Welcome to the second issue of Great Baddow Online Newsletter

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Introduction
As stated in the first edition 2 months ago, a bi-monthly newsletter will be published on this site and circulated by email to registered members and friends, to supplement information on the site itself. Please forward to colleagues and friends in order to publicise the site.

Update on Google registration
For those only familiar with use of Google as a search tool, I recently discovered the webmaster tool set available for site owners, which provides a number of functions to provide analyses of site use. I am at present using Google “Analytics” to monitor visitor activity and have submitted a site map and robots.txt file to enable web spiders to discover the site more effectively. I will report on activity in a later newsletter.

News and events
If the site is to build on its initial 6 month success, it needs to develop into much more of a community site. The right hand column already lists news items and forthcoming events but there is considerable opportunity to widen the scope and publish feature articles submitted from individuals. Some readers may be aware of the plans to create a local history society and I hope to develop the existing section of the site devoted to this topic. But more general information about other club and society activities would be welcome. Please submit content yourself or invite friends to do so.

Advertisements
As a result of marketing activity, several more local, small firms have taken up my offer of free advertisements on the site. Unfortunately these are hidden away and not particularly noticeable without any fast links from the home page. Now that there are 14 individuals or organisations listed in a tabular format, I intend shortly to regroup a set of links on a single page using the existing images as links to the individual adverts. Meanwhile the present adverts remain accessible.

Road traffic in the village
Does anyone else feel like myself that the recent road works at the eastern end of Church Street have had little effect as a traffic calming measure? The narrowing of the road adjacent to the bus stop outside the telephone exchange has done nothing to restrict speed because the carriageway is still sufficiently wide to provide unrestricted movement in both directions.

Slightly further towards the village centre, the pinch point and restriction outside the old brewery building intended as a traffic calming measure has had little effect in reducing speed but in my opinion presents a risk of accidents. The line of sight from each direction is restricted due to the slight bend and there is a tendency for vehicles leaving the village to race through the point where the carriageway is reduced to single vehicle width, because traffic from this direction has priority right of way.

Already the ‘keep right’ bollard has been hit. At least this one has been replaced in an upright position. One of the pair in Molrams Lane was (as of Sunday 24 September) still not replaced after being hit a few months ago.

If you have any thoughts on this issue why not let me know and I will create a discussion forum on the topic.

Members section of the site
Members is a section of the site for use by members, so far virtually unused except by “Simon” and myself. Congratulations to Simon for creating a comment about the Marconi radar tower by uploading some personal notes.

I invite other, recent joiners to add content of their own, including a photo and / or some description about yourself or interests. Pseudonyms are acceptable but content must be formatted in html and should conform to site standards and appropriate ‘netiquette’. Please note that members’ content is ‘open’ and once published is available for public view.

Discussion forums
The 4 original topics have been withdrawn and replaced by a new one about the poor service provided by ‘One’ railway on 1 September when the overhead power lines were down. In fact there were 3 separate incidents over a period of about a week and the local press has reported statements by commuters bemoaning the poor service.

To be fair to ‘One’ I have just received travel vouchers for £25 and an apology for the delay, but this is no recompense for the time wasted, the lack of information about the incident and failure to organise adequate replacement bus services or other alternatives.

If you‘d like to comment, go to Discussion forum – ‘One’ rail services , log in and add your views. Suggestions for additional topics are welcome. Or simply email me with your views.

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Chris Harvey
Site master
1 October 2006