Yesterday, I noticed that some hooligan had set fire to the litter bin outside the laundrette. It was completely burned out and the pavement, which is tarmac just there, was badly damaged as well.

A couple of people who saw the incident told me that it was a group of youths on bicycles who had done this. They obviously thought it was amusing. If they were caught and made to pay for the damage they have caused I don’t suppose they would find it quite so funny.

Recently the two bins by the underpass at the end of Parry Road suffered the same fate and one of the Council men who was replacing them told me that by the time they have cleared away the mess, repaired the footpath and replaced the bin you don’t get much change out of £300. That money is coming out of our Council Tax payments. No wonder the bill just keeps going up and up when there are idiots who find it funny to destroy property. There was also the cost of the fire brigade having to come out to put out the fire before it spread to any of the adjacent building including the flats next door to the laundrette.

The Council came out this afternoon and cleaned up the mess, cut out the damaged area of tarmac and reinstated the footpath. Whether we will get a replacement bin remains to be seen.

PLEASE NOTE, IF YOU WANT TO BE ON PRANK PATROL YOU NEED TO CONTACT THE BBC:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/cbbc/ 

Yesterday the laundrette was closed for business because it had been taken over by the BBC so they could shoot an episode of the kids programme Prank Patrol. This is a programme where they set up a prank for a kid to play on a friend or family member. I don’t know when this episode will be on, but watch out for it. Should be fun.

You can imagine the sort of things you could get up to setting up a prank in a laundrette! The clean up crew from the BBC were there this morning to remove all evidence that they had ever been there and to return the laundrette to its normal pristine self.

Today is Remembrance Day when we remember all those who lost their lives during war so that we might be free. I buy a poppy every year in remembrance of my Uncle Lindum Morris who died during the Second World War aged just 16 years.

Uncle Lindum was desperate to join the Royal Navy and went to the recruiting office and lied about his age. The recruiting officer realised that he was still only a boy and sent him back home. Uncle Lindum still wanted to go to sea and also wanted to do something for the war effort. He eventually managed to find a job as cabin boy on the Merchant Vessel Edwy R Brown.

The MV Edwy R Brown was an oil tanker and Uncle Lindum sailed from Great Britain to Halifax, Nova Scotia where he arrived safely. The ship was filled with clean fuel oil to be brought back to Great Britain and then she had to wait for a convoy to be formed. Ships sailed in convoys because it was safer than sailing alone across the Atlantic during war time. A convoy could only travel as fast as its slowest member and this convoy was a slow convoy. By the night of 17/18th February 1941 the convoy was just south of Iceland and had only to sail for another day or so to be safe. A wolf pack (a group of German u-boats) was lying in wait for them and a number of ships from the convoy were torpedoed and sunk.

Amongst those ships was the MV Edwy R Brown. My Uncle Lindum was just 16 years old when he died, he would have celebrated his 17th birthday in July 1941. Uncle Lindum and his ship mates, along with all merchant seamen and fishermen who died during World War II and who have no grave but the sea are commemorated on the Tower Hill Memorial in London.

 If you want to check out your ancestors who served inthe armed forces or the merchant fleet and who died during the First or Second World War then take a look at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission web site. Many people from India and Pakistan and from the West Indies fought during the Wars and will be commemorated on this web site as well as British people, Canadians, Australians and New Zealanders, in fact, anyone who came from a country that formed part of the old British Empire, now known as the British Commonwealth.

A week or so back I was standing in the street chatting with a neighbour when all the feral pigeons suddenly took off. they zipped this way and that across the sky in a mad panic. When Iooked around to see what had upset them I was lucky enough to spot a bird of prey hunting the pigeons. This is something I have not seen since I moved down here eight years ago. I guess this was a young bird that has left home to look for a territory of his own. It would be really great if this bird would settle in this area as not only are they beautiful birds, but he would also help to keep the number of pigeons under control.

For several days after we saw the hawk hunting the pigeons were keeping a very low profile.

Check out the Hawk and Owl Trust web site for more info on British birds of prey.

Although I only had a quick glimpse of the hawk I suspect that it was a female sparrow hawk.

Now that the weather is growing colder many of us think about the struggle wild birds have finding enough food to eat. Lots of us like to feed the birds. However, there is a right way and a wrong way to feed birds. The wrong way is to throw heaps of left over food into the street or the park. This is not feeding birds, this is attracting vermin such as rats, mice and cockroaches. We can all do without those, thank you very much! If you are seen throwing left over food into the street, the alleys or the park you can be issued with a fixed penalty notice,which means that you will have to pay a fine. This was £50, but I understand that this may well have just been increased.  

If you want to know about how to feed the wild birds properly then check out the web site of the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds.

When the first two phasesof the redevelopment were carried out the trees planted in the streets were protected with metal tree railings. All the trees planted on those two phases are still there and growing well.

When the final phase was started the trees were planted, but no protection was installed. In some streets virtually all the trees have disappeared. I have personally seen a contractor working for the developers deliberately and repeatedly ram a tree with his van until the tree snapped off at the base and he then proceeded to plant on top of it. Despite my reporting this it would seem that no attempt has been made to make the contractor pay for the replacement of the tree. These trees do not arrive for free. Each one arrives at a cost of around £300.

I have heard of people cutting trees down with an axe because “they were in the way”. Most recently a tree was sawn down in Patey Street in the early hours of a Sunday morning. When the group of men cutting the tree were approached they said that they needed the tree for a bonfire. Excuse me! You do not go out into the street and cut down a tree just because you want some firewood. I hope they are caught and made to pay the full cost of replacing the tree.

It is the planting season again for trees and consideration is being given to replacing all the trees that have been deliberately cut down, knocked down or snapped off. This time they will be given protection like the trees on the first two phases.

Check out the Tree Council web site for more information about trees and how important they are for the environment.

Another good web site is Trees for Cities. Here is what they say about Manchester.

Northmoor Community Association is currently building a website, but there is not much on there at the moment.

It does however give their contact details.

The laundrette has been on Northmoor Road for many years. With the regeneration of the area the laundrette  passed into the control of the community and is now really up to date with state of the art washers and dryers. It is also the only internet laundrette I have ever heard of. You can come in, put your washing on and log on to the net. There is also a community library area with donated books and a tool hire business. Check out their web site for full details.

The English Partnerships website has a page on Northmoor

Welcome to my blog. This is going to be all about various aspects of the Northmoor Road area of Longsight including history of the area, current affairs and all the latest community news.