INTRODUCTION BY THE MAYOR

Town Mayor Brian Terry

There are more details about the Town Plan below.  If you want to be part of any of the groups that will be asked to carry out more investigations to implement the proposals you asked to be included in the Town Plan, then please let us know. 

I hope the information below is of interest to you and look forward to receiving any comments you wish to make on this Newsletter or, indeed, on any of the services we provide on your behalf.

Cllr Brian Terry

Town Mayor

The Town Plan sets out the views of how residents believe the challenges facing Ringwood should be dealt with in the future.  It details your views on the environment, community and social issues, the economy and also transport and accessibility matters. 

In conjunction with members of the public who joined our Focus Groups, we have identified a plan of action which sets out proposals in the short, medium and long term for dealing with issues of concern to residents.  We want to make sure that the way in which those issues are dealt with are fully debated by you, the residents. 

For example, are you interested in whether we should try to improve the appearance of the High Street?  Whether we should take action to deal with dog excrement, litter and graffiti?  Or should we spend time and effort on improving the Castleman Trail or spend more time to make it easier for people to recycle? 

Councillors can make decisions on all of these issues, but the Council does want to know your views and wants you to be involved.You can look at a (PDF) copy of the Town Plan and the Implementation Programme on our Website and if you want to help us implement it, copies are available free of charge at the office.

If, therefore, you can spare a few hours to be part of one of our teams carrying out further investigations into proposals in the Plan, then please contact us by one of the methods shown at the end of this Newsletter.  We really do want to hear from you.

Environmental Improvements in Southampton Road

The Town Council is working with the District and County Councils on a scheme to improve the area of Southampton Road between Fridays Cross and Mansfield Road, which we hope will result in the regeneration of this part of the town.  The main aims of the scheme are to provide a more attractive and safer environment for pedestrians and shoppers, create a space more in keeping with the Conservation Area location and improve the commercial viability of the area.  Links to adjoining pedestrian areas and cycle routes will also be improved.

This project links directly in with the findings of the recently published Town Plan referred to earlier.

Town Access Plan

Work is about to begin on developing a Town Access Plan (TAP) for Ringwood.  The purpose of a TAP is to set out a strategy which is a shared vision for how access to facilities and services within a town will be improved.  Such facilities and services include health, education, employment, retail, places of worship, leisure facilities, and access to open spaces.  When complete, the TAP will be used to direct funding in a way that responds to the accessibility needs of the local community.  Public consultation will be an important part of the process, so please do take the time to have your say when the time comes.

This was one of the projects identified through the Love It, Hate It, I Wish survey
carried out by the Town Council as part of the work on the Town Plan.

Castleman Trail

The County Council has spent a lot of time and effort on implementing Castleman Trail.  In partnership with the County Council, we have now started to maintain the grass alongside either side of the trail between the Bickerley and the County boundary.  We are working with the County Council to improve the environmental appearance of land on either side of the Trail, to improve access to the Trail from Bickerley Green and from the Trail to the Millstream . 

Our proposals include some additional seating, interpretation boards to provide information to visitors about the area and some additional access to the Millstream itself.  If you are interested in the Trail and want to be involved in planning and developing the work we are doing with the County, then please contact us. 

In the long term, and if enough people are interested, it may be possible to establish a ‘Friends of the Castleman Trail’ group just to make sure that the maintenance we want to carry out is continued long into the future.

Once again, the Festival was a huge success.  Who will forget the Pedal Car Grand Prix and Ringwood Rocks on the Bickerley.  But remember, the Festival is mainly about bringing clubs and societies together in the Market Square to enable them to bring themselves to the attention of all members of the public and, hopefully, to increase their own memberships. 

But we rely on volunteers to plan and organise events.  If you would like to be part of the Festival organisation, we would be delighted to hear from you.

Ringwood is twinned with Pont Audemer in France.  Whilst the link is still in place, and our colleagues in France are keen to encourage that link, there seems to  have been a reduction of interest here.  The Council believes twinning does bring benefits to the town and we should consider encouraging interest in the link. 

If you are interested in twinning, and will serve on a new twinning committee, then please let us know.

History of Ringwood

Hampshire County Council is encouraging all communities to bring together details of archive material and historical records so it can be viewed by future generations.  The Town Council believes that this is an excellent project and has agreed to act as a common contact point to receive any information about archive material that any residents of the town hold.  Please look in your attics and the back of your cupboards to see if you have any documentation which will serve to show the history of the town. 

You do not need to hand them over to the Town Council, indeed we have no appropriate accommodation in which to store them.  What the project is about is trying to identify these historical records and make a note of where they can be viewed. 
In some cases, if you are not able to retain them, but do wish to hand them over to another organisation, then we will try to find a home for them.  Please let us know if you have anything that you think ought to be included within the Community Archive Project.

Did you know that the Jubilee Lamp was erected in 1887 and originally contained a drinking fountain.  It was re-painted in the original colours a number of years ago.  The Town Council had intended to realign the lamps on the monument this year and also carry out some further re-painting. 

But for such an important landmark in the town, is that good enough?  Do you think that the Town Council should try to carry out a much more extensive refurbishment, hopefully with the aid of a lottery grant, to bring it back as near as possible to its original condition? 

If you do, and would like to be involved in the project, and particularly if you have a real interest in the Jubilee Lamp, then we would like to hear from you.  You will not be expected to carry out the physical work of renovation, but instead help us organise everything that would go towards the successful completion of a project of this nature.

This year we have organised ‘Kids Capers on Carvers’ for the under eleven age group.  If you have children in that age group who attended, was it worthwhile?  Please tell us your views and tell us whether we should do anything different next year.  If your children were too old to attend that play scheme, should we organise something for the older age group next year or should we just leave it for parents to provide entertainment for their own children? 

All five were erected at the beginning of the Summer to help our visitors.  Sadly, one of these boards was vandalised within a week, that was repaired, but the same map board and one of the others have now been destroyed by vandals. 

If you know anything about who might have damaged these boards, please let us know.  The question is, do you think we should spend yet more money on directional maps to improve the attractiveness of the town to visitors, even though they may well be attacked by vandals?  Please let us have your views.

1.  We were the first town in the New Forest to gain Fairtrade recognition, but we need to keep the impetus going.  Would you like to join the group of volunteers, which includes young people from Ringwood School, who encourage shops, commercial premises and residents to follow Fairtrade principles?  Again, it will only take a few hours a year, give you an opportunity to not only have an impact on the community of Ringwood, but also others across the world. 

Get Involved

2.  The Town Council meets virtually all of the costs of the Christmas lights you see around the town every year.  We have a small group of Councillors and volunteers who decide on the displays – we have a contractor who does all of the erection and dismantling of the lights – but we would like more people from the town to join that group and help us to decide on future Christmas lighting displays.  Again, if you can spare a few hours a year and want to contribute to ensuring a festive appearance to the town during the Christmas period, then please contact us.