On this week in King’s Lynn, Downham Market and Hunstanton: October 8 – 14, 2012 – and look back to October 1978 for St John Ambulance annual inspection
On this week: October 8 – 14, 2012
West Norfolk Council is preparing to launch a new waste collection service which it claims should save more than £1 million a year. The new service, which is due to come into force next April, will see a weekly food waste collection and fortnightly, instead of weekly, emptying of the black bins with general waste. Council deputy leader Brian Long said jointly organising waste collection with North Norfolk District Council would save them around £600,000 a year, with another £500,000 worth of savings annually being drawn from lower landfill tax costs.
Train enthusiasts have gathered in Hunstanton to mark the 150th anniversary of the opening of the resort’s rail link with Lynn. The exhibition, which was held over three days at the town hall, was held amid growing calls for the line to be reinstated. However, West Norfolk planning committee has voted in favour of an application by Marstons for a pub and restaurant for land on Southend Road, opposite Tesco. More than 200 people have signed a petition calling for West Norfolk Council to protect the former rail bed.
A dilapidated house which has been an eyesore in East Rudham for nearly two decades is being restored to its former glory by new owners. Meher Vanner and John Dawson are transforming London House, which has blighted the centre of the village for 19 years. The building – once a shop and petrol station – was transferred to the couple in June after West Norfolk Council issued a compulsory purchase order. It is thought to be the first time that the council has worked with private individuals in this way.
Bob Booth’s latest book More Memories of Lynn has zoomed to the top of the best-sellers’ list at Waterstones bookshop in the town after selling 185 copies on Saturday alone. The book of photographs of Lynn, taken between the end of World War II and the 1970s, has even left Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling’s latest release, The Casual Vacancy, trailing in its wake.
A copy of a priceless parchment scroll charting seven centuries of Tilney’s pedigree past has gone on display in Tilney All Saints. Compiled from 1640 onwards the eight-foot scroll traces the genealogy of the Tilney family from 1097 to 1740 and is kept at Norfolk Records Office in Norwich.
Organisers of the popular Downham Festival have warned that this year’s event will have been the last unless residents come forward to help save it. The officials warn that they will pull the plug on the event unless more people join the committee, saying that at least five new members are needed.
A woman had a lucky escape after her car overturned and plunged into a water-filled dyke at Gravel Bank, St John’s Fen End. The woman in her 50s was able to breathe thanks to a small pocket of air in her Rav.4. She was rescued after the vehicle was raised from four-foot of water by a local farmer’s forklift and firefighters smashed the window.
An unusual three-in-one service has been held at St Michael’s Church on the Ryston Estate near Downham. As well as the usual harvest festival, the occasion saw the baptism of 12-month-old Francesca Walsh, and the presentation of a cheque from the congregation to long-serving church warden Michael Pratt. The Rev Judith Grundy, of the Denver group of churches, took the service and baptised the child, and the Archdeacon of Huntingdon and Wisbech, the Venerable Hugh McCurdy, preached the sermon.
Anglia Car Auctions hosted its last car boot sale at the old cattle market in Beveridge Way, due to falling numbers of pitch holders. Regular shoppers have been left disappointed, saying sales had been held there since the 1970s and are hoping to find a new venue in the area.
A tree-planting ceremony has been held at Oxburgh Hall to mark the 60th anniversary of the building being taken over by the National Trust. Teresa Squires, the trust’s property manager for the hall, said: “The past six decades have seen some tremendous changes in Britain, but Oxburgh Hall is still the same charming medieval hall that it always was.”