10 July - No smoke, no talent, no commuters
There is a Cabinet meeting scheduled for this evening, so that may scupper plans to repair the fence
on Saturday. But meanwhile…
Lesnes Abbey
As
the first fire engine drew up at Lesnes Abbey circa 10:20 this morning I looked in vain for the smoke. There was none.
Within seconds there were four appliances on the scene.
From overheard conversations I gathered that a dog was trapped in the brambles surrounding
the lower pond and no one had remembered to bring a chain saw.
One of the men was on the radio for one to be rushed to the park.
Bexleyheath ward
Councillor and recent Mayor Sue Gower has confirmed her yes, no, yes again
and now definitely no decision about standing at the 2026 election after successfully
passing through the selection process. This might look like indecision but everything
has been triggered by changing family circumstances. Two or three electoral defeats
could leave Bexley Tories with no discernible talent at all.
Bollards!
I am lukewarm about
deterring
commuter parking on my drive because it is not a cheap option and feels a
bit like overkill, but a small number of readers showed an interest in the
subject. Hence this update.
Enquiries were first made long before the subject was mentioned here so the
timescales are longer than the recent blogs implied.
The first company approached was Bollard Security which gives a Yorkshire
address. They offered one solution and a more expensive alternative. I emailed
to say that I was prepared to order either subject to their comments on one
specified difference.
I heard nothing more.
A second company calling themselves Wentworth Protection sent what they said was a
PDF quotation but it was nothing more than a link to their website. An email
said see below for the actual quotation. There was nothing below. Not even a
company signature or logo.
My query suggesting that their email had been
accidentally truncated went unanswered,
A third company called Bison Security phoned me soon after I made an enquiry.
Upon hearing my requirements I was told their specialist would call me back and
he did within the hour. He wanted to do a site inspection. When was I available?
Any time next week.
I heard no more so eight days later I phoned them. They remembered by enquiry
and said they would get the specialist to call me straight back. That is more
than two
weeks ago. Absolutely nothing since.
A web form request to
a fourth company resulted in a near immediate phone call from someone who
said that what I had been offered previously required a complex control system
which could control up to four bollards and put the price up very considerably.
This was not made obvious by any of the other companies who offered the control
box only as
an extra implying it was optional on a single bollard installations.
Careful reading of the manuals suggests that the control box is indeed a
necessity and while the fourth company was prepared to fit it it wasn’t
practical to use my existing 32mm conduit to convey the various signal cables
back into the garage. This more or less ruled the system out because of the
extra expense and the need to rip up part of the block drive.
However this fourth fellow was trying to be helpful. He said he has a new
product coming on stream next month once its testing trials are complete and he can bring it round to show me
before making any decision. It is not quite as substantial looking as the others
but it not much more than a quarter of the price of the others.
Watch this parking space!