scrubbedexpat094

It all sounds rather depressing. All the wildlife that has been displaced and the knock on effects of that. It's going to take a good while for the area to get re-established after the new infrastructure has been put in. Apparently it's called progress

BuckinghamshireBoy

I did however hear the woodpecker this morning. Our bit of the park is still 'out of bounds', but I'm planning to infiltrate later this afternoon on the ruse of looking for my missing cat named Wichser as the idea of walking around calling out Wichser when I get within earshot of any of the contractors appeals somewhat.

scrubbedexpat142

Be careful, you don't want to end up on the wrong end of a chainsaw!

BuckinghamshireBoy

Pretty safe on that front, most of these people are French cross border workers who can't even speak French properly let alone German.

scrubbedexpat094

Love it .

Good news about the woodpecker, that's reassuring.

BEVS

Very pleased about the woodpecker.

BuckinghamshireBoy

I've been somewhat out of sorts for a few days, but I managed a walk in the park yesterday, or at least as much as I could reach; it's now seriously fenced off, presumably in preparation to mark out the basic road track.

I reckon that I could gain entry by taking a round-about 3 km walk to cross what I believe is still as yet an insecure entry point, but what I saw yesterday upset me even more.

Our property has 40-50 metres flat hedge bordering the park, the neighbours to one side have the same, plus a dog-leg spinning off at 90 degree giving another 40-50 metres.

The neighbour's dog-leg section is now completely gone, trees, hedgerow the whole thing, all their privacy out of window.

Nothing new recently in from the collective...

scrubbedexpat142

The "march of progress"

BEVS

Stinks doesn't it.

BuckinghamshireBoy

Found in our postbox on Saturday morning a letter from the local town/commune council giving us an update. The work begins in earnest Monday 7th, aka tomorrow.

Talk about doing a 180! This was the council that originally - reputedly - tried to vote this whole thing down, and this letter kicks off in typically flowery language about the commune's commitment since the project's inception to engage with "all parties concerned, public and private" in the "greatest respect for the commune's environment and citizens".

Toads!

Construction phase 1 (of 4) starting tomorrow is planned to last 4 years to create 670 dwellings, a school, two new 'green spaces' and two new public transport access lanes. Pretty sure I know where they'll be. And they started thinning the outer circle of remaining vegetation mid last week.

The letter continues with a somewhat vague statement saying that until September various bits of the park will be out of bounds. But that will be until July for other bits. Not clear which bits when, but hey, all will be made clear on their website starting from tomorrow. Yeah, right.



No statement yet from the collective.

BEVS

Toads indeed.

Very sorry to read this. What a pile of old crock.

scrubbedexpat094

That's a bummer. Very sorry to hear your news.

BuckinghamshireBoy

"Progress" is now full on, bulldozers, diggers and a shredder that looks like it escaped from Star Wars have been at it solidly right outside for the last two days.

Haven't been around to check out what's going on yet, but I can see that they've now broken the final tree boundary, opening up the route through to the target existing roundabout.

Ours and neighbours hedges luckily remain intact, but others have been whittled back to the barest minimum.

BuckinghamshireBoy

The 'dozers and diggers continue to annoy on a daily basis. Our neighbours remaining bit of hedge has been thinned depth-wise, but still affords a reasonable amount of cover. There are wooden stakes appearing along the length of the park now, which I presume are marking the first dig of the road itself.

After a few weeks of absence I heard the woodpecker this morning! He's quite a way off now, and it must have been the gentle easterly breeze that brought his hammering to my ears.

BuckinghamshireBoy

Went out shopping for a couple of hours, on coming home found that the woodpecker is back on station, and now only about 40 metres off from us - really nowhere else to be now - and bless him, he's rediscovered his middle claw!

"It's my park, sod off with your digging and chopping stuff!" Yay!

Don't normally hear him in the afternoon, maybe he's joined the collective...