Breakfast trivia

[Anglian Water’s existing treatment works off Cowley Road in north Cambridge]

First, a bit of urban gossip says that GLC is putting exclusion zones around some of its schools and if you drive into one you get fined £60 or so. Gossip which includes no information about how these zones are defined or about how they are enforced - beyond saying that it is easy enough to drive into one unknowingly and to get fined. No information about exemptions, if any. Perhaps for the disabled or people who live in the zones. Presumably the people whose children go to the schools in question are the ostensible target and are not exempt. Something we know all about, as the parents of the children at the primary school near us (not in GLC) were making quite a nuisance of themselves with all their cars a year or so ago, until the head got properly to grips with them. 

Is this all part of a dastardly Russian social media campaign to destabilize Mayor Khan?

Second, the Cambridge Water people took a full page advertisement in yesterday's Guardian to tell us of an application that they had made to the Secretary of State to move the Cambridge sewage works from south of the A14 to north of the A14. With the sewage works of old now euphemised with the title 'waste water treatment plants'. An application which says something about new houses to be built north of the A14 but nothing about the considerable development potential of the old site, more or less adjacent to one of Cambridge's thriving science parks. First thought was that this was yet another case of our over-mighty central government taking on powers which one might have thought would be more sensibly left with local government.

Digging a little, I find from reference 1 that this is not very new news, surfacing in the 'Cambridge Independent' in January 2021. The item from which the snap above was taken.

I learn that three sites were investigated in depth. Many objections to all of them.

From there I got to the thirteenth public drain, running roughly west and east, just across the A14 from the existing sewage works. Curious about what was clearly a whole system of public drains, I dug a bit further, getting myself to reference 2, from which the snap above is taken. Existing works in the top (northern) corner of the area marked out with the dashed black line. But nothing about public drains in general, other than that this one is disused. Perhaps they are all mixed up with the extensive fen drainage works to the north. At which point I thought it was time to call time on this particular investigation.

Last but not least, the 90 year old Joan Collins is doing a tour of the UK which will include a stop at the Rose Theatre in Kingston: 'to coincide with the release of her much-anticipated memoir 'Behind the Shoulder Pads', global superstar Dame Joan Collins is embarking on a brand new tour for 2023. With her husband, Percy Gibson by her side, they will field your questions, giving audiences the opportunity to have an intimate chat with the world famous actress'. 15:00 start, running time 2 hours, with interval. It all sounds a bit much - notwithstanding which one is almost tempted; one could always leave at the interval.

PS: in connection with cars and primary schools, I remember that I used to cycle to mine, initially on a tricycle, on the pavement, gradually moving up to a bicycle on the road. I think that being driven to this particular school at this particular time was more or less unheard of.

References

Reference 1: Anglian Water reveals its proposed site for new waste water treatment plant serving Cambridge region - Paul Brackley, Cambridge Independent - 2021.

Reference 2: Cambridge Northern Fringe East: Area Flood Risk Assessment - Cambridge City Council, South Cambridgeshire District Council - 2014.