Your guide for your
GROUP
Bicester and surrounding villages Thursday, March 1 - Wednesday, March 7, 2018
Weekly leisure guide for in and around Oxford
Out& About leisure time in &
around Oxfordsh
ire
A good habit to have
Sister Act Live Choir to light up New The atre
Free
oxfordshireguardian.co.uk
Protesters’ anger at green belt homes
Travellers moved on from park and ride site
Page 2
Join The Jacksons for disco day at Common People
Trekking the Great Wall to say thank you
Page 5
Page 15
A hole lot of fun but friends have a dig over poor roads By Owen Hughes BICESTER briefly became a ‘garden’ town as green-fi ngered guerrillas went viral in their plot to fi ll “cavernous” potholes with compost and flowers. More than 30 potholes on Boston Road, Churchill Road, Buckingham Road and surrounding streets and roundabouts were packed with flora to make the council “take notice” of the severity of road deterioration in the town. Alyson Clifton, caterer at Bicester Buffets Sandwich Bar, took to the streets with trowel in hand alongside friend Kizzy Burt to raise public awareness of the problem. Alyson said: “The point was that we wanted the council to sit up and take notice and hopefully do something about all the cavernous potholes. “There are so many craters on the roads that it’s just a joke. “I had a couple of hours free from work one afternoon. Kizzy and I thought we would have a giggle by fi lling in the potholes ourselves and it just sort of escalated from there really. “We put some where we knew they would get run over straight away, but it didn’t matter, we just wanted the problem to get noticed, which it has.” Despite being told by bystanders that what they were doing was breaking the law, the duo were
undeterred from stuffi ng the potholes with greenery. The vigilante gardeners reported 11 of the potholes to the council before splashing out around £7 on compost and shrubs. Alyson’s post on a community Facebook group went viral reaching more than 800 likes and 150 shares within 24 hours, with the majority of the 130 comments supportive of Alyson and Kizzy’s scheme. She added: “I’m sick of all the doom and gloom, I like to go on Facebook for a giggle. I just wanted to give everyone a chuckle and I think I’ve done that.” Oxfordshire County Council recently received an extra £1million in funding from the Department for Transport to patch the county’s roads. Between January and February 20, more than 3,510 potholes have been identified and repaired with a further 2,365 pending. A spokesperson for Oxfordshire County Council said: “While planting flowers is an interesting idea the safest and most effective thing to do is to report the potholes to us via Fix My Street. “The severe winter weather has had a major impact on the road surfaces and we are having to repair a large number of potholes. “Potholes that pose a safety risk are dealt with as top priority.” Cherwell District Council declined to comment.
Alyson Clifton and Kizzy Burt filled potholes with flowers to draw the council’s attention to the poor state of the roads in and around Bicester
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