First returns arriving

Great excitement here at Thatcham Vision HQ as the first paper returns arrive. People have been completing the online version of the Thatcham Questionnaire since we launched it on Tuesday. We'll be using our 'wiki' - see the feedback page on our main site - to let you know what people are saying, but we won't publish details until after the closing date for completion of the questionnnaire - 2nd May.

In the meantime the wiki contains summaries of the views of over 600 people in Thatcham who have completed our earlier 'qualititative' surveys. These were mostly open-ended forms in which we asked people what they'd like to change about Thatcham and what they like best at present.

If you haven't completed the online questionnnaire yet click here to go the survey page and do so - it should only take you 5-10 minutes to complete it.

People are making good use of the text box at the end of the questionnaire to cover points and ideas which aren't in the questionnaire and comments on the survey itself.

Wrap Day

After a few hectic weeks our 'wrap' is published today. It's called a wrap, in newspaper jargon, because it's wrapped around The Advertiser free newspaper. Forty thousand copies of the wrap were printed yesterday and copies will be distributed to all homes in West Berkshire. There are two reasons for such a wide distribution. Firstly, we're interested in the views of people who live outside Thatcham as well as residents. So, if you visit the town, work there or go to school there we'd very much like to hear from you. Secondly it's not possible to target a wrap on specific areas - it must be printed with all copies of the newspaper, but even so it is very cost effective. If we wanted to produce, print and circulate a document of similar length just to homes in Thatcham and nearby villages it would be much more expensive than using the wrap format for our supplement and we wouldn't, for example, get coverage in places like Newbury.

We've had a very interesting time working with the team from the Newbury Weekly News on the wrap - notably John Hampson and Marcus Bishop - who have done an excellent job for us. (I'm sure that they'd want me to stress that all the words and ideas in the supplement are ours, not theirs.)

We're hoping to get a good response to our questionnaire and, just as importantly, to find more people who want to get involved in improving Thatcham. We've got an excellent team of volunteers working on the Thatcham Vision already (see page 2 of the wrap for details), but there's lots to do.

BBC's Action Network

Action week has just finished.  What did you do?

If the answer's not a lot, you'll find lots of good ideas - and information about the BBC's Action Network - here.

For political anoraks only...

... see this from BBC political correspondent Nick Robinson's weblog on 'double devolution', giving power to the people (perhaps) and related matters which are connected with the parish planning initiative of which the Thatcham Vision is a part.

A quick wave ...

... to visitors to the Blog from the National Parish Planning conference which took place in Newbury yesterday.  An excellent event, I thought, although I can't comment on the 'Using ICT in Parish Planning' session - on the grounds that I ran it!  If you'd like a copy of a brief handout which lists the websites and web related services which we're using as part of the Thatcham Vision please click here.  Please feel free to let other people know about this.  If you'd like to contact me with any questions you have about ICT and Parish Planning please email me by clicking here.  I'm can't provide you with expert advice on the subject - I'm not a website designer by trade - but I can at least tell you about our experiences.

As with most of the other posts to this blog, I added this one by just writing an email and sending it to a special email address which you can create when you set-up the blog. 

I'd be also be very grateful to hear any ideas you have about how we can improve the website. 

Incidentally, I did find most of yesterday very interesting and useful.  One point that struck me was that calling what we're doing 'planning' is misleading.  I'd be interested to hear what others think about that.

While we're talking about keeping our fuel bills down...

... here's an interesting item from today's science and technology section in the Guardian. As you'll see, it's about heat pumps: an idea that I haven't heard much about recently but always sounded interesting. One couple quoted in the article claim that their recent installation will pay for itself within seven years (compared with their oil fired system) and the technology is very simple.
Perhaps all new homes in Thatcham should feature a heat pump? The Office of the Deputy Prime Minister are on the case. According to the article they are 'reviewing options'. Meanwhile things are a little further forward in Sweden where 97% of new homes have heat pumps.

As an alternative to wind turbines...

...(see below) you could consider making your own electricity. There's an article on the subject in this week's New Scientist. It's available from the magazine's website but you'll need to pay to read it in full.

Keeping track of the blog (and lots of other things)

If you're interested in keeping track of changes to this blog and you don't know about web feeds take a look at this explanation of the idea at the always excellent BBC News website.

The BBC article explains what 'news readers' are - I'd recommend Bloglines which is based on a website. Once you've set up an account you can keep track of changes to websites which feature a feed, including this one and our Wiki. You'll find the link for the feed for this blog in the links section on the right hand side of this page.

To keep track of changes to the wiki, copy the address which appears in your browser's address bar when you click here into your newsreader.

Confused? Well, this will take a little concentration but after you've read the BBC article all should become clear.

Wind turbines

The company that runs the new wind turbine which is just visible from the M4 as you drive past Reading has also supplied two for the town of Swaffham in Norfolk. As you'll see from their website, a consultation with local residents identified that a large percentage of those who responded were in favour of installation of the second machine.

Would Thatcham residents be similarly enthusiastic? There's just one catch: one member of our team of volunteers has pointed out that the turbine in Reading meets the needs of 1200 homes. We'd need about eight Reading-sized ones just to meet domestic demand.

Wired Thatcham

One of the topics we're currently investigating as part of the Vision is the idea of the 'wired community'.

I've just stumbled across this excellent collection of links on the subject.

Websites and other internet applications have enormous potential for linking people together and getting them involved in different aspects of their community, but we obviously need to take account of the fact that web access is by no means universal. Do you have any ideas about how we could bridge the 'digital divide' in Thatcham, assuming that this would be a good thing? If so, we'd be very interested to hear from you.

What do 8-12 Year Olds Think of Thatcham?

You can find out by visiting our Wiki and downloading a summary of views expressed by children at Parsons Down School. Lots of interesting views and ideas were expressed. For example, problems crossing the road and the general issue of road safety featured much more prominently than in responses from adults.

The general issue of youth provision is being worked on by one of our Hot Topic teams. We have set-up a number of these teams, all involving Thatcham residents, to look at a range of topics which also include the town centre, transport and access, the environment, social and community, senior citizen provision amongst them. If you're interested in making a difference to Thatcham in any of these areas and would like to get involved please email us by clicking here.

Government Follows Thatcham's Lead

It's good to see central government catching-up with the Thatcham Vision Project. It has just launched it's very own 'wiki' - click here to take a look at it and here to look at ours which we set-up two months ago. A great idea, obviously, and there are some interesting links on the home page including one to the excellent IDeA website, which is about innovation in local government.

I'd like to offer a small suggestion to the Whitehall wikiers. Try to wean yourself off the jargon guys. This is a personal thing – I’ve written about it on this blog before - but I really do have a pathological dislike of management jargon. For instance, the following leaped off the home page and tried to strangle me:

'key competency' - translation: something really important we need to be good at

'embed innovative thinking within local government' - translation: ensure councils get better at improving things

‘joined-up working’ – translation: well that one needs a whole new blog entry of its own, but I guess that it’s a more 'muscular' (ugh!) version of ‘joined-up thinking’, another phrase which has been bandied about a lot over the last few years.

The quote from the usually lucid Peter Drucker is particularly impenetrable: if anyone can work out what it means do drop me a line via this email address.

But hey, it’s easy to criticise. Innovation is a subject which fascinates me and I’ll try to find some (of my own) time to explore and add-to the ‘e-innovations’ (oh dear!) wiki. You might like to do that as well because the whole point of a wiki is that it’s a two way thing: wikis are websites you can both read and write yourself.

Incidentally, the world's most famous wiki was in the news yesterday.

Thatcham Speaks

As you'll have noticed if you've visited the main website, we've started adding short interviews with people in Thatcham to the site. Just click the link on the home page - or on the interviews page - and you'll be able to hear what our first 'aural' contributors have to say.

The flow of responses to our 'Wishes' consultation exercise is increasing by the day - both via the online survey (also accessible via our home page) and the paper version, which are available from the library and Thatcham Vision Supreme Headquarters at the Town Council offices - see contact details on the main website.

Over the next few weeks (with a break over Christmas, of course) we'll be holding the first meetings of our 'Hot Topic Teams' which are looking at issues like the town centre, youth provision and transport. A full list of teams is available at the Hot Topics page, also on the main website.

Lastly we're going to post some of the comments and ideas we've been receiving at our 'wiki'. See the link in the right hand column of this page to visit the wiki.

It's all go, to say the least!

Wishes to date

We’re beginning to get lots of responses to our ‘Wishes’ consultation campaign, which you can take part in by clicking here.

Here are some examples of the wishes that people are sending to us.

I wish…

… ‘for a larger, better equipped library. Thatcham’s population continues to increase – this amenity needs to follow suit. It is important to many people for multiple reasons.’

… that there was a bridge over the level-crossing.’

…for an improved shopping are with ample free parking – this would be to include some ‘High Street’ names desperately needed would be a clothes shop for adults as well as children.’

…there was a wider range of shops, even smaller versions of big brand shops, or independent ones. A small Burger King, Pizza Hut, clothes shop for children and adults and a proper coffee shop.’

When are you going to be sending us your wish?

Three (plus or minus) wishes for Thatcham

There are two versions of our Wishes for Thatcham exercise. We're distributing a paper based version via schools, Thatcham library and other public places. We launched our web based version today - you'll find the link on our home page which you can visit by clicking here. The link is just below our online poll.

The aim of the wishes exercise is not to produce a wish list (as in 'that's just a wish list'). We're using the idea of wishes to tap into people's aims and aspirations. Asking people 'If you could make one wish related to a change in Thatcham what would it be?' - which is something I started doing shortly after I started working on the project - produced some interesting, and revealing, results.

You'll find out about the way that we are collecting wishes when you visit the survey. As you'll see we've taken the idea a little further and are asking people to think about ways that their wish could be turned into something real. The online survey talks about 'bridges and barriers'. Bridges are factors which exist now which could enable the change to happen and barriers are things that could prevent it. This is a plain English (well, almost) version of a widely used technique which you can find out all about by clicking here.

Eventually we're also going to help ensure that our wishes are rooted in reality by introducing the brand new concept of SMART Wishes (a first, I think, for the Thatcham Vision project). Click on this link and follow some of the references to find out what SMART is all about. If you've ever been involved in planning in organisations, you'll probably know already.

The benefits of talking to each other

You don't need to be a sociologist to know that people don't talk to each other as much, or know each other as well, as they used to. I remember my Grandmother's house in South East London in the early 1960s. It was a hub of activity for the extended family, many of whom lived in the surrounding streets. For a child Christmases were magical: a knees-up around the piano, not a TV is sight, dozens of people in the house.

Ten years later that had all changed. The family had dispersed not only to different parts of London but also to other parts of the country (and other countries). We never got together in quite the same way again.

This sense of separation and isolation in our communities is almost tangible: look at the 9' fences which are built between the tiny gardens in new housing estates, for example.

Perhaps people want to keep themselves to themselves: maybe that's partly why the (and my) extended family broke down. But it seems that there are real benefits to getting people engaged in thinking about their community. See this interesting speech, by 'Minister of Communities’ (you all knew that we had one of those, didn’t you?) David Milliband for more on that subject. If you agree – or disagree – with what he had to say, feel free to post a comment below. (One of my goals for this week is to see if we can persuade Mr Milliband to come down and have a chat with us, down here in deepest Berkshire.)

Scenarios, processes and that sort of thing

In spite of my dislike of management jargon (see below), there are useful ideas available from the wonderful world of business planning which we're going to be using during our project.

One of them is called 'scenario planning'. It's a very simple idea which has been used to good effect by organisations like Shell - in fact this particular idea was invented by someone from Shell.

Scenarios are often described as 'stories' about possible plausible futures. They aren't intended to be predictions, not least because it's pretty much impossible to predict what will happen in the future (if you know any differently, do drop us a line!). Instead they are used in two ways - to help people to think about things and to test the specific plans they come up with. If you'd like to know more about this, there's a very good website on the subject here.

If you'd like to join in with the work we're doing on this kind of thing, we'd be delighted to hear from you! Click the link to our main website (on the right of this page) to find our contact details.

Good news for premature evaluation sufferers

I met someone yesterday who was deeply sceptical about the Thatcham Vision. That’s fine, of course: people should be sceptical about everything. Being sceptical means not accepting things at face value, digging beneath the surface, asking questions, thinking hard, testing ideas and so on. Sceptical is good.

But this person was also deeply negative about the Vision. In my view negative is bad. Very bad. Being negative certainly isn’t the same thing as being sceptical, although they often get confused. Negative is when your first response to an idea is to find everything that’s wrong with it. I can understand why people are negative – we live in trying and stressful times: I’d be concerned if I met someone who wasn’t a bit negative from time to time.

But to be honest, negativity – particularly as the very first reaction to a new idea – really winds me up. If you want to kill an idea the best way to do so is to be negative. Trot out the usual excuses: ‘we tried that before and it didn’t work’, ‘it might work there, but it won’t here’, ‘we’ve never been any good at doing that sort of thing’ and so on. There are dozens of variations on that theme. (The ‘we tried that before’ line is particularly weak I’m afraid: won’t bore you with the details here – drop me an email by clicking here and’ll tell you what I think is wrong with it.)

In a nutshell, I hate negativity because it stops useful things from being done. This is a subject on which I could bore for England: it’s something I’ve thought about a lot. Some years ago I came up with a name for the condition suffered by people who exhibit a severe negative response to everything: I call this Premature Evaluation. Premature Evaluation can be very unpleasant, but luckily there are cures available these days. Of which more in later posts.

And I shouldn't leave you with the impression that everyone is negative about the project. That, I'm pleased to say, is very far from the case.

Research into Vision Projects

If you are interested in researching into vision projects in general http://www.sustainable.org/creating/vision.html
is worth a visit. It has loads of general information on the subject plus details of tools for analysis etc. It also contains links to a number of project sites.

A UK based Vision project

It is interesting to see how Vision projects are moving in America and our exchange of information with the city of Racine have proved to be most useful. In the UK, Weston Super Mare has been running a Vision project for some time now and their situation is in quite a mature condition. Their site - click here - makes interesting reading, have a look at: