March 1997
The issue of street lighting in the village has come to the fore again recently and I thought it might be helpful to set out the response of the Parish Council to date to the requests that have been made. It is a subject that has to be approached with some care, weighing between the wishes of those people who feel that the introduction of Street lighting would alter the rural village aspect of Chipperfield at night to give it an urban feel and the wishes of another sizeable group, who feel that road safety and personal safety should have priority over any aesthetic viewpoint.
In July of last year, the Parish Council received a petition from the residents of Tower Hill requesting the implementation of traffic calming measures and stating that they would welcome street lighting as a means of achieving this. In December, possibly prompted by a spate of garage break-ins, the residents of Nunfield wrote to the local Divisional Manager of Hens County Council Highways Department asking for street lighting to be installed in their area. He in turn indicated that the County Council’s budgets would not be able to finance such a move and suggested that the Parish Council might be able to help.
The first response of the Parish Council has been to make one point of principle - that the only circumstances in which we would consider Street lighting, would be where it could be shown that it would be beneficial to road safety. The second has been to obtain more information about the implications of the provision of lighting - in particular, its costs and the likely impact on the levels of Council Tax. We are awaiting information from the County Council on this. However, it has to be said that with the severe reduction of County budgets for road maintenance and improvement, it is difficult to envisage any plans for lighting being implemented in the near future.
I hope that we shall have more information at hand by the time of our Annual Parish Meeting in the Village Hall on Monday April 14th.
David Nobbs
CHIPPERFIELD TENNIS CLUB
It’s nearly (but not quite) time to dust the cobwebs off your racquets for another action packed season!
A variety of events are planned for this year, including a ‘music evening’ (details later), the annual tournament, etc.
The AGM is to be held on Tuesday May 13th, starting at 7.3Opm in the Village Hall. The
committee extends a warm invitation to all members past and present, and would especially look forward to meeting any prospective new members who are interested in joining the Tennis Club.