October Update

Meetings! Put these dates in your diary now:

• THIS Tuesday 15th October 7.30pm Quaker Meeting House: we'll have an update from all our wonderful groups and we'll do some planning ahead, and think about how we can continue to build our community. If anyone would like to join Andrew at Unico (Grove St) to eat before the meeting, he will be there from about 5.45pm - upstairs this time.

• Tuesday 19th November 7.30pm Quaker Meeting House: Car Wars! EV v. ICE - which side are you on? TW member Mel Harris sets out the facts and the arguments for us to debate.

Lindow 40 Years continues: We're launching an open call photography exhibition which will take place at The Guild next April /May. The brief is to photograph the wonderful artworks that are currently on the moss and details are here: www.discoverlindow.org/photographyexhibition or see the flyer with all the details below. Do get involved, we'd love to see lots of your photos.

More Trees Please: we will be planting many more trees this Autumn (1,200 at least) - want to get involved? See more about our Tree Group here. The next tree group meeting is TOMORROW Monday, 14th October at the Friends Meeting House at 7.30pm - all are welcome so please do come along if you'd like to get stuck in to sticking trees in the ground and preserving our existing trees in and around Wilmslow - we'd love more people to come along. 

Repair Café: Our Next Repair Café is Saturday 2 November at St Chads in Handforth. Get in touch if you are a volunteer repairer (small electrics, bikes, furniture, knitting, textiles etc) or if you can help in the Café or by donating homemade cakes and biscuits. Email us at repaircafewilmslow@gmail.com, we would love to hear from you. The event is getting busier and busier so more volunteers are now very much needed. It so gratifying that the concept is so popular and becoming so busy, but it does mean more help is required. 

Exciting Update: We are delighted that Lisa Johnson will take on work for Transition Wilmslow for at least the next year, to maintain our mailing lists, respond to enquiries, and production of newsletters and social media and communication with Wilmslow. It’s not something we have been doing as well as we would like recently, with so much exciting work going on with trees, gardens, and the Moss - plus an exciting potential energy project on Colshaw. We're delighted to have someone who can pick up all these loose ends. 

Accounts Help: If you have particular skills in financial management that you might like to offer us, we would love to hear from you, as we need to replace at least one trustee and need that skill set. Email us here.

Donate: if you want to make a donation to the work we do here at Transition Wilmslow, you can do this from the homepage of the website, even donating £1 helps us to continue our work around Wilmslow, supporting nature, biodiversity, climate action and eco education.

Or Click here: paypal.me/transitionwilmslow

June Meeting this week!

Thursday: We moved the monthly meeting to Thursday, 27th June this month - so 7.30pm as usual at the Quaker Meeting House. All are very welcome, come along for a chat and see what we are up to, how you can help, or get involved. We will have the Eco Lead from Wilmslow High coming along and we're excited to hear how we can support the thousands of students at our local High School on the eco journeys.

The Lindow Art Trail (Window on Lindow)  is now officially OPEN and has 16 amazing artistic installations which form a fascinating trail around the area of the Moss. Some of us walked around on Thursday with Phil Barton, the artist, and it is quite simply wonderful. You can enjoy the walk at your own time and see the incredible installations around the route - many of which change in the light and time of day. A truly magical place that we are so privileged to have on our doorstep. You can pick up a route map at the start of the trail or see more on the website here: https://www.discoverlindow.org/art

Repair Cafe, Saturday 6th July: We're still looking for more volunteers to help organise this.  If people would like to be part of the small team, please send an email to repaircafewilmslow@gmail.com (mailto:repaircafewilmslow@gmail.com)  with details about yourself and any experience you may have had organising such events. The next one is in the halls at Wilmslow URC on Chapel Lane.

The Wilmslow Show - 7 July : We will have a stall for Lindow Moss and Transition Wilmslow at the Wilmslow Show on 7th July - could anyone offer to help? Please let Andrew know (andrew.backhouse@phonecoop.coop (mailto:andrew.backhouse@phonecoop.coop?subject=Wilmslow%20Show) ). It would be lovely to have someone who is good at design/display to help set up our stall. If we could get a few people doing a couple of hours each, that would be great! Many hands make light work.

Sunday, 28th July - WORLD BOG DAY

Can you help the Lindow Moss Bioblitz on Sunday 28^th July (World Bog Day) running from 10-5.30 on the Lindow Moss restoration site. Either help all day or part of the day. You need to be familiar with the site.

Please contact Simon Caporn for more info. 07949208983 s.j.m.caporn@mmu.ac.uk (mailto:s.j.m.caporn@mmu.ac.uk)

TREES

For those of you who attending the Climate Hustings, many of us where very interested in the questions asked by Paddy Johnson, Chair TW Tree Group

The Candidates all wanted more information and this is Paddy's Summary:

Tree Planting on Highway edges (Streets!)

The bad news

For a couple of years Transition Wilmslow Tree Group have been trying to get replacement trees planted along the streets of Wilmslow where we have lost trees.The planting on such locations is strictly controlled by Cheshire East Council (CEC and in particular their Highways Department).

Originally, we were told that planting in general was not possible as they were devising a policy. In March ’23 they finally produced an interim policy (Highway Tree Safety maintenance and inspections, and the code of Practice for Highway Tree Safety inspection). They also reported their intention to produce a Highway tree planting policy by September 2024.

The problem with this interim policy is that it lays out 13 stringent criteria for Highway planting including:

 Trees must be planted within a minimum of 1.1m verge width

 The tree must be a minimum of 3m from the edge of the carriageway.

This effectively rules out almost all existing tree planting sites within town.

The good news

The Tree group has been lobbying CEC Highway department since last December. This campaign has now also spread throughout the new organisation of tree groups across the county (Cheshire Tree Alliance). This group has now sent a letter to the Highways Department (see below) demanding that an immediate review of the interim policy is undertaken and that we must be involved in consultation regarding the new policy.

This problem was raised at the TW hustings of candidates for the election and received unanimous support from all 4 candidates to help in our efforts. The candidates were subsequently asked to demonstrate this support and all 4 have written to the council.

What can I do to support this?

If this issue and the prospective loss of trees in the towns of Cheshire is a major concern to you, please read the contents of our letter and pass on your concerns to your local councillors, prospective MPs and, most importantly, the Highways committee (as per our letter).

June meeting date change, hustings and Lindow

Some of you came to our climate change and biodiversity hustings in Wilmslow last Saturday - what an absolutely fantastic afternoon that was! We had a hall full of people who care deeply about our natural environment and we made that very clear to our four Tatton candidates. It's so important that we let our potential future MP know how much we care about these issues - luckily we have a vote, so let's all use it on 4th July.

There's another hustings this week: Churches Together in Wilmslow are having an Election Hustings, not just about climate, but all issues, so we can hear more about what our candidates have planned for us here in Tatton.

Location: Wilmslow United Reformed Church

Date: Tuesday 18th June

Time: 7pm for a 7:15pm start

This month's meeting: We are moving the meeting to Thursday, 27th June this month as this Thursday night is the preview of the The Lindow Heritage trail. This opens officially on Friday and has 16 amazing artistic installations which form a fascinating trail around the area of the Moss. The trail will become a wonderful addition to the story of our landscape as we celebrate the 40th anniversary of finding Lindow Man who was found on the moss in August, 1984.

Check out the link for further details about our wonderful Lindow Moss and be sure to visit: https://www.discoverlindow.org/whats-on

Thursday, 27th June: Monthly meeting at 7.30pm at the Friends Meeting House - a general catch up. Do come along for a cup of tea and a chat. 

The Wilmslow Show - 7 July : We will have a stall for Lindow Moss and Transition Wilmslow at the Wilmslow Show on 7th July - could anyone offer to help? Please let Andrew know (andrew.backhouse@phonecoop.coop). It would be lovely to have someone who is good at design/display to help set up our stall. If we could get a few people doing a couple of hours each, that would be great! Many hands make light work.

Repair Cafe: We're still looking for more volunteers to help organise this.  If people would like to be part of the small team, please send an email to repaircafewilmslow@gmail.com with details about yourself and any experience you may have had organising such events. We host three repair cafés a year, alternating between Wilmslow United Reformed Church on Chapel Lane and St Chad's church in Handforth. The next one is Saturday 6th July in the halls at Wilmslow URC on Chapel Lane.

Want to get involved in some slow cycling? We've had an email from Karl Swetnam who started a British Cycling Let's Ride Cycling group, which may be of interest to some of you:https://letsride.co.uk/groups/wilmslow-social-cycling His aim is to lead a steady ride to a cafe (about 11-12mph), total ride distance between 20 to 30 miles on the 1st and 3rd Fridays of the month. Sounds great! If you'd like to get involve email Karl.