Friday 8 November 2013

This should get Chalkhill residents on their bikes!

The site plan
The BMX track
The scooter track
The planning application for a family cycling facility at St David's Close (Chalkhill Sports Ground) has now been posted on the Brent Council website LINK and it looks well thought out and very exciting. A lot of thought has been put into making the facility both safe and challenging and the noisiest track is well away from the houses next to the railway track.

 The initial deadline for comments is November 20th 2013 and the planning officer is Matthew Harvey: matthew.harvey@brent.gov.uk

Only two comments so far appear on the website. One is a simple objection while the other states:
Support: I currently live in a neighbouring borough and would be prepared to cycle 3 miles here to use this facility. I have grown up riding BMX in East London and moved to North London recently I have seen the benefits first hand of what places like this can do for local kids and communities. I've seen kids from all kids of backgrounds become friends, avoid turning to crime and help stay healthy because they had somewhere to go and something to do on the weekends.
I hope there will be similar positive comments from local residents including children.

This is a summary of the facilities from the Planning Application:


Family Cycle Trail

The Family cycle trail will be a ‘Green Grade Trail’ based on the International Mountain Bicycling Association’s (IMBA) grading of routes/trails. The difficulty level of the proposed trail equates to ‘Leisure and Easy’ and will be built to IMBA Standards for Green Grade Trails. 

The Family Trail (Green Trail) will snake its way around the Sports field as indicated on the design. Boulder stones will be placed to add features to the trail and help create a natural segregation from riders and pedestrians. Best possible use will be made of existing land forms and features onsite. All aspects of the trail will be integrated into the exiting land forms as much as possible for example elevations and deviations of the existing parkland.

BMX Track

The proposal relates to the creation of a BMX Track facility to The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents (ROSPA) and British Cycling standards. Further, a post installation inspection will be carried out before the facility is handed over to ensure it meets the standards and safety parameters set by British Cycling and ROSPA

The proposed design has been created to suit all abilities of riders from beginners to experts as all obstacles are to be 'rollable', meaning not so confident riders can roll over each obstacle and still carry sufficient speed for the next. The nature of the obstacles and angle of the berms will allow more experienced riders to carry further speed and negotiate the obstacles in a number of different ways. Each element of the track will be progressive and allow riders to increase their skill level during each visit.

The Start Hill has been positioned to be easily accessible from the entrance to the area. This helps to reduce conflict between riders as well as other users of the sport ground as the easiest way to the track
start it the most desired route. 

The position of the Start Hill also helps to reduce the possibility of riders crossing the track as the Start Hill is the area riders congregate and when positioned as close to the entrance as possible riders are magnetized towards the correct starting position before riding the track. The Track start slope is low to help control the speed of riders entering the first straight. This will give less skilled riders the confidence to try the track as they will not be entering th e obstacles at great speeds. The obstacles have also been designed low. This keeps the speed controlled by not allowing riders to gain lots of speed from long down slopes which high jumps would allow. 

Inexperienced riders can roll each obstacle safely whilst still carrying enough speed to negotiate the next. The track will also be of interest to more experienced riders as they can try to ride the track in different combinations and carry extra speed round the berms. 

Scooter Track

The Scooter Track will be placed at the end of the asphalted access path to the area to allow for ease of access by the users such as young children and families. 

These asphalted access paths will allow users of scooters and other small wheeled bikes ease of access to the Scooter track as they will be of a smooth finish.

The access path will cross over the start or return of the family cycle trail. this will be negotiated with the use of stone boulders to slow both riders on the family trail and users of the scooter track by means of a squeeze area. 

The Scooter Track itself will consist of small low obstacles linking from one to another. There will also be a low start hill to allow riders to gain sufficient speed to negotiate the obstacles along the Track. The entire Scooter Track will be finished in asphalt to allow a smooth finish for the small wheeled Scooters and Bikes. The smoother the finish the easier smaller wheels will be able to travel over the surface. 

Storage Container

The storage container will be supplied to provide a future cycling club valuable storage space for equipment such as bikes, helmets and other safety equipment.

Floodlighting is not proposed and the lack of this provision should minimise recreational noise during the hours of darkness.

2 comments:

trevor said...

That is a good Start but more needs to be done.
I do not like to see the pavements full of cigarette butts and empty cigarette boxes and yet sadly that is the norm in this area.
The council should be doing all in its power to promote healthy habits because The human body was not designed to be abused and we not here to be exploited by tobacco companies and shop keepers.
Wembley is our Home and not a place for Tobacco companies and shopkeepers to work together to exploit us with health damaging death dealing things like cigarettes.
I also am extremely offended by adverts being placed in public places that promote so called electronic cigarettes.
Smoking is not good and that is a Fact of Life.
and something that causes countless Deaths every year from smoking related diseases such as throat and Lung cancer, makes it undeniable that smoking in human society cannot be justified
and companies should not be allowed to use clever advertising to attempt to entice vulnerable people to smoke.
The Public are not here to to exploited and taught to abuse themselves so that companies along with the government can rake in billions in profit and taxes.
if MP's frown upon Police officers that Tell lies which results in an MP being forced to resign
then How much more Wrong is it to permit the advertising of a habit that causes nothing but extreme damage to health?
Smoking is one of the biggest causes of preventable Death in this country alone and yet smoking remains legal!!!
Lying is wrong of course but lies do not result in millions of preventable deaths every year.
and therefore smoking should be outlawed as soon as possible.
of course it would not be welcomed for obvious reasons
since smoking is the means by which many make their living and The government rakes in billions in tax revenue each year and so for smoking to be banned would mean many would lose their means of living and the government would lose billions in tax revenue.
but on the other hand it would mean that lives could start to be saved and people could start learning to look after their health.
I know that People can stop smoking without smoking being banned by the government
but We have to face facts that smoking is not good for society
and it does nothing but hurt people and causes millions of preventable deaths each year and also increases the cost to the NHS each year when people are forced to turn to it for help when their health ends up extremely damaged from the unnatural and extremely unhealthy habit of smoking.

Anonymous said...

Certainly I agree smoking is biggest causes of death and must be tackled with immediately. Labour Party in Brent is doing its best to move towards non smoking Brent which eventually will come in the future but we must not forget,Labour Adminstration in Brent has done so much in their 1st 4 years in Barnhill ward what other failed to do in last many years.