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Annual Pencaitland Litter Pick-up next Sunday

On the 29th April it’s Pencaitland’s Annual Litter Pick Up. The aim is to start at around 2pm. All kids taking part (and bringing parents with them) will be in with a chance of winning a digital camera.

East Lothian Council will supply handy claws for picking up rubbish...

This year the Community Council is working much more closely with Pencaitland Primary School’s Eco Group and other community organisations in the village.

We would really welcome any families or groups, from the church to the brownies, who would like to help out on the day.

Litter Pick 2012: Prize Draw

Apart from refreshments and litter-picking equipment and maps from our Litter HQ in Trevelyan Hall, all kids (anyone in Nursery/Primary or Secondary School) will be entered into our prize draw with the chance of winning a brand new digital camera, plus a 4GB memory card and carrying case to protect it.

The camera is the Fujifilm Finepix AV10. This handy little pocket snapper has a 10 megapixel resolution, 3x optical zoom, 2.7″ rear LCD screen and even lets you shoot HD film. You can also set it to snap when it detects someone is smiling or to avoid snapping if anyone is blinking as you click. All the cables and instructions for plugging it into your home PC are included.

Take part in this year's Pencaitland Litter Pick-up and you could win this Fujifilm Finepix AV10 10 megapixel camera.

So don’t forget to collect your raffle ticket on the day to be in with a chance of winning the prize draw.

The draw will take place at around 4pm on the day, but don’t worry if you can’t stay as we will have your contact details if you collected a ticket.

Send us your best Litter snaps

We’re also looking for the best snaps of any rubbish you find in an odd or unusual place on your travels around the village. Send your snaps to website@pencaitland.org and your picture may be picked to be featured on next year’s Litter pick-up promotional poster.

Litter Pick 2012: Where do you go?

Trevelyan Hall – come get your litter pickers (giant claws for picking up rubbish), bags and route maps.

Litter Pick 2012: When does it start?

The Pencaitland Litter Pick-up is from 2pm onwards. We only want an hour of your time! If you can’t make 2pm, come along later. WE aim to finish around 4pm.

Litter Pick 2012… did you know?

Every day this week, in the run-up to Litter Pick day on the 29th, we’ll share a little litter fact with you. Here’s the first…

Fast food is the fastest growing litter problem we have. Ditched packaging has grown by 12%, with snack wrappers rising by 11% and ditched food such as pieces of pizza, half-eaten burgers and chips increasing by 7%. Although food is biodegradable (i.e. it eventually rots away back into the ground), our half-eaten kebabs, burgers and chips often don’t get a chance to decompose because they are eaten by pests such as rats, which thanks to our leftovers are thriving at an alarming rate (the rat population alone is up 25% in just two years). That makes fast food litter bad for our health and our environment.

[SOURCE: http://www.scotlandinfocus.org/get-the-facts/litter ]

Litter Pick 2012: Useful Resources

Keep Scotland Beautiful – website.
National Spring Clean – website.
Eco-Schools Scotland – website.
The Scottish Government: Litter – website.
East Lothian Litter Initiative Community Information Pack – website [PDF].

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Dog warden visits Pencaitland

Anyone who has been on the wrong side of an encounter with an unwelcome doggy deposit may be interested to know that the East Lothian Dog Warden is coming to Pencaitland today.

Dog Warden revisits Pencaitland

Villager Shamin Akhtar who organised the visit explains, “Over the past few months we have spoken to so many Pencaitland residents who have highlighted dog fouling as a concern. In response we have arranged for the Dog Warden to come along to the village, meet some residents and provide information about the scheme.”

This follows an earlier visit organised by the Community Council intended at looking for solutions to the problem of a few dog owners messing up (literally) the pavements for the rest of village residents.

Unfortunately the inaction of these few can tarnish the reputations of all dog owners. See our previous story “Scoop on the Poop” for details on reporting incidents.

TIME: 11am
PLACE: At the beggining of Huntlaw Road, Pencaitland

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Pencaitland traffic nears 4,000 vehicles daily

Residents of Pencaitland may have noticed the recent appearance of a pair of black wires running across the main road in the village near to the entrance to the Carriage House.

ELC carried out a new Traffic Survey in Pencaitland in March.

This was part of a recent road traffic survey being carried out by East Lothian Council over the course of a week in March.

Here are some of the interesting stats to come out of the survey which ran from the 2nd to the 8th.

The average speed of vehicles was 31.1mph which is generally good news. However, this is an average so some would have been travelling faster, whilst others would be slower.

Of course, the location is fairly close to the lights at the bridge which may be an influencing factor in terms of speed measured at this point.

The percentage of heavy goods vehicle traffic remains fairly constant at 11 percent out of a total 5 day average count of all vehicles of 3,900. This counts traffic travelling in both directions and isn’t hugely different from the measured numbers in 2009.

Nevertheless it’s hard to believe the reality of a daily figure just shy of 4,000 vehicles per day travelling through Pencaitland in both directions.

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Have you considered car-pooling from Pencaitland?

With recent news about the unwelcome closure of vital bus routes to Pencaitland and Ormiston this June, you may be interested to know that there are still ways to get from A to B thanks to car pooling.

Tripshare allows you to car pool with others whilst reducing costs, road traffic and pollution at the same time. Click to find out more.
Tripshare allows you to car pool with others whilst reducing costs, road traffic and pollution at the same time. Click to find out more.
Car pooling is the act of sharing a private car to get to a mutually agreed destination at a prearranged time. In a local context that might be car-sharing from Pencaitland to Tranent or Wallyford in the morning in order to catch public transport into town… and back again at the end of the workday. Alternatively it might be a commute directly to the city.

The advantages of this approach are pretty clear. A car with four seats fully utilised will spread the fuel costs amongst four people. It also means just one round trip compared to four separate cars on the roads, each with just one commuter.

It’s not only a more economical and social practice, it’s also much more environmentally aware, reducing unnecessary road trips and pollution.

You don’t have to own a car to participate. If you do have your own transport then you can arrange to take turns driving, thus using your car perhaps 75% less than before. This reduces wear and tear and, of course, fuel costs.

Interested? Then find out more about East Lothian’s very own TripShareEastLothian service.

As the website explains, “Tripshare has been created so that you may actively search for other members who are doing similar journeys at similar times. Tripshare has the capability of matching all types of journeys. This scheme will not only allow members to share car journeys if you wish, but also to choose to share taxi journeys, and to choose to cycle and walk together.”

The website costs nothing to use and forms part of the UK’s National liftshare network. It is restricted to people aged 18 and over.

PS – Do you already car-pool from Pencaitland or other villages in and around the area? Please tell us about it below and whether it’s been a success for you?

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News Photos

This is snow joke – photo

It’s hard to take in that we’re seeing snow so late on in the year. Puts a real dampener on the plants which were loving the unseasonally warm weather a few weeks ago…

Snow in mid April in Pencaitland!

Click here to see a larger image (and more snow).

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RELBUS calls on commuters to contact Council reps

RELBUS, short for Rural East Lothian Bus Users, is calling upon members to make personal representations to their elected representatives.

RELBUS calls for bus users/members to make views known to elected reps

As a recent articles on the RELBUS website explains, “In the light of recent announcements we thought it would be a good idea to set out some of the steps we can all take to ensure the politicians and operators respond appropriately. We are encouraging all RELBUS members to make personal representations to elected members, your local councillors and community councillors. Get support from your MSP to urge Government to step in and support the transition to a new provider, but also to look again at the regulations.”

The story goes on to recommend:

  • The views of bus users are central to constructing a better service, so ask them how they propose to take bus users views into account.
  • It is inevitable that urgency pushes decision makers to replicate the existing setup – perhaps like for like or close to it. However the status quo is inadequate. It can only be a starting point not the end point.
  • There need to be better connections with rail services. One study in Dunbar showed that no passengers used the bus to get to the train station.
  • There need to be better connections between communities and services to ‘destinations’.
  • We need better quality and more reliable commuter services. These are clearly very important, but too often oversubscribed at peak times and over-provided when they demand is lower.
  • Improve the bus fleet. Smaller buses are better suited to small rural towns and connecting services. Greener buses are going to be less noisy and less polluting.
  • A not for profit company should be set up to run the services. The company should seek to provide a comprehensive public service.
  • Profits should be used to help keep the fleet clean and green, lower fares and rationalise them, devote sufficient resources to marketing and publicity and aim to increase patronage of the buses by residents, business, visitors and tourists.

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Pollingtons village visit cancelled

We received last minute word that the Pollingtons fine food and drink van will not make it to Pencaitland today.

Owner Michael asked us to pass on apologies to anyone expecting to use his service today.

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East Lothian Courier seeks local views on axed bus routes

The East Lothian Courier newspaper is seeking the views of people in villages across the county who will be directly affected by the cuts planned by First bus this June.

Some of the growing list of comments on the East Lothian Courier's Facebook page.

Kirsty Gibbins, the paper’s Editor, wrote on it’s Facebook page, “We’d like to hear comments and views from people in East Lothian affected by the significant cuts to First bus services across the county from June 10. We will be running a selection of quotes from the public in the paper so please send your reaction/letters to kgibbins@eastlothiancourier.com with your name, age and home town/village attached.”

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Pencaitland kids put on play about Florence Nightingale

Kids from the local primary school put on an impressive performance of ‘The Lady with the Lamp’ for their parents yesterday, based on the life and ground-breaking work of Florence Nightingale.

The Lady with the Lamp - click to see more photos

Children from the P3 class put on the 30 minute performance detailing how the wealthy family of Florence Nightingale disapproved of her wish to become a nurse. However, this didn’t stop her and she went on to gain fame for her pioneering work in the Crimean War.

Today she is best remembered as a nurse at a time when only women from poor backgrounds would be considered suitable. But it was her statistical research which, through the use of at the time, novel pie charts (see the famous chart here) she was able to prove to Parliament and civil servants that the lack of sanitary conditions was a bigger killer than battle-inflicted injuries.

You can see a selection of snaps from the afternoon performance on the Pencaitland Facebook page.

More on Florence Nightingale on Wikipedia.

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Great turnout for PTA Fun Run

The slightly overcast and misty conditions were ideal for the more serious runners in the 10km race held today in Pencaitland village.

The Fun Run was organised by the Parent and Teachers Association of Pencaitland Primary School with the aim of raising funds for both the PTA and Pencaitland’s Playgroup. Turnout was higher than expected with plenty of entrants for all three routes. There was a 5km and 3.5km route on offer too.

When the numbers have been added up we’ll provide details of the winning times and funds raised. Meantime you can see snaps from today’s event below…

NOTE: We hit a limit on how many pictures we can host on Flickr above, so we’ve uploaded Saturday’s snaps to the Photos section of Pencaitland Community Council on Facebook.

And a little video of the warm-up…

Look out for further pictures from around the course which we hope to be adding later. If you’d like to send one for inclusion email it to website@pencaitland.org.

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