Hughenden Valley Residents Association

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  • Valley Wives July & August Reports

    From Joan Steel. Margaret chaired the July meeting and introduced Sarah Mordount, our speaker on the “One Can Trust” a project that started in May 20011 at Saint Andrews Church in Hatters Lane,with the aim of facilitating charities by setting up food banks for people in need in the High Wycombe area. A food bag is provided containing non perishable items as a short term emergency food supply in a crisis, for a family or individual. Each bag contains a menu card and a variety of nutritious food that forms a complete meal .This is all done through the generosity of donors who give eg. dried foods eg pasta, rice or, canned foods eg meats fish, soups ,stews milk puddings fruit,also coffee ,tea etc. “Changing Lives for the Better ” is the Logo. Support is given by indiviuals,churches,schools brownies, scouts,etc and every person attending one of Sarah’s talks is asked to bring a can of food. Donations can be made directly to the food bank at the Big Yellow Storage in London road where a store cupboard is provided free by the company. Sarah was thanked warmly for coming to talk to us about this charity that is so easy to contribute to, and needs much support in these times of austerity.

    In August we enjoyed a Pot Luck Supper and a time to chat!

    On September 7th Janet Duneen is our speaker on “Bucks County Crafts”. All welcome..

  • Hughenden NAG Newsletter August 2012

    The August edition of the Hughenden Parish NAG Newsletter can be viewed here

  • HS2 Update

    HS2 – Up-date

    HS2 Action Alliance is a national campaign making the powerful case against HS2 and they want to hit their biggest milestone of the campaign so far – to have 100,000 supporters of HS2 Action Alliance. So, if you think HS2 represents the wrong choice for our country please sign up as a supporter TODAY at http://www.hs2aa.org/signup and get everyone you know who is opposed to HS2 to sign up too. It takes less than a minute and the campaign is only as strong as the people behind it.

    Progress on judicial reviews

    There are five separate challenges being brought against the Secretary of State for Transport’s announcement on January 10th 2012 to proceed with HS2. These comprise one case being brought by 51m (the group of Local Authorities opposed to HS2), a case being brought by Heathrow Hub Limited (a company which wishes to see a more direct high speed link to Heathrow), a case being brought by Aylesbury Vale Golf Club and two cases being brought by HS2 Action Alliance.

    HS2 Action Alliance is working with its lawyers as well as the lawyers representing the other parties mentioned above and the Government’s legal team to finalise an appropriate timetable for the various cases to be heard in court. Currently it is anticipated this will be at some point in the Autumn of this year but this has not yet been finalised.

    For further information about HS2, its implications and the campaign visit http://www.hs2actionalliance.org or follow them on twitter @hs2aa or facebook at http://www.facebook.com/HS2AA

    http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/353 This is the link to the official government e-petition for HS2 but will close on 04/08/2012, having been open for almost one year, So if you haven’t signed this please do so. If it collects 100,000 signatures HS2 will be debated in the House of Commons. So far this HS2 e-petition has collected only 26,075 signatures.

  • Planning Update

    The following information has been supplied by the Resident’s Association Planning Sub-committee:

    Hemley Hill Travellers Site
    The Public Inquiry held at Wycombe District Council (WDC) on 22 May has been adjourned until
    5 September because of controversy over the Proofs of Evidence, and that one of the Appellants had purchased land in Flackwell Heath which co-incidentally appears in the Baker Report on Gypsy & Traveller Sites in Bucks as a “gypsy site of significance”.

    Walters Ash Travellers Site
    The Judicial Review into the Hemley Hill Travellers’ Appeal that was held in the High Court was rejected on 8th May. The lawyers for the Appellant have informed WDC that they submitted Notice to Appeal on 6 June, 2 days after the 28 day deadline, but it is the discretion of the Civil Appeals Office to decide whether to accept the appeal, even though it is out of time. If the Court of Appeal refuses permission then that would leave no further avenues to pursue this matter in England but the Appellant can take the matter to the European Court of Human Rights.

    Hopkins Yard
    The Appeal against WDC’s refusal to grant planning permission for boundary fencing has been dismissed by the Planning Inspectorate.

    Magnolia Sports & Social Club
    WDC has refused planning permission for an indoor gym and outdoor fastlane pool.

  • Hughenden NAG Newsletter July 2012

    The July edition of the Hughenden Parish NAG Newsletter can be viewed here

  • Valley Wives Meeting Report – June

    From Joan Steel
    Kate Miller was our guest speaker on Himalayan Singing Bowls. She told us of their history in Nepal, Tibet and other Buddhist countries, and of how they have been used for hundreds of years in monasteries as both artifacts and in rituals.

    Kate spoke of her many visits to Nepal and how she came to love and understand the properties of the bowls. When the bowls are gonged or stirred, they give out a beautifully haunting sound which is first of all strange, but then very relaxing. We not only heard the sound of the bowls, but felt the very strong vibrations given off when they are stirred. It is this vibrational energy that is so effective in meditation, relaxation and energy balancing. Kate explained how each bowl resonates with different energy centres in the body, chakras, and how the bowls can balanced this energy for wellbeing.

    We were all able to experience how to play the bowls by gonging or stirring round the rim with a velvet covered wooden mallet, and we finished the session by participating in making our own harmonies.

  • HS2 will go ahead – and it will be a thing of beauty, says Justine Greening

    HS2 will go ahead – and it could eventually come to be seen as a thing of beauty, says Justine Greening in an interview with the Daily Telegraph.
    The Transport Secretary said that despite opposition from Conservative supporters, the £32 billion scheme is progressing “full steam ahead”. Speaking to the Daily Telegraph, Miss Greening compared the huge project to the “iconic” works of the great Victorian engineers, which were controversial at the time but are now regarded with affection and admiration.

    HS2 is intended to see trains travelling at 225mph between London and Birmingham by 2026, cutting the journey time to 49 minutes. A second phase, to be complete by 2033, would see HS2 proceeding on a Y-shaped route to take in Leeds and Manchester.  Advocates say the scheme will reduce domestic air travel and create jobs and prosperity in the Midlands and northern England. Opponents say the scheme is a multibillion pound white elephant. Some of the critics of HS2 have also argued that it will despoil some of the most beautiful parts of the English countryside. The chosen route for the line will pass through rural areas including the Chilterns Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty.

    The Department for Transport has already announced extensive work including tunnels, cuttings, sidings and screens of trees to minimise the visual impact of the line.
    Miss Greening conceded that the line will have “an impact” but promised the very best design possible for the project, to make it as attractive as possible. “I want to do the very best job I can on making sure that when we look back on it people will feel we got the other elements that matter right, especially how it looks and this legacy that it leaves,” she said. In the decades ahead, the minister suggested, today’s controversy over the line could eventually be replaced with appreciation.

    “If you look back to some of those big railway projects that were built by the Victorians, there were people there who were sceptical about the benefits,” she said. “I think the Victorians did show the way: they did a lot of investment in infrastructure but a lot of the things they left behind people think are things of beauty.” People could one day come to see HS2 in the same way, she suggested. “What we should be aiming for is to have a level of quality of design that in decades to come people will look back on and think you know what, they built a railway but it was so much more than that.”

    Recent reports have suggested that David Cameron and George Osborne are cooling in their support for HS2. Miss Greening, a close ally of the Chancellor, insisted that both the Treasury and No 10 are still entirely committed to the project. “We are full steam ahead and there is no wavering in our determination to get on with High Speed 2,” she said. “The Chancellor is four-square behind it and the Prime Minister is. George Osborne more than any other Chancellor in recent years has shown a real understanding of the importance in investing in infrastructure.”

    There was no legislation for HS2 in this year’s Queen’s Speech, leading to speculation that the project could be shelved Miss Greening said that the timetable for the line means legislation does not need to be published until next year. “We remain absolutely on track to deliver our hybrid bill as part of the Queen’s Speech next year which was always part of the plan,” she said.

  • Hughenden NAG Newsletter June 2012

    The June issue of the Neighbourhood Policing Newsletter is available here.

  • Valley Wives Meeting Reports – April & May

    From Joan Steel
    Due to holidays, this is a belated report for April and an interesting account from Janet(Clarke) about the May Meeting.

    Alan Copeland was our speaker for the April meeting and among over thirty subjects he speaks on, we had the talk with slides on “Tales of the Unexpected”. Generally, people tend to miss many interesting and unusual things during their ordinary travels, if they are not observent. Alan has photographed many curios and odd items connected with e.g. early days of motoring, war heroes, churches and other buildings, countryside items, royalty etc. and has researched their histories, stories and legends. He entertained us with many amazing tales of things locally that we could go to see for ourselves as well many further afield that he had described. Alan was warmly thanked for a most facinating evening.

    The speaker at the May meeting was P.C. Lee Turnham, our local policeman who told us that he began his career at Southall where he was allocated itchy woolen trousers, a blue shirt a balsa wood trunchon and a pocket book. He had to supply his own boots. After only one week and no training, he was sent to High Wycombe. Later he was sent for ten weeks training, then returned to High Wycombe and became a qualified P.C. after he had gained two years experience. Four years later he took a post at the Vehicle Traffic Department where he inspected vehicles that had been in accidents, one being the lorry that ran out of control on Amersham Hill. Eventually P.C. Lee became Area Beat Officer for Hazelmere and finally Neighbourhood Police Officer for eight villages. During his talk he showed us items that had been used in offences or had just been confiscated e.g. a knife that had been used in a house burglery, a kitchen knife which had been used on him, two knives carried by young girls, two air guns and an air rifle that had been used to shoot a cat. His uniform has changed over the years to combat trousers, polo shirt, bullet proof jacket with belt to carry handcuffs and a cup for liquid. The helmet has changed to a flat cap and riot helmet with visor, also a high visibility jacket. P.C. Lee said community police are efficient at dealing with petty crime, so always telephone him and if he is out on duty, leave a message for him to listen to on his mobile phone. He answered many questions at the end of the meeting and stayed to talk to people. P.C Lee donated his fee to the hospice fund. Sylvia (Kinch )gave the vote of thanks for a very interesting evening.

    Our next meeting is on 1st June when Kate Miller’s talk is “Himalayan Singing Bowls”. For our competition please bring an interesting item begining with W.

  • Hughenden NAG Newsletter May 2012


    The Hughenden Neighbourhood Action Group have published their May Newsletter with updates on matters of local policing.