Personally I am not a big fan of  this Christmas structure either, I LIKE real trees – so I am delighted to walk to the Christmas Market – around 400 meters from where you took your photograph and see the dozens of trees, festive cabins full of local independent traders, illuminated churchyard oh, and just along from there, another massive tree overlooking our illuminated riverside. Could it be that your photographer and reporter are only able to look at things from one angle? SURELY NOT! For your information, the works going on around the end of the high street where you kindly visited and decided to focus on meant that the positioning of a tree or lighting a pointless and cost-ineffective waste. Your regular readership would love such strategic ‘efficiency’ surely. I believe the structure you call a tree is part of a much bigger lighting scheme for next year. Sadly that, I presume is the year you will be concentrating on slating someone else’s efforts within our recession torn country.

So, next time you come to my town Daily Mail… I would personally like to meet you. I would like to tell you of our heritage; of our regeneration and of our vision. I would love you to meet some of the 2000 participants of last week’s community event; or the massive numbers of small, specialist shops who are bucking the trend and successfully setting up shop in the high street; I could take you for a coffee in one of a number of cafes and tea rooms; perhaps you could enjoy a gig, a comedy night, or theatre show in our thriving arts centre. We could pop to the world class watersports centre or visit Durham University Queens Campus And then, once you have visited, I will wait – and enjoy your complete lack of coverage and silent ignorance of a community that is real, dynamic and regenerating.

I look forward to meeting you.

Best Wishes

A Man You Don’t Meet Everyday

After months of being shifted from developer to service provider, from service provider to local council and back around, Alex was told they needed to measure the distance involved to determine the cost.  Nothing has happened so Alex joined resident, Chris Andrew, and measured the distance themselves.
They found that around 100 metres of cable is needed and the nearest property is just one metre from a service point.

Alex said:  “This is a very frustrating situation for residents in Brunel Walk who, through no fault of their own, are unable to access a service which is increasingly vital for everyday living in the modern world.  I would like to see Keepmoat, Virgin Media and Stockton Council get together to rectify this bizarre situation – especially as cable boxes are located so close by.”

Keepmoat Homes, who are currently responsible for Brunel Walk, have insisted that Virgin Media should bear the costs for fully relaying the footpaths which would have to be dug up in order for Virgin’s cables to be laid.  This is intended to satisfy an agreement with Stockton Borough Council, under Section 38 of the 1980 Highways Act, that the Council will not adopt land from a private developer until work is completed to a necessary standard, which includes the reinstatement of whole footpaths, as opposed to the refilling of trenches only.  However, Virgin Media have declined to commit to full reinstatement of footpaths on cost grounds, leaving residents of Brunel Walk without access to broadband.

Resident Chris Andrew, who lives in Brunel Walk with his wife and young son, said:   “It is ridiculous that we cannot access superfast broadband internet services in a newly built estate like this.  The irony is that we still receive general mail outs from Virgin Media boasting that Virgin broadband is in our area.”

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What a weekend we have had in Stockton… People zipping over the tees, rat-racing through the river, picnic’ing and bouncing to the Wildcats and showing what they’ve got in Preston Park. Did we break any records??? Sadly no – no official ones anyway. Did it matter – not a jot. The record attempts were real – official and meticulously organised but the key to it all – like all of the weekend’s activities was bringing people together. I say it time and time again, but when Stockton’s community come out to play there is not a better place in the UK. We buy into what is going on. We accept work in progress and support those giving it a go – because actually, we possess fantastic community spirit. That thing that people say has vanished has NOT in my opinion. What is no longer there are the chances to show it. We are living in a secularised, marginalised and digitalised age which reduces our potential to show what fantastic people we can be. We have become a society where our humanity is being dumbed down – and we are become apathetic of who we could actually be.

On Sunday night I saw families having a great time together. People commented that the music was great – but greater still was the opportunity to come out and spend time with each other. I remember the days of going along to the P&E club in Eaglescliffe and entering fancy dress competitions; of gasping through smokey fun days at the YMCA in Stockton; of bonfire night it preston park… days where nothing really happened – but that were the best of days.

And then on Monday I saw people going for broke to break a world record! Not a Usain Bolt style record that would make the world sit up and notice, just trivial ones that brought people together. From the shaking body of a doctor who lookalike sweatily forcing down a 12 inch pizza to the athletic prowess of our space hopping nearest record breaker, ( he came within 10 bounces of hero status), people took part for the very best reason – to make people smile. The admin / media team worked for nothing. Pizzas were painstakingly weighed and made by Domino’s for nothing. Our time keeper spontaneously decided to sponsor each record attempt – because he ‘liked the concept’. Business people turned up on a rare day off – because it would be fun. Not one person cared about breaking a world record – because everyone gathered in and around a small gazebo in Preston Park became the best in the world for an afternoon.

The question is – how is all of this activity maintained, grown and embedded? How do we help an obvious appetite for community spirited activity continue to expand? Can one ‘formalise’ and germinate such growth. And should we even bother?

Operation #smile is about to move into phase 2. A little less conversation and a whole lot more action. Who is with me? Dedication’s what we need…