Category Archives: Barmford

Barmford, Highways

Cock Alley to Gippingstone Road

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County Highways are at long last constructing a footway to link Cock Alley to Gippingstone Road to allow parents to use the path to get to the school without getting muddy. The work will start on the 23rd July and take approximately a week. 

I was asked for this by the team that look at safe travel to school some years ago but it has been an uphill struggle to get the land transferred from Mid Suffolk District Council.

The county say that noise and dust will be kept to a minimum and the work should not affect vehicles and pedestrian access. 

The footway will be constructed along the right side of the left hedge above and will be two metres wide leading to the existing footway  

 If you have any specific requirements, such as disability access, or deliveries planned for this date, please contact the contractor, Suffolk Highways Contracting 01473 588640.

If you have any queries about these works, contact (0845 606 6171) and ask to speak to Aaron Gordon

Barmford, Energy, Flowton

National Grid latest route proposals for Bramford to Twinsted

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Today Natrional Grid announced their latest position on the Bramford to Twinsted Tee connection that will be needed to take power from the North Sea windfarm East Anglia One and Sizewell C (if it is ever built) to London.

Local groups, the Libdems, the MP, County Council and District Councils have all  been fighting to get National Grid to use modern technology to underground this connection that will otherwise blight our lives, damage our tourist industry and be out of date before it comes into use.

Have they adapted their plans?  Well, two short sections through the Dedham Vale AONB and the Stour Valley will be underground but the residents closer to Bramford, particularly in Hintlesham, are still cursed with a double 400kv pylon line.

National Grid, this is just not good enough.  Minimising cost at the expense of so many is not acceptable.  Why not go for undergroiund DC connections like the windfarm companies are proposing?  There is time to re-think,  Sizewell  C will only be constructed if the French Government decide it is good business and the final three parts of East Anglia One are some time away.  The re-vamped existing line which will carry some 6,200 Mega watts will do till then.

Latest National Grid Data is at http://www.nationalgrid.com/uk/Electricity/MajorProjects/BramfordTwinstead/Documents/index.htm

Barmford, Waste

Bad news about Bramford Recycling Centre

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Reuben Bolton of Bolton Brothers Ltd who run the Recycling Centre in Bramford will close the site on 11 March 2012.

They are looking at expanding other operations they manage so that they can accept items from the public. This allows staff to cover all activities on the site and reduces costs.  It has been successful in Beccles. 

The site has been used a lot less after the county closed it for several weeks before the Boltons operation started.  There have been fewer than 25 visitors a day for most of January when you might have noticed that it was snowy and freezing. 

The income from charges and material sales has not been covering  costs, over the months of the trial period.   In December 2011 Boltons  introduced a charge for green waste and wood waste in an attempt to eliminate the loss but without sucess.

The type of waste has also changed.  There is less recyclable waste of value, such as metals, textiles and cardboard.  This is again not helping.

Your local councillors will work together to try to find a solution but it will at best be very difficult

Barmford, Waste

Bramford Household Waste Site Latest

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The Bramford site has closed but three companies have approached the County Council with plans to re-open it.  Two, Glazewing from Norfolk and Bloton Brothers from Gt Blakenham have extensive experience in the waste recycling business and the third is experienced in re-cycling of clothing and eager to get involved in the wider scene. 

All gave presentations tonight to local parish, district and county councillors at a meeting hosted and led by John Hooker of Bramford Parish Council.  The proposals differed in some respects and Bramford will chose next monday night which to pursue on behalf of the community that was served by the County’s HWRC.

A new service with free disposal of recyclable materials and green waste and disposal of non-recyclable materials for a pay as you throw charge of £5+vat per car appears a real possibility and could be in operation by mid September.

This will meet the needs of those who want to recycle things that can’t go in the green bin, those with garden waste who don’t want to pay for Mid Suffolk’s brown bin and those who are not prepared to sort their waste.

This looks like real progress!

Barmford, Energy

Giant 400kV Pylon Line

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The National Grid wants to build a new 400kV line of pylons from Bramford to Essex to carry the power from Sizewell and massive North Sea wind farms to London. 

This link is essential in some form if we put windfarms in the North Sea  but, as an overhead line, is damaging to our countryside, our environment and tourist trade.  It is an eyesore least damaging alongside the present line.  However an overhead line is not the only option.  It is possible, at a cost, to put the cables underground.  We are told that will cost at least 17 times the cost of an overhead line.  Perhapse £26 million per kM instead of £1.5 million for 30 kM.  Countries in Europe claim the cost ratio can be as low as 7 times. 

A further possibility would be to run the cables under the sea but that again is expensive

We need to be sure the options have been analysed thouroughly and give full weight to the impact on our quality of life.

As councillors we are preparing our response.  You should make your views known through the consultation at the National Grid www site.

For those interested in the data looks like this:

The uk uses about 60 Giga Watts (GW) in the winter at peak

Sizewell B is 1.3 GW and Sizewell C will be 3.2 GW (if it happens)

Offshore Wind  0.5 GW under development  5.0 GW just agreed

Total 10 GW that needs to get to London and one 400kv line caries about 6.4 GW

This would power several million homes