group

BCC Location of road injuries, 2010-2012.
Jago, my son, is the purple blob in the
middle of Brook Lane 

On Tuesday 28th Jan 2014, 7:30 to 9:30 Swan Corner Community Group will meet/ drop-in for the first time.  It feels like a significant step for me - being more involved in caring for my immediate local area, and taking more responsibility with our neighbours.

As with all groups, it was a particular issue which brought it about - planned road improvements.  But as we began talking to each other more issues were raised, and the more the need for a community group grew:

• Planned road improvements and immediate effect on roads leading to the roundabout
• Waste ground around the pub, anti-social behaviour and community planting plans
• Parking for parents of Swanshurst causes problems at pick up and drop down
• Increase in burglaries locally
• Road accidents along our roads and the citywide 20mph plans
• Larger 'Long Park Corridor' project 
• Sustrans project improving access for cyclists and pedestrians
• More street play for our children

Locally I've helped set up community groups before - Kings Heath Community Centre Garden Club, KHCC Stay & Play, and Hall Green Arts Forum, all of which were exciting and challenging.  With all those groups it was primarily about having some fun, either with kids and/or creative stuff, with people who wanted similar things.  Is Swan Corner different?  Is there enough shared to bring us together, or will our different interests and huge agenda be too much?

Looking forward to Tuesday 28th!