Community Grants
Around £60,000 has been awarded in grants to community groups across Charnwood.
The Borough Council has provided Charnwood Community Grant funding to 12 community projects ranging from mental health and wellbeing groups to a recycling project for children.
The Council awards Charnwood Community Grants worth tens of thousands of pounds per year to help support community groups and projects across the borough.
Six Community Facility Grants have also been awarded to local groups to improve the spaces they operate from at a variety of places across Charnwood, including Anstey, Barrow upon Soar and Newton Linford.
We are delighted that the St Mary’s Church in Anstey were successful in their bid and will be using their facility grant of £3,409 to make repairs to the building’s roof and to improve their heating systems.
Heritage Trail
A new Heritage Trail about Loughborough’s history is being brought to life by a new reality heritage trail launched in the town. The Discover Loughborough Heritage Trail will help people find out more about the town’s rich heritage at 15 fascinating locations.
People will be able to simply scan a QR code on their mobile phones to access images and pictures about each place. A specially recorded narrative will also play at each location so people can hear the story of Loughborough’s past.
People will be able to access the trail by downloading the Loyal Free App and scanning QR codes at the 15 locations which include Queen’s Park, Loughborough Bells, Great Central Railway and Charnwood Museum.
The initiative is part of the £2.87 million ‘Living Loughborough’ project which is being led by Charnwood Borough Council, in partnership with Love Loughborough BID. The funding has come from Loughborough Town Deal which secured £16.9 million from the Government’s Towns Fund. It is backing 11 projects, which in total are worth more than £40 million of investment for the town.
To find out more about the Discover Loughborough Augmented Reality Heritage Trail, visit Discover Charnwood (https://www.discovercharnwood.co.uk/) and Love Loughborough’s (https://loveloughborough.co.uk/love-loughborough/) websites.
Loughborough Town Hall Panto Funday
Families are being invited to Loughborough Town Hall for some high-flying fun ahead of this year’s pantomime Peter Pan.
The Town Hall, operated by Charnwood Borough Council, will open its doors between 10am and 3pm on Sunday 10th September to offer a wide range of free activities for the whole family to enjoy.
From behind-the-scenes tours and craft activities to a treasure hunt and dance workshops, there will be plenty of adventures to be had throughout the day. There will also be a chance to meet members of this year’s pantomime cast. Places are available on a first come first served basis and can be booked by calling the Box Office on 01509 231914.
For more information about the Peter Pan Panto Funday, please visit the Loughborough Town Hall website at www.loughboroughtownhall.co.uk.
Peter Pan runs at Loughborough Town Hall between 25th November 2023 to 7th January 2024 and tickets are available to book now through the Loughborough Town Hall website or Box Office on 01509 231914.
Annual Report
Charnwood Borough Council have recently published the Council’s Annual Report for 2022/23, which captures some handy information about the services the Council delivered over 2022/23.
You can read the full report at www.charnwood.gov.uk/annualreport but we have included an infographic in our report to provide you with a snapshot of some of the work the council has carried out this year.
Planning Application
This planning application was on the Plans Committee Agenda on 17th August 2023. We asked for the application to be decided by the Plans Committee, due to levels of concerns about this application. These were our main concerns:
- Concern relating to the amount of development allowed at Anstey without any major infrastructure support
- Lack of general practice capacity for doctors’ surgeries
- Concern about provisions of a further 20 dwellings in this location
- Limited bus services close to the site
- Catchment area for schools in Anstey and concern about footpath links and the speed of traffic
- Highway safety issues, including the need for a request for a signalled crossing across Gynsill Lane
- Mention of past planning application for a bungalow to the rear of 97 Gynsill Lane refused.
Cllr Baines attended the meeting to speak on behalf of residents. The Plans Committee accepted our highway safety issues including the need for a safe pedestrian crossing.
The Plans Committee agreed to defer the decision and go back to the Highway Authority to gather more information about a possible crossing. We will continue to fight against this planning application whilst also pushing for a crossing if the Plans Committee are minded to approve this application.
Installation of Electric Vehicle Charging Points in Anstey
The Borough Council has secured some Government funding from the Office of Low Emission Vehicles (OLEV) to add electric vehicle (EV) charging points within the borough to support residential charging but also allow for public charging.
The Council owns several car parks in the borough and has opted to install EV charging points in:
- CBC car park in The Nook, Anstey
- CBC car park King Street, Sileby
The Nook Car Park, Anstey has 82 parking spaces and 8 x 7kW EV charging points are to be added to serve 8 parking spaces.
We are very pleased that Anstey has been chosen as one of the sites for EV charging and we are sure this will be welcomed by residents with electric vehicles.
Types of Charging Points
The types of charging points recommended by OLEV are known as ‘fast’ chargers (7kw to 22kW) – these are the standard charger and mostly widely installed type of public electric charging systems. They are slower than higher wattage, ‘rapid’ or ‘ultra-rapid’ chargers, but are more suitable for residents and those staying longer (over 2 hours) at a site.
Charge Point Supplier and Operator
The Council has a contract with a company called Blink Ltd. (formerly Electric Blue) to supply and maintain the charge points. Blink have contributed 15% of the overall costs of the installation project.
Blink Ltd will manage all customer interactions and charges for use of the electric vehicle charge points. They will have their own dedicated electricity meter installed and will pay for all supply costs. There is no impact on the Council’s electricity bills.
Construction
Ground works to install the equipment at the car park in Anstey will commence at the end of August. In addition, there will also be works required from the electricity network supplier to install new connections in nearby roads and pavements which may cause some disruption.
The bays will be unavailable while the charging equipment is being installed and they will still need connecting to the grid before being available for charging, so there will be some disruption to the car park for a period of time yet to be confirmed.
Funding
The charging points are costing around £86,000 (covering both car parks) with the bulk of funding being provided by a £60,940 grant from the Government’s Office for Zero Emission Vehicles. The Council is providing around £8,000 and the provider Blink Ltd is also contributing around 15%.
If you have any issues or concerns, we are here to help.
