A response from Nick Raymond, our local head of Highways

Mr Dellow

Further to Andrew Moss’s earlier email, I can confirm that colleagues have been to site and have agreed the following course of action with Persimmon Homes.

The developer will lower the ironwork to the 3 no. gullies - one in the estate entrance and two on Union Lane itself, adjacent to the development, by close of play tomorrow (Friday). This will remove the risk of water continuing to flow into Stanley Street during the Christmas break and will allow the developer time to prepare before undertaking the surfacing work early in the New Year.

The developer had originally planned to top surface Union Lane three weeks ago but held off as they were waiting for a BT connection before doing the work. Their view was that it wouldn't have been well received locally if they had surfaced, only for BT to then come to site to break into it with a trench for the service connection.

Thank you very much for bringing this to our attention.

Regards


Nick Raymond
Highways and Transport Manager – South

Cumbria County Council – Cumbria Highways
County Offices, Kendal, Cumbria LA9 4RQ

Tel: 01539 713069

Mobile: 07825 103594

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The response of Mr Raymond has been much appreciated and some work has indeed been done. However heavy rain in daylight will demonstrate the effectiveness (or not) of this.  The most upsetting thing is the experience of having our phone calls requesting information from both the contact numbers provided by Persimmons : the local site office and the  project manager, Geoff Brown, at Lancaster being ignored. Now with the intervention of the Highways Department we have the reassurance of someone who will intercede on our behalf and achieve a response of some kind.

It's now nearly 21:00 on Friday. What do I do to amuse myself : take a stroll in the rain to gaze intently at . . . drains. (Get a life someone will comment!) Of three in Union Lane two are still at their original height and one at the top has been lowered. None are working 'properly' in that only about half of the water (highly technical measurement) approaching any of them is 'caught'. The second one down has had a little dam added to a drain at the original unaltered height and again catches half. The bottom one continues to catch none. With this gentle rain, the water is less 'muddy'.

Here I pass the job over to Highways to decide when is a drain not a drain. We'll have another look under heavy rain conditions in daylight and you : experts and the uninitiated can make your own judgements by examining the latest Youtube production. Communication by Youtube is becoming a fun way of informing the world what is happening. It doesn't require immotive commentary and can be left to 'state the facts'. What do you think. How are we all doing?

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To round off the situation over the weekend : it was very impressive that Mr Nick Raymond gave up his Saturday morning to come and check the drain situation first hand. We had an amicable chat and appeared to be in full agreement so that further work on a least one drain at the bottom was to be required ASAP. This could even mean before Monday. A summary of this conversation will be posted here on Monday. Meanwhile there are other more enjoyable things to think and write about.