THE online community newspaper for Nailsea people, their family and their friends

February 2025

Our town is a very, very nice town

Property people

22 historic sites are being added to North Somerset Council Local Heritage List including our old library at Somerset Square as part of Crown Glass Shopping Centre. Once compared to a 'Soviet gulag' it is a classic 1970s concrete structure. And news of a major economic development in green belt at Long Ashton has been approved by North Somerset Council.. Read more HERE

What's On 2025

This month we have Valentine's day, first farmers' market of the year and half term. Our What's On page is filling up nicely with advanced dates for 2025 lots of cub and club quizzes, bingo sessions, local walks and library opening hours and more. Read all about it HERE

Gallery 2025

We have a wonderful slideshow from Backwell Lake and also swans at Jacklands Lake but the photo here is of Ned watching the fish at Jacklands. We love all the atmospheric weather photos too especially those taken from a done. We have galleries going back a decade. To add your local images of people and places email nailseapeople@gmail.com

THREE WEEKLY

North Somerset Council recycling and waste team has organised a Q&A session for Facebook group admins at the recycling depot in Weston-super-Mare 2-4pm on Thursday, February 27, in preparation for planned changes to recycling and waste collections being introduced later this year. In the meantime, there is a dedicated page on the council website at www.n-somerset.gov.uk/threeweekly, which will update regularly as more information becomes available.

COMMUNITY STALL

Nailsea Farmers' Market is back in February and a charity which is setting up a community stall is asking for donations for a tombola it is running. Hft, which supports adults with learning disabilities across the region and the UK, will be at the market on Saturday, February 15. They will be providing information about their work and running a tombola to raise funds. Though a few prizes have already been donated, more contributions are needed, which will help the charity continue its work. Hft community fundraiser Hannah Vischer said: "We are really looking forward to attending the market and meeting everyone. We already have some lovely donations of prizes for the tombola from other traders attending the market on the day, but more are needed." She will be at the market from 9am to 1pm. Anyone wishing to donate email hanner.vischer@hft.org.uk or call 0791 844 6817.

'WHEN' NOT 'IF' CAR PARKING FEES?

Nailsea Town Council 86-pages of the 92-page agenda papers for its meeting on Wednesday, February 5, 7.30pm at the Tithe Barn are now online to read/download HERE. However, agenda item 17 the 'response to North Somerset Council’s proposals for the Clevedon Road and Station Road car parks' and has been deemed ‘commercially sensitive’ therefore will be discussed in closed session (no press or public). Probably ‘secret’ parking fees information? A letter from North Somerset Council senior sustainable travel and road safety officer confirms the speed limit from 40mph to 30mph on Queens Road plus narrowing of carriageway at some of oversized junction should happen this spring 2025. Wednesday, October 1, is the date pencilled in for second residents' meeting at Nailsea Masonic Hall.

DENTAL TREATMENT

The Houston Group in Nailsea reports 649 patients didn’t turn up for appointments last year costing the Clevedon Road dental practice 301.7 clinical hours. They have now introduced a £2 per hour fine for non-shows or short notice cancellations.

Dancing on Ice superstar Mollie

Dancing On Ice star Mollie Pearce enjoys more good wishes to her spectacular journey on the sparkling televised rink show.

Mollie was born in Nailsea and is an English television personality and model, who was runner-up on the second series of The Traitors in 2024 and is currently competing in the 17th series of Dancing on Ice.

Nailsea School shared the staff photomontage top with a caption saying: "A few familiar faces here - just wanting to wish former Unicorn House captain Mollie P all the very best for Dancing on Ice on Sunday. You are totally smashing it and it's a thrill to see you Aspire Believe Succeed - we're super proud of you!"

And did you know Mollie's mega rise to fame has resulted her own Wikipedia page - read more here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mollie_Pearce.

She has 116,000 plus followers on Instagram!

Mollie celebrated her 23rd birthday this week on Tuesday, January 28, and we send her belated very happy birthday wishes, was that a photo posted with her mum in the Livro Lounge?

Mollie said: “A big thank you for all my birthday messages, love you all, bring on Sunday.”

The next episode airs on Sunday, February 2, at 6.30pm on ITV1.

All past episodes can be watched on ITVX.

Read all about Mollie's journey on our VIP page HERE

Who owns Nailsea open spaces?

In September 2022 Nailsea residents were shocked to learn that small plots of land including roadside grass verges being sold off to the highest bidder by London auction houses.

It resulted in speculators buying plots hoping to get planning permission to build now or in the future.

Attempts by Nailsea Town Council to put to areas at The Perrings and between Bibury Close and Birdlip Close under the protection of a ‘town green’ status failed on legal technicalities.

North Somerset Council owns Scotch Horn Centre and the adjoining Millennium Park, while other playing fields and play areas are either part of a school campus or managed by sports or recreation clubs and are mainly safe.

In a controversial move even North Somerset Council sold ‘recreational’ land south of The Uplands to build 54 new mixed-tenure Passivhaus homes.

It is the no-man’s-land that is the worry.

The problem is open space on many housing estates from the 1960s onwards wasn’t taken over by the district council – then called Woodspring.

Federated Homes who developed the houses south of Queens Road back in the 1970-80s went bust and as the land in contention was counted as an ‘asset’ by the official receiver who was duty bound by law to sell to the highest bidder.

We are still unsure who bought the land but what we do know is the land isn’t being maintained and the grass is so high it has stopped children playing on what everyone believed was community space.

The same is happening in Portishead when a road went up for sale!

The problem has been solved about open space on new housing developments including road maintenance is now the responsibility of the householders via a management company.

At the end of January 2025 Nailsea Town Council environment and leisure committee considered a lengthy list of land parcels being offered by North Somerset Council although this isn’t clear if they are selling/leasing or giving the asset away?

The committee decided to inspect the sites and prepare a report.

We attach HERE in pdf format the list of assets.

We presume if the open space near you isn’t on this list it falls into the no-man’s category?

What do you think? Leave your comment below.