In February, the Council offered “the Ridge” in Bestwood ward for running by organisation. There were over 15 expressions of interest and some of these of coalesced to form a handful of applications being considered.

Meadows Youth Club is being offered to organisations; the City Council welcomes “interest from groups or organisations who intend to manage and operate the site as a resource for the local community with a focus on youth provision”, at a rent of £2,500 and expectation that commercial rates are covered (£18-19k); the council expects to conduct required repairs before any organisation takes over.

Another sign of what is becoming possible with a new financial settlement from the national government that is much more supportive of Nottingham.

A few years back, there were some public meetings on getting the youth centre run again, from which the main message is just how expensive it would be to repair. I now wonder to what extent the talk of high costs put organisations off and adding to Austerity, deterred progress.

I visited the Youth Centre with an officer in March, and again with Lilian Greenwood MP, on Friday 17th. There are lots of facilities – pool room, kitchen & cafe, dance studio, sports hall (with climbing wall), fitness room (with a pottery kiln), offices downstairs and up, a music studio, a portakabin for storage and loads more. The heating is relatively modern and sound. But it does look tired and like it hasn’t been polished.

I wonder about the effectiveness of the committee that once ran the centre. They never really reached out to local Councillors and kinda run out of steam as its leading members aged.

I know of one organisation that runs a community centre elsewhere in the city very well who are interested and would welcome chats with others who’d like to join in. I understand another organisation may want to provide alternative education from there.

Note the open days on May 8th and May 13th. Pop along and see just how much is there.

[PHOTOS to follow]

The mass of spectators coming out of Trentside North and Pavilion Road led to them taking over one and at times 2, and even 3, of the outbound lanes on Trent Bridge. There were occasions when cars – travelling faster on the inbound – felt the need to use their horn cos of spectators crossing. Spectators felt comfortable sticking to the pavement around 20-22 minutes after the final whistle. The challenge is that the law requires spectators to be separated from hostile vehicle movements by next April, and this is the advice I have received from a Police Officer who regularly oversees spectators leaving. If I get a chance, I will ask the Acting Chief Constable to check the advice cos it’s plain that current arrangements have not resulted in any reported injury accidents.

(Note, whilst the boundary between the City and the County runs down the middle of the river, operationally Trent Bridge is run by the City, whilst the County run Lady Bay Bridge.)

[TO BE WRITTEN UP]