Edington Parish Council News September 2019

The Parish Hall car park was constructed to remove an ongoing problem with vehicles parking in Monastery Road when attending events in the Parish Hall and in so doing were deemed by the police to be creating a significant hazard to other road users. It is the policy of the Parish Council to allow casual use by visitors of villagers for a couple of hours at a time when the car park is not required by users of the Parish Hall. However there have been a number of occasions when this system has been abused by villagers themselves and as a consequence the Parish Council have decided to limit parking in the car park to a maximum of three hours with no overnight parking or parking by commercial vehicles at any time, this parking will only be available when the car park is not required by users of the parish hall when a sign will be displayed in the entrance to the car park stating its use only for users of the parish hall. The Parish Council hope this will allow everyone to make use of the facility at the appropriate time and they will review the situation in six months to determine whether to make it permanent.

The Council would like to thank those responsible dog owners for clearing up the offerings left by their dogs and depositing it safely in one of the numerous bins around the village. Unfortunately a few people seem to think that it is ok either to leave the mess where their dog left it or to make an effort to bag it but then leave the bag on the ground or in some instances hanging from the nearest bush waiting for the bush fairy to come and collect at some future date. If your dog leaves an offering on the ground please bag it and dispose of it in one of the bins provided by the council.

The issue of inappropriate parking has arisen again, in that the council have received a number of complaints about cars being parked at the junction of Long Hollow and the Westbury Road and at other locations around the village. Please do not park a vehicle near a road junction as it obscures the view for people leaving the side road and could cause an accident. We have asked the police to monitor the situation and take the necessary action with vehicles causing a danger to other road users.

Defibrillator training – we have been invited to join a training session being held in Erlestoke church on Monday 4th November at 7pm. The session will be run by a representative from the South West Ambulance Service and will last no more than two hours including a video, demonstration and an opportunity to practice the techniques, it will cover managing the unconscious patient, basic life support and defibrillation.  No need to book just turn up on the evening.

Neighbourhood Watch is still in existence but now takes the form of everyone needing to check on their neighbourhood and if anything suspicious is seen in the area to report it to the police on 101, it helps to make everyone’s lives safer.

Finally the speedwatch team are in need of more volunteers, if you can spare a few hours a month to help us have a visible presence in the village to deter speeding please contact the Parish Council through the “A Safer Edington” link on the front page of the village website. Don’t forget as well we also need the reports of speeding or unsuitable traffic using the village roads.