BRIDGWATER FORWARD - alive and well and still campaigning for a better deal for Bridgwater

Bridgwater Forward tried many ways to prevent the closure of our well loved Splash: petition, occupation, meetings. Help us now by using the sample letter here to get your message across to our Council that we are not happy with the building of yet another supermarket.

We are being asked to unite as a community in order to get what we think is best for our area. By sending the letter to Peter Smith for forwarding to SDC you will be helping to show how many people want a pool and leisure centre in the town, and not another supermarket.

What we need in Bridgwater is somewhere to go for leisure and to keep fit.

So many people miss Splash!

....with a learner pool beyond.

Splash has now gone, but its replacement must be right for the people of Bridgwater.

Chilton Trinity School has now been reprieved so the swimming pool will be back on the agenda. The site for our new pool is still in the wrong place.

A New Pool and Leisure Centre should be built on the Northgate site, which many of you voted for when visiting the consultation in the Town Hall

 As well as serving the needs of local people, this will encourage tourism to the town and provide leisure facilities to encourage new businesses to come and stay in Bridgwater.

THIS IS WHY

BRIDGWATER FORWARD

CONTINUES TO ARGUE FOR 

A TOWN CENTRE POOL

Our new pool should be part of a leisure centre to provide activities such as ten pin bowling, indoor sport area for training purposes, built on the Northgate site.

What can residents do to make their voices heard?

WRITE TO or EMAIL

Mr P Smith

Vice Chairman, Bridgwater Forward

1 Greatwood Close Bridgwater TA6 6UL

Email: pjsmithgreatwood@yahoo.co.uk

Peter Smith will pass all your letters to

Councillor Duncan McGinty,

Leader of Sedgemoor District Council

or "copy and paste sample letter into an email to Peter Smith".

SAMPLE LETTER

DATE

Councillor D McGinty

c/o Mr P Smith

Vice Chairman Bridgwater Forward

1 Greatwood Close

Bridgwater

TA6 6UL

(your address)

Dear Councillor McGinty

Replacement Public Swimming Pool for Bridgwater

There is still much anger in the town regarding the demolition of Splash. There is money ring-fenced for a new pool and I think it should be in the town centre, on the Northgate site.

This site is accessible by all, whether on foot, cycle, bus or car. It is our money that is being spent and this is what we, the people, want.

Yours sincerely

(Your name)

LET’S SEE WHAT PEOPLE POWER CAN DO!

 

Please help us. We need thousands of letters - this is your last chance. We lost the Splash but it is not too late to get a new town centre pool.

Come & join us! Contact:   

Secretary:

glenburrows@btinternet.com

01278 450562

Chair: Sally Jones 07516978088

http://bridgwaterforward.blogspot.com

Bridgwater Forward – Report of meeting held on Tuesday 17th August

Members of Bridgwater Forward confirmed their position at a meeting held on Tuesday 17th August that Bridgwater’s new pool should be built in the town centre, not outside the town as part of the re-building of Chilton Trinity School ( under the Government’s private finance project: “Building Schools for the Future”) Apart from the health and safety factors involved in adding traffic to an already congested route, why should Sedgemoor taxpayers pay for a pool which the Council will not ultimately manage, and where the community will have to share use with the school?

A Bridgwater Forward petition has been prepared calling for plans to build the pool at Chilton Trinity to be abandoned in favour of a town centre site. This is to counter claims from Sedgemoor District Council that only a minority of people want a town centre pool.

Members of Bridgwater Forward will be at Wembdon Village Fete on Monday 30th August, with leaflets and petition, to ask members of the public for their views.

The next meeting of Bridgwater Forward is on Tuesday 31st August, 7.30pm, at the Unity Club, Dampiet Street, Bridgwater. Tel. 01278 450562 for further details

A TOWN CENTRE SWIMMING POOL? LET THE PEOPLE DECIDE!!

Bridgwater’s much-loved Town Centre swimming pool, ‘The Splash’ was closed by Sedgemoor District Council at the end of August 2009. Soon after, they demolished it and pursued plans for what we believe would be a poorly-sited and inferior replacement, alongside a re-built Chilton Trinity school.

For a year, we have been fighting hard to persuade the Council to do the right thing, admit its mistake, and re-build a town centre pool as part of the Northgate development. Not only would this be far more accessible and sustainable, but it would also give a massive boost to help regenerate the town centre.

When the Government put the Chilton Trinity Building Schools for the Future project ‘on hold,’ it seemed that the out-of-town pool project was dead. Now it has been revived, but Bridgwater Forward is STILL not impressed with the plan: nothing has changed our view!

We predict that Sedgemoor District Council, with the panic of possible cancellation of Chilton Trinity over, will now continue to insist to the people of Bridgwater and the surrounding villages that there is no alternative to an out-of-town pool.

Why do we say that is nonsense?

• Firstly, Sedgemoor originally agreed to replace the Splash as the centre piece of the Northgate development following extensive public consultation and advice from its own consultants!

• Secondly, Sedgemoor stands to gain from the sale of another massive land asset, the old Bath Road Cattle Market site;

• Thirdly, both Tesco and French nuclear energy company EDF expressed an interest in funding a pool as a part of successful planning negotiations: Whilst both companies may receive a frosty welcome from some quarters, Sedgemoor have, so far, turned their backs on exploring these possibilities. Why?

Bridgwater Forward says that there IS an alternative to a second-rate out-of-town Chilton Trinity Pool!

Sedgemoor District Council has NEVER properly consulted local people on:

• whether the Splash should have been closed and demolished this time last year;

• whether the replacement pool should now be out-of-town rather than in the town centre at Northgate;

• whether the Northgate development should include a supermarket if this would provide funding to build and run a new Pool at Northgate.

Bridgwater Forward challenges Sedgemoor to admit that there is STILL a choice of sites for a new swimming pool, and, by means of a properly-conducted local poll, to let the people decide where it should be built. We believe that voters would choose the town centre Northgate site. Is Sedgemoor afraid of this result?