The Cherry Tree 2/2004 The Cherry Tree The Cherry Tree A newsletter for the Cherry TTreesrees Residents’ Amenities Association A newsletter for the Cherry Trees Residents’ Amenities Association 2/2004 Editor: Thomas Blomberg Daytime: 8237 7907 Evenings: 7938 3775 Mobile: 07785 393 330 Congestion charge you’ve been registered with Voice- thieves who stick bamboo canes [email protected] Connect, you have already been or fishing rods through the let- Material for future issues can be sent to: up 60% next year? The Police Flat 7, 18 Vicarage Gate, London W8 4AA Emergency only 999 transferred to the new system. terbox. he proposed extension of Notting Hill Station 7221 1212 Those who would like to receive • Always check the identity of the congestion charging The Cherry Trees Residents’ Local Beat Officer the service, please contact Charles unknown callers. Before opening zone, to include most of PC Simon Piper 8246 0162 Amenities Association T Frankly, the new Royal Borough your door fully, ask to see ID if they Kensington, is still undecided, Crime Prevention Officer Neighbourhood Watch Co-ordina- claim to be officials. Telephone PC Andy Booth 8246 0169 Chairman: Willoughby Wynne although most experts think that it tor, on 8246 0822. their office if in any doubt. 39 Brunswick Gardens,London W8 4AW will eventually go ahead. • Don’t make it obvious that Tel: 7727 9786 The Council Keep the burglars away At the end of November, the Graffiti: Katie Phillips 7361 3235 you are away on holiday. Ask a The aim of The Cherry Trees Residents’ recently re-elected Ken Livingstone Follow these tips to help pre- Amenities Association is to improve our Town Hall Car Park 7937 7040 neighbour to keep an eye on your added more fuel to the road toll Noise (24 hours) 7361 3484 vent yourself becoming another neighbourhood and to function as our rep- home and remove mail from your resentative towards the Council and other debate by asking Transport for Dog fouling 7341 5284 burglary statistic – and make a letterbox. authorities in matters concerning the area London to plan for an increase of successful insurance claim if you Membership is open to all residents living • List valuable items with serial the charge to £8 per day. Neighbourhood Watch do have a break-in. in Palace Gardens Terrace, Strathmore Mariju Lee 7727 0205 numbers and a short description. Gardens, Berkeley Gardens, Brunswick The reason given for the 60 per- • All accessible windows (those Ashley McNeile 7229 3239 Take photographs of jewellery and Gardens, Inverness Gardens, Vicarage cent increase, which could come on the ground floor and base- other valuables. Get a property Gardens, Vicarage Gate, Kensington Mall, and on the eastern side of Kensington into effect in July, is to “maintain Voice-Connect upgraded ments, near drainpipes or flat marking kit - use your postcode roofs) should have key-operated Church Street between Kensington Mall the effectiveness of the charge and the number of your house. and Vicarage Gate. and raise additional revenues.” to Ringmaster locks. • If you’re considering installing In order to improve communi- The congestion charge of £5 per • Front doors should have an alarm system, get advice from If you see anything suspicious, cations with members and resi- day was introduced in February deadlocks that at least conform your insurers. Many insist that the contact the Police on 7221 1212. dents of Neighbourhood Watch, 2003. If the charge is increased to to BS3621. These locks can only installation is carried out by com- The 999 number should only be the message service has been be opened with a key - not with a used for emergencies. Please also £8 per day 30 months later, what panies registered with the National will the increase be in January upgraded from ‘Voice-Connect’ to plastic card or through a broken Approval Council for Security keep your Neighbourhood Watch 2008, or at least after the next ‘Ringmaster’. The service is free, door pane. Systems (Nacoss). representatives informed. and you can choose to receive • If you have a large letterbox, fit Your CTRAA Neighbourhood mayoral election? In February 2004 urgent messages and informa- a letterbox casing. Don’t leave car Keep us informed Watch representatives are Mariju Ken Livingstone promised that the tion about criminal activity in our keys and handbags near the front Our aim is for a safer neighbour- Lee (7727 0205) and Ashley charge wouldn’t be increased for The Vicarage Gate House luxury flat development has been rejected by the Council. If the owners decide to area via email, telephone or fax. If door, as these can be reached by hood. Please be vigilant and alert. McNeile (7229 3239). at least 10 years, but that was before his re-election… appeal, their case will probably not be heard by the Planning Inspectorate until next autumn. Three parties Luxury flat development rejected in 2005 t the CTRAA Annual Final decision next autumn? General Meeting on 22 hen the Council’s Planning Committee met in October to A November, a popular vote decided that there will be three consider Northacre’s application for building a block of 12 parties held in 2005, instead of the W luxury flats on the site of the Vicarage Gate House nursing normal two: home, the committee’s unanimous rejection came so quickly that The Spring Party, on Tuesday 24 May at 6.30 pm in Inverness the attending public had hardly had time to sit down. Gardens. The main reason for the rejection was the expected; Society, the Crown Estate and the Norwegian The Midsummer Party, on that the proposal involved a loss of elderly persons’ Embassy (a close neighbour). Thursday 16 June at 6.30 pm accommodation and therefore didn’t comply with After the Council’s refusal, Vicarage Gate Ltd (the in the garden of St Mary Abbots the Council’s policies in these matters, especially company set up by Northacre for this project) will Vicarage. as the Robson Rhodes study, commissioned by the have to appeal to the Planning Inspectorate. Such The Autumn Party, on Sunday 18 Vicarage Gate Action Group, “indicates that a viable an appeal will probably not be considered until next September at 12 noon in Inverness [nursing or care home] scheme could be provided autumn, and it is expected that this will take the form Gardens. on the site”, according to the report laid before the of a big public hearing in the Town Hall, instead of At the AGM it was also agreed committee. a small meeting at the Inspectorate’s headquarters that the CTRAA membership fee However, the committee also rejected the applica- in Bristol. should be increased to £6 for tion for another, rather unexpected, reason. The Meanwhile, Northacre’s troubled finances seem to one year or £15 for three years, Unitary Development Plan requires developers of worsen. On 12 November, the company published from the £4/£10 that has been sites with 15 or more flats to provide affordable its latest six months’ result, showing that the income housing within the site. With 12 flats, Northacre’s has gone down and the expenditure has gone up. In unchanged for eight years. project is below that limit, but the committee chose fact, the losses have increased so much that they to interpret the UDP regulation as meaning sites that now are higher than the turnover. The income in the Back issues of can accommodate 15 or more flats, and concluded period was £1.3 million, and the loss was £1.5 mil- the Cherry Tree that this could easily be done at the Vicarage Gate lion, due to the fact that the administrative expenses House site, and that it therefore must provide some (mainly salaries) were almost twice as high as the f you want to read previous affordable housing as well - something the potential income. In September the company sold its own issues of the Cherry Tree, all buyers of the luxury flats probably wouldn’t be very offices for £2.8 million, in order to pay a loan to I issues since 2/1999 can now thrilled about… Coutts & Co, but the remaining debts payable within be downloaded as pdf files from The objections from the Vicarage Gate Action a year will still be almost £3 million. the internet – and whilst the print- Group, the Kensington Society and others are With no substantial income in sight, Northacre ed version is in black and white, well known by now, but the report also included continues to live on borrowed money, putting all There can be a no more fitting Christmas card for the Cherry Trees area than John Callcott Horsley’s. It was the world’s first mass-produced the later internet versions are in some previously not published objections against its hopes on a positive ruling by the Planning Christmas card, published in 1843 and designed in Horsley’s home at 128 Kensington Church Street (or 1 High Row, as it was then known). colour. Just go to http://homepage. Northacre’s plan from the West London Architectural Inspectorate, almost one year from now... Through our very good contacts upstairs, we asked John to send a card to his future neighbours, which he was delighted to do... mac.com/cherrytreelondon Page 2 The Cherry Tree 2/2004 2/2004 The Cherry Tree Page 3 empress, Archduchess Maria In the mid 1830’s her description of Leopoldina of Austria, who passion- the earthquake in Chile 1822 started The cosmopolitan lady ately shared her interests in the a heated debate in the Geological natural sciences. Society, where she was caught in In March 1826, King João VI of the middle of a fight between two who wouldn’t be ladylike Portugal died.