Wrington Forum
Any resident of the parish of Wrington is welcome to e-mail opinions and comments as contributions to the formation of public opinion on matters of interest and concern to residents generally.

The Editor reserves the right to refuse or edit e-mails.
Contributions to
forum@wrington.org.uk
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Most recent contributions first
New Surgery scheme
From: Peter Gearing [e-mail received 16th September. It is also to be found on the News page - Ed]

Save our Surgeries

At a meeting of North Somerset’s Health Overview Service Panel (HOSP) on Thursday, August 27 objectors to the proposal to close Wrington and Churchill surgeries and build a much bigger surgery on a new site in Pudding Pie Lane, Churchill/Langford won more time for consultation.

A press release issued by NHS North Somerset on September 3 states that the formal consultation will not now start until November and will then run for four months.

One of SOS’s complaints is that until now (mid September) there has been no consultation worthy of the name on a major change in doctor (GP) services which could set the pattern for the next 20 years or more. NHS North Somerset’s announcement is therefore welcome but time remains short.

More than 600 people have signed a petition urging that the Wrington surgery be kept open.

Wrington Vale Medical Practice (WVMP) says a new surgery would allow them to offer more services. SOS would welcome more services but not at the expense of the closure of either the existing Wrington or Churchill sites.

The loss of the Wrington surgery would be a serious blow to the significant number of Wrington residents registered at Wrington. They would have to travel by car to appointments and there would be an increase in mileage for the remainder of Wrington registered patients who live in Redhill, Butcombe etc.

At a stroke it would put a distance between doctors and patients which cannot be desirable. SOS is conscious that many patients already have to travel by car to the existing Wrington and Churchill surgeries, but adding, unnecessarily, to that number will not improve ease of access to GPs and the extra car miles can only damage the health of the environment.

The loss of the surgery would also damage the general economic health of Wrington village as fewer people would visit. The survival of the much-valued chemist would be called into question.

In addition, the proposed new surgery would be on a Greenfield site, taking prime agricultural land outside the Churchill village fence, and would mean a significant increase in traffic passing the Churchill Primary School in Pudding Pie Lane.

There is another way. Two neighbouring practices, Wavering Down (Winscombe & Banwell) and Yeo Vale (Congresbury & Yatton), are both two- site practices, and plan to stick with this arrangement while improving services: they feel it serves their patients best.

Time is short but at least now there is some time available for serious consultation. SOS believes the two-site model for a GP practice in a rural area has self evident advantages. If now is the time to renew the WVMP, we should not be throwing these advantages away, but building on the strengths of the two-site practice and looking at other ways of providing more services for patients.
From: Ben Hardy

As a local resident I often review the Wrington website, which is full of useful information and for which I am grateful for. However, I have come across a few paragraphs relating to the Surgery proposals, as follows. I have some opinion regarding the proposals, but am more annoyed by the Village website being used to promote one point of view:

[Extract from statement by WVMP and quoted on Wrington website Newspage]
"The doctors' sense at both public meetings, and from informal comments that patients have made since during GP consultations, was that a lot of people present were supportive of the proposals - even amongst people who may be concerned about transport from Wrington to Langford. The rounds of applause given to the doctors was evidence of this. However, few of these people actually stood up to say so publicly, or have since actually sent in comments expressly supporting the proposal. They may feel that their views and support are "taken as read". We need to get their feedback explicitly too, as it is just as valid as expressions of objection to the proposal.

So :

If you know of individuals who are supportive but who have not actually sent in a comment (letter or email) to say this explicitly because they do not feel they need to, would you be in a position to ask them to do so? A quick email via the website "contact us" link would suffice.

The aim is to achieve a representative and balanced response of all views actually held by individuals. So it goes without saying that equally if you know of individuals who are not supportive, and/or have particular concerns they would like to see addressed, but have not hitherto sent their comments in, we need their comments too."

Whilst I understand why these comments are felt, the website should surely be an un-biased service. These comments are actively trying to promote one side of the argument. I would suggest that at the bottom of any article relating to the Surgery proposals you list all of the contact details for individuals to make their thoughts known - on both sides of the argument.

Response from Editor, Wrington Website

The website takes a strictly neutral stance on any issues of this kind. Its role has always been seen as acting as a channel of communication, not promoting a particular view in a matter of public concern. Shared Space is another such example. Wrington website publishes contributions which come its way. In fact, the only contributions received to the Forum page have been against the proposed new surgery.

The extract from the statement by WVMP calls for opinions both for and against to be sent by "a quick email via the website". This refers to the WVMP website, not this one.
Shared Space
From: Graham Berry

Call me an old-fashioned highway engineer, but for safety reasons, I prefer segregated pedestrian facilities wherever possible. In order to promote highway safety during the Avon CC years, new lengths of footways were installed, mainly at the requests of the Parish Council. These are located in School Road, part of Silver Street, part of Station Road/Butts Batch and Garstons Close.

There is a large degree of security when using footways rather than the vulnerability felt when walking over the existing shared areas where there are none, e.g. Silver Street, Cox's Green, Butts Batch, High Street and School Road beyond the junction with South Meadows.

Shared spaces have been successfully implemented in residential accessways that serve a small number of dwellings, e.g. Old Station Close, Alburys and the established Church Walk. But this is due to the fact that traffic speeds are very low, the roads are culs-de-sac and the drivers are very familiar with the conditions.

However, the four Class 3 through roads that serve the village, are, in my view generally unsuitable for space sharing.This is due to the volume and speed of traffic together with associated on-street parking. The pedestrian would have no defined rights of passage and would become the vulnerable stranger amidst the predominant presence of vehicles.

However, what I would like to see is the instigation of 20mph zones from the four main approaches to the village possibly with gateways, although this would involve more signage and road markings.

In addition to this, where there are already shared spaces, alluded to above, perhaps special surface treatment would be advantageous.

What is also essential is that we all pay due regard to the number of unnecessary vehicle trips that we undertake and so alleviate the parking problems and reduce the traffic flows in and around the village centre.
New Surgery scheme
From: Bob Bowen

Come on Wringtonians. Have your say!!

12 months of consultation!! With who? If the Parish Council and consultative groups were doing their job how come the majority of the village did not know!!
Latest dog fouling outrage

We live in School Road and have had problems with dog poo for a long time. Well, today some thoughtless person with obviously a very large dog judging by the size of the poo, left the biggest poo I think I have ever seen just inside our drive. I am absolutely disgusted that someone could be so thoughtless and not clear it up. How would they like it in their drive I wonder.

from 'Rocklea', School Road.
Shared Space and the new Surgery scheme
From: Bob Bowen

It seems somebody needs to kick the forum debate off on these topics. One word comes to my mind. Urbanisation.

Shared space to make a village like a suburb or district in a town. I came to Wrington almost 40 years ago because in was a village in looks and style. Leave well alone.

Surgery bringing to villages town-like services without thought for practicalities of rural transport.
In the past we have seen villages lose services. Blagdon lost its surgery - so did Langford. Churchill replaced those but close down Wrington would be wrong with knock on effects to the pharmacy maybe.