Rus in Urbe

Wedged between the consumer palace of the Brislington's giant Tesco Extra store and the non-stop traffic along Callington road, there's a short quiet stretch of Brislington Brook and a brookside path.

The kingfisher has been a regular patroller recently – though it's very camera shy!

The price of a kiss

TescoValue - £3

Street price - zilch

Some Extra for Tesco

A small splash in the Bristol Evening Post followed my story (below) about Tesco's takeover of the council recycling banks at their major stores. The Post's theme was that Tesco are diverting the value of the materials to their own profits, instead of to the council.

They were right. It's a takeover that's being rolled out across the country, and it's drawn well-deserved criticism.

The Post article drew more online comments than you might expect, some of them well-informed - pointing out, for instance, that collections from large recycling banks are one of the few truly profitable (as against less costly) recycling services. The council could use that income to subsidise the more costly elements of recycling collections. Tesco will use it, in part, to make selective contributions to local schools, presenting it as an altruistic measure while actually imprinting the name Tesco on impressionable minds. The rest will go into the corporate coffers.

This takeover also features a novel way of 'externalising' a commercial cost, so it doesn't have to be borne by the company. Under Tesco's usual business strategy, this usually means squeezing suppliers, but with the recycling banks it means getting the supply totally 'free'; we punters bring it along gratis, bearing the whole collection cost ourselves.

I asked the new contractors about the quality of this Tesco version of recycling. Two questions:


First, could we still deposit a whole range of plastics in the banks, as before?

Answer came there none, in spite of sending a second reminder.

Second (having ascertained a while back that there are checks in the council service to guarantee that the materials really are recycled) could we expect the same of the Tesco service - or might there be circumstnces where materials would be landfilled or incinerated?

Back comes the reply "Severnside Recycling/DS Smith Recycling have no investment in landfill, and are the market leader in diversion from landfill strategies, we always aim to return material back into the recycling stream." .

Not exactly a straight answer, then. And no word about incineration. Not even a fortnight after a second request.

So it looks like Tesco are providing us with an inferior recycling service, with no guarantees that the materials we take the trouble to provide will be recycled, and with the profits dedicated solely to Tesco's corporate aims instead of cross-subsidising the public recycling service.

Thanks, Tesco. Every little helps.


I've asked if Stockwood's only alternative plastics recycling skip (behind the Co-op) can be expanded; it's now the only place we can take many plastics. It's also the only place we know they'll really be recycled. And also the only place where the income goes to help provide council services at a time of deep cuts.

[Added 30th May:]
The tidy appearance of the recycling banks after the Tesco takeover was short lived: here's what it looked like today.


Not entirely Tesco's fault, of course, part of it's down to the punters who seem to see every recycling bin as a handy spot for a bit of flytipping. Even so, you'd think that if they can run the whole retail operation on a bank holiday, they could extend it to covering their own recycling operation.

The 'trolley' bins are newbies, just arrived - and they hold the promise that plastics of all sorts deposited here will be recycled, as when under council control. The contracting firm is based in Chippenham, and specialises in skip hire; it will be interesting to know what happens to the plastics that are overflowing from these bins. If they tell us.

Traffic to rise 20% in congestion hot-spot.

......and they're thinking of adding a Tesco Extra to the mix!

One of the two proposals for a South Bristol Ring Road, which won the blessing of the West of England's transport bosses on Thursday, would add over 7,000 vehicles a day to the traffic on Ashton Way as it approaches the Cumberland Basin.

That's before adding further to it by building 230 houses, a stadium, hotel, and fast food outlets at Ashton Vale, and a Tesco megastore at Ashton Gate, as Bristol City Football Club are demanding.

Is it the transport planners, or the football club owners, that are on some other planet? All of them, I reckon.

Edit, 2.30pm 7/10:

The 7,000 figure above comes from the Options Appraisal (App7.1), showing an increase from 35350 (do minimum option) to 42950 vehicles/day for Option 1 - a road from Hengrove to A370 Long Ashton

Lots more on this topic from the Bristol Blogger (look out specially for Tony Dyer's comment on the regeneration myth) and on Chris Hutt's 'Green Bristol Blog'

The stadium and the World Cup

Looks like a decision will be delayed - according to Jones the News. But 'minded to approve' decisions on November 4 and 5 would leave it open for Bristol to remain part of the World Cup bid - and make it more difficult for the 'No Tesco' objectors to appeal.

Not, of course, that the World Cup bid has anything whatever to do with the planning decision! I know. Jan told me

Learners and Customers v2

The distinction gets ever-more blurred.....

Ashton Gate - the Ormondroyd view

Last month the Bristol South Greens complained to council CEO Jan Ormondroyd that by being part of the 2018 World Cup bid team, the council is compromising its neutrality on the linked planning applications to deliver a new stadium.

It will come to a head in November, when it's to rule on the planning application to put an unwanted, unneeded, 24/7 Tesco retail shed - much like the one here at Brislington - on the current Ashton Gate site, instead of something that's actually needed. Like places for people to live.

To avoid any suggestion of prejudicial interest, we suggested that the council stand down from the bid team, and let a real football fan take their place.

After all, we all know that no Tesco equals no new stadium. And that no new stadium equals no World Cup. We know, because they've said so. So doesn't council support for the World Cup Bid constitute council support for Tesco?

Absolutely not, says Jan. She'd 'like to differentiate between the Council's support for the principle of Bristol becoming a World Cup host city and the planning process the football club is pursuing to deliver a new stadium'. She doesn't say quite how they'll keep the two issues apart, nor does she think to mention that the council also has a pivotal role in deciding whether to hand over its own land to make it all happen. But she does freely admit that planning permission can be awarded on the grounds that Tesco's financial influence will 'enable' the new stadium. Even though we already have a stadium.

Arguably, of course, the new stadium is 'enabling' not only Tesco, but a green belt seizure; but I don't suppose they'll be pushing that line.

Jan goes on to assert her confidence 'that the Council, its officers and members are fully able to distinguish between the aspirational nature of the bid process and the need for the Local Planning Authority to determine the applications for the new Stadium and the former Ashton Gate site upon material planning considerations alone'.

My 'Simple OCR' software had its own ideas about the truth. It managed to reject 'aspirational' in favour of 'antirational'. Maybe it's a bit more perceptive than its name suggests?

Stockwood Miscellany

......mostly for Stockwood people.

At last there's a chance to recycle a bit more plastic than bottles. There's a trial run of 'bring site' collections of other food containers, and one of the sites is Tescos. Click the picture for more detail of what you can and can't take.

One day, my child, there'll be kerbside collections of plastic waste.



Another innovation outside Tesco is this ever more unnavigable barrier to progress along NCN Route 3. This started as a clear path (and why not, there's a further barrier 100m on)... then the basic barrier was put in.. then they blocked one of the side gaps that provided the route of choice for most cyclists... then they blocked the other side. The lower bar stops anything passing under the barrier. Imagine trying to get a wheelchair, or a pushbike with a trailer full of recyclable plastic , through this.

More positively..



An orchid spotted on the Open Space, during a 'Friends of Stockwood Open Spaces' (FoSOS) guided walk a week ago. I'm told it's a hybrid.



Next, an advance invitation to help contain the spread of Japanese Knotweed on the Open Space. FoSOS have organised a session to restrain the advance of this invasive plant on Sunday June 7 starting at 10.30am at the top of Scotland Lane (junction with Stockwood Lane). Bring secateurs and work gloves.



Finally, a mystery object. Well, the mystery is how and why it got here. This half bag of animal bedding appeared by the brookside path to West Town Lane, just where a FoSOS team had done a clean-up a few weeks previously. It can't have been easy to get it to this off-road site... but then it can't have been easy to dump most of the stuff (like old bikes, and doors) that we'd collected there first time round.

Fortunately, we've found an alternative use for this particular item - as a mulch on garden paths, and a trial slug deterrent on some strawberries.