Kingsdown Conservation Group

The City has published the draft Kingsdown Residents’ Parking Scheme. The draft detailed design you can find at http://tinyurl.com/yf3vbg7 and the notes to the scheme at http://tinyurl.com/yg6kgm3. This is the summary.

Residents’ Permits

• Each household will be able to apply for up to two residents’ permits. In exceptional circumstances a third permit may be available.

• The first permit will cost £30 per annum and the second will cost £80. A third permit, if available, would cost £200 (exceptions for low polluting vehicles).

Other types of permit

• Each household will be able to apply for up to 100 visitors’ permits a year.

• The first 50 visitors’ permits will be issued free of charge; the second 50 will cost £1 each.

• Businesses located within the scheme area can apply for a business permit for operational business vehicles. These permits will cost £100 per annum.

Permit eligibility

• A house in multiple occupation (HMO) will be entitled to apply for the same number of permits as other households.

• In practical terms, this means that if a property has been divided into several flats, with each flat having a separate postal address and entrance, then each flat can apply for two residents’ permits and 100 visitors’ permits.

• However, a large property that is shared by several people but only has one postal address, main entrance and shared amenities will be counted as one household. They will thus only be eligible for two residents’ permits and 100 visitors’ permits.

Types of parking within the scheme

• The majority of parking spaces will only be available for use by residents and other permit holders (eg visitors and businesses) during the operational hours of the scheme. These parking bays are shown in orange on the scheme design drawings.

• A small number of Pay & Display bays have been included in the scheme to provide short stay parking for people who do not have a permit, eg people visiting shops or other local facilities. Permit holders will not be able to park in these bays without a Pay & Display ticket. These bays are shown in pink on the scheme design drawings.

• To provide maximum flexibility, some shared use bays are also proposed. These will be available for use by permit holders and people displaying a valid Pay & Display ticket. These bays are shown in blue on the scheme design drawings.

• Existing advisory disabled bays within the scheme area will be replaced with new mandatory disabled bays where required. These bays can only be legally used by Blue Badge holders and are enforceable

The Scheme’s operating hours

Parking will be restricted Monday to Saturday from 9.00 a.m. to 5.00 p.m.

How to comment

Comments are welcome at respark@bristol.gov.uk or 9224999.

What happens next?

The plans will be on the website until the 6th December 2009. The Council ask for comments and suggestions and are willing to make adjustments. Officers will then review the scheme and incorporate any amendments. The revised scheme will then be sent as a statutory consultation process to all those within the area who would be entitled to apply for a parking permit. If a majority are then in favour, the scheme be implemented.

The next committee meeting will be on Tuesday the 1^st December 2009. If you wish to meet the committee or bring any matters to their attention, please contact the secretary@Kingsdown.org.uk.

Our local bus will be calling in at Temple Meads from Nov 29. No details on the First Group website, as far as I can see, but timetables will be available ‘approximately 2 weeks’ beforehand. Might save a car journey or two.

Councillor Alex Woodman – the committee welcomed Alex to the meeting. The committee discussed these topics him.

Residents’ Parking Scheme

There appeared to have been a lack of information from the Council about the detailed plans for the scheme. Alex said that Highways Officers have assured him that they will meet the informal residents’ group before the next stage is published on the Council’s website. This will give the representative residents the chance to raise the most obvious objections to help reduce the number of revisions. The Council will then consult all Kingsdown residents again. Nick Kidwell will attend the meeting with Highways Officers, expressly to consider the conservation issues, which the scheme involves, such as signs and paint on the road.

Lamp posts

The Lighting Department recently improved the level of our street lighting. However, the Department chose the most utilitarian designs. Other local authorities choose more suitably designed street furniture in design sensitive areas. The Kingsdown Conservation Area Character Appraisal says that the design of all new street furniture must be of a high standard. Kingsdown residents must be consulted the changes that affect the appearance of our neighbourhood. KCG does not want the City to spend more but officers should turn the page in the street lighting catalogue and look at other designs. Alex said that he will discuss KCG’s concerns with the Executive Member and report back to KCG.

Large Rubbish collection bins on Kingsdown Parade

Alex said that this proposal is indefinitely postponed. Any new proposal will involve a preliminary public consultation.

Home Grown

The committee congratulated Helen Phillips for organising the event again.

Green matters

Do you have ideas to improve our local amenities such as benches at view points and planting schemes that KCG can promote to the Parks Department If so, please tell the Secretary.

The next committee meeting will be on Tuesday the 3rd November 2009. If you wish to meet the committee or bring any matters to their attention, please contact the secretary@Kingsdown.org.uk.

Post Homegrown ‘09 Meeting at St Matthews’s Church hall.
Tuesday 20th October 7.30 – 8.30

For anyone interested in a summary of the day; a discussion of what had worked well and what could have been better; how much had been raised for our charity of the day; whether we should carry on next year and new ideas and suggestions if it is to continue. If you would like to be involved in any way, please come and give us your name.

There will also be another showing of last year’s very charming ‘Homegrown’ Film made by Lucia Ashmore. Everyone welcome, even if you didn’t manage to make it to the event this year.

Mark Alderton from the police has asked us to mention that the next meeting of Partners and Communities Together is at St. Matthews Church on Saturday 24th October at 2.30pm. If you want to know more, contact him at Cabot Neighbourhood Policing Team (Kingsdown and Clifton), New Bridewell. Tel: 945 5055 or by email

Vicky Wright, Community Minister at St Matthew’s, has asked us to help gather views about possible improvements to the Ark. Here’s what she has to say.

“St Matthew’s Kingsdown and Bristol Christian Fellowship are currently working in partnership to explore how we could improve ‘The Ark’ building on Cotham Road South.  We see this as a great opportunity – not just to improve the existing building but also to improve how we connect with and serve our local community.

If you could take a few minutes to fill out our ark-consultation-questionnaire we would love to hear your views.  All completed questionnaires can be emailed to vicky.wright@bristol.anglican.org or dropped into St Matthew’s church office, Clare Road, Kingsdown.

Thanks for your help.

Vicky Wright, Community Minister, St Matthew’s”

So it was Radio Fourish, it was even a bit Archery; but Kingsdown’s answer to the Ambridge Flower and Veg was at once more lively and laid-back. It was a spectacularly beautiful day too, warm autumn sunshine, while most of Kingsdown visited, browsed, chatted, donated, bought, and sold to the cheerful sound of the Ambling Band, helped out this year by French visitors Zebaliz.
Homegrown stalls included the usual popular sales of plants and second-hand books, works by local artists and authors, any amount of Fairly-Traded chocolate and quantities of bric-a-brac; sideshows included some old favourites like the Human Fruit Machine and Whack the Rat, and some new delights, like the crush-‘em –yourself apple press brought along by the St Matthew’s Cider Collective.
In the Church Hall there were traditional competitions for homegrown veg, best Victoria sponge, jam – lots of jams and jellies entered this year – and some less traditional, like the scary but of course edible Vegetable Monsters from Mars. Our thanks to the judges, especially Barny Haughton from the restaurant Bordeaux Quay who had a very long and difficult task deliberating over the multitude of jams and chutneys.
This year’s First Prize for Best Ever Celebration Cake, which was topped with a wonderfully detailed icing-sugar vegetable garden including watering can (would have put Jill Archer’s boring old honey cake well in the shade) was later raffled, along with other goodies like a Spa treatment for two at the Clifton Lido, tickets drawn and prizes presented by local MP, Stephen Williams.
Our thanks, as ever, to St Matthews’ Church for their wonderful support and to all Kingsdowners taking part: it was a lovely day.

There’s a new Kingsdown book just out by local authors Penny Mellor and Mary Wright. At £16.99 for 128 pages with 60 colour illustrations it sounds a snip, and you can get it from the publishers – www.phillimore.co.uk or from Amazon

Penny and Mary will be signing copies at Borders on Tues 13th Oct from 6 to 630.

Here’s an extract from the blurb: Kingsdown was built as Bristol’s first planned suburb in the 18th century. At the time it was well known locally as the site of an important Civil War fortification and appreciated as an airy, green space just beyond the crowded medieval city. The land had once belonged to the Benedictine Priory of St James but Henry VIII’s Dissolution resulted in the fragmentation of land ownership. The consequent sale of lands to wealthy entrepreneurs in the 16th and 17th centuries provides the first documented description of Kingsdown.

Crucial battles for Bristol were fought on the heights of Kingsdown during the English Civil War and a related love story still survives in local folklore. The Georgian suburb which appeared during Bristol’s golden age became increasingly fashionable, but the economic collapse that followed the outbreak of war with France at the end of the century led to the financial ruin of many of the investors and developers who were building Kingsdown. The Victorian and Edwardian periods were a time of consolidation, sanitary improvements and growing urbanisation, as Kingsdown was incorporated into the City of Bristol. Improved transport links and the attractions of the outer suburbs drew residents away from the inner areas and Kingsdown’s social status slowly declined, its physical fabric subsequently deteriorating.

A lack of maintenance, coupled with Second World War damage and the post-war zoning of the Kingsdown slopes for hospital expansion and municipal housing, resulted in the 1950s clearance of those houses deemed to be unfit. Passionate protests accompanied their destruction and are recalled in this lively illustrated account of a fascinating and singular area. The story ends on a positive note by celebrating the survival of the streets on the hilltop. The area’s architectural qualities are the subject of growing appreciation and a vibrant community makes the care for Kingsdown’s unique heritage a priority.